As your business grows, so does your website. And more traffic means more server resources. If your website’s been chugging along on a shared server all this time, you’re probably already experiencing the sluggish loading speeds that come with outgrowing your web hosting package. If you want your website to continue to grow, it’s time to move to VPS hosting.
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Why get VPS hosting?
VPS hosting has several advantages over shared hosting and dedicated hosting. (To find out more about how VPS hosting works, check out our quick guide here.)
Let’s look at some of the major benefits you enjoy when you choose VPS hosting:
Increased Privacy at an affordable cost
When you choose VPS hosting, you get the privacy and security of dedicated hosting, at a much lower cost.
Your own server resources
When you have a shared hosting plan, your website is constantly battling for server resources. And if a big website suddenly experiences a traffic spike, this will suck resources from your website, causing it to slow down or even crash.
When you choose VPS hosting, server resources like RAM, CPU and your OS are instantly allocated as soon as your server is up and running. And these resources are allocated only to your site.
If another website on the server suddenly finds itself needing more resources, that has nothing to do with your website. You’ll never have to share server resources with any other site.
Root access
Just like dedicated hosting, most VPS hosting services grants you root access. That’s because with VPS hosting, you get a private server that’s partitioned from all the other private servers, even though they’re all hosted on the same physical server. With root access, you can customise your server and your resources. You can even run a different OS from the other servers! That’s complete control over your server for a fraction of what you’d pay for dedicated hosting.
VPS Provides an Extra Layer of Security
VPS hosting means you can customise your server to have additional security features. Also, if one website on the server falls prey to malware, it’s highly unlikely that your site will be affected. And if one website gets its IP address blacklisted, your website will be completely safe, because each private server has its own IP address.
So, you definitely need VPS hosting. The question is whether you should get managed or unmanaged VPS hosting. First, let’s take a quick look at each.
What is managed VPS hosting?
Managing a server is a huge time-suck. It also requires a lot of technical know-how. This means that if you choose unmanaged VPS hosting, you’ll either need to carve out time from your schedule to manage your server or you’ll need to hire someone to manage the server for you. This cost can skyrocket over time.
When you choose managed VPS hosting, you don’t have to worry about things like server maintenance, software installation and updates. We’ll take care of the technical aspects of managing your server, so you can concentrate on growing your brand.
If you’re an entrepreneur, freelancer, or small business owner, managed VPS hosting is the better option for you. It frees up your time and mental energy so you can focus on marketing instead of maintenance.
What is unmanaged VPS hosting?
With unmanaged VPS hosting, you take care of your own server maintenance. Your hosting provider will only take care of the physical server and of making sure the resources you paid for are always available to you. Choose unmanaged VPS hosting only if you have a bigger business with an in-house IT team to manage your server and OS.
Managed vs Unmanaged VPS hosting
Managed and unmanaged VPS hosting both provide the security, privacy and customisability that are the key features of VPS hosting, but they differ in two important respects:
· With managed VPS hosting, your hosting provider (That’s us!) will take care of maintaining and upgrading your server. With unmanaged VPS hosting, your hosting provider maintains only the physical server.
· Managed VPS hosting costs a bit more than unmanaged VPS hosting, but you’ll end up paying more for unmanaged VPS hosting in the long run unless you’re technically experienced or have in-house IT staff.
Should you choose managed or unmanaged VPS hosting?
A quick glance at the differences between managed and unmanaged VPS hosting will tell you which VPS hosting plan is better suited to your business. If you’re a small business owner, a freelancer or an entrepreneur, go with managed VPS hosting to save time, money, and mental space. If you have a bigger business or know your way around a server and have the time to manage your own server, go for unmanaged VPS hosting on Monsterhost to have your own secure and fast server environment.
