When it comes time to choosing the right type of web hosting plan for your website(s), it’s not as simple as you may think. There are many types to choose from, such as shared hosting, virtual private servers (VPS) and dedicated servers. While it might seem like finding the best deal is the main factor, there are many other aspects that need to be considered. A shared hosting plan may work for certain types of websites, but might not cut it for others that require more resources than what a shared environment can supply.
VPS web hosting is a great midway option between shared and dedicated hosting environments. Just like the name entails, a VPS runs like a private server, but in a virtual environment. In this case, some resources, such as CPU, are shared. However, important resources like RAM and disk space are dedicated to each VPS account. Also, with a VPS you get your own operating system, email server, web server and more.
VPS hosting is a great option for many reasons, especially for the following:
- Root/SSH Access – In other words, you get “server-level customization,” which was previously only available with dedicated hosting due to security reasons. In addition, you can utilize the command-line access and have the option of operating as the root user if you’ve got the experience to do so.
- Scalability – For a website that’s just starting off, shared hosting is usually a sufficient choice. However, since the goal of many website owners is to grow or improve by either adding other sites or increasing traffic, there’s a big possibility of growing more than you expected to. Shared hosting, by its very nature, isn’t scalable because all of the resources are shared among all of the accounts on the server. However, VPS hosting can provide scalability that allows you to add more resources (RAM, disk space, etc.) for the room needed for growth.
- Burstable Memory for Unpredictable Usage Spikes – If your goal is to gain more traffic to your website, then you should definitely be prepared for it. Let’s say that the popularity of your blog is on the rise. In addition, links to your website are added to larger ones like Digg or Slashdot. On a shared server, this can become a major disaster that can quickly cripple your website. But on a VPS, this wouldn’t be much of a problem with the availability of “burstable memory,” which is a pool of reserved memory that’s available when needed, such as in times of very high traffic.
- Can Support Large, Dynamic Websites – If your website’s a source of income (e-commerce site with product-filled databases), it wouldn’t be a good idea to count on shared hosting to handle the expected heavy load. With a shared environment, you never know when someone else on the server may use up a large portion of the resources (CPU, MySQL queries, RAM), so you’re at risk of your site not functioning from time to time. On a VPS, you can rest assured of surmounting this problem since your website doesn’t rely on the same resources as others on the same machine.
- Cost – With the great benefits of a dedicated server combined with the affordability of a shared platform, VPS web hosting is a great option to look into when in need of sizable resources on a modest budget.
