When you start a new website, you usually have a tight budget to stick to. As a result, you’re usually tempted to go for one of the cheap shared hosting plans.
The thing is, while it may keep your balance sheet relatively healthy for now, in the long run, your shared hosting service can have a few negative effects, particularly on website performance and security.
The solution?
It’s called managed VPS hosting, and today, we’ll show you why you should consider it.
Managed VPS Hosting: A Comprehensive Overview
To properly understand how a managed VPS hosting service works, you have to split the term in two and examine the parts separately. We have to see what VPS hosting entails as a whole, and we also need to learn how managed services differ from the rest.
How does VPS hosting work?
VPS stands for Virtual Private Server. The account gives you access to a virtual machine reserved specifically for hosting your website. Let’s see how this happens from a technical standpoint.
At the bottom of it all is something known as a hypervisor. A hypervisor is software that allows the creation of multiple virtual machines on the same server. Each virtual machine has more or less the same characteristics as a physical server – it has its own operating system, hardware resources, and IP address. It works independently from the rest of the accounts, and it’s all yours – other users can’t access it or use its resources.
The advantages?
Your host can run multiple accounts on the same server, meaning efficient hardware utilization and less money spent on maintenance and data center costs. Website owners get all the advantages of using a separate server all to themselves at a fraction of the price of a regular dedicated machine.
Managed vs. Self-Managed Server
A lot goes into setting up a server so it can host websites. In addition to installing and configuring the operating system, you must set up a database management system, web server, message transfer agent for emails, etc. When you’re done with that, you have to configure the firewall and set up the automated backup system that ensures you always have a secure copy of your website.
With a managed VPS service like ScalaHosting, you don’t need to worry about any of this. The VPS is ready to go out of the box, and usually, there’s a control panel giving you an intuitive interface packed with all the tools you may need to deploy your project.
Ongoing maintenance tasks related to updates and security patches are also left to your hosting provider’s technical team while you remain focused on running your website.
By contrast, a self-managed service gives you a bare-bone server that you need to set up yourself. These solutions are more suitable for users who need to customize their hosting environment and have the technical skills to do it.
Managed VPS Hosting’s Top Features
There are more than a few reasons for choosing a managed VPS solution over other forms of hosting. Let’s explore some of them:
- Excellent performance – Modern VPS solutions run on state-of-the-art hardware infrastructure capable of providing blistering loading speeds. Couple that with the dedicated resources, and you have a recipe for a seriously quick website.
- Top-notch security – A managed VPS is designed to be a comprehensive hosting solution. This means that in addition to the isolated environment, it offers plenty of security tools and systems to keep your website protected.
- Flexible hardware configuration – When you’re choosing a VPS service, you decide how much storage, memory, and processing power it will have. After you outgrow the capacity of your initial configuration, the upgrade options are pretty much limitless.
- Ease of use and support – A control panel allows you to build and manage your project via an easy-to-use interface, and maintenance isn’t really a problem because your host’s technicians are in charge of it.
- Value for money – Despite being more expensive than some of the other options, a managed VPS plan is almost always the most cost-effective form of hosting. A combination of customizable hardware configuration and tons of time- and resource-saving perks makes the extra cost more than just worth it.
As you can see, managed VPS hosting has a lot going for it. Let’s explore its key advantages in more detail.
Enhanced Website Performance
Internet users aren’t a patient bunch. If a page is taking too long to load, they’ll just click away. Google and other search engines know this, and in recent years, they’ve been putting more and more weight on the user experience as a factor when ranking websites. If your loading speeds are less than impressive, you’ll struggle to climb up the results pages.
In other words, website performance can affect the entire project’s future. But how can a managed VPS ensure you get the performance you (and your users) are after?
It all starts with the hardware. Reputable hosting providers invest a lot of resources into ensuring they use modern servers and the latest available technology. There’s plenty of innovation going on, and its effects on loading speeds can be profound.
You often have a choice of several data centers, so you have the freedom to deploy your website close to its target audience. To boost speeds further, you can also configure your VPS to work with a CDN.
However, the biggest performance advantage of using a managed VPS is rooted in its guaranteed resources. The CPU cores, memory, and storage included in your plan are reserved for your server only. You don’t share them with anyone, so your site’s performance is not affected by other projects’ behavior or load.
Because you’re getting a managed service, you can also rely on your host’s technical experts to use their expertise and configure the server for the best possible performance.
Security Features
The managed VPS setup gives you an advantage from the very start. Although multiple VPS accounts are situated on the same physical server, virtualization technology means they are fully isolated. So, if another VPS on the same server is under attack, this won’t affect you in any way.
