15
Hosting
over 8 years ago from Anton Sten, antonsten.com
What's your preference in (web) hosting? Stability and user friendly dashboard + support is what I'm looking for.
79 comments
Faiz Mokhtar, over 8 years ago
DigitalOcean. Great stability. Best support and pretty nice dashboard. Since it's a VPS, you still need to know your way around CLI. But, they do have a the best tutorial & community to get you started.
Ege Görgülü, over 8 years ago
Huge +1 for tutorials and community. They provide great tutorials for pretty much any setup.
charan lekkalapudi, over 8 years ago
I'm a huge fan of Digital Ocean even though I only have a single droplet active. Their support is awesome and the service is evry reliable.
Joel Califa, over 8 years ago
What he said :P
Casey Britt, over 8 years ago
I'll be moving all of my sites over to DO within the next year. Was a little worried about how difficult it would be to get up and running but due to the tutorials its actually super easy. Makes me feel like I'm learning a bit as well :D
Joe Alfonso, over 8 years ago
I've heard a lot about Digital Ocean, and I was wondering if you could maybe answer a few questions. I don't need much from a host. I just need the ability to shot multiple domains and install CMS systems for client if need be. Most of sites i do are for fun or testing. Ease of use is a big thing for me too.
I don't get into VPS, virtualization or servers OS's much. I'm fairly light in what i require and do. I'm a UI designer so i just need to ability to give myself and clients a web presence if need be.
Digital Ocean seems to sell itself as having all of these features, but would it still be a good fit for someone like me?
Thanks
Lara Schenck, over 8 years ago
I've found DO is awesome for developers and people with sysadmin experience - it is a VPS so things like installing WordPress aren't so straightforward (though there are great tutorials) - you have to get into Apache configurations, etc.
I'd go with a shared hosting plan - Media Temple is great, and I've been happy with Lithium Hosting.
Elliott Regan, over 8 years ago
I do all of my sites with Node...do you know of any companies that support that? I set up a DO server once, but it didn't work perfectly, and I was afraid that each new site I put on it would soak up a bunch of my time.
Now I host sites on the free version of Heroku. It's easy, cheap, but the bump up to the first tier is way more than I would want to pay for a basic web presence.
Ah, in that case you'd need a VPS with those companies (at least I think). I've heard good things about Webfaction, more developer friendly - looks like they have a 1-click node install and nice prices.
Yea...that's what I'm come to accept. Heroku is a stop-gap until I can spend time setting up a few DO droplets.
DO has 1-click setups as well. It's just the "keep this process running in the background and don't forget about it, and restart and maybe alert me if something bad happens" that is intimidating with a VPS.
Hey Joseph,
These are great questions. Really psyched you’re thinking of possibly using us!
We do indeed have all of the features you need, but if ease of use out of the box is a priority for you, we might not be your best option. The reality is that DO is not for everyone, and we don’t try to hide that. We focus on providing the simplest experience for developers. If you’re looking for a CPanel-like UI that does all of this stuff for you, that’s totally legit and DO might not be for you. If, on the other hand, you’re willing to learn something new, setting up sites is actually pretty easy, and you end up having far more control.
Before I had any ties to DigitalOcean, I was setting up to launch my new portfolio. I knew I wanted consistent speed and stability (without spending a ridiculous amount of money) and ended up going with a $5/mo droplet at DO. That’s held up gracefully to my site going semi-viral and ~300 people being on it at once. For context, I’m primarily a designer and I didn’t have any prior experience with VPS, but I still got my first droplet set up pretty easily with the help of some of the A+ documentation and community. It took me probably 30 minutes to figure out how to route multiple domains, and it’s been extremely easy to set new ones up since. We have step by step guides for most things you’d need, such as setting up multiple WP instances on the same droplet and domain routing. A lot of these things are more complicated to do the first time, but a lot of them are simply impossible to do with shared hosts.
If you want to set up WordPress or Ghost site, it’s really easy—spin up a WordPress or Ghost one-click installation. These are ready to use out of the box. If it’s another CMS that relies on MySQL and PHP—spin up a LAMP droplet and work from there. You can also start from scratch, of course, and install pretty much anything you want (including CPanel ;))
To sum up: - In many use cases the initial setup is more difficult than the one you’d get with shared hosts (for certain things such as setting up a single WP site or a RoR app it can actually be easier). - It’s still pretty easy and just requires learning some new stuff, some of which can be a bit complex at first but you can get the hang of relatively quickly. - In my experience, the performance that you’ll get trumps anything else at the same price. - It’s definitely not for everyone, and it might not be the best thing for you.
