Shared Hosting vs. VPS - Which is right for you?

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Published on Wednesday, 05 March 2014 02:54

Written by James

Often the team at My Storage House is asked, “Which is a better solution- Shared Hosting or VPS?”  The answer depends on what’s most important to you.  Let’s start with the basic definition of each:

• Shared hosting refers to a service where your website and many others, reside on one web server connected to the Internet. Your website is sharing the servers speed and resources with the other sites.
• VPS hosting is a type of web hosting that uses Virtual Private Servers. Although the websites are hosted on the same physical machine, VPS allows each website to be fully independent as if each were on its own separate machine.

Now let’s compare the VPS to the Shared Hosting on the main selling platforms:

Cost

Shared hosting is almost always less expensive than VPS, when you are hosting only a single website.  If you have 4 or more sites, the price difference becomes progressively smaller.  For 6 websites and above, a VPS is almost always less expensive, and still includes all the advantages of speed, dedicated resources and increase storage space. Bonus- Most VPS’s also provide you with the ability to host a virtually unlimited number of websites.

Speed

If by definition, you’re thinking that Shared Hosting has the potential to ‘bog down’, you’d be correct. The more sites sharing hosting on the server, the less resources available for you, and the slower all sites load collectively. A VPS will load your website faster than ANY shared server- hands down without exception. While the loading speed may only be the difference of a few seconds, even loading half a second faster will improve your sites visibility on Google and Bing.

Control & Customizability

Shared hosting is configured the way the hosting company deems best, and is rarely influenced by the account owner. This can create challenges if you wish to speed up your website load time, or if you have a complex or resource-intensive website with lots of modules and scripts. Shared hosting also limits how emails are sent and, often times, how much email you can send or receive. A VPS gives you 100% control over every part of the hosting functionality and gives you the ability to add new software, new functionality, and change or remove what you don’t need, to optimize your clients experience.

Maintenance

Since shared hosting configuration is controlled 100% by the hosting company, there is very little (if any) maintenance and up-keep you as a user are responsible for. In managing a VPS, security and software updates usually become the sole responsibility of the owner.

The short answer is this; shared hosting is good enough for most people on a tight budget with only one or two sites, and who have a website that doesn't need to be SEO optimized. In most other cases, the benefits of speed, resources and customization make a VPS a much better solution.