If you’re looking to upgrade from your shared hosting plan to a VPS (Virtual Private Server) package, chances are your website is starting to do traffic numbers that exceed the capacity of your current plan. So, first, congrats! Now, it’s time to choose a VPS provider and this is the only guide you’ll need!
I like to call VPS hosting “the poor man’s dedicated hosting” – basically, with a VPS plan, you get to enjoy the perks of dedicated hosting – resources reserved just for you, exceptional scalability, exclusive IPs, you name it – for just a few dollars per month more than what you’re used to with a shared plan.
However, like shared hosting, VPS is also incredibly common and thanks to the thousands of hosting providers on the market, your options can be overwhelming. But you don’t have to worry, that’s what this guide is for.
We’ll expand on how VPS hosting works, who should consider buying a VPS hosting plan, and then show you the 10 very best VPS hosting providers in 2024 and the qualities that make each provider stand out in the market. At the end of this guide, you’ll be armed with all the necessary info to zero in on the VPS provider just for you.
10 Best VPS Hosting Providers At A Glance
Hostinger
BlueHost
ScalaHosting
A2Hosting
Ultahost
Stablehost
Verpex
DreamHost
HostGator
IONOS
What Is VPS Hosting and How Does It Work?
VPS (Virtual Private Server) hosting combines the best of both worlds of shared hosting and dedicated hosting. In a VPS hosting environment, you still share a physical server with other websites, however, using virtualization technology, the physical server is ‘split’ into several virtual machines or servers, each with its own dedicated amount of resources – RAM, storage, CPU.
When you pay for a VPS hosting plan, the entirety of the virtual server’s resources are dedicated to your website. Each virtual server acts as a completely independent machine and can have different operating systems, storage space, etc., even though they are all on the same physical server.
A key difference between VPS hosting and shared hosting is there are usually far less websites hosted in a VPS environment (typically 5-20) on one server than in a shared plan where hundreds of websites share one server.
So when you really think about it, a VPS hosting plan is actually a form of ‘dedicated hosting’ only that you still share the same physical server. VPS hosting also gives website owners benefits like dedicated IPs – each virtual server can have its own IP address, shielding you from the consequences of your neighbors being flagged by search engines.
Who Is VPS Hosting For?
VPS hosting is the most popular kind of hosting for websites looking to upgrade from their shared hosting plan. If your website’s traffic is growing rapidly and you’re having more frequent disruptions, it may be time for a VPS hosting plan.
The virtualization technology that powers VPS hosting also makes it incredibly scalable. Many hosting providers allow you to adjust the amount of resources you want per time, hence VPS hosting makes a lot of sense for websites that experience traffic spikes often – e.g: eCommerce stores during seasonal sales and discount holidays.
VPS hosting is also more secure than shared hosting. Each virtual server is independent of the others, hence, attacks on one website will not affect your own website. This makes VPS hosting great for websites that need premium security – websites and databases that store sensitive customer data.
The 10 Best VPS Hosting Providers in 2024
Decided that a VPS plan is right for you? Ready to see our list of the very best VPS hosting providers? Let’s dive right in!
With Hostinger’s most basic VPS plan starting at $4.99/month, the provider gives most others a run for their money. Hostinger offers four VPS hosting packages KVM 1, KVM 2, KVM 4, and KVM 8 giving you 1-8 vCPUs, 4-32 GB RAM, 50-400 GB high-performance NVMe storage, and between 4-32 GB of bandwidth.
Every VPS plan with Hostinger promises premium performance with AMD processors and their KVM virtualization ensures that the hardware resources allocated to you are exclusively yours. Hostinger’s servers also peak at a record speed of 300 megabytes per second, making them excellent for resource-demanding tasks like gaming and streaming.
Backups of your website are taken weekly and should you encounter any errors, you can easily restore your website to a previous version. Hostinger’s VPS plans also allow you to choose the operating system you want to use as well as your control panel, giving you even more customization options.
