Cloud vs Shared Hosting: Pros, Cons & Which One You Should Use

Imagine buying a huge plot for your business and forgetting to set up. That is exactly how a website without hosting looks: the plans are ready, but nothing exists yet. Hosting acts as a foundation that keeps a business online and reachable by the target audience. Technically, today, people prefer shopping and scrolling through products and services online. If we were to put it in a simple phrase, it would be: every business owner needs a website. So the first question that you will definitely face is, what hosting should you go with? Essentially, there are two options available: Cloud Hosting and Shared Hosting. 

Let us get deep into how shared hosting differs from cloud hosting. One important note to remember here is that the website can only be as good as the hosting solution behind it. Let’s get started.

What is Shared Hosting? 

Shared Hosting is usually the preferred option for small businesses or beginners. Because it’s easy to navigate, affordable, and requires little to no technical knowledge. With shared hosting, your website shares server space with multiple other websites. It is like sharing a house with your roommates. It works well for smaller websites with minimal traffic and less inventory. But if your products/services increase or traffic surges, it can cause a load on the servers and slow down your website. 

What is Cloud Hosting?

Cloud hosting, on the other hand, is built for scalability and speed. Instead of relying on one physical server, your website is hosted on a network of servers. For starters, it spreads your website’s data out across different servers, which also means more stability and protection from downtime. If one server goes down, your website can be migrated to a different server in the network with little or no timeout. It’s ideal for e-commerce businesses with many products or any business that expects high traffic and needs a secure space.  

Cloud Hosting vs Shared Hosting: Pros and Cons

The key difference lies in how resources are allocated and managed.

Shared Hosting:

Pros:

1. Cheap: Being the cheapest hosting available, shared hosting is the best fit for small websites, bloggers, or entrepreneurs who have just started up with an extremely tight budget.
2. User friendly: Most hosting providers give you those one-click installations, simple dashboards, and customer support; very good if you’re not a tech person yourself.
3. Package deal: Free domains, free SSL certificates, and email accounts are bundled in with the package.

Cons:

1. Limited Resources: Because you have to share space with several websites, if any one of them uses up too many resources, your site will be slowed down. 
2. Performance: If there are sudden traffic spikes on either your website or anybody else’s website, it can cause severe lagging issues and lead to engagement drop. 
3. Less Secure: Being together on the same server means sharing security risks as well. It would mean that if one website on the server gets hacked, a few may also be conveniently compromised, so web security is negligible.

Cloud Hosting:

Pros: 

1. Scalability: Need more bandwidth or storage? Cloud hosting lets you scale up or down on the fly according to your requirements.
2. Better Performance: Load times are faster and experiences are smoother, thanks to many servers backing up your site. With cloud hosting, traffic handling is much easier. 
3. Stronger Security: Cloud servers are often prepared with extra security protocols and migration backups.

Cons: 

1. Expensive: Cloud hosting offers better performance and flexibility. And if your website demands that, it is worth it to invest in it. 
2. Technical Challenge: Cloud setup may require more technical knowledge or could require hiring a developer.
3. Pricing fluctuation: Certain providers bill a website based on usage, so if traffic increases or decreases, the bill also fluctuates.

Which one is better for your business?

The choice of hosting depends on your future plans for your business. When deciding upon a hosting solution, make sure that your choice is able to handle the current and projected traffic without reducing the quality of user experience.

If you are starting a personal blog, portfolio, or a small business with limited traffic, shared hosting is a cost-effective choice that gets you started while you figure things out. At the most basic level, shared hosting gives you all the essentials: you don’t pay much, and you don’t need to know a lot about the technical stuff. You can simply pay for what you need instead of paying for resources that you may never use. 

However, if you are building an e-commerce store, running a high-traffic website, or designing a site that operates a business that very much relies on uptime (speed), you should plan on investing in cloud hosting. It is designed for performance and growth, meaning your website won’t crash just because it grows faster than you expected. Cloud hosting can provide you with better security and more control, all of which will be non-negotiable as you grow your business.

Still deciding? A good standard practice is to go with shared hosting when you have simple needs, then once you get traffic and require better performance levels, you can upgrade to cloud. Most hosting providers have this process quite simple and seamless.