What is cloud hosting? Everything you need to know about hosting in the cloud.

Choosing the right website hosting is one of the first (and most important) decisions you make when building a website. Your hosting provider impacts everything from website speeds to security to uptime to scalability.

You need to be sure that your hosting setup provides the resources your website needs. Otherwise, you end up with a site that loads slowly, crashes frequently and fails to provide the top user experience your customers expect.

Cloud hosting is one of the options you’ll come across — and it’s something we recommend here at Radical.

So in this post, we explore what cloud hosting is, how it works and its pros and cons. We also take a look at some of the best cloud hosting services in the UK right now.

Here’s what we’ll be covering:

• What is cloud hosting?
• What is a cloud server?
• Hosting in the cloud: how it works
• Cloud hosting advantages and disadvantages
• Traditional web hosting vs cloud hosting/li>
• 6 of the best managed cloud hosting services for small businesses

So, let’s start with a cloud hosting definition.

What is cloud hosting?

