VPS is short for Virtual Private Server hosting. VPS hosting is therefore a server, inside a larger server, that has its own copy of operating system and allocated server resources. It gives users their own dedicated resources such as: CPU, bandwidth, storage, RAM, etc.
That was a mouthful. So, to break it down, think of VPS hosting as living in an apartment complex. There are other people living in the same building, but you have your own apartment, with its own resources, within the compound. So, what your neighbours do in their apartments is the owner’s problem and not necessarily yours. Unless they start a fire!
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Advantages of Having VPS Hosting
VPS, which is sometimes called cloud, has a number of benefits over shared web hosting and other hosting options.
1. Increased Security
Shared web hosting is one of, if not the most inexpensive hosting options, but it also comes with a significant disadvantage – the security isn’t that great. If a user on a shared server decides to behave badly, everyone on the server is affected. It’s like a domino effect – when one falls, the others falls with it. This could cause your blog to slow down or worst, crash.
No website owner wants that to be their fate, especially is it’s caused by someone else.
VPS hosting seeks to resolve this by ensuring you have your own, dedicated server, which not only increases security, but also reliability and stability. So if your security has been breached on the server you’re sharing or if you are concerned that it could be based on observations, such as the bad behaviour of others using the server, VPS hosting is one option to get you around that. If not, you will have to rely on your host to manage the situation and this is not ideal, because security on your website is crucial to its success. If you are seeking a dedicated hosting plan check out these.
2. Total Control over the Server
As noted before, VPS hosting gives you your own server. This means you have the freedom to change it to meet your needs anytime you want and you don’t need permission to do so. Shared hosting does not offer that kind of control over your server, so if you want to, for example, install custom software, you have to get approval from the host before you can do the installation.
Another advantage that a VPS server offers is that there is no limit on the number of software you can install. With shared hosting, security and performance concerns prevent optimization settings from allowing a lot of popular software packages. This limits users’ option for installing a host of tools that they may need.
Managed VPS hosting gives you full root access to the server, so you don’t need approval to do your installs. Problem solved.
3. Increased resources
Think bandwidth and disk space for example. Most website will see an increase in traffic overtime, which means the hosting plan you started out with may not be able to handle to volume of traffic to your site. Paired with the increased traffic, is the fact that, eventually your site may start slowing down, if you increase the quantity of the content added to it, particularly if your site relies on database-intensive operations.
Another example of your need for more bandwidth and disc space is if you are constantly or consistently getting 503-server errors. These are an http status code telling you that the website’s server is not currently available. Simply put, you do not have adequate memory on your server, most likely because other users sharing the server are hogging the resources.
If the server isn’t available to you, it is most likely not available to your customers and visitors to your site either and that is bad for business. Virtual Server hosting is one sure way of fixing both problems mentioned, because again, it gives you your own set of resources.
4. Cost-Efficiency
There is an idea that VPS hosting is super expensive and only meant for businesses with larger budgets, but the opposite is true. VPS options for your blog are already an affordable solution and thanks to the rapid advances in virtualization technologies, they are getting cheaper.
For between $10 and $35 per month, you can get reliable VPS hosting for your blog.
This price range allows bloggers to choose from a variety of options, which brings us to our next question and sub-heading.
How to select the best VPS Hosting Provider for your blog
With the thousands of service providers online, it can be hard to choose the one that’s best for you. Before you decide, consider the following things.
Virtual Private Server Cost
Deciding to pay between the $10 or $35 or more is highly dependent on the types of resources you need to successfully run your blog and since VPS resources are scalable, ensure you compare prices with other VPS providers. At the end of the day, you should get bang for your buck. The host must provide what you pay for.
Reliability and hosting performance
Uptime! Uptime! Uptime! This cannot be stressed enough. Given that uptime in shared services environments tend to be more inconsistent than should be expected in a VPS environment, make sure that you check to see how much uptime your host guarantees. What’s the minimum that you should accept? 99.5 %. 99.9 % uptime is however, ideal, so read reviews to see if the hosts deliver on what they promise.
Live customer support
Customer support is crucial. Ensure your VPS service providers offers at least some type of 24/7 support. Whether it’s by phone, live chat or a ticketing system, ensure you are able to get the help and support you need whenever you need it. Not only should the customer support be available; the quality of the support must great.
Again, read the reviews.
Summary
VPS hosting gives users a great balance of price, performance and privacy. It also offers a great level of security that allows users to focus on other things, such as creating content for their blogs. So, if these are some of the things you value for your blog and you haven’t yet upgraded to VPS hosting, now is a great time to do so.
To continue reading about VPS hosting for business, go here.
