Updating Your Windrose Server
How Windrose server updates work on GameGrid: the Admin tab, the auto-update switch, and why restarting does not update anything.
Where updates happen
Updates are on the Admin tab of your server panel, in the "Game Updates" card. That card is the whole of it.
Restarting your server does not fetch a new build. That is true on every game here, Windrose included — a restart stops the process and starts it again on the files that are already there.
The card shows the build your server is actually running. If nobody has reported a build for it yet, it says so rather than guessing.
Automatic updates
"Automatically apply game updates" is a switch at the top of the card and it is on by default. Left on, a newly detected build is applied to your server on its own, and you do not have to do anything.
Switch it off and detected builds are not applied. The card then says "Auto-update is off, so this build will not be applied on its own", and the "Update now" button below it is how you apply one when you choose to.
Turning it off is worth considering if you run Windrose Plus and want to check the mod has caught up before you move the server onto a new Windrose build.
Updating on demand
When a newer build has been detected, the card shows an "Update available" badge with the version and an "Update now" button.
Pressing it backs the server up, stops it, moves it onto the new build and starts it again. Windrose has no in-game broadcast, so nobody playing is warned in game: tell your players first, on Discord for example. It usually takes several minutes.
The result appears on the card on its own — you can leave the page. While it runs, the card says the update is in progress and names the build; when it finishes it says which build was applied, or, if it failed, the host’s own reason and which build your server was left on.
The build that lands is the newest one on the Windrose branch, which is not always the build number that was detected, because Steam serves the current build rather than a nominated one. The card tells you when the two differ rather than showing two numbers that disagree.
Checking what you are on
The Admin tab’s Game Updates card is the authoritative place: it shows the installed build and whether a newer one exists.
The Dashboard server card also shows an "Update available" badge when one has been detected, but applying it is done on the Admin tab.
The Console tab shows the version the game itself prints at startup, which is a useful cross-check after an update.
After an update
Players need the same version. Steam updates the client on its own; a player who has not restarted Steam recently may still be on the old build and will be refused. See Fixing Windrose Version Mismatch Errors.
A Windrose update can leave Windrose Plus (which GameGrid installs on every Windrose server) behind. GameGrid checks GitHub for new Windrose Plus releases every 30 minutes on its own schedule and pushes them out — that check is not tied to your server restarting. If the game stops while loading Windrose Plus after an update, GameGrid starts your server without it and tries it again after the next game update or Windrose Plus release; you do not have to switch anything.
Your world is not touched by an update. Updates replace game files, not save data, and a backup is taken before the update anyway.
Windrose Plus and item delivery put themselves back. An update rewrites the game's own folder, and the piece of Windrose Plus that has to live inside it goes with it. On the next start the platform reinstalls that piece — and the delivery system on top of it — before the game is allowed to start, so your live map, player list, item catalogue, playtime earning and shop deliveries come back with the server. There is nothing to press.
Most updates do not touch item delivery: the platform checks the updated game files and keeps delivering when the parts it uses are unchanged. If a Windrose update changes the game internally enough that item delivery needs an adjustment from us, deliveries pause rather than misfire: purchases wait instead of being dropped into nothing, and the platform keeps trying them. Our monitoring alerts us automatically, the fix reaches every running server within about half an hour of being ready, and nobody's server is restarted for it. Waiting purchases are then handed over by themselves; one still waiting 24 hours after it was made is refunded to the player's wallet automatically. See Windrose Economy and Shop.
When an update fails
The card reports the failure with the host’s own words and tells you which build your server was left on. It does not leave you halfway.
Press "Update now" again — a failed download is often transient.
If it fails again, use "Check & Repair" on the same tab. It reports whether your server’s files all come from one build, whether that install finished, and whether the game’s own start-up check passes, and it puts back files that are missing.
If that does not settle it, open a support ticket with your Service ID, the failure text from the card, and the console output.