Before Hypixel was a server, it was a YouTube channel. Two friends built Minecraft adventure maps, cut trailers for them, and uploaded them for anyone to watch. The audience they built there became the first wave of players on what grew into the most famous minigames network in the game.
The two were Simon Collins-Laflamme, the "hypixel" of the name, and Philippe Touchette, known as Rezzus. Their company was registered in Canada in January 2013. On April 13, 2013, the Hypixel server opened in beta.
Built for the map-maker's crowd
Adventure maps are handcrafted experiences with rules, goals and a designer's hand on every block. Hypixel took that instinct and pointed it at multiplayer. Instead of one big survival world, the server offered a lobby full of short, designed games you could join in seconds.
It worked. By December 21, 2016, Hypixel had passed ten million unique players. It was also expensive: in 2015, Wikipedia reports, the server was costing roughly $100,000 a month to run.
The game list kept growing. Bed Wars, SkyWars and Murder Mystery became the names people typed into YouTube search. In August 2017, Guinness World Records counted 43 separate live games running on the network at once. If that's the style of play you're after, our minigames server list is built around it.
The record summer of 2017
On July 7, 2017, Guinness counted 64,533 people playing on Hypixel at the same time. That number earned the network two records: most popular Minecraft server network, and most popular independent server for any videogame.
It is the most popular known independently operated server for any videogame.Guinness World Records, record for most popular independent server for a videogame (2017)
The records were a benchmark, not a ceiling. Wikipedia puts Hypixel at 14.1 million unique players by December 2018 and 18 million by April 2020. Then the pandemic hit, and on April 16, 2021, the network peaked at 216,000 players at once.
Being the biggest had costs beyond hosting. After attacks by Mirai-based botnets, the network moved behind Cloudflare Spectrum in April 2018. On June 18, 2021, large-scale denial-of-service attacks forced an emergency shutdown that lasted four days.
SkyBlock changes the shape of the server
Skyblock was already a Minecraft classic. Noobcrew published the original map on the Minecraft Forum on September 4, 2011: one small island, one tree, and a long way down.
Hypixel's take, released on June 11, 2019, kept the private starting island and then pulled players out into shared public islands floating in the sky. It turned a survival challenge into something closer to an MMO, with its own economy, skills and endgame. For a lot of players, SkyBlock became the reason to log in, not just another tile in the lobby.
Two versions of the same idea
Classic skyblock is you, a tree and a block of dirt. Hypixel SkyBlock is a whole shared world built on top of that start. Our skyblock server list has both kinds.
Hytale: the game that almost wasn't
Hypixel's founders always wanted to make their own game. On December 13, 2018, Hypixel Studios announced it: Hytale, a block-based adventure game. The trailer passed 31 million views within a month.
Then came the long wait. In April 2020, Riot Games completed its acquisition of Hypixel Studios. Collins-Laflamme later said the studio had been spending up to $400,000 a month on development before that deal. Years of delays followed.
On June 23, 2025, Hypixel Studios' Aaron Donaghey announced that Hytale was cancelled after roughly ten years in development, citing an overly ambitious scope.
Five months later, the story turned. On November 17, 2025, Collins-Laflamme announced he had bought Hytale back from Riot. The official post said the team had rehired more than 30 developers, would fund the game themselves for ten years with no outside investors, and would ship it unfinished, in early access, rather than let it die.
No risk, no Hytale.Hytale Team, "HYTALE IS SAVED!", hytale.com, November 17, 2025
Hytale launched in early access on January 13, 2026, for Windows, macOS and Linux, priced at $20. Wikipedia reports it passed a million players shortly after launch and briefly topped Twitch with more than 420,000 viewers. The team settled into weekly patches, added controller support and a server browser in May 2026, previewed Chapter 1 on July 16, 2026, and posted pre-release notes for Update 7 on September 3, 2026. Chapter 1 has no date on the official blog as we write this.
The Hypixel server opens in beta.
Ten million unique players.
64,533 players at once; Guinness World Records follow.
Hytale is announced; the trailer passes 31 million views in a month.
Hypixel SkyBlock is released.
Riot Games completes its acquisition of Hypixel Studios.
The network peaks at 216,000 concurrent players.
Hytale is cancelled.
Collins-Laflamme buys Hytale back from Riot.
Hytale enters early access.
Hypixel today
Through all of the Hytale drama, the Minecraft server kept running. It is still Java Edition only, still built around a lobby of quick games, and SkyBlock is still one of its biggest draws. Here's how it looks right now, by our own count:
Live from our pinger · checked 1 min ago
The best way to get a feel for it is the server's own trailer:
Jump in, pick a game from the lobby, and see why so many other networks copied the format. New to joining servers? Our guide on how to join a Minecraft server walks through it.
Sources
- Wikipedia: Hypixel
- Wikipedia: Hytale
- Wikipedia: Skyblock
- Guinness World Records: Most popular Minecraft server network
- Guinness World Records: Most popular independent server for a videogame
- Guinness World Records: Most games on a Minecraft server
- Hytale: HYTALE IS SAVED! (Nov 17, 2025)
- Hytale: News
Player counts, votes and uptime on this page are live from our own checks. Everything else comes from the sources above. Spot a mistake? Tell us.
