Enshrouded Server Admin Commands and Controls (2026): Roles, Kicks, Bans, and Config

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Enshrouded does not have a documented dedicated-server console, chat command system, or RCON interface as of October 14, 2026. Server administration is role-based instead: you assign a password to a group in enshrouded_server.json, and a player who joins with that group password receives the group’s permissions. Kicking and banning are performed from the in-game player list by a role that has canKickBan.

One 2026 guide lists slash commands such as /kick and /ban, but other current guides and community reports contradict it. Treat those commands as unverified rather than building your moderation process around them. The game’s 1.0 release is scheduled for October 15, 2026, so labels and administrative tooling may change immediately after this article’s date.

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What “admin commands” mean in Enshrouded

In many dedicated games, an administrator types commands into a server console or chat. Enshrouded’s dedicated server is different. Current third-party documentation describes three important limits:

• The server window is not a command console that accepts administrative input.
• No documented in-game chat command framework is available for the dedicated server.
• No RCON listener is documented for remote administration.

Administration is therefore split between configuration and the game interface. You configure groups before players connect, then use the player-list moderation controls while connected as a sufficiently privileged role.

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How Enshrouded server roles work

Roles are selected by the join password

The password a player enters when joining determines which group they receive. In practical terms, the password is both an access credential and a role selector. A player who joins with the password assigned to an administrator group receives that group’s permissions; a player using a less privileged group password receives fewer or no moderation controls.

Permissions are defined per group inside the userGroups section of enshrouded_server.json. Current guides describe each group as having a name, a password and five permission settings. The exact set and labels of all five settings are not consistently reproduced in public documentation, so preserve the keys generated by your server rather than inventing new ones.

Common group names are conventions, not guaranteed defaults

Community posts commonly refer to groups named Admin, Friend and Guest. Other reports describe a single Default group. These names are not proof that every installation starts with the same groups. Treat the file generated by your own server as authoritative for the groups that exist.

Some community anecdotes claim that a password must contain the group name. That requirement is not established. Use a strong, unique password and test the resulting role instead of relying on that anecdote.

Set up an admin role step by step

1. Stop the dedicated server. Editing a live JSON file can be overwritten at shutdown or leave a partially written configuration. Use your host’s stop control or stop the server process cleanly.
2. Back up the configuration. Copy enshrouded_server.json to a dated backup before changing it. Keep the original outside the server’s automatic restore or synchronization directory when possible.
3. Open the generated file. The exact directory depends on whether you run the server yourself or through a hosting panel. Search the server installation and save-data directories for enshrouded_server.json. If the file does not exist, start the server once, stop it normally, and check again; community reports say it is generated on first run.
4. Locate userGroups. Edit an existing group or copy the structure of a group already present in the file. Keep the property names and nesting that your installed build created.
5. Assign a private password to the administrative group. Do not reuse your Steam password, panel password or a password shared in public chat. Anyone who knows this join password can enter with that group’s permissions.
6. Confirm the JSON is valid. Preserve quotation marks, commas and braces. A single malformed character can prevent the server from loading its settings. Use a local JSON validator if your editor does not provide syntax checking.
7. Save the file and restart the server. Configuration changes are not expected to apply reliably until a restart.
8. Test with a separate player account or a trusted account. Join using the administrative group password and check that the player-list moderation controls appear. Do not test by banning your only owner account.

If a hosting panel manages the server, check its startup settings before assuming the edit failed. Community reports say some panels write their own group passwords at boot, which can replace a hand-edited value every time the server starts.

Kick and ban players from the game

Required permission

The moderation gate reported by current guides is canKickBan. A player can know the administrator password and still lack kick or ban controls if the group does not have this permission enabled.

Kick procedure

1. Join the server using a group that has canKickBan.
2. Open the in-game player list.
3. Select the offending player.
4. Choose the kick control and confirm the action.
5. Tell the player why they were removed if the situation is not obvious, then review the group password if they immediately reconnect with elevated rights.

A kick removes the player from the current session. It is not a permanent access restriction; the player can normally attempt to join again.

Ban procedure

1. Open the player list while connected with canKickBan.
2. Select the player and choose the ban control rather than kick.
3. Confirm the ban in the in-game prompt.
4. Restart or inspect the server only after the action completes, and make a backup before manually editing any resulting configuration.

