New vs returning players: how clan.me categorises them
How clan.me decides whether a player is new or returning, and why the split is a more useful growth signal than raw player count.
Updated 7 June 2026
A player count tells you how busy your server was. New vs returning tells you whether that activity is growing or just cycling through the same faces. The distinction is one of the most useful things clan.me can show you.
How players are categorised
Every player is identified by their Minecraft UUID. The first time clan.me sees a UUID on your server, they are marked as a new player. Every subsequent time they appear, they are a returning player.
New vs returning is a permanent distinction per player. Someone who joined two years ago and returns today is always returning, not new. This makes the new player count a reliable signal for actual discovery and acquisition.
Why the distinction matters
Player count can hold steady while the underlying dynamic is unhealthy: high churn where new players replace departing ones at exactly the same rate. That server is not growing, it is cycling.
The new vs returning split reveals this. If 70% of your weekly players are new, your server attracts well but struggles to retain. If 90% are returning, your community is stable but you may not be growing. Both insights lead to different actions.
Reading the ratio
Healthy ratios vary by server type. A newly launched server might be 80% new players while it builds an audience. A mature server with good retention might be 80% returning. Neither is inherently better: the question is whether the ratio matches where you are in your server's lifecycle and whether it's moving in the direction you want.
Watch the ratio in the weekly retention digest, where it is presented alongside the week-over-week change and the return rate from the previous week's new players.