A built-in firewall comes with all VPS plans for excellent DDoS protection. And what’s more? Hostinger allows you to upgrade your plans to a higher tier easily as your website grows.
One unique feature that comes with Hostinger’s VPS plans is the built-in AI assistant that guides you through most tasks when setting up and managing your VPS account. You also get 1-click installs on the most popular OSs, control panels, and applications.
And finally, in terms of server footprint, Hostinger’s servers are spread across Asia, Europe, North America, and South America ensuring your website performs superbly wherever your target audience is. In my Hostinger review, the host’s servers responded in an impressive 243 ms and had a 30-day uptime of 100%.
Here’s why you should choose Hostinger:
- Their VPS plans are some of the most affordable
- You get access to their AI assistant
- 1-click installs for popular software
- Backups ensure website security
- Exceptionally scalable plans
- If you perform resource-demanding activities
Overall, if you are looking for a VPS plan on a budget that still delivers with premium features, Hostinger is your best bet!
Read Review →
Visit Hostinger →
2. BlueHost (Best pre-purchase support)
BlueHost is another well-known name in the hosting industry and is up there amongst the horde of VPS providers. BlueHost provides just three VPS hosting packages STANDARD, ENHANCED, and ULTIMATE, giving you between 2-8GB RAM, 120-240 SSD storage, and unmetered bandwidth on all plans.
With BlueHost’s VPS plans, you can host as many domain names as you want, have access to their signature VPS dashboard to manage your plans, all the while being backed by their 24/7 VPS-specialized support portal.
With your single BlueHost account you can manage your VPS plans as well as other services like shared and dedicated hosting, as you please. You are also granted root access and can create passwords for specific access to different environments in your servers. One thing I like about BlueHost’s VPS plans in particular is even before you pay for a package, you can reach out to their customer support agents via chat or phone call and get the best recommendations for your website.
In my BlueHost review, the host’s servers responded in 400 ms which is decent but not the most impressive. However, their 99.9% uptime guarantee is rock-solid.
Here’s why you should choose BlueHost:
- BlueHost is especially great for WordPress websites
- Website essentials are provided for free
- They offer many useful complementary services
- BlueHost is very beginner-friendly
- They boast excellent uptime
If your website is built on WordPress, then BlueHost may just be the best host for you.
Read Review →
Visit BlueHost →
3. ScalaHosting (Best custom VPS plans)
The ability to create custom plans just for you and your website is one feature I like to see and Scalahosting’s VPS plans are a cocktail of such great features. The host offers four VPS hosting packages Build 1, Build 2, Build 3, and Build 4, with Build 1 starting at $29.95/month.
You get 2-12 CPU cores, 4-24 GB RAM, 50-200 GB NVMe SSD storage, automatic backups, and unmetered bandwidth on all plans. And my favorite feature – Scalahosting allows you to build a custom VPS plan by setting the number of cores, amount of RAM, and storage you need.
Once you pay for one of their VPS plans, you have access to their support agents 24/7 via live chat or support ticket. What’s more? Migrating your website to Scalahosting is free of charge. They are also one of the very few hosts to offer an unconditional anytime money-back guarantee.
Managing your VPS plans and website in general is super easy with SPanel – Scalahosting’s native control panel. The provider also takes your security seriously – you get a free SSL certificate, their SShield firewall, powerful caching for faster website load speeds, remote daily backups, and anti-spam protection.
Scalahosting’s VPS plans are also especially great for developers giving you access to staging tools, tweak your PHP versions, web servers managers, a NodeJS manager, easy CloudFlare integration, and over 400 1-click installs, through SPanel.
Here’s why you should choose Scalahosting:
- Allows you to create custom plans
- Exceptionally developer-friendly
- SPanel is very easy to use and highly functional
- Offer free website migrations
- Anytime money back guarantee is unmatched
Choose Scalahosting if you want to be able to scale your resources at your own pace or if you are a web developer.
