An Introduction To VPS Hosting

There are several different kinds of server on which websites can be hosted. They essentially come in tiers, both of the amount of speed and power they provide and of the amount of space you'll have:

  • The most basic kind is a shared server, where there are multiple websites stored on one machine. This is the kind of hosting you're most likely to get from a free package, and it has plenty of drawbacks and benefits that have been detailed elsewhere on this site.
  • Next up is VPS hosting, or Virtual Private Server. This is a little more complicated, and basically means that there are multiple 'servers' partitioned on one machine. This article hopes to explain VPS to you in more detail, to help you decide whether or not it's for you.
  • The next 'level' is a dedicated server, where an entire computer is devoted to hosting your website. This is more expensive, but a good choice if you know that you're going to need a lot of space, security and bandwidth. We've written more about it elsewhere, too.
  • If you need more stability and room even than that - and you're prepared to pay for it - you should look into cloud hosting, where your website will be stored on a multitude of machines that are all working together to keep it running. Find out more in our other introduction articles.

What Is A Virtual Private Server?

Essentially, a VPS is a halfway house between shared servers and dedicated servers. The machine has virtual 'partitions' on it, so there's more than one operating system and more than one server installed on the same computer.

Virtual Private Server Pros

  • They're pretty affordable, and they offer a good quantity of space and power for your money. This is especially true when compared to what you'll get from a shared server plan.
  • From the end user perspective, a VPS is easy to set up - much more so than a dedicated server, where you'll have to make many more different decisions.
  • Unlike with a shared hosting plan, a VPS will give you root access and allow you to be much more in control of how your hosting is administrated without the extra cost and hassle of a dedicated server.
  • Shared servers are quite vulnerable to a variety of attacks, while a VPS plan will get around many of those problems pretty neatly.

Virtual Private Server Cons

  • While you'll have more speed, space and power with VPS hosting than you will with a shared server, they're still not as good as a dedicated server would be.
  • They're generally more expensive than shared server plans, though still cheaper than other types of hosting.
  • VPS servers have a lot to do, which means that they're nothing like as stable as server types that are higher up the ranks.