When does a WP site need a VPS hosting?

Mostly my wordpress sites started with a shared hosting and I could remember when I transferred them to a VPS, maybe I learned VPS hosting after 2 months and I knew how to setup, maintain it, since that I have started moving sites to a VPS. Does this reason make sense to move a WP site to a VPS hosting or there are others to move sites to VPS hosting or higher packages?

Hi Kaz,

I would say you have 2 main reasons to transfer WP sites to a VPS

1. Performance (but good shared hosting will out perform a lowend VPS)
2. Control

What you need to analyze is because your website is having problems in shared hosting. Sometimes an optimization on your website already solves the problem, now you have a high volume of visits and suffers from constant falls in the case of switching to a VPS.

Shared hosting has less resources than a VPS, so on a VPS WordPress can perform better. Also on VPS you will have full control so you will be able to configure it for best performance.

So when you need best performance for your wordpress website you need VPS

I agree with all of the above, shared hosting have less resources then VPS and only well optimized WP will last on shared hosting until high volume hits WP and performance decrease.
Then is time to go on better hosting i.e. VPS and when VPS not enough then you need dedi. Servers have full control and can be configure for best WP performance.

StackNetwork said:

Shared hosting has less resources than a VPS, so on a VPS WordPress can perform better. Also on VPS you will have full control so you will be able to configure it for best performance.

So when you need best performance for your wordpress website you need VPS

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GswHosting said:

I agree with all of the above, shared hosting have less resources then VPS and only well optimized WP will last on shared hosting until high volume hits WP and performance decrease.
Then is time to go on better hosting i.e. VPS and when VPS not enough then you need dedi. Servers have full control and can bi configure for best WP performance.

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I'm sorry, but this is terrible advice.

A) A VPS is not always better then shared hosting. It depends on the resources offered in each.
B) There are plenty of high quality shred hosts that can outperform same priced VPS plans.
C) "full control" is not better for everyone. A large number of WP users do not have the skill set to self manage a VPS, adding extra burden and/or expense.

Saying VPS is better in every situation is like someone wanting a truck for hauling equipment, and you tell them to get a Ferrari because it is "better".

Yes, there are benefits to using a VPS. That is why we offer shared and VPS plans. However, just because a VPS can be "better", that does not mean it is better for everyone.

Not all VPS's are created equal. There are a lot of quality VPS providers, and there are a lot of low quality VPS providers. Some are oversold, some are not. Some give dedicated resources, some share all resources.

I dont know when it why it started, but I have noticed a trend in the hosting industry of way too many companies and users user the blanket phrase "VPS is better", which is simply not true for everyone.

If you have a high traffic site, need to use a lot of plugins, or have a need for root access, sure, VPS is probably the best option.
However, a hosting provider saying that a Wordpress site should be on a VPS or it won't perform well, comes across as simply trying to discredit shared hosting in a attempt to boost VPS sales.

If your website NEEDS to be on a VPS, then by all means, spend the money for a VPS. If you WANT to have a VPS for the experience or control, then do it if that makes you happy. Paying for a VPS plan because someone convinced you they are "better", is just wasting money due to poor advice.

No one here says that VPS is a must. I don't know why and how did some people think that we are promoting VPS, it is logical when shared hosting isn't enough you have to think about upgrades.
There is lot of good shared hosting and some of them have options to upgrade shared hosting in way that you can buy more CPU usage, disk space, bandwidth, MySQL space, web accelerators like Varnish, Memcached and Node.js.
Ofc there is option to use CloudFlare, CDN for images videos etc.
But many people (experienced or not) takes VPS when they know that their shared hosting isn't enough.

As OP says he have some knowledge and He want to know when is good to move websites on VPS or higher packages and why.

Short answer will be: When you see that your currently hosting packages can't satisfied websites needs you will look for better solution or higher packages.

The most simplified answer, as some have already said, are:

1. Traffic
2. Space

When you use more space than you have, and have more traffic loading up precious bandwidth, then your upgrade to VPS is justified.

The main difference between a VPS and a (strong) shared hosting plan would be, in most cases, SSH access.
Most hosting companies will allow you to upgrade to a higher shared hosting plan and only pay for a difference.
You will have almost the same performance between a premium shared hosting plan and a low-medium VPS (that will most likely cost you double the price or so)
The costs for a VPS will grow if you want a cPanel/WHM license (cpanel/whm is included in shared/reseller hosting plans), also support for VPS will probably cost you more.
Purchasing a managed VPS will increase the costs even more.

Bottom line: Unless you are hitting the resource limits on your shared hosting there really is no need for a VPS, unless you are expecting higher than usual traffic - that you know your Shared hosting plan can't handle

LJSHost said:

Hi Kaz,
2. Control

Click to expand...

What "control" are you wanting to say to? control VPS or controlling Wp site?

RDO Servers said:

A) A VPS is not always better then shared hosting. It depends on the resources offered in each.

Click to expand...

