Which Should It Be: VPS or Dedicated Server?

When developing your company’s IT infrastructure, you will first need to determine your server’s infrastructure. Virtual private servers and dedicated servers are two of the major server solutions available. They are extremely similar in some aspects, but have some marked differences that make each solution better for different situations.

What is the difference between a Virtual Private Server and a Dedicated Server?

Virtual private servers are virtual servers that appear in all aspects to be identical to dedicated servers. However, multiple virtual private servers can run on a single hardware machine. Functionally, a VPS can do anything that a dedicated server can do and is usually a fraction of the cost. However, users of a VPS do need to share their system resources with the other virtual private servers on the system.

A dedicated server is a machine that is running a single server solution. Dedicated servers are more expensive than virtual private servers but the server installation can use all the resources on the system. Having multiple dedicated servers rather than multiple virtual private servers means that the entire system won’t go down if the physical server goes down.

Should you choose a VPS or a Dedicated Server?

If you need the flexibility and options of a server but don’t require significant system resources and don’t have a large budget, a VPS is the best solution. Virtual private servers offer all of the benefits of a dedicated server at costs that approach shared hosting. However, if you need more resources and have a bigger IT budget, a dedicated server may be a better solution. If you rely heavily on your server system and thus need to have a backup server, you may want to have redundant dedicated servers rather than virtual private servers. It’s also important to remember that a dedicated server is often more secure than a virtual private server.

Considerations when choosing between VPS and Dedicated Servers

When choosing between the two hosting solutions, you also need to consider your future technology concerns. If your company will need to rely more on technology in the future, you may want to move towards a dedicated system. However, if you company may benefit from multiple virtual private solutions on a single server, you might want to use a VPS infrastructure and expand it as necessary. You should also consider your budget. A dedicated server requires a larger upfront cost than a VPS but the ownership costs drop off over time while VPS costs will remain static. It’s also important to remember that there are other options as well, such as cloud hosting solutions and shared hosting.

As long as you’re aware of your company’s needs, the choice between a dedicated server and a virtual private server should be a fairly simple one. You should also remember that you can switch between the two technologies fairly easily as long as you prepare for the migration in advance. It’s more than possible that you could host your company’s applications on a virtual private server until you outgrow the virtual private server and then transition to an on-site dedicated server when your infrastructure expands. Likewise, you can transition from a dedicated server to a virtual private server if you find that the benefits of a VPS have outweighed the drawbacks.