The hosting package plays a significant role in leveraging the full potential of a website. The web hosting Dubai industry offers a myriad of hosting solutions with unique set of features that fit the requirements of any website. But the challenge is to find the right kind of hosting solution from all the offers. 

For a mid-large scale business website, the options come down to either Virtual Private Server (VPS) hosting or Cloud hosting. Because these two hosting solutions offer great benefits, it won’t be easy to choose one. Basically it will depend on the following factors.

• The resources you are going to need to run the website
  
• The services you need to keep it functioning
  
• Your expected business growth rate 
  

Let’s assess the strengths and weaknesses of cloud and VPS hosting to give you an idea of what each can do for your website.

Control and Security

VPS hosting is a variant of dedicated hosting or is similar to the latter. You will have control of all the server resources allocated to your hosting account. Cloud services, on the other hand, may save your data in different servers though they are easily accessible. But this means that you will have only a limited control on the security. 

Data is centralized in a VPS server. You will be able to run the OS you prefer for your own server, and can configure firewalls and antivirus programs, meaning you will have comparatively more control over the security aspect. However, you won’t be able to change the settings shared by other users of the physical server (yours will be a virtual server – a part of the physical server).

Flexibility and Scalability 

If you prioritize scalability over security and control, cloud server would be the better option. For changing needs, it’s better to use cloud hosting. Though cloud hosting solutions are normally highly scalable, scalability in VPS hosting is quicker. 

Assuming that the physical server has enough resources to support your upgrade, your VPS can access more resources as soon as your need changes. It allows instant upgrade of processing speed, memory and disk space. However, if the resources aren’t readily available in the physical server, you may have to move to a new server, with a risk of server downtime during the migration. In the case of a cloud server, there is no downtime as it uses multiple servers. 

You will be able to control your applications in both types of servers. But VPS hosting takes the prize for its additional flexibility that gives you control over the memory, disk space, and processor usage. 

Data Protection and Performance

As mentioned before, data is centralized in VPS servers, while cloud servers save data in multiple disks. If the disk in a VPS server gets corrupted, you might lose your data for good unless you have backups. In cloud servers, that isn’t going to be a problem as it’s less likely that all the disks in a cloud server (where you data are stored) go down. 

Cloud servers provide better data protection. In VPS servers, it is easier for you to configure routine backups that won’t consume a lot of resources. This means the system will perform the backups on schedule without you having to bother about it. 

In VPS hosting, you get the resources you paid for. Yours will be a virtual partition of a single physical server which would be housing other users in their own virtual private servers. So if all users extensively use the resources of the physical server, it may affect your VPS as well. There could be slower response time when it comes to running applications and moving data.

Cloud hosting uses multiple servers to store data. So even if a single server goes down, it won’t affect the performance of the website. It scales during peak use periods.  

Cost

For businesses with a budget to spend on hosting services, VPS would be a better option. You will be charged based on the amount of resources you use, while cloud servers charge you for the time your server stays online. Your website resource utilization may sometimes exceed the resources allocated to your VPS. But a cloud server practically has access to unlimited resources. The overall cost of a cloud server will be lesser than that of a VPS server of similar standard. 

With that said, it will ultimately come down to your priorities. You will have to consider your budget, server performance requirements, control etc. to make a choice.