Source: https://gameye.com/glossary/downtime/

---
title: "Downtime | Gameye"
description: "Downtime is when a machine, or computer, crashes or is out of action. It’s rare, but can happen, especially during peak times."
---

# Downtime

Downtime is when a machine, or computer, crashes or is out of action. So when we describe ‘downtime’ in the gaming world, we’re typically talking about when this affects one of your servers, which host your game’s sessions. It’s rare, but can happen, especially during peak times.

## This can be due to multiple things

Your server crashing can be due to multiple reasons. Computers overheating or even servers being overloaded with too many players or data. To avoid this depends on what types of servers you use for your sessions, your traffic, or how many resources your game uses.

## Orchestrators fix this problem

That’s one of the things we do. If and when a server crashes, our orchestrator moves those sessions over to a new server. And because your game will already be in a container, it’s quick to shift these sessions across.

Building a multiplayer game? Gameye hosts dedicated game servers: ship your server as a Docker container and start one per match with a single API call, in a region near your players.

[See how it works →](https://gameye.com/how-it-works/)

[Back to Glossary](https://gameye.com/glossary/)

## Related terms

- ### Bare-metal servers

A bare-metal server is a physical machine which lives inside a data centre. It’s a place where you’ll host your games matches and sessions. [Read more](https://gameye.com/glossary/bare-metal-servers/)
- ### Cloud servers

Your cloud server is a virtual server. It runs in a cloud computing environment, and it's a place where you’ll host your games’ matches and sessions. [Read more](https://gameye.com/glossary/cloud-servers/)
- ### Flex metal servers

Flex metal servers are basically bare-metal machines, but you can have them available in the same amount of time as cloud servers. [Read more](https://gameye.com/glossary/flex-metal-servers/)
- ### Orchestrator

An orchestrator automates game server lifecycle — starting sessions on demand, placing them in the optimal region, and shutting them down when matches end. [Read more](https://gameye.com/glossary/orchestrator/)