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A short history of Minecraft name changes
Today changing your Minecraft name is an ordinary thing to do. It was not always possible, and the rules around it, including whether anyone can see your old names, have changed more than once. Knowing that history explains a lot about how name drops work now.
When names could not change
For the first years of Minecraft, the name you chose when you bought the game was yours for good. There was no way to change it. A typo, a name you had grown out of, a joke that stopped being funny: all of them stayed. That also meant names almost never came back: a name was only free if nobody had ever picked it.
2015: name changes arrive
In February 2015 Mojang opened name changes to every Java account, free of charge. From then on players could choose a new name, with a wait between changes. Two things followed at once. Players who had always wanted a different name finally changed it. And the names they left behind began to come back, which had never happened before: the first name drops.
The reservation of the old name, the time during which nobody else can take it, is what gives today's drops their rhythm. Today a renamed account waits 30 days before it can change again, and the old name stays reserved for 37 days. The guide to name drops explains the 37-day rule in detail.
Name history, public and then not
For years Mojang offered a public way to see every name an account had had, with the dates of the changes. Players used it to look up friends, server staff used it to recognise returning players, and name hunters used it to see how often an account renamed. In September 2022 Mojang removed it. The reason given was player safety: a public list of old names makes it easy to follow someone who changed their name to get away from people.
Since then there is no official source for the names an account had. What sites show, including our name history, is what they saw themselves while watching names, and what other public records kept from before. That is why a history can be incomplete, and why we mark dates we did not see ourselves.
From Mojang accounts to Microsoft accounts
Minecraft accounts used to be Mojang accounts, signed in with an e-mail and a password on Mojang's own site. Between 2021 and 2023 Java accounts had to move to Microsoft accounts. For names, that changed where you go to change one, now minecraft.net with your Microsoft account, and it brought Microsoft's security, such as two-step verification. Protecting your account explains how to use it.
Java and Bedrock together
Since 2022 the PC version of Minecraft comes with both Java Edition and Bedrock Edition. They still keep separate names: the Java username follows the rules on this site, while Bedrock shows your Xbox gamertag. The article on Java and Bedrock names covers the difference.
What this means today
- Every short name that comes back comes back because its owner renamed, and 37 days later.
- There is no official history, so knowing when a name was left means having watched it.
- The account behind a name is a Microsoft account, with everything that brings for security.
That is the gap 37 Days fills: we watch short names around the clock, notice the renames as they happen, and list the drops they lead to.