If you’re still interested in trying it out, hit me up at joel (at) digitalocean.com for a coupon code :P
I really appreciate the extensive response Joel! After reading everything you wrote and thinking about it. The initial investment of time is something that isn't a huge obstacle and honestly, I'm not a fan of CPanel for various reasons. Is there a way i could reach out to you directly to ask some questions or is there a sales number i could call that can answer my specific questions? I only see email contact on the site.
Devin Halladay, over 8 years ago
+90. Best hosting provider I've ever worked with. It's cheap, reliable, and fast. The company itself is actually one of the best companies I've ever had the pleasure of interacting with, and the people behind the company are fantastic. If you ever need help, they have the best support team I have ever worked with (by far). The only downside is that you need to be familiar with the command line to handle one of their virtual servers (or as they call them, Droplets)—but they have a very solid knowledge base that will help you out whenever you have an issue, or whenever you need to guidance on where to get started.
Colin Keany, over 8 years ago
The newly revamped Community is always there to help as well!
mewo a, over 8 years ago Just wanted to chime in and mention Dokku one click install for DO. It's a mini Heroku written in bash which is great for testing and staging.
Not production?
Jeff Escalante, over 8 years ago (edited over 8 years ago )
What, why does this have any upvotes at all? The dude clearly stated that he was looking for user friendliness, and a linux VPS is the exact opposite of user friendliness.
Don't get me wrong, I use DO and thoroughly enjoy it. I think it's great and is a valuable thing to learn. But I'm also a full time engineer.
This is like a guy asking "hey I need a recommendation for a cheap beginner-level camera" and someone jumping in and saying "get this $3000 DSLR, it will take you months of practice to actually use it correctly, but once you understand it well, it's the best option." While a valuable answer in general, it's the wrong answer to the question asked.
EDIT: A lot of people saying "follow a tutorial". Terrible idea, especially if websites you or others are relying on are going on this box. If you are going to use a VPS, understand how to use a vps, don't just tutorial and pray nothing goes wrong. It will. And when it does, you will be out of luck.
I'm in the same boat as OP. I mainly use NodeJS for my sites, and would love an easy way to host them. VPSs are my only option right now, other than a $35/mo Heroku instance.
What stack are you on with node?
I'm mostly on Node 11. Or do you mean my full stack?
Yeah the full deal, just to see how easy it would be to wrap your setup. I mean theoretically there should be a host that you can push to and it will run
npm startfor you for pretty cheap, but all the node-specific hosts are fairly pricey right now, which kind of sucks. Like you won't really get less than $15/month I think. Nodejitsu used to be cheap and I ran my stuff with them, but then they x10'd their prices, no joke, so I had to swap off.Yea, I've looks at Nodejitsu, but..$$$.
On the front-end, i've been using AngularJS for routing and everything. It apparently doesn't affect SEO with Google anymore, so it's good enough for me. Here is my current process with Heroku:
Commit to Github, CodeShip picks it up and runs some tests, then deploys to Heroku automatically.
On the server,
npm installinstalls Bower Components and runs a Gulp task to compile my source and dump it all into my public folder.npm start
In Gulp, I have one task to start a dev environment with LiveReload and non-compressed files, and one 'build' command that just gets the files ready to be served, but doesn't use
gulp.watch.For some sites, I figure I could just deploy the generated static assets to someplace that would host them, but occasionally I have the server respond to requests (like email inquiries or Dropbox integration, etc.). I've also worked with Docker before, although I haven't set it up myself before.
Wait so you are just using this for hosting static sites that are built with a node pipeline? Or are you actually running a node server?
Yea, it's a full Node server.
Most of my projects are personal and company sites. They serve the files generated from Gulp, and hook into Mandrill or Dropbox APIs for added functionality.
Mandrill for sending forms I assume, what is dropbox used for? Sorry for all the questions here, at the end I might come out with something useful for you.
