VPS Hosting Demystified
VPS hosting, also known as Virtual Private Server, is a relatively new way of hosting websites. It provides a hosting environment that lies between shared and dedicated hosting plans. The physical server is subdivided into virtual servers, and VPS allocated one of these servers. The server contains an operating system, disc space, and bandwidth. Technically, it is both a dedicated hosting and shared hosting. Benefits of VPS hosting Lower costs With VPS hosting, you get exactly what you pay for without spending money on features you don’t need. It is so much cheaper compared to dedicated hosting yet you get similar features. You get your physical server and server environment without having to pay for the whole server. Customization VPS allows you to tweak the server environment to give you much more wiggle room in what kind of websites you create and the programs you install. You will also have root access and can make changes to all your files on the server. If you are installing programs on the server that require a system restart, you can do so without affecting anyone else. With VPS, you are the administrator of your virtual server, something you cannot get in shared hosting. Since you get your own server with an operating system, you have more control over your server environment. You can customize it to meet your requirements. You have the ability to use scripts like PHP, Apache, and MySQL and can make changes to them to suit the server to your specific needs. Better Uptimes Downtime is the bane of online businesses. Regular downtimes will it affect your SEO rankings and cause your customers or visitors to lose trust in your site. What causes downtime? Usually, it is due to servers being attacked by malicious software or hackers, hosting too many websites on the same server or client websites crashing and taking down the entire server with them. With VPS, you won’t have these problems. Since you only get a portion of the physical server, should another website crash, your server won’t be affected. Besides, most VPS hosting providers ensure servers are not overcrowded. Easy to Scale VPS can grow with your website. Depending on the size of your website, you can use very few resources in your server environment. As your website grows, you will have to cater to more traffic, which means more disk space, bandwidth, and processing power. VPS allows you to increase the number of features and resources in your server environment by simply scaling up your VPS hosting package. VPS saves you the hassle of downtime experienced when moving in shared environments. Drawbacks of VPS Hosting Although VPS hosting gives the best of both shared and dedicated hosting worlds, it comes with its drawbacks. Cost and technical knowledge required are probably some of the biggest drawbacks of VPS hosting. Compared to shared hosting, VPS is more expensive. It only makes financial sense if your website has a large amount of traffic and generates decent revenue. So if you are a small business, this hosting plan may not work for you. While VPS gives you more control over your server environment, that control comes with certain risks. If you don’t know what you are doing, you could end up crashing your server. Although it gives you root access, don’t use it if you don’t have in-depth knowledge of how it works. VPS hosting is ideal for you if your website has a lot of traffic or you have a big budget. It is a good choice if you want to run your server environment and have the expertise to do it.
