5 Surprising Benefits of Using VPS Hosting for a Joomla Website

If your Joomla website has outgrown its shared hosting plan, it’s time for you to upgrade to another plan that will enable the site to function at its full capacity. One of the reasons why you chose Joomla in the first place is because of its enhanced performance. It would be a shame if your site was designed to handle large amounts of traffic but the hosting plan could not accommodate it, especially if traffic translates to revenues.

In the past, your only option would be to enroll in a costly dedicated hosting plan. Having a dedicated server for your site would definitely solve any problems on resource usage, but then, the site’s revenues might not be enough to pay for such a plan just yet. Fortunately, virtual private servers (VPS) are available and they’ll be the perfect solution for a person in your situation. Here are some advantages of VPS hosting for a Joomla site.

1. Performance – The major drawback of shared hosting is that it severely limits the amounts of resources you can use on the server. With virtual private servers, your site will be able to use much more resources, even when several VPS plans are functioning on a single physical server. However, don’t expect that you’ll be able to use the same amount of resources that would be available on a dedicated server hosting plan.

2. Savings – One of the biggest advantages of VPS hosting is savings. If you compare cost versus performance, a VPS will certainly be more cost efficient than a dedicated server, especially in your situation. There may come a time when you’ll need a dedicated server, but that will only be when the website is earning a considerable amount of revenue. For now, it’s important to save as much as you can and virtual private servers will allow you to do this. You’ll be receiving almost the same performance of a dedicated server at a considerably low amount.

3. Scalability – Every website has its ups and downs. There will be times when you get a sudden surge of traffic, and times when you won’t need as much resources from the server. With virtual private servers, you won’t have to worry about the resources you use since it’s configured to allow you a bigger amount of resources when you need it. When your site starts maxing out the allotted resources, it may be time to move on.

4. Control – With Joomla, you have a lot of control over your site, even without technical expertise. It’s the same thing with virtual private servers. You’ll be provided with total control over the VPS, including what software to run. Having total control on every aspect of the site and the server gives you the freedom to do what you please.

Additionally, since Joomla and Linux are both open source software, your site will be able to take advantage of the developments in the open source community.

5. Security – One of the worst nightmares of every website owner is a site going down because of attacks. Joomla has quite a number of security measures that ensures the site is safe from common attacks. If you add this to the security of virtual private servers and a Linux OS (if you intend to use one), your site is practically impenetrable. However, security is like a chain that is only as strong as its weakest link. In many cases, the human factor is the weakest link so it will be up to you to ensure that your security processes are in place and are function if you intend to secure your Joomla based website running on Linux VPS.

Joomla and Linux VPS provides the versatility that every website owner, administrator, or developer needs to ensure that the site is functioning at its peak all the time. A site’s reputation is not only dependant on its content, but also on its reliability. Your website may have high rankings on Google, but if it’s not reliable, then you won’t be able to expect that visitors will bookmark your pages.

The key to reliability is having a great combination of a content management system like Joomla, and a fast and secure hosting plan, like a VPS. If you add excellent site administration skills, then you’ve created a site that your visitors can trust and rely on.

So, if you’re not ready to upgrade to a dedicated server just yet, but you need room to see how much the site can improve in terms of traffic, then virtual private servers are the best solution. Its cost effectiveness provides you with as much resources you’ll need to see if you’ll reach the point where you’ll need a dedicated server. By that time, the cost of a dedicated server will not be a heavy burden.