What is CraftBukkit? Explained.

CraftBukkit is a modified Minecraft server software that’s based on the vanilla server and adds support for the Bukkit API so you can run plugins.

Historically, CraftBukkit was the way to run a Minecraft server with plugins. These days, it mostly survives as the technical base that Spigot is built on, while most servers have moved to Spigot or PaperMC for better performance and support.

How is CraftBukkit different from Bukkit?

In short: Bukkit is the API, CraftBukkit is the server software.

Bukkit is the API that plugin developers write their code against. Bukkit isn’t something you “run” as a server jar. It’s a collection of Java interfaces, events, and classes that describe what a plugin can do and how it can talk to the server.

CraftBukkit is a Minecraft server software that implements Bukkit API on top of Mojang’s vanilla server code. CraftBukkit behaves like other server types (Spigot, Paper, etc.). You start the jar, generate server files, upload plugins to the /plugins folder, and manage configs.

Why CraftBukkit is important?

CraftBukkit is important mostly because it changed what “running a Minecraft server” even means, even if you almost never pick it for a new server today.

CraftBukkit introduced the idea of a server you could simply drop plugins into while players joined with a normal, unmodded Minecraft client. That single shift made public servers with ranks, homes, land protection, teleport commands, and minigames practical for normal players.

It’s a big reason why, in most people’s minds, a “Minecraft server” is expected to have commands, protections, and quality-of-life features beyond plain vanilla.

The second important thing is that it became the foundation of the modern Bukkit ecosystem. Spigot is a performance-tuned fork of CraftBukkit, and Paper is a performance-tuned fork of Spigot. So even if you’re running Paper today, you’re still standing on CraftBukkit’s shoulders.

Understanding that relationship makes plugin documentation easier to read: when a plugin says it supports Bukkit, CraftBukkit, or Spigot, it’s usually talking about this entire family of server softwares.

So CraftBukkit is historically very important: it’s the ancestor that made the modern plugin ecosystem, and modern Minecraft hosting as you know it, possible.

Should You Use Bukkit Today?

Short answer: almost never. Here's few reasons why:

No active support: The Spigot team maintains CraftBukkit only as a base for Spigot and explicitly does not endorse running it in production. It doesn’t receive the same level of bug fixes, performance work, or community attention.

Fewer optimizations: Spigot and Paper include extensive optimizations that CraftBukkit simply doesn’t have.

Plugin and ecosystem expectations: Many modern plugins are tested primarily on Spigot/Paper. They may still load on CraftBukkit, but you’re on your own if you hit edge cases or performance issues