For vanilla minecraft, the default launcher from Mojang themselves is fine but lacks support for mods (since you have to download those seperately alongside the mods you want to add). However, if you are serious about modding the game: Prism, ATLauncher, Curse Forge are preferred since those have the loaders (Forge, Fabric) integrated.
I use vanilla launcher and honestly, the only thing you are gaining with Curse Forge is the possibility for some questionably supported mods. Modrinth is a bit better, (Modrinth has better cross compatibility with fabric mods, so you get plug n’ play) but both run their own instances of the game separate from your primary install. Honestly, navigating to your mod folder is not such a big deal, unless you are playing on a PC that you don’t have administrator access to.
i like the prism launcher, it allows me to download mods, recource packs, shaders, and even whole modpacks, have multiple instances of my game so i can have diffrent modded versions, and a few other niffy features like a cat button.
Also the Prism Launcher automatically separates new instances into separate folders (So that you don’t accidentally open a world with missing/extra mods). The vanilla launcher can do it to, but you have to manually change the folder location.
The vanilla launcher lets you use mods, shaders, resource packs, behaviour packs
The other launchers support things like mod packs, or they make it easier to install mods
can you have multiple instances through the vanilla launcher?
Yes you can but it’s kind of hidden.
In Prism, it’s super easy to set up an instance, throw in a mod loader, and filter, download, and update compatible mods in the app. It also allows you to choose and configure the Java version easily per instance, view logs, and export instances.
It also has the cat button, which shows a cat :3
Cat button?
The normal launcher is fine for the average player who plays single player and realms and an occasional SMP. It’s made specifically for them; the average player.
Something I learned today: Prism Launcher and MultiMC Launcher (haven’t verified the second) do modify Minecraft’s telemetry, even in Vanilla to not send your user ID and client ID. So if you care about data protection or/and privacy, this is definitely beneficial.
Been a while since I used it, but in retrospect, it felt basic but functional for what it does. The “better” ones, I’d defend they are because they are tinkered to the uses the user wants/needs.
