Manage
Moving an instance to a new Minecraft version
Check whether every mod has a build for another Minecraft version, then move across in one confirmed step.
Two versions of this page follow. Step by step walks through the task in order. In depth explains the underlying behavior. They describe the same product, at different levels of detail.
Step by step
Follow the steps in order. No prior modding knowledge assumed.
Moving to a new Minecraft version usually fails on one or two mods rather than all of them. Agora checks first, tells you which, and only moves when you say so.
After this you will be able to
- Check an instance against a target version.
- Read the verdict and per-mod statuses.
- Move across, with a snapshot taken first.
Check before you commit
Open an instance, choose a target version from the list, and check. Checking changes nothing at all — it reports whether every installed mod has a build for that version. The list only offers versions your loader actually supports, so a version you cannot reach is never presented as an option.
Read the statuses honestly
Each mod lands in one of a few groups, and the difference between them matters more than the total.
- Ready: a build exists for the target version.
- No build yet: nothing published so far. Waiting is often enough.
- Looks abandoned: no activity for a long time.
- Has a replacement: the author points at a successor.
- Could not check: the lookup failed. This is not the same as bad news.
- Needs a look: no online identity to check against, such as a hand-added JAR.
Make the move
When you move, Agora first prepares everything it needs (the loader, the replacement mods) without touching the instance, then takes a snapshot, swaps every mod it can for its build on the target version, and updates the instance. If something fails while preparing, the instance was never changed and the message says so. If it fails after the swap begins, Agora undoes the changes and restores the instance to how it was; only if that undo itself fails is the snapshot named so you can restore it by hand.
In depth
How the system actually behaves, and why, for readers who prefer the model to a recipe.
Migration is a transaction with an explicit gate on the things it cannot solve for you. Understanding what it refuses to decide is most of understanding it.
After this you will be able to
- Know which conditions block a migration outright.
- Decide what to do about mods with no target build.
- Understand what migration deliberately leaves alone.
Locking is the only hard gate
A locked instance cannot be migrated; unlock it first. Everything else is a warning you can accept, including moving an instance that came from a modpack.
Mods with no target build
Migration does not silently drop them. You either leave them behind at their current version, accepting that they will not load, or you stop and wait for builds to appear. Either way it is an explicit answer, not a default.
What migration does not do
It moves mod versions. It does not migrate your worlds, rewrite configuration files for a new format, or guarantee that a mod behaves the same on the new version. Back up saves you care about before moving, and expect to revisit configuration afterwards.
This guide is the same text Agora shows in its built-in Help & Guide, which is searchable and links directly to the screens it describes.