If you’re a website owner who has grown your website or network of web sites to a point where you are attracting thousands of visitors per day you will probably need to start thinking about using a more powerful web hosting solution than shared or reseller hosting. The more obvious solution may be to go out and order a dedicated server but this option can be expensive one. If you can’t afford a dedicated server at this point but require the same performance and stability, then VPS hosting may be the best solution for you.

What is VPS hosting?

VPS (virtual private server) web hosting consists of a server divided into multiple isolated accounts, and each VPS account has its own independent operating system with it’s own web server and mail server resources, so there is no sharing of resources with other customers even though your accounts are on the same server. Just like a dedicated server, you can have access to all configuration files within your account which means a greater ability for you to install and run custom software should you choose to.

Generally speaking your VPS hosting account will cope with a high level of traffic. The best vps hosting accounts provide bandwidth allowance of 100’s of gigabytes which is usually more than enough for most purposes, even for for the busiest of websites.

In addition to allowing more traffic and providing more control over your hosting environment, VPS hosting accounts are generally more secure than shared hosting accounts. For example if a hacker were to attempt get access to websites on a shared server he could damage any or all of the websites on that server at once. But because a VPS server is divided into isolated accounts, even if a hacker were to successfully gain entry through one VPS account there is little chance of access to other accounts.

More experienced webmasters may wish to manage the technical aspects of managing their VPS accounts, but this can be a time-consuming and complicated task for some. It’s little wonder many people prefer to have their VPS web hosting accounts fully managed and monitored by the web hosting provider. Usually you’ll pay a few dollars per month extra for this, but this can free up your valuable time and energy to concentrate on content and website promotion.

How much does managed VPS hosting cost?

Virtual Private Server hosting will usually cost considerably less than a dedicated server. While a managed dedicated server might cost $150 per month or more, you can expect to pay $40-$50 per month for an entry-level, fully managed vps hosting account and this will allow you to run multiple sites from one account just like a reseller account. You’ll be provided with an operating system, control panel, your own allocation of RAM memory, plus large space and bandwidth resources. A minimum of 256MB guaranteed ram is suggested in order to run your control panels and database driven sites smoothly. For higher traffic sites consider 384MB or 512MB of guaranteed ram or more.