When you are first thinking about getting hosting for your business for the first time, it can definitely seem like a daunting decision. There are two choices – dedicated and shared – and it can just about make your head spin attempting to figure out which one makes the most sense. Of course, when it comes to shared vs dedicated hosting, research is key in order for you to make the best business decision, so here are some things to consider for each option:
Dedicated Hosting Defined
Dedicated hosting is a situation where you host your website on a single server that you fully own and is tailored specifically to your website. Think of dedicated hosting like living in your own house. No one else owns it but you. However, with every other type of hosting, it’s more like you live in an apartment building instead of a house. With dedicated hosting, you will have more control over where you can go with the website, just like you would have more control over how to decorate your house or remodel it. Of course, you must have some maintenance knowledge if you are going to properly run a dedicated hosting system.
Additionally, dedicated hosting is a good option to go with if you are concerned about privacy. They are fully devoted to the HIPAA law, which was passed in 1996. According to Joe Oesterling, Chief Technology Officer at Liquid Web, “HIPAA has requirements in place for limiting the access to personal information found on a dedicated server.”
Shared Hosting Defined
Shared hosting is a website hosting method where multiple websites are hosted on just one platform. The best metaphor that we can use here would have to be that shared hosting is akin to a public bus system simply because it is inexpensive to use. However, you will have to share resources with many other users on the system. In the case of shared website hosting, you are often looking at hundreds or even thousands of different websites being hosted on just one server. This obviously can create many advantages and disadvantages.
First of all, one advantage to shared hosting is that the costs are lower. Moreover, in order to engage in shared hosting you usually don’t need to have very high technical skills. This is probably one of the main reasons why most people utilize shared hosting when they start their first website. Not to mention the fact that a shared hosting platform will always come with a handy control panel. However, there are also some disadvantages to shared hosting, including the fact that you have to share your server resources with a multitude of other people. And that there would be higher security risks for this type of hosting.
Dedicated hosting vs. shared hosting: what are the differences?
The best way to sum up the differences between dedicated hosting and shared hosting can be summed up in one word: traffic. If you are expecting your website to have a lot of traffic, you probably should go with a dedicated server. Now, this obviously means that you will either need to teach yourself the technical skills to go with operating a dedicated server or you will need to hire an IT expert. On the other finger, if you are only expecting your website to have only small-to-moderate traffic, you probably would be just fine with a shared server.