Read Review →
Visit Scalahosting →
4. A2Hosting (Best high-performance host)
A2Hosting is one of the most impressive VPS hosts on the market both in terms of performance and out-of-the-box features. They offer six managed VPS plans – three with their high-performance servers and three with the signature Turbo servers.
With these plans, you can get between 4-32 GB of RAM, 150-500 GB SSD or NVMe SSD storage, 2-8 CPU cores, and 2-4 TB data transfer. Their most basic VPS plan starts at $35.99/month while their Turbo basic plan starts at $54.99/month.
Some of the hosting goodies you get out-of-the-box – 24/7/365 support, free website migration by A2Hosting’s agents, free SSL certificates, the Imunify360 Security Suite, CloudLinux OS, and cPanel.
With A2Hosting’s managed VPS plans, the provider takes care of most of your website’s maintenance, sets up your security, and performance tweaks. You also get a free dedicated IP address that’s unique to your virtual server, ensuring a unique identity in the eyes of search engines.
A2Hosting’s unmanaged VPS plans are tuned for developers who are comfortable with code and want strong root access to customize their servers fully. In my A2Hosting review, the provider’s servers responded in an excellent 102 ms and also held up to their 99.9% guarantee proving their incredible performance.
Here’s why you should choose A2Hosting:
- Very powerful servers
- A2Hosting provides multi-channel support
- They provide a custom control panel for WordPress
- A2Hosting’s Turbo plans promise exceptional speed
- Free features out-of-the-box
- A2Hosting allows you to configure server locations.
Choose A2Hosting if you want high-performance servers and the most free features out-of-the-box.
Read Review →
Visit A2Hosting →
5. Ultahost (Best collaboration feature)
Ultahost is another provider that offers very affordable VPS hosting plans with their most basic VPS BASIC starting at $5.5/month. You get between 1-4 CPU cores, 1-6 GB RAM, 30-100 GB SSD NVMe storage, and a dedicated IP address on each plan.
Their VPS plans are categorized by the control panel you decide to use – Hestia & CyberPanel, Plesk and cPanel. And when setting up your plan, you can choose between 7 popular operating systems for your convenience.
On each of Ultahost’s VPS plans, you get unmetered bandwidth, a dedicated firewall, free backups, free SSL certificates, an IP whitelisting feature, their auto healing servers, the BitNinja Security suite, free website transfers, and a free CDN pre-installed. Your website data is also stored on SSD NVMe drives ensuring premium performance and you also get full root access for server-level configurations.
Another great feature that comes with Ultahost’s VPS plans is its team collaboration portal – you can conveniently share limited or full access to your VPS servers or applications among your team team members to enhance productivity and seamless workflow.
In terms of support, Ultahost connects you with its agents via live chat, an active community of customers and experts, an extensive knowledgebase, and a ticketing system. In my Ultahost review, the provider’s servers started sending data back in an impressive 128 ms, proving their high-speed performance.
Here’s why you should choose Ultahost:
- Their plans are very affordable
- Backups are free unlike many other providers
- They offer Node.JS socket
- Several operating system options
- Unique team collaboration feature
- Extensive support portals
Choose Ultahost if you want to grant other team members access to your server with specific roles.
Read Review →
Visit Ultahost →
Stablehost is another decent VPS host and provides only unmanaged VPS hosting split into five tiers. Their most basic plan VZ 1GB starts out at $10.95/month making them quite affordable.
You get between 1-16 of RAM, 1-8 CPU cores, 40-300 GB of storage, and 2-16 TB of data transfer across their plans. Stablehost’s SSD storage disks promise high performance and on each VPS plan, you are guaranteed level 3 customer support from trained agents.
With Stablehost’s VPS plans you are in charge of installing your own operating system. What’s more? You don’t get a control panel built-in, but you do get a VPS control panel that allows you to tweak your VPS package. To get cPanel, you’ll have to purchase their management add-ons which include a WHM/cPanel license.
All Stablehost’s VPS plans also come with SSH and full-root access giving you complete control over how you tweak your virtual server. If you are just getting into VPS hosting and are not code-savvy, Stablehost is probably not for you. However, if you are a web dev who wants command-line-level access, then you’d feel right at home.
