Fix Palworld "Failed to join session" and connection errors

Palworld gives you two ways to join a server and almost all join failures come from using the wrong one for your platform. Here is which is which.

6 min read · Updated Oct 21, 2026 · By GuavaHost Team

The messages you will see:

Failed to join session
Failed to connect to the server
Connection timed out
This session no longer exists

They all mean the client could not complete the join, and Palworld is not forthcoming about why. So rather than reading the message, work through the causes by platform.

Two ways in, and they are not interchangeable

This is the single most important thing to understand about Palworld servers.

If a Game Pass or PlayStation player is trying to type in an IP address, that is your answer. Those platforms are expected to find the server by name in the community list instead. Tell them the exact server name and have them search for it.

Conversely, if a Steam player cannot find the server in the list, give them the direct address rather than debugging the listing.

Step 1: Confirm the server is up and finished loading

Sign in at customer.guavahost.com, open My servers and click Manage on your server. The status next to the server name needs to read Online.

Starting is the one that catches people. Palworld takes longer to boot than you expect, and a large or recently uploaded world takes longer still. Players who try during that window get a join failure that looks identical to a real problem. Open the Console tab and wait until it stops producing startup output before you start troubleshooting anything else.

Step 2: Use the right port

Palworld servers have more than one port, and only one of them is for players.

Open the Ports & network card on your server's Overview tab. The Server address at the top is the game port, and that is the one players use. Anything under Other ports is for something else, typically RCON or the REST API, and a client pointed at one of those will never connect.

Copy the address with the copy button rather than typing it from memory, and send your players exactly that text. Finding your server IP and port covers which field is which.

A detail worth knowing: Palworld uses UDP for game traffic. That matters if a player is on a restricted network such as a school, office or hotel connection, because some of those allow TCP and block UDP, which breaks Palworld specifically while web browsing appears to work. There is usually no way around that from the player's side.

Step 3: Check the version

Palworld updates often, and a client and server on different versions cannot join. The failure message does not say so, which is why this is worth checking early whenever a server that worked yesterday stops working today.

The pattern is unmistakable: the game patched, your players updated automatically, and the server is still on the old build. Everyone fails at once, nothing changed on your side, and the timing lines up with a patch.

Update your Palworld server after a patch covers bringing the server up to date. Take a backup from the Backups page first, which is the one step people skip.

Step 4: Check crossplay

If some platforms can join and others cannot, crossplay is the likely cause rather than the connection.

The setting lives in the server configuration and lists the platforms allowed in:

CrossplayPlatforms=(Steam,Xbox,PS5,Mac)

Every platform your players are on has to be in that list. A player on a platform that is missing from it fails to join even with a perfect address. If this value is exposed in Startup settings on the Settings tab, change it there rather than in the file.

Palworld crossplay: Steam versus Xbox and Game Pass covers the full setup, and Editing PalWorldSettings.ini covers the file itself and how to change settings without losing them on restart.

Step 5: Check the password

A wrong server password produces a join failure rather than a clear "wrong password" message, which is unhelpful but easy to rule out.

• Send the password as plain text, not a screenshot, so there is no ambiguity about similar-looking characters.
• Watch for a leading or trailing space picked up when copying.
• Confirm it has not changed since you last shared it.
• Make sure the player is typing it into the password field rather than the address field.

If you are not sure whether a password is set, check the server configuration. A password that nobody knows is a surprisingly common cause of a server nobody can join.

Step 6: Narrow it to one player

Have one person try at a time. The result tells you where to work.

• Nobody can join. Look at the server: status, version, port, password.
• One platform cannot join. Crossplay, or the wrong join method for that platform.
• One person cannot join. Their own setup. Have them fully close Palworld, confirm the game has finished updating, restart their router, and turn off any VPN.
• It worked an hour ago. A patch, a restart, or a settings change in between.

Step 7: After uploading a world

If the failures started right after you brought a world across, the world is the suspect rather than the connection. Check that the upload finished extracting, that the folder structure is right, that Level.sav is not empty, and that the Console shows the server finishing its load. A world from a much older Palworld version may simply not load on the current build.

If players cannot find the server at all

That is a different problem. A server that works on direct connect but never appears in the Community Servers list is a listing problem, not a join problem, and it has its own guide: Palworld server not showing in the community list.

Common questions

Why can my Steam friends join but not my Game Pass friends?

Because Xbox, Game Pass and PlayStation players are expected to find the server in the Community Servers list rather than entering an IP address. Give them the exact server name to search for, and check that their platform is included in your crossplay setting.

Which port do Palworld players connect to?

The one shown as Server address at the top of your server page and in the Ports & network card. The other ports your server has are for RCON or the REST API, and a game client pointed at one of those will never connect.

Everyone stopped being able to join and I changed nothing. What happened?

Almost certainly a Palworld update. Clients update themselves and then cannot join a server still running the previous build, so the fix is to update the server, after taking a backup.

Does a wrong password show a password error in Palworld?

Not clearly. A wrong password usually produces a generic join failure, so it is worth ruling out early by sending the password as plain text and checking for stray spaces at either end.

Still stuck? Jump into our Discord at discord.gg/GuavaHost and the team will help you out.

• palworld
• connection
• session
• crossplay
• troubleshooting

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