What are different kinds of Hosting services?
Nearly every bigger or smaller business in today’s world needs some web presence, whether it’s a big corporation, a small shop, or someone’s blog. Of course, creating a website needs a lot of time, attention, and resources, and the better it’s done, the more likely you’ll get a broad audience. But apart from this, there is another essential aspect of organizing your web presence, which is directly responsible for the company of your site, as well as its speed, performance, uptime, and security. This aspect, however, is not something you get automatically – instead, there are many options to choose from, which may be confusing for someone new in the area. In this article, we will clarify what kinds of hosting services there are and what is unique about each of them.
How does hosting work?
Every hosting service is based on a server – a physical machine similar to your PC but constructed to provide uninterrupted availability of hosted content and applications. Using a whole server by a single client is one of the possible hosting options, and it is called Dedicated Server. We’ll cover its specifics later in the article. However, the capacities provided in this type of hosting often exceed the needs of a single client, while costs are too high for their budget. Therefore, we have other types of hosting that are differentiated by how the server’s resources are distributed.
Shared Hosting
Shared hosting is a hosting service where the physical server is shared among different customers. The main benefit of this solution is that it’s the cheapest option available.
It is generally considered a good solution for entry-level businesses that do not need extremely high performance, do not have to cope with increased traffic peaks, and do not require a high level of security. The reason for hat is that, since all resources are shared without any regulation, the users may compete for them, and if one suddenly needs much more than usual, so the performance of the rest of the users may suffer. Thus, crashes, downtimes, and other problems will occur more often. The problem with security is that a hacker that has access to at least one of the users’ websites will find it easier to hack the websites of the rest, which makes shared hosting a worse choice for anybody who deals with sensitive information, like credit cards or personal information.
Considering all these drawbacks, users who have a more reliable hosting solution usually opt for the services discussed in the following.
VPS
VPS (or Virtual Private Server) is similar to shared hosting, but in some way also to the dedicated server. Like shared hosting, VPS is based on sharing the resources of one physical server. But unlike it, each customer has a certain amount of resources dedicated to them, so they don’t get “bothered by the neighbours,” thus avoiding the main disadvantage of shared hosting and still for an affordable price. Furthermore, apart from a much more stable operation and a decent level of security, VPS provides the customer with a unique IP, which is also an excellent advantage for the site’s promotion and search engine optimization. These advantages are achieved using virtualization technology, which allows for creating an isolated virtual machine with its operating system, dedicated resources, and management independent of other users.
With VPS, you pay for the resources you need, and you can scale them up or down quickly when required – you only need to contact your hosting provider.
This makes VPS an optimal hosting solution for a significant number of users that have already felt the need for a more stable and efficient, and at the same time relatively inexpensive, hosting solution but do not require the absolute power of dedicated hosting.
Dedicated server
Finally, a dedicated server is a hosting service that offers the maximum resources to the user – because the entire server is dedicated to them. Generally speaking, its properties are similar to the earlier described virtual private server but more powerful. So, you get maximum performance, and you don’t have to compete for it with anyone. Your security is not threatened as well. You get root access and can manage your capacities in any way possible – you have the highest control grade.
The only questionable issue is that these advantages come with a price, so you should opt for a dedicated server instead if you are sure that these are what you need.
Conclusion
In this article, we’ve had a look at the three primary hosting services available. Generally, they can be graded according to the pattern “higher price – more efficiency.” Hence, the right choice depends on how advanced your business is, how high the technical requirements are, and how much control and security you need.
Make sure to check HostZealot’s Dedicated Server Hosting if you are sure you need a dedicated server. If you are not sure, you can contact their support, and they’ll help you choose the service you need.
Thank you for your attention, and take care!