In my Stablehost review, the web host’s servers sent the first byte of data in 300 ms which is dancing right on the line between ‘quick’ and ‘could be better’.
Here’s why you should choose Stablehost:
- Gives you total control over your servers
- No server setup fees included
- Straight-to-the-point VPS packages
- High-level customer support
Choose Stablehost if you want complete control over your servers – setup, security, management, control panel, etc. – as all their plans are unmanaged.
Read Review →
Visit StableHost →
Founded in 2018, Verpex is one of the new kids on the block, but their VPS hosting packages prove you can do great stuff in little time. Verpex offers managed and unmanaged VPS plans for Linux-based servers and Windows-based servers with their most basic managed Linux server starting at $23.4/month.
You get between 4-16 GB of RAM, 80-320 GB of SSD storage, and 2-8 Xeon CPU cores. And on every package, you enjoy high-performance NVMe disks, unmetered traffic, access to cPanel/WHM, and free daily backups.
Once you buy one of Verpex’s VPS plans, you have dedicated support agents who you can reach out to 24/7 via live chat and email. Their support will also give you a free consultation to help you choose the best hosting type and tier for your website.
Some of the other features you get include a free SSL and built-in firewalls for your website. You can also choose between cPanel, Plesk, or DirectAdmin for your account management. Daily backups ensure your website’s most recent data is stored so you can easily reverse changes to these restore points.
If there’s one other thing that makes Verpex stand out, it’s their server footprint. Their servers are spread across 12 data centers around the world, giving your website excellent performance to global users. In my Verpex review, the host’s servers responded in 400 ms which wasn’t as impressive as I expected but still decent overall.
Here’s why you should choose Verpex:
- Wide server footprint guarantees excellent performance
- Offers managed and unmanaged for Linux and Windows
- High-performance NVMe on all plans
- Free website migration and consultation
- Provides daily backups
Choose Verpex, especially if you are targeting a global audience for your business.
Read Review →
Visit Verpex →
Founded in 1996, DreamHost is one of the oldies on the market and gives you sage-level VPS hosting plans. Their VPS packages are mostly managed, taking the technical aspects of server management out of your hands, however you can still choose unmanaged plans. The provider has four VPS plans, with the most basic starting at $13.75/month for a yearly payment schedule.
1-8 GB of RAM, 30-240 GB of SSD storage, unmetered traffic, a free SSL certificate, and the ability to host unlimited websites are some of the great features you get. What’s more? DreamHost’s VPS plans allow you to create as many professional emails (@ yourdomain) as you need.
You can quickly scale your resource demand grows in between their VPS plans or to a completely different hosting category like cloud or dedicated hosting. DreamHost is also one of the few hosts on this list that give you a custom control panel, further simplifying your website management.
Some of the more advanced features include unlimited IP addresses, the ability to configure user access, 1-click installs for some of the most popular apps (WordPress and co.), SSH access, and several others. You can also easily reach out to DreamHost’s agents via live chat and email.
One slam-dunk feature I like about DreamHost is the sheer number of complementary services they offer. You can hire their experts for website design and branding, web development, website management, marketing services, and training.
Here’s why you should choose DreamHost:
- One of the most reputable hosts on the market
- They offer excellent complementary services
- Custom control panel is incredibly easy-to-use
- Unlimited email setups
Choose DreamHost if you want a web host that’s well known and also provides complementary services so you can consolidate all of your website’s critical infrastructure.
Visit DreamHost →
HostGator is another VPS hosting provider you should definitely consider – they offer three VPS hosting plans giving you between 2-8 GB RAM, 2-4 CPU cores, and 120-240 SSD storage – with their most basic plan starting at $36.99/month.
Unmetered bandwidth, free migration, unlimited domains and emails, make HostGator’s VPS plans a great choice. You also get full root access to configure your desired CMS, powerful Intel and AMD servers, the Softaculous script installer built-in, cPanel/WHM, and a free SSL.
