Choosing Between Shared Hosting and Dedicated Hosting

If you think of shared hosting as public transportation, dedicated hosting is like traveling in a rented car all by yourself. With public transportation, you don’t have control over the number of stops, speed, what music it plays, etc. But with a rented car, you have complete control of where to stop, what music is played, and travel at your own speed.

Let’s take a look at how both these types of hosting stack up against each other with respect to certain factors as explained below:

• Customization & Flexibility

When it comes to customizing the server, it is often not possible with shared hosting. Since the server is shared with multiple clients/websites, any changes done will also have an impact on others as well. While some allow for having extended storage or additional FTP users, beyond that customization with shared hosting is a big question.

With dedicated hosting, you are in complete control of the server. Since it is not shared with anyone, you are free to install the required software, tools, and utilities and configure the environment to your liking. 

• Reliability

One of the major drawbacks of shared hosting is frequent slowdowns and downtimes. There could be many reasons behind the slowdown as other websites could have huge traffic and using up the processing power of the server more. Faulty coding and server crashing down due to other issues can create a slowdown on the server.

Large enterprises with high volumes of traffic, generally prefer dedicated hosting as it is reliable and withstand extreme traffic as well. If you need more processing power, you can increase it as well.

• Security

When it comes to security, hosting your website with shared hosting servers will increase the chances of cyberattacks. Since the server is shared with hundreds of other clients, there is every possibility of a security breach.

If you are concerned about security, then you should definitely go for dedicated hosting. With dedicated hosting, you can install all the needed security and software to protect your server against cyberattacks.

• Scalability

Another major drawback of shared hosting is that they are not scalable. Even though some shared hosting providers offer scalable bandwidth, it is not the case with everyone. Hence, if you are seeing increased traffic to your website and want to scale it up, it could be a problem with shared hosting. Either you need to move your files to another server with more resources and bandwidth or opt for dedicated hosting.

On the other hand, dedicated hosting is highly scalable according to HostingSprout as you have complete control over the server. Hence, you can install or increase any resources you need to scale your website.

• Cost Factor

When it comes to the cost factor, shared hosting could be the clear winner. If you are just a startup company or hosting your personal portfolio, then you can always go for shared hosting. Generally shared hosting costs will vary anywhere between $5-$25 a month. But with dedicated hosting, the costs could be very high in the range between $300-$350 a month. If you need additional resources, then you need to pay extra for in dedicated hosting. But if you are a large enterprise or have a website with huge traffic, then shared hosting is not an option.

• Technical Knowledge

Even though you need to have some knowledge about how to copy/move files around, with shared hosting, everything is configured. All you need to do is move your files to the server and you are done with the hosting. It is the hosting company that takes care of installing the OS, software, etc. Hence, you don’t need to have much technical knowledge when it comes to shared hosting.

With dedicated hosting, you will be allotted a separate server and you will have complete control over the server. If there are any issues with the server, then you will need to check and resolve the issue. Hence, technical knowledge of handling and maintaining a server is required if you opt for dedicated hosting.