Community reports say bans are written back to the server configuration through an in-game ban widget. Reports disagree about the array name: one source calls it bannedAccounts, while another calls it bans. Because the key could not be verified, do not script against either name or add one manually unless your own server build has already generated it.

What to do when a banned player returns

• Confirm that the ban action was completed, not merely a kick.
• Check that the player is connecting to the same server instance and save directory.
• Ensure a hosting panel did not restore an older configuration at startup.
• Do not delete or rename an unknown ban array while troubleshooting; make a backup first.
• If the player still connects, record the server version and seek a version-specific fix after the 1.0 release.

Slash commands: why you should not depend on them

An outlier 2026 guide lists /kick, /ban, /unban and /serverstatus. Other current guides state that Enshrouded has no server console or chat administration commands. No consistent command syntax, permission model or official reference establishes the slash-command list as working.

You may harmlessly test a reported command on a private test server, but do not advertise it to moderators as a supported feature. A message being accepted in chat does not prove that it changed server state. Use the role password and player-list controls for production moderation.

Reserved slots and group capacity

Community reports describe reserved slots as a way to hold seats for a group so its members can join when the server appears full. The behavior and configuration are not settled. Reports conflict on whether a value greater than zero is required, and the exact configuration key is not consistently identified.

Because of that uncertainty, treat reserved slots as an experimental setting:

• Back up the JSON before changing anything.
• Use only a key and structure already present in your generated file or documented by your host for your exact server version.
• Test with the server genuinely full, not merely with a displayed player count.
• Remove the change if ordinary players are blocked unexpectedly or reserved users cannot connect.

Do not confuse reserved capacity with administrator access. A reserved slot does not grant permissions; the join password still determines the player’s group.

Other configuration controls

Difficulty and rates

Community documentation places difficulty and gameplay rates in the gameSettings section. These settings are reported to require a server restart, and confidence in the exact behavior is lower than for role passwords and player-list moderation. Change one setting at a time, restart, and verify in a test world before changing a long-running public server.

Updates and regenerated files

Some community posts report that a Steam update did not refresh the server configuration. In one reported case, reinstalling the server files resolved the problem. Reinstalling can remove or replace local data, so export your world and copy the JSON before attempting it. Prefer a clean update and restore from backup only after confirming which files your host preserves.

Troubleshooting checklist

The admin controls are missing

• Verify that you joined with the administrative group password, not the ordinary player password.
• Check that the group actually contains canKickBan.
• Confirm the server was restarted after the edit.
• Check whether a hosting panel rewrote the password or group definition at boot.
• Ensure you edited the active server’s JSON, not a backup or an unused installation.

The server will not start after an edit

• Restore the last known-good backup.
• Validate JSON punctuation and encoding.
• Undo only the most recent change, then start the server again.
• Compare the edited group with the original generated structure; do not remove unfamiliar permission keys.

A kick or ban appears ineffective

• Confirm that the selected action was ban, not kick.
• Check that the player reconnected to the same server and world.
• Allow the ban action to finish before shutting down.
• Look for a host-panel restore or a second server process using another save directory.
• Because the ban-array key is disputed, avoid manual edits until the installed build exposes the actual generated key.

Security practices for server owners

• Use separate, long passwords for administrator, friend and guest groups.
• Share the administrator join password only with people who need moderation authority.
• Rotate the password after a moderator leaves the team or after it appears in a screenshot or stream.
• Keep dated backups of enshrouded_server.json before updates and configuration changes.
• Give ordinary players the least privileged group that meets their needs.
• Record who performed a ban and why, because the in-game control may not provide a durable moderation log.

What may change after Enshrouded 1.0

The 1.0 release is scheduled for October 15, 2026, one day after the information date for this article. A release could add a console, expose RCON, rename permission keys, change the player-list labels or formalize reserved-slot behavior. Until version-specific documentation confirms a change, continue to treat role passwords and in-game moderation as the dependable workflow.

For a production server, record your current game version, retain a working configuration backup and test every administrative change on a temporary instance first. That procedure protects you from both silent hosting-panel rewrites and post-release schema changes.

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