I don't agree with this, if a VPS could not be better than a VPS why its price is always higher a shared hosting and on a VPS package they always offer better features over a shared hosting did.

EpicGlobalWeb said:

The most simplified answer, as some have already said, are:

1. Traffic
2. Space

When you use more space than you have, and have more traffic loading up precious bandwidth, then your upgrade to VPS is justified.

Click to expand...

What are traffic and space, can you show more details on what you are saying to?

MattDemon said:

The main difference between a VPS and a (strong) shared hosting plan would be, in most cases, SSH access.

Click to expand...

At least I think SSH access is an advantage of the VPS over a shared hosting, mostly shared hosting packages didn't allow ssh access, even if you require to have that then it is impossible with many web hosting providers.

Kaz Wolfe said:

What "control" are you wanting to say to? control VPS or controlling Wp site?

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By control, I think LJSHost mean you can setup what you want on your VPS to make your WordPress running faster, that's not the case with a shared hosting, you are limited by the software provided by your hosting company.

I don't agree with this, if a VPS could not be better than a VPS why its price is always higher a shared hosting and on a VPS package they always offer better features over a shared hosting did.

Click to expand...

The main feature of a VPS is the ability to setup yourself your web server but if you don't have any server management skills, a bad setup could be slower than a shared hosting.

What are traffic and space, can you show more details on what you are saying to?

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I don't understand that point, a VPS with SSD have often less storage than a shared hosting, and a very similar bandwith/trafic.

At least I think SSH access is an advantage of the VPS over a shared hosting, mostly shared hosting packages didn't allow ssh access, even if you require to have that then it is impossible with many web hosting providers.

Click to expand...

Yes that's the main feature of a VPS, you can setup what you want to host your wordpress website and if you know how to setup your VPS, you will have better performances for the same price than a shared hosting. But I'm talking here of unmanaged VPS with just Centos/Debian/Ubuntu. If you add a control panel it will cost more, and be slower than a custom setup.

From our point of view when comparing high end VPS with high-end shared , VPS will always win the game.

Speed, resources of RAM/CPU/IO (Ignoring Storage which is not the case here) and security ofc.

High end VPS = Better IO/, Dedicated CPU/RAM , Higher bandwidth speeds and security**. Period.

The only situation when (except security) shared hosting have the same or better performance is when the used server is high end with ~100 - 300 average websites and average traffic. Something that is not the case with Oversellers e.g unlimited everything for $5/mo


**VPS environments can be good solutions, and when deployed correctly,can provide a higher level of options around security and configurations. However, it requires a heightened level of knowledge in a wide range of things like systems administration, security, and general website maintenance.It's not ideal for most small businesses that don't have staff capable of correctly configuring and monitoring, let alone everyday website owners.

If you are running personal blog then you have no reason for moving to VPS or starting with VPS. If you are business, running commercial site.. if you can't manage VPS alone then you hire sys.admin or pay for managed hosting.. is VPS to expensive for your commercial website? Shut it down and start selling on ebay.

Simple as that...

Hey Cheerag,
From "personal blogs" we mean "MyCatBlog.com" with average daily traffic of 3 :tam: (me,my girl and my mom).

CyberHour said:

Hey Cheerag,
From "personal blogs" we mean "MyCatBlog.com" with average daily traffic of 3 :tam: (me,my girl and my mom).

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For that kind personal blog people use free blog platforms blogger or Wordpress.com.
When personal blog have tons of traffic, then it isn't personal anymore. Now how much daily / monthly traffic can handle shared web hosting depends how good hosting is.

I read somewhere that some ppl have problems with 16+K visitor daily on dedicated server, wp site, and support told user to buy another instead to offer sys.admin solution. Yes for them is better to have another $300+/mo.

At least I think SSH access is an advantage of the VPS over a shared hosting, mostly shared hosting packages didn't allow ssh access, even if you require to have that then it is impossible with many web hosting providers.

Click to expand...

There is shared hosting where you can get/buy SSH as advanced feature (if you need).

We are pretty sure that our reply was going for Cheerag

"For that kind personal blog people use free blog platforms blogger or Wordpress.com."

You can't image the amount of "MyCatBlog.com" we are hosting. Only idiot would use freebie hosting for personal art (and any other project) unless ofc he doesn't give a X Y Z for it . No? https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/jul/14/dennis-cooper-google-censorship-dc-blog ofc after lot of headache his blog was re-launched https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/aug/31/dennis-cooper-dcs-blog-relaunched-google-censorship and actually he was lucky because he is known person and his case hit the viral bell.

"I read somewhere that some ppl have problems with 16+K visitor daily on dedicated server, wp site, and support told user to buy another instead to offer sys.admin solution. Yes for them is better to have another $300+/mo."

Sorry but can't image high-end dedi which can't handle 750-830 visits/h!!. VPS can handle such traffic Sound like lowend~average dedi with average to none optimisation . Of course for provider is always better to sell one more dedi than spending 1-2h which is one time work

Anyway the OP question is not related to others optimisation fails