Ark: Survival Evolved is a game that lives and dies by its online appeal. Teaming up with your friends, creating a Tribe, and fighting for the Alpha status on a server are some of the best times in Ark. This, of course, means that the servers you’re looking to play on need to be online and ready to use, and if they’re running any mods, that the mods are also up to date.
Ark has a number of different online server play options. Players willing to dip their toes into the Official Servers and all the mayhem that comes with it will play on Wildcard’s own hosted servers. Players looking for a modded experience or something with less ping and closer to home will often opt for the unofficial servers hosted by individual server sites. There’s also the option to host your own dedicated or non-dedicated servers, which means players have no shortage of platforms to play the game on.
How to check if Official Ark servers are down
Ark’s own official servers sometimes go down for maintenance or unexpectedly. You’ll want to head over to the official Twitter page to check this as they will post any relevant updates there regarding any server issues. Ark will often wipe its Beginner Servers, and the Arkpocalypse Servers, so make sure you’re aware of the wipe times as they might take the servers offline to initiate the wipe.
Using third-party sites to check Ark server status
Using third-party software is a great tool for both official and unofficial servers. Using third-party sites can be a great way to check if anyone else is experiencing issues. Downdetector or Battlemetrics are great sites to use.
Platform-specific checks for Ark server status
If you’re playing on Xbox, PlayStation, Epic Games, or Steam, you’ll want to check that these are still up and running if the Ark servers themselves are fine.
Personal connection and accessing Ark servers
As a last-ditch effort, just check your connection to ensure that you’re online. Make sure your profile isn’t set to Offline if you’re on Steam.