As you’d expect, scaling your plans in between VPS packages is super convenient. HostGator also offers expert server guidance where an agent guides you through the server setup process. There are also a ton of advanced features for web devs and IT professionals who want even more control.
HostGator also has a thriving support hub, allowing you to reach out to their agents via phone, live chat, and Twitter(X).
Here’s why you should choose HostGator:
- Offers expert server setup guidance
- Unmetered bandwidth, domains and emails
- Softaculous installer for popular apps
- Thriving support hub
Visit HostGator →
IONOS is hands-down the most affordable VPS hosting provider on the market right now with their most basic VPS Linux XS plan starting at $2/month. You can enjoy between 1-24 GB RAM, 1-12 vCPU cores, and 10-640 GB SSD storage across their plans.
On every plan, your servers are backed by NVMe disks ensuring extremely low latency. I also like the fact that you can choose to pay per month or per year as your budget enables.
Some of the goodies? You can choose your preferred data center location, accommodate unmetered traffic, and up to 1 GBit/s bandwidth. For security, you get a free SSL certificate out-of-the-box, plus firewall management and an optional cloud backup solution for 6.5 cents per GB/month.
You can between several Linux and Windows operating systems, have access to Cloud Panel and cPanel, and can assign up to 2 email addresses with 2GB inbox storage each, and also have a free dedicated IP address assigned to you.
IONOS is also one of the very few hosts on the market that offers dedicated support. Once you buy one of their VPS plans, you have a particular support agent assigned to you and you can reach out via phone, chat and email, without paying any extra fees.
Here’s why you should choose IONOS:
- The most affordable VPS host on the market
- Offers dedicated support like no other
- Allows you to choose your data center location
- A wide range of VPS plans for easy scaling
- Comes with a ton of out-of-the-box features
Choose IONOS if you want the cheapest VPS hosting plans you can find, ever, but still don’t want to compromise on performance.
Visit IONOS →
How We Chose The Best VPS Hosting Providers
We’ve seen some of the very best VPS providers on the market so how did we choose them? What were some of the qualities we looked out for that can also help you zero in on the one for you out of these ten we listed? Let’s see them:
Server specs
The very essence of a VPS plan is to be the ideal upgrade from your shared plan for your growing website. When considering the VPS hosts, we focused on providers that gave you virtual servers with as much storage space, memory (RAM), number of CPUs (cores), and bandwidth as possible.
On our list, A2Hosting and IONOS offer the most storage at 500 GB and 640 GB respectively. We were also on the lookout for providers that gave you NVMe SSD storage for superior performance – NVMe (nonvolatile memory express) drives deliver the highest throughput or transfer data the quickest.
Pricing and plans
Another appeal of VPS plans is they give you the benefits of dedicated hosting at a steal, so choosing hosting providers that offer the most affordable VPS plans is important. IONOS, Hostinger, UltaHost, and StableHost are some of the most affordable VPS providers on the market with plans starting at $2/month, $4.99/month, $5.5/month and $10.95/month respectively.
With these VPS hosting plans, you don’t need to get a budget shock especially coming from a shared plan. You’ll only be paying a few $ extra per month for powerful VPS services.
Support
If you are migrating to a VPS hosting plan for the first time, you should only go for a managed plan. You also want a provider that handles as much as the technical aspects of your website for you and provides personalized support along the way.
All the providers we showcased give you support and access to their agents via one or several of these portals – live chat, phone, email, tickets, etc. They also have documented resources where you can find answers to commonly asked questions by other VPS customers for convenient self-service.
Scalability
And finally, we looked out for providers that allow you to upgrade your plans and scale your resources as your website grows to accommodate traffic. Some of the providers we also listed allow you to create custom plan to fine-tune the amount of resources you pay for even further and control how much you spend.
And their scalability isn’t restricted to VPS plans only. As your website grows even more, you’ll be able to conveniently transition to a cloud or dedicated hosting plan from these providers.
Credit: Source link
