Trying to decide between shared hosting, virtual private servers, and dedicated hosting? It may sound like a lot of confusing jargon when you\’re just learning about hosting websites, but it\’s not too difficult to understand which type of hosting you need for your website. Just think of it like this, web hosting is similar to housing. Shared hosting is like living in an apartment complex. Virtual private servers are like townhouses. Dedicated hosting is like living in your own house. Let\’s dissect each type of hosting.

Shared Hosting Is Like Living In An Apartment

An apartment is a great place to start out when you move into your first place. It\’s relatively cheap to rent and it\’s just the right size if you don\’t own too much stuff. There are downsides, though, such as thin walls and living in a cramped place with multiple tenants.

Shared hosting is very similar to living in an apartment. It\’s relatively cheap compared to the other options. It\’s highly recommended as the starting point for anyone pushing out their first website. If your website doesn\’t use too many resources, shared hosting is the perfect fit.

Just like apartments, shared hosting also has downsides. One building will shared among multiple tenants and apartments. It\’s the same case with shared hosting. One physical server machine will be shared among multiple customers and websites. This means you\’re sharing resources like CPU and memory. Thin walls are a common issue in apartments. Noisy neighbors are a bad thing. It\’s the same case with shared hosting. Neighbors who hog resources on a server are a bad thing. It means your website gets less resources and visitors to your website will experience lag.

Overall, I recommend shared hosting for websites that are just starting out and require little resources.

Virtual Private Servers Are Like Townhouses or Duplexes

A townhouse or duplex falls in between an apartment and a home. Your neighbors are still near you, but nowhere as near as in an apartment complex. It\’s the same case with virtual private servers. You\’re still sharing one physical server machine among multiple customers. However, the walls are thicker and stronger. Using software, you\’re placed into a environment which feels like you own the entire server yourself. Hence the term virtual and private.

With virtual private servers, customers are given a hard limit on resources. They can\’t surpass a certain amount of CPU or memory usage. This may sound like a bad thing, but it actually protects customers from their neighbors. Like a townhouse or duplex, you won\’t have to worry about your neighbors\’ noisy parties as much as in an apartment complex.

I recommend virtual private servers for more resource intensive web applications or popular websites.

Dedicated Hosting Is Like Owning A Home

Owning a home is more expensive than renting an apartment or townhouse. It\’s also much more private. You don\’t have to worry about noise from your neighbors at all. If your neighbor leaves the stove on, you don\’t have to worry about your home being set on fire. There are downsides. It\’s more expensive. You also lack a landlord who will fix your leaky faucet or other broken fixtures for you.

It\’s the same case for dedicated hosting. Customers are given their very own physical server machine. You don\’t share it with anyone else. The CPU and memory on that machine is 100% yours. This is great for resource intensive web applications and websites. You don\’t have to worry about any neighbors hogging your resources because you don\’t have any neighbors.

Dedicated hosting is very expensive. It\’s not ideal for anyone who\’s just starting out. It also takes more time to manage. With shared hosting, a support staff will handle upgrading and patching the operating system for you. With dedicated hosting, you\’re on your own just like with owning a home.

I recommend dedicated hosting for extremely popular websites. If you\’re just starting out, I recommend going with shared hosting or virtual private servers first. Upgrade to dedicated hosting only when it\’s required.

Learn More About Web Hosting Find out what type of hosting service you should use, learn more at shared hosting versus VPS.

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Author Bio: Learn More About Web Hosting Find out what type of hosting service you should use, learn more at shared hosting versus VPS.

Category: Internet
Keywords: shared hosting, ruby on rails hosts, web hosting, vps, virtual private server