Yea, I really appreciate it. Feel free to email me, too, or hit me up on Hangouts (oatmealsnap@gmail.com), although this might eventually be useful for someone else in here.
Yea, Mandrill is for inquiry forms and stuff. I set up a Dropbox CMS of sorts for a client. They could drop images and markdown files into a folder, and the site will update automatically.nSounds kinda goofy, I know, but it was fun to build.
Muhammad Saad Khan, over 7 years ago +1 for DigitalOcean. And if you don't want to manage your DigitalOcean droplet from command line, you can use Cloudways for managed DigitalOcean servers.
Joe C, over 8 years ago
In the past I've had great experiences with A Small Orange and Gandi. Both are honest and just worked for me - none of the hard sales techniques or confusing control panels.
David Darnes, over 8 years ago
+1 for Gandi, UI and admin views has decent control but isn't the most beautiful. Though that isn't a deal breaker, its the only minor drawback in fact.
Nick Dominguez, over 8 years ago +1 for A Small Orange. I've tried just about every shared web hosting service out there and they're just about the best in terms for pricing, support and stability. You'll also have a hard time finding SSD hosting at $5/mo.
Sean O'Grady, over 8 years ago
DO maybe? :)
Nick Dominguez, over 8 years ago True. I should've specified *shared hosting + SSD :-)
Matt Pinheiro, over 8 years ago +1 for A Small Orange. Great pricing. Great support. Great control panel.
Amazing Rando, over 8 years ago
+1 for A Small Orange. Been with them a decade.
Eliot Slevin, over 8 years ago
+1 for A Small Orange and Digital Ocean
Floyd Williamson, over 8 years ago (edited over 8 years ago )
Exactly the two I use for clients and personal sites.
I see you do UI as well...Do you have a system for setting up a personal site? How much maintenance do you need to do on a regular basis?
I've been creating small node servers to push to Heroku's free tier (aside form the instance spinning down every 30mins, it works great), but the next step up is more than anyone should spend for a small site. I'd love to move to DO, but the last time i attempted it, I had trouble keeping the right processes running. It would have been rough if I had like, 10 sites on it and had to restart the server and all the node instances.
For personal projects, I actually have a VPS on A Small Orange from which I run everything . You can grab a coupon over at Retailmenot; I saved 50%. Their stuff is fully managed too, so you don't have to waste your time with maintenance. That's about as headache free as it gets.
I use Digital Ocean when clients have more specific needs. For example, one client had a project that used python and postgreSQL, so I found it easier to create a custom droplet for them. But I don't use it for personal projects.
What does your stack look like? I mostly use Node, and there don't seem to be any cheap "easy to setup" solutions for it. I've used DO before, but I'm not a server admin, and I'd rather not have to manage processes and all the jazz if I can avoid it.
It seems like I should just learn Ruby+Rails rather than Node for this kind of stuff.
Mostly, I still use PHP. Familiarity I guess.
Yea, I'm mostly a front-end dev. I'd rather not spend time learning PHP, but most of the industry's "easy to set up infrastructure" is built on it.
David Springate, over 8 years ago We recently switched to MediaTemple and it is the best we've used. They re-designed their dashboard which is much better and the chat support is very helpful!
Their prices and packages are versatile as well, if you'd like 20% off then you can head over to their site using our affiliate link - http://mdtm.pl/1wQDDfJ
Hope this helps
Marius Jørgensen, over 8 years ago
I'm a big fan of MediaTemple as well. Their support is one of the best I've ever seen!
Andrew Lee, over 8 years ago
+1 for AWS.
I have a static site with S3 + Cloudfront.
I found it easy enough to use. Plenty of documentation and forum activity to navigate questions.
Sam Pierce Lolla, over 8 years ago
I have some static sites on S3 as well. I love using grunt to deploy, and I want the backing of Amazon's infrastructure in case I spike :)
But damn that web UI is a total PITA. Editing config files, trying to delete multiple files... the permissions are so confusing. Wish it was a little more polished.
Muhammad Saad Khan, 7 years ago +1 for Amazon AWS. And if you don't want to manage your Amazon AWS cloud server via command line then I would recommend managed AWS platform by Cloudways. Super slick UI and console. One click application installs. Pre-optimized server. http://www.cloudways.com/en/amazon-cloud-hosting.php
Eugene Ross, over 8 years ago
I've fallen in love with Linode countless times. Super fast support and great uptime. You'll have to learn your way around, but learning new skills is never a bad thing.
