The Great Minecraft Race is returning for 2026, bringing an opportunity for Minecraft players to race to complete advancements for charity. We spoke to organiser RhinoCasts to find out more…
“I always wanted to do those kinds of events on a bigger scale,” RhinoCasts tells us. Although RhinoCasts (a.k.a. Rhino) had always envisioned hosting a large charity event, the process of building The Great Minecraft Race was purely organic. When Rhino dedicated himself to the esports community in 2024, it was him and his friends trying to beat the Ender Dragon in hardcore mode, and when one of them died, they had to pay a certain amount of money. Fast forward to 2025, and whilst Rhino wasn’t able to successfully beat the Ender Dragon in the hardcore mode, he was able to transform the challenge between his friends into something charitable and universal.
The rules for The Great Minecraft Race are simple: each player, either themselves or with teammates, creates a survival world and then completes the advancements. When all the advancements are completed, a new world can be created. During the 24 hours, the winner is determined as the player or the team with the most advancements completed.
The event is looking for players of all skill levels, regardless of their Minecraft experience. “You could have never played Minecraft before in your life, and still play The Great Minecraft Race,” Rhino tells us, “and we pride ourselves on it. There will be some people who join the event to be competitive, who want to be the winners of the race – but there is also a good group of players who play The Great Minecraft Race for fun, entertainment, and to raise money.”
Charity has always been the heart of the event, which Rhino attributes to the community’s efforts towards charitable causes. “There’s something so special about bringing people together for a common cause and raising money for fantastic charities across the world,” he says. This year, The Great Minecraft Race has partnered with Project Flamingo, Mental Health Collaborative, and Humanity First UK. The charitable organizations were selected with their “appreciation for esports and gaming” in mind. In particular, Project Flamingo, a non-profit organization fighting against breast cancer in South Africa, was selected in response to the male-oriented nature of the e-sport space. “I think that’s what separates us from the crowd – that we are looking to cover as much of the spectrum as possible,” Rhino continues.
When hosting such a large-scale Minecraft event, cheating is one of the foremost concerns. Although last year’s footage showed that all players were playing fair, this year, the team had developed a custom plugin to prevent cheating and to offer a few quality-of-life additions. “It means players don’t have to keep going back into Discord to report their achievements,” Rhino says. “The game will report them forward – so you can only report an achievement if you’ve actually earned that achievement in-game, which is a big step forward from last year.” Further security is ensured by the encouragement of anti-cheat server plugins and the request for Minecraft world files if necessary.
Rhino also foresees strategic differences in this year’s The Great Minecraft Race. “Last year’s Minecraft Race wasn’t so much about strategy,” he tells us. “Most of the time with teams, we would see them split up. We would see one go into the nether pretty early, we would see one trying to do the overworld tasks, we would see one trying to get the Ender Dragon fight done, and then another one kind of filling in where necessary, likely in the overworld again.”
This year, Fudge, a member of The Great Minecraft Race staff team and the Minecraft speedrunning community, suggested an optimal route for taking the crown of The Great Minecraft Race. The strategy involves killing the Ender Dragon right away. “Get that done because as soon as you do that, that unlocks so many more avenues and ways to go,” Rhino retells Fudge’s advice.
Through this year’s The Great Minecraft Race, Rhino and his team are ready to demonstrate the positive influence that the esports and gaming community in Minecraft can put forward. “That’s why we believe in The Great Minecraft Race, and I’m most looking forward to seeing the amount of money raised slowly increase across the period of the day. That’s the reward. That’s what makes me feel like we’ve done a good thing.”
The Great Minecraft Race will begin on Saturday 7th March at 8pm GMT. The event is open for anyone to sign up solo or as a team through the community Discord, with sign-ups closing an hour before the race starts. You can find out more about the event on the website.
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