There’s more, though. When your server is deployed, the best possible security settings are automatically applied. They are chosen by your hosting provider’s technical specialists, so you can rely on their expertise to set everything up correctly.
In addition to the operating system’s core settings, there are other components keeping your website safe.
Almost every VPS package comes with a firewall, and when you choose a managed solution, your host’s technicians will configure it for you. They’ll also set up an automated backup system. If it’s properly configured, it will let you choose the backup interval and store your secure copies in an offsite location.
Depending on your package, you may also have additional systems that block DDoS attacks or scan your server for malware.
Scalability and Flexibility
If you use a shared hosting solution, you will (sooner rather than later) exceed its capacity, and you’ll have no option but to upgrade to a more powerful solution. Often, this means moving your entire website to a different server, which is never an easy job, even for a relatively small project.
Things aren’t much better if you opt for a dedicated server. If you choose a suitable configuration, a physical server can give you plenty of power, but it does have limits, and when they’re reached, your upgrade options are not exactly flexible. In fact, migrating the entire website to a more powerful machine is the only option again.
By contrast, upgrading your VPS solution is as easy as clicking the mouse a couple of times. The virtualization layer means hardware resources can be added and removed at will. The process depends on the type of virtualization, but it rarely takes more than a couple of minutes and usually requires nothing more than a reboot.
On the right infrastructure, the sky literally is the limit, as well. Some hosting providers deploy their VPS solutions in a cloud environment. This means that instead of taking individual physical servers and partitioning them into multiple smaller virtual ones, they build a cluster of physical machines (called a cloud). Effectively, the cloud is a pool of hardware resources that can be distributed among customers’ accounts.
If the pool runs out, the host can easily add more physical nodes and expand it. The upshot is that your VPS can grow virtually infinitely.
No other form of hosting gives you this sort of flexibility.
Expert Support
The job of a managed VPS hosting provider is twofold. On the one hand, it has to deploy your virtual machine and ensure it’s up and running. On the other, it must ensure your VPS gives you excellent performance and security. All this without burdening you with any complicated tasks.
During the initial configuration, your host’s technical experts must set everything up and choose the correct settings to ensure you can start work on your website immediately. Their job doesn’t end there, though.
While you build a modern online business based on the latest and greatest technology, your host’s focus will be on ensuring your demands. This means implementing support for new versions of the programming language and database systems, updating the firewall settings to keep up with the latest cybersecurity trends, and tweaking the core configuration to extract every last drop of available performance.
Another critical job your host’s technicians deal with is installing security patches. The operating system, the web server, and all other core components could be excellent attack vectors if the security vulnerabilities aren’t fixed in time.
All in all, when you use a managed VPS, your hosting provider’s technical support experts play an active part in keeping your website protected.
In addition to all this, many hosts offer an active monitoring service for your VPS. With it, an automated system keeps a close eye on every service running on your server and alerts your host’s technical team whenever there’s a problem.
Cost-Effectiveness of Managed VPS Hosting
A managed VPS isn’t the cheapest hosting solution out there. Shared plans go for as little as a few dollars per month, and self-managed virtual servers also tend to be more affordable. Why, then, is the managed option the preferred choice for many? Well, when you familiarize yourself with the service, you’ll see that paying a bit extra makes a lot of sense.
First, you have the hardware configuration. If your virtual server is deployed in a proper cloud environment, you can specify its resources according to your exact requirements. Then, as your project grows, you can upgrade only the components that are no longer adequate for the job. This means that you don’t need to pay for hardware resources you don’t use.
The other thing that makes a managed VPS such an enticing proposition is the amount of time and energy you save on deploying, configuring, and maintaining the server and the projects hosted on it.
You have a control panel with a graphical user interface, so you won’t need to spend hours trying to find the right command every time you need to modify your site.
In addition to all this, if you opt for a self-managed VPS, you have to configure and maintain the server yourself. If you don’t have the technical skills or resources, you’ll need an IT professional (or a team of IT professionals) to do the hard work for you.
All in all, despite its higher price tag, a managed VPS solution can save you a lot of money in the long run.
Conclusion
The advantages of managed VPS hosting may not be immediately clear to everyone, especially to those trying to build a website on a shoestring. On the face of it, you have multiple websites hosted on the same hardware, just like you do with a shared plan, but you’re paying a higher price.
However, once you understand how the service works, you’ll see that a VPS is a much more elaborate setup geared toward website owners who want maximum security and performance.
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