Damion Grimfield, over 8 years ago
Linode is by far the best VPS service I've used, and I've tried a multitude of offerings from many companies. If you're looking to spend $10 or more, give them a shot. You won't regret it.
Muhammad Saad Khan, over 5 years ago Linode is indeed one of the finest cloud server provider. Self-managed though and support is minimal. They have recently did a partnership with Cloudways to bring Managed Linode Hosting platform. Usually managed linode service costs around $100.
But Cloudways pricing for a managed service and 24/7 support is amazing.
Linode 1GB $12/mo
Linode 2GB $24/mo
Linode 4GB $50/mo
Linode 8GB $90/mo
John Keyes, over 8 years ago (edited over 8 years ago )
It depends on what you are planning to host:
- a static site
- PHP (WordPress, Laravel, Zend, Symfony)
- Python (Django, Flask)
- Ruby (Rails, Sinatra, Merb)
- JavaScript (Node.js, Express, Ground)
- Database (MySQL, PostgreSQL, MongoDB)
It can also depend on what features you require:
- SSH
- SFTP/FTP
- GIT
WebFaction is a hosting provider who can handle most of these, with simple installers. The UI can be confusing but the support team is good.
Heroku can provide hosting for most of these too, and uses Git backed deployment.
Anton Sten, over 8 years ago
Just PHP (static + Wordpress). Almost all email is on Google (I have 30+ domains). Just wanted reliability, great support and decent pricing (not necessarily the cheapest though).
It might be worth your while giving WebFaction a trial run. You can have as many sites and applications as you need for the same basic monthly price. I've been a customer of theirs for about eight years now. The UI can be a bit confusing as I said earlier, but good support, and documentation.
Ouch! Hosting 30+ emails on Google must get insanely expensive. I wonder if there are any alternatives platforms that don't stink?
Most of these domains are on Google since before they started charging for every account :)
Aaron White, over 8 years ago (edited over 8 years ago )
Depends on the context of what I need to host...
- Digital Ocean - Amazing VPS and cheap
- Google App Engine - Great for static content, I use it to share Framer.js prototypes. FREE for static content
- Github pages for jekyll sites. FREE
- Heroku - Deploying Rails apps is a snap
Frank Lämmer, over 8 years ago
SHAMELESS PLUG: i wrote a small overview of current PaaS cloud hosting offerings if you are into that: http://blog.fortrabbit.com/cloudscapes-revisited-php-cloud-overview
Pierre Verrier, over 8 years ago
I've switched over all my hosting to Digital Ocean. Great service, very reliable, strong community and the dashboard is seductively simple. Last I checked a little command line never hurt anyone :)
They've always got deals running, with a plethora of coupons online - The Googs is your friend.
Muhammad Saad Khan, over 7 years ago If you are looking for stability, user friendliness and state of the art dashboard to manage your web hosting server, there is no better choice for designers other than Cloudways.
Cloudways provide managed servers from DigitalOcean, Linode, Vultr, Amazon AWS and Google Compute Engine. Being a designer you don't want to mess around command line and server side configuration. Cloudways does it all for designers. They patch servers for security and update application installs as available.
Lili Kastilio, over 8 years ago AWS & Heroku
Updula Lee, over 8 years ago
SiteGround for WordPress hosting.
Alex Ionescu, over 8 years ago
I've used and am very happy with WiredTree and FutureHosting. Now I am using Media Temple and I'm very glad for the choice I made. They're very good.
Mathias Biilmann, over 8 years ago
For static hosting I'm obviously biased since I'm the founder, but do check out BitBalloon.
Whether you're using command line tools and continuous deployment or just wan't to quickly drop a site onto bitballoon.com to get it online, it's gonna be a really good fit. We have an excellent uptime record and all sites gets optimized for performance when deployed and served straight out of a CDN.
We're using Rackspace, Digital Ocean and AWS for various things, so I have a lot of experience with those 3. Each of them have their own strengths and advantages.
DO have cheap, well performing instances that are really fast to spin up and a clean modern UI. They've also had the worst uptime for their instances of the 3 (but for us that's not a big deal, we've engineered around that) and they don't have features like any kind of attachable disk or object storage like S3 and Cloudfiles.
