Rust admin commands and RCON cheatsheet

Admin commands let server owners moderate players, debug worlds, capture cinematic footage, and tune gameplay. They are powerful — and strictly off-limits on community/official servers. Use them only on private, dev, or sandbox servers you own.

1. Becoming admin

Rust uses three auth levels:

Run from RCON, F1 console (if already auth 2), or write directly into server//cfg/users.cfg while the server is offline.

After granting, the targeted player must reconnect for the auth level to apply.

2. Player management

3. Spectator and dev commands

4. World and server commands

5. F1 console — non-admin client commands

The F1 console is open to everyone for client-side tweaks (no auth required):

6. Common server.cfg variables

Always server.writecfg after editing live.

7. RCON setup

RCON (Remote Console) is the out-of-game protocol used by RustAdmin, Battlemetrics, and web tools.

Launch parameters (add to your .bat / startup script):

+rcon.ip 0.0.0.0
+rcon.port 28016
+rcon.password "long-random-secret"
+rcon.web 1

rcon.web 1 enables the WebSocket protocol (required by RustAdmin and Battlemetrics; the older legacy TCP protocol is deprecated).

RustAdmin desktop — free Windows tool by Facepunch-adjacent devs. Open Settings -> Add server, enter IP, RCON port, password. Gives a chat tab, console, banlist UI, scheduled commands.

Battlemetrics RCON — paid tier ($x/month/server) gives multi-admin permissions (no shared password), 3-month chat retention, ban federation across servers, scheduled tasks, and Discord webhooks. Running admin commands while logged into Battlemetrics is the safest workflow for community servers.

Open the RCON port (28016/TCP) in your firewall, and never reuse the game port or share the password.

8. Useful one-liners

# Clean up all corpses around you (entity scope)
ent kill                       # (looking at one)
del assets/.../player_corpse.prefab

# Freeze the world at noon for a build session
env.time 12 ; env.progresstime false

# Stop AI movement to claw back FPS on a dev box
ai.move false

# Disable gibs (no debris on destroy) — client perf
effects.gibs false

# Build-menu free-build (admin only)
debug.nodecay true             # turn off TC upkeep
ent unlock                     # unlock a door without keys

# Hot save before testing something risky
server.save ; server.writecfg

# Instant-day for screenshots
env.time 8 ; weather.load clear ; hidehud true

9. Hard rules

• Admin commands grant god-tier PvP advantage (noclip, spectate, give weapons, see TC auth). Using them on a server where you play with others is cheating.
• Battlemetrics auto-flags owners/moderators who play on their own community servers — most large communities ban this on principle. Maintain a separate "play" account if you administer publicly.
• Don't share RCON credentials over Discord or screenshots. Treat the password like an SSH key.
• server.writecfg is required to persist changes; commands issued live revert on restart otherwise.
• Auth level 1 (moderator) cannot grant further admins — only owners can.

Use admin powers on personal dev servers, build servers, or scrim servers where everyone knows you are admin.

10. Sources

• Facepunch Wiki - Creating a server: https://wiki.facepunch.com/rust/Creating-a-server
• Facepunch Wiki - Useful Console Commands: https://wiki.facepunch.com/rust/useful_commands
• Facepunch Wiki - Debug Camera: https://wiki.facepunch.com/rust/Debug_Camera
• Corrosion Hour - RUST Admin Commands List: https://www.corrosionhour.com/rust-admin-commands/
• Corrosion Hour - The RUST Admin Toolbox: https://www.corrosionhour.com/the-rust-admin-toolbox/
• Rust Wiki (Fandom) - Server Commands: https://rust.fandom.com/wiki/Server_Commands
• Battlemetrics - Rust RCON: https://www.battlemetrics.com/rcon/rust
• Nodecraft - Setting up the RustAdmin RCON tool: https://nodecraft.com/support/games/rust/setting-up-the-rust-admin-rcon-tool
• Shockbyte - Rust Admin Commands List: https://shockbyte.com/help/knowledgebase/articles/rust-admin-commands-list

Want more? Console Commands (player-side)

11. Entity management — ent commands

The ent family operates on whatever entity your crosshair is pointed at. It is the workhorse for cleaning up grief builds, inspecting bases, and debugging. You must be admin/owner and looking directly at the target.

Why ent who matters: the most common admin task on a community server is resolving "someone griefed my base" tickets. Point at the offending wall, run ent who, and you have the exact Steam ID of who placed it — proof for a ban or a build removal. Combine with ent kill to remove the grief instantly. For mass cleanup of an abandoned build, the Oxide plugin route (covered on the Oxide page) is cleaner, but vanilla ent kill handles one-offs fine.

12. Debug camera — full control reference

The debug camera detaches your view from your body. It is essential for screenshots, spectating cheaters from angles they cannot see, and inspecting base interiors. Enter and exit with debugcamera; while inside, these convars shape its behavior:

The practical admin use is anti-cheat spectating. Combine debug camera with the Oxide Vanish plugin (you are invisible to the suspect) and you can sit inside a base watching a player's screen-share-like behavior. Without Vanish, debug camera alone still lets you watch from outside walls — a suspected wallhacker who tracks you through solid stone while you are in debug camera has just convicted themselves.

13. Spawning items and entities precisely

Two separate systems exist: give puts items in an inventory, and spawn places entities in the world.

• inventory.giveto <steamid> <shortname> <amount> — gives an item to a specific player by ID. Use the exact item shortname (e.g. rifle.ak, ammo.rifle, wood, metal.refined).
• inventory.give <shortname> <amount> — gives the item to yourself.
• inventory.givearm <shortname> <amount> — places the item directly into your hotbar/belt.
• spawn <prefab> — spawns a world entity (a scientistjunkpile.c NPC, a bear, a minicopter.entity) at your crosshair.
• spawn.fill_groups / spawn.fill_populations — repopulates the map's animal and node spawns.

The shortname rule: Rust commands take the internal shortname, never the display name. "Assault Rifle" is rifle.ak; "High Quality Metal" is metal.refined; "Garage Door" is door.hinged.metal. The cross-checked reference is the Item Database page and rustlabs.com. Spawning the wrong prefab name simply returns "not found" — it is harmless, just retry with the correct string.

14. Advanced player management

Ban by ID, not by name. Names can be changed and can contain characters that break the command parser. Always resolve the Steam ID first (via ent who, the F7 report, or players) and use global.banid. A name-ban can be evaded with a Steam name change before the ban applies; an ID ban cannot.

15. Environment and time control

Admins can freeze or accelerate the day/night cycle and weather, which is invaluable for events, screenshots, and testing.

For a roleplay or build server, a common setup is env.time 12 followed by env.progresstime false to lock permanent daytime. For an event night you might do the reverse and lock midnight with forced fog for atmosphere. All weather convars default back to natural simulation once you set them back to -1 or restart the cycle.

16. server.cfg variables that change the game feel

Beyond the basics, these convars define how your server actually plays. They belong in server.cfg (loaded at boot) or can be set live and persisted with server.writecfg.

The workflow: set variables live with the console while testing, confirm the server feels right, then run server.writecfg once. That command bakes every current convar value into the on-disk config so the settings — and critically your ownerid entries — survive a restart. Forgetting server.writecfg after granting yourself ownership is the single most common new-admin mistake: your admin rights vanish on the next reboot.