How Much RAM for Smooth Modded Minecraft Gameplay?

As an avid Minecraft fan who lives and breathes modded gameplay, I get this question a lot – just how much RAM do you need for buttery smooth performance with hundreds of mods?

Through years of testing and optimizing various modded setups, I‘ve found 16GB to be the sweet spot for maximizing performance and stability. However, you can get by with 8GB RAM for lighter packs. Servers need more like 32GB+ depending on player count and mods.

Let‘s get into the nitty-gritty details!

Recommended RAM Capacity by Use Case

Based on real-world testing and community feedback, here are rough guidelines on how much RAM you should have:

I run an ATM7 server for 15 players on a 24GB RAM box which works smoothly 99% of the time. More on optimization later!

Having at least 16GB for modded gameplay ensures you can run high res textures and shader packs without choking up your memory.

Why Mods Demand More RAM

You might wonder what exactly makes modded Minecraft so much more resource intensive than vanilla. Here are the key reasons:

1. More Blocks, Entities and Texture Maps

Mods can introduce thousands of new blocks, mobs, and items – each with custom models, behaviors and texture maps that use up precious RAM.

Biome mods for example, add new vegetation and structure types that eat memory.

2. Complex Machinery and Automation

Popular tech and magic mods add intricate machines, pipes, inventories, power systems that enable automation. All those moving parts use RAM and processing cycles!

Handling logic for tech mods with oil processing, logistics and in-game programming needs RAM headroom.

3. Additional Dimensions and World Gen

Exploring new dimensions from mods multiplies the terrain and blocks that have to be rendered and cached, requiring more memory.

New biomes, structures and terrain generation types (e.g. Recurrent Complex, Biomes O Plenty) also drive RAM usage.

4. Higher Resolution Resource Packs

Using 64x or 128x resource packs instead of default 16x textures blows up memory consumption for storing all that texture data!

More RAM = Better FPS, Less Stuttering

Based on my testing, here is how FPS improves with more RAM allocation:

As you can see, the FPS nearly doubles when going from 4GB to 8GB! The sweet spot is 16GB where most setups become smooth.

By removing memory bottlenecks, allocating sufficient RAM also drastically reduces lag spikes, blocky terrain generation and texture pop-in.

Real-World Examples from /r/FeedTheBeast

Here is what the /r/FeedTheBeast community reports for AllTheMods 3 RAM usage:

"I have 16GB allocated to ATM3 and my system says it‘s using 15GB with 5 people online"

"I hosted an ATM3 server for 15 players with 32 gigs of RAM allocated and that seemed to make it run pretty well with very occasional lag"

So real-world usage aligns with allocating 1GB RAM per player, and preferrably 50% more to prevent lag.

Tweaks for Improving Modded Performance

While throwing more RAM helps, you can also optimize mod configs for a smoother experience:

• Install performance mods like Optifine, BetterFPS
• Reduce render distance to 8 chunks
• Disable unnecessary decorative mods
• Lower graphics settings (use Fast instead of Fancy)
• Restart the game periodically
• Close other memory intensive apps

Every bit counts! Mods like AI Improvements can also help by optimizing mob behaviors and pathfinding.

Final RAM Guidelines

To summarize, this what I recommend as a good starting point for RAM capacity:

I hope this gives you a concrete idea on how to size your RAM for buttery smooth modded Minecraft sessions! Let me know if you have any other questions.