The Aether

The Aether is a adventure mod created by Gilded Games. A sky dimension mod adding a heavenly realm with floating islands, unique mobs, dungeons, and boss fights above the clouds. As a adventure mod it concentrates on exploration, structures, and new things to fight, and it has been downloaded around 55 million times, which puts it among the options players reach for in this space.

The Aether is built for players who want a bright heavenly counterpart to the Nether. Reached through a glowstone portal lit with water, the Aether floats above the clouds with its own mobs, dungeons, and flight-enabling gear. It is approachable enough to drop into a world and use right away, with little setup required.

The mod is available for Forge and NeoForge, so it fits a range of modpacks and launchers. It currently supports Minecraft 1.20.1 and 1.21.1, spanning the 1.20.1 to 1.21.1 releases. It runs on both the client and the server, so on a multiplayer server every player who connects needs it installed alongside the server itself.

The Aether works particularly well alongside Just Enough Items. It targets the Forge side of the ecosystem, so it fits comfortably into Forge and NeoForge packs.

The Aether has a modest footprint for what it adds and is widely used in modpacks without notable performance concerns.

If you are comparing options, similar mods include Twilight Forest and The Betweenlands. They cover comparable ground, so the right choice usually comes down to your loader, version, and the rest of your pack.