Rackspace have generally been the most solid with regards to uptime (apart from yesterday where they rebooted pretty much all servers, even the ones specifically places in different network clusters and hosts, at the same time). Their Akamai integration for Cloudfiles is great, whole the latency to Cloudfiles both when uploading or reading files can be a pain. Their block storage performs really well, but compared to EBS it's a pain to manage - slow snapshots and really high prices for keeping snapshots around.
AWS is by far the most feature rich and have the largest eco-system. And at least when they go down bad, they seem to take half the internet with them, so no-one will blame you too much :)
For all of these, I would only really recommend them to people with a lot of Linux/devops experience or people who want to learn all of this. It's really easy to get something on there that's not secure, that's will suddenly suffer from a bunch of downtime when an instance disappear, and getting really good uptime on any cloud provider requires distributing your app across several instances.
For anything with a budget, but without a full time ops guy, I would go with a managed service. Whether it's Heroku (for Rails apps, node stuff, etc), WPengine or similar (for Wordpress) or BitBalloon or similar (for static hosting).
Chris Slowik, over 8 years ago
I use thiswebhost for all my hosting needs.
great support, uptime, and transparency. Anything I don't do on digital ocean I do on thiswebhost (usually client stuff)
Marcus Campbell, over 8 years ago
DigitalOcean and Linode are both nearly flawless VPS hosts and offer great value. The only downside is that you have to know what you are doing.
David Wall, over 8 years ago
I've found WebFaction to be great – a small learning curve at the start but very well documented and supported.
For flat sites/testing and playing I've been using Site44 to host via Dropbox. Never used it for anything in the public domain, but I've found it to be quick (to update) and cheap. I tried Cloudcannon and Kissr before settling on Site44.
Martin Lee, over 8 years ago (edited over 8 years ago )
For small sites, we often recommend apisnetworks.com. The performance is really good for shared hosting, plus their custom control panel really sets them apart - way better than having to use cpanel. Their support is amazing too. I've tried A Small Orange, Site 5, 1and1, Media Temple, and keep coming back to these guys. A Small Orange would be my second choice.
Sri Kadimisetty, over 8 years ago
Apart from the regulars, there's also the pretty powerful Github Pages paired with a static generating system such as Jekyll (or it's myriad alternatives).
Ivan Vásquez, over 8 years ago
Just pitching in with OpenShift. You can host WordPress sites with them for free, so it's worth taking a look at it.
It's kinda tricky to understand if you don't have a technical background though. Depending on that you'll either find it user friendly or a total nightmare.
As far as support goes, it's a service by RedHat, a pretty solid company. It's also been rock solid for me for some time now.
Jon Marsh, over 8 years ago
I've been using Media Temple for a few years now and I higy recommend them. Great customer service.
Saulius Stebulis, over 8 years ago I am currently with Heart Internet, but thinking to switch to Media Temple. I wonder if anyone else have used MT and if so, how was it?
As for Heart Internet, I think it is over priced. Although the customer service is fast to respond.
David Springate, over 8 years ago Did the exact same thing and changed from Heart to MT not too long ago, MT are excellent all round and I'd recommend switching. I'd agree that Heart is overpriced but their service was generally very good.
Oscar Marcelo, over 8 years ago
Hostgator.
Typical cPanel, excellent support and it's very reliable host!
I have a coupon code (25% OFF) if you want: deprogn25off
Tom Nagel, over 8 years ago (edited over 8 years ago )
If you're looking for VPS/reseller hosting, check out Site5.
Joe Turner, over 8 years ago
I use Krystal (UK Based) and I'm on their £59 a month package. It's super fast, miles better than MediaTemple in my opinion. It's UI is not the best, most things have to be done via cPanel.
Jonathan Cremin, over 8 years ago
£59/m seems like terrible value for shared hosting. What exactly are you getting for that money?
Zach Kuzmic, over 8 years ago
Agreed, that sounds expensive.
David Barker, over 8 years ago
I wonder if Joe has a typo in his comment. I looked at Krystal and can't see a £59/month package. Perhaps he meant the £5.99/month package?
Morning guys. It's the business package, we host quite a few big websites. If you're just handling client work and/or your own website then then the Ruby Package should do just fine.
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