What is VPS?

In our last post, we talked about different types of servers in web hosting. The first category was “Shared hosting” which we have explained about it fully in that post. In this post, we are going to explain about the second category which is VPS.

VPS stands for Virtual Private Server and is a type of service that a web hosting company provides. The web hosting company (like AiroServer.com) installs a virtualization software like VMware on a server and by using that, they divide the server into multiple virtual machines. Let’s give you an example, imagine there is a server that has 100GB of hard disk, 32GB RAM and etc. You can divide this server into 4 (more or less) VPS and give each 25GB of disk and 8GB of RAM and etc.

In a virtualization software, you can choose and manage how much of the hardware each machine (VPS) can choose. So, this means that virtuals servers are customizable and all of the existing virtual servers in a server, might vary in the amount of hardware they use.

These virtual machines act as a small dedicated server. Each VPS has its own operating system and the client has full control over it like dedicated and can install any software on it or use it however they want. However, they are smaller than a dedicated server in hardware resources and they can be more affordable according to your usages. After a while and if you need more resources, it might be a better and more efficient idea to switch to dedicated services.

Shared hosting vs. VPS

In both shared hosting and VPS you are basically sharing one server with other clients. However, in shared hosting, as we have explained before, you are sharing all of the resources and there is no limit unless the provider warns you for using too much. In VPS you are all in one server but you have specific shares of resources and you have root access to your virtual server. Let’s explain this with an example: Shared hosting is like all clients are living in one room and they are sharing all of the resources and space. But for VPS, It’s like there is an apartment (server) and each client has their own unit with specified space and resources.

In our next post, we are going to explain about ” Dedicated servers”.

Hope you enjoyed this post if you did visit our blog for more.