You sell a plugin, a buyer shares their license key in a Discord server, and suddenly fifty servers are running your plugin on a single purchase. Key sharing is one of the most common and frustrating forms of revenue loss for Minecraft plugin developers — and one of the most straightforward to stop.
Here’s how it works and how to shut it down.
Why key sharing is so easy without limits
A license key without restrictions is just a password. If there’s no limit on how many servers can use it simultaneously, a single buyer can distribute it freely with zero consequences. The key works, your plugin enables, and you have no idea how many unauthorised servers are running it.
Even well-meaning buyers do this — sharing a key with a friend, spinning up a test server alongside their production server, or moving to a new host without deactivating the old one first.
Concurrent server limits
The most effective tool against key sharing is a concurrent server limit — a cap on how many servers can be actively using a license at the same time.
When a server starts and validates its license, MC License records it as an active instance. If the number of active instances for that key exceeds your configured limit, the validation fails and the plugin disables itself.
For most plugins, a limit of 1–2 concurrent servers per license is completely fair for legitimate buyers (one production server, maybe one test server) and immediately flags abuse — if someone shares their key, the 3rd, 4th, and 5th servers will all fail validation.
You configure the limit per plugin in the MC License dashboard, and can adjust it per-license for customers with legitimate multi-server setups.
IP restrictions
Concurrent limits catch active abuse. IP restrictions let you go further by locking a license to specific IP addresses.
If a customer only ever runs your plugin on one server with a fixed IP, you can restrict their license to that IP. Any validation attempt from a different address fails, even if the key itself is valid.
This is particularly useful for enterprise customers or server networks with static IPs. For customers with dynamic IPs, it’s less practical — but you can still use it reactively if you spot suspicious usage patterns.
Spotting key sharing in the dashboard
Even before you act, MC License gives you the data to detect sharing. The dashboard shows:
- All active servers currently running each license, with their IPs and last-seen timestamps
- Validation history — every check, including failed ones, with timestamps and server identifiers
If you see a key showing 15 active servers but your pricing only covers 1–2, that’s a clear signal. You can revoke the key immediately from the dashboard and issue a replacement to the legitimate buyer.
Setting up limits in practice
When you create or edit a plugin in the MC License dashboard:
- Set a default concurrent server limit for all licenses generated for that plugin
- Optionally override the limit on individual licenses for customers with special needs
- Enable the analytics view to monitor active server counts across all your licenses
The Discord bot integration also helps here — customers can check and manage their own license status without contacting you, which reduces support load while keeping them informed.
The right mindset
The goal isn’t to punish buyers — it’s to make sharing impractical while keeping legitimate use frictionless. A limit of 2 concurrent servers costs nothing for an honest buyer and immediately blocks the most common sharing scenarios.
Pair it with analytics so you know when something looks off, and you have a system that protects your revenue without creating friction for paying customers.