A Beginner’s Guide to Virtual Private Server

What Is a Virtual Private Server?

Firstly, let’s describe what VPS stands for—the virtual private server. In Layman’s words, a server is a powerful device that holds all the data and files that make up the website. When someone enters your domain name in their web browser, the strong machine “serves” your website to the browser screen. Now for the virtual aspect: VPS uses virtualization technologies to break the one strong server we’ve just been talking about into several virtual servers. Think of it this way: it’s one piece of physical hardware that acts as a few different servers. The word “private” means exactly as it means. Your virtual server is reserved for you, so you don’t need to share RAM, CPU, or other data with other users.

How Does VPS Work?

VPS Hosting simulates the experience of a dedicated server even though you also share a physical server with other users.

Your web hosting company adds a virtual layer on the top of the server’s operating system (OS) using virtualization technologies. Separating the server into separate virtual wall compartments, this layer allows each user to install their OS and applications.

Since VPS removes the files from other users on the OS level, it is a private server. This means the website is within a protected layer with guaranteed resources. You don’t have to share any of it with others.

How is VPS Compared to Shared Hosting & Dedicated Hosting

This ensures that the website resides inside a protected container of guaranteed resources—think memory, storage space, CPU cores, etc. You don’t have to do all of this with anyone. To truly understand how VPS functions, it’s important to get acquainted with some of the fundamentals of web hosting, and other similar plans. Here is a short explanation of the distinctions between shared, dedicated, and VPS hosting.

Shared Hosting

Shared hosting is the most popular type of web hosting and fits well for many new website owners. If you buy a shared hosting package, you share main services including CPU, RAM, and hard disk space with other website owners using the same cloud.

Let’s use the comparison to make this idea a bit easier to understand. Think about a shared server as a big apartment complex, and all apartments are reserved from other website users. You all need a house to live in—just like the files on your website—but moving out to buy a large family home will be too expensive to satisfy your needs. Sharing common areas and services in an apartment block tends to keep prices down. And the same is true of cooperative hosting. There are a few downsides to shared hosting, though, mainly because you share. For eg, if someone else has a big traffic surge on your shared server, this might impact the output of your website. However, if you just got your website off the ground and don’t have a big traffic rate, shared hosting is a perfect way to get online!

Dedicated Hosting

Dedicated hosting is just the reverse of shared hosting. Instead of pooling services (and exchanging costs) with other website operators, you have a dedicated server reserved for your website only.

Sounds nice, doesn’t it? The catch is that it’s more expensive, but you have 100% leverage of your resources and you can tailor the app to suit your particular needs. This type of hosting kit is ideally suited to websites with robust technological specifications. For eg, dedicated hosting could be right for you if:

• You’re getting a lot of traffic every day.
• You ought to install your operating system.
• You manage thousands of banking transfers.
• Your website needs custom tools.

VPS Hosting

VPS hosting is between cooperative and dedicated. When you choose a virtual private server, there will be other websites hosted on the same hardware as yours (remember the strong server we spoke about earlier?).

But—and this is a major one—the website is the only domain given to your unique virtual compartment. And that means you’re having your operating system, dedicated storage, efficient CPU, scalable RAM, and unrestricted bandwidth.

For a VPS, you’re receiving a lot of advantages from a dedicated server—for an inexpensive price. In short, VPS hosting is going to give you more bang for your buck.