Ancient Echoes is a whitelist SMP on Minecraft 1.21.11 and it feels like a real community server where people actually do stuff together.
The End island got fully cleared and now everyone is teaming up to build a massive gothic End city on the empty space. It is in a big build phase right now so it is a good time to jump in and help.
Spawn is doing a Lunar New Year celebration with decorations and it ends with a community event and a fireworks show.
They also run custom textures and models with a Hermitcraft style datapack system so you can see extra cosmetic items like plushies hats pokemon figurines and trading cards as they add more.
There is a new Nether highway and portal network to get around. They do frequent community events plus hangout nights and even a shared jukebox with rotating music where players take turns being the DJ.
The biggest rule vibe is no paywalls ever. No pay to win no paid cosmetics no donor perks and everyone stays equal from day one.