Can I join a Scrap Mechanic world if the host is offline?

No. Scrap Mechanic multiplayer runs through the host's game session - if their game isn't open, the world isn't reachable. The only way to keep playing is for the world file to be on someone else's machine.

How do I take over hosting a Scrap Mechanic world?

Get the world's .db file from the current host, drop it into your own Save folder (%APPDATA%\Axolot Games\Scrap Mechanic\User\User_ \Save), and it appears in your world list. Load it and you're the host.

What if the host won't respond at all?

Without their world file, the base is gone - there's no dedicated server holding a copy. This is exactly why groups set up save sharing before it happens, so every player already holds the world.

Will I lose progress by hosting from my own copy?

Only if your copy is older than the last session. Whoever played most recently has the newest world. SaveSync handles this by syncing after each session, so the copy everyone holds is the current one.

Can we take turns hosting Scrap Mechanic?

Yes, and it's the healthiest way to run a long Survival campaign. Each session the world moves to whoever hosts next - manually by copying the .db, or automatically with SaveSync.

Play Scrap Mechanic When Host Is Offline

Everyone’s free, everyone’s online, and the one person who started the Survival world isn’t. In Scrap Mechanic that’s the end of the evening: you can’t join a world that isn’t being hosted, and your base is sitting on a hard drive you can’t reach.

This guide covers every realistic way to keep playing Scrap Mechanic when the host is offline - and how to make sure it never blocks your group again.

Why the World Gets Stuck on One Machine

Scrap Mechanic co-op is host-based. One player loads a Survival world, and everyone else joins that player’s session through the Steam friends list. Your client just renders what the host is simulating.

The world file itself - a .db database - lives only in the host’s user folder. Scrap Mechanic has no official dedicated server, so there’s no always-on copy sitting somewhere else. When the host closes the game, the world goes with them.

No host, no world. No world, no co-op.

Option 1: Get the World File From the Host

If the host is reachable but just not playing, they can hand the world over. Ask them to:

Fully close Scrap Mechanic (copying a live database is how worlds corrupt).
Press Win + R and open %APPDATA%\Axolot Games\Scrap Mechanic\User.
Open their User_<SteamID> folder, then Save (Survival worlds sit in the Survival subfolder as .db files).
Send you the .db for the world.

Then on your machine, close the game, drop that .db into the same path under your User_<SteamID>\Save\Survival folder, and launch. The world shows up in your list and you can host it.

This works if the host is reachable, remembers which file is the right one, and the file is small enough to send. It fails the moment they stop answering.

Option 2: Host From a Copy You Already Have

If your group set up save sharing before this happened, there’s nothing to ask for. The latest world is already on your machine.

SaveSync syncs the Scrap Mechanic world to every player in the group after each session. The world sits on the host’s PC, on yours, and on everyone else’s. When the host is offline, you open Scrap Mechanic and host from your own copy - the same base, the same progress, no messages sent.

If you set that up already, just play. If not, skip to the prevention section - this is the exact scenario it exists for.

Option 3: Roll Back to an Earlier Snapshot

Sometimes the problem isn’t an absent host but a broken world - a base wrecked, a world glitching after an update, someone bulldozing a build in a bad mood.

If the group uses SaveSync, every sync is a stored snapshot with a timestamp and the name of whoever uploaded it. Pick the version from before the incident and restore it. Manual file copies only help here if someone happened to make one on the right day.

Option 4: Start Fresh (Last Resort)

If nobody has a copy - host unreachable, no backup, no sync - the world is gone. There’s no server-side copy to recover, because there’s no server.

Start a new world, and set up sharing this time, before someone’s schedule owns another hundred hours of building.

How to Stop This Happening Again

The principle is simple: the world should not live on one machine.

Every player installs SaveSync from Steam.
Whoever currently holds the world opens SaveSync, selects Scrap Mechanic, and clicks + New Save.
They click the share icon, search each friend’s Steam username, and share.
Friends open SaveSync, find the shared world, and click Activate.
After each session, whoever hosted syncs automatically.

From then on, any player in the group can be the next host. No file transfers, no Discord uploads, no waiting for one person to wake up.

Agree on One Rule

Whoever hosted, closes the game properly. Scrap Mechanic autosaves as you play, but leaving through the menu ensures the world is written out cleanly before it syncs. Thirty seconds of group etiquette prevents nearly every “wait, whose copy is newest?” argument.

Keep the Snapshot History

A rollback point per session is cheap insurance - particularly around game updates, when a world can start behaving strangely on a new build. It costs nothing extra and it has saved more than one group’s base.

The Base Should Outlive the Host

A missing host is the single most common reason co-op groups drift away from a game and never come back. Don’t let one person’s calendar decide when the workshop is open.

SaveSync on Steam - one-time purchase, covers Scrap Mechanic and 45+ other co-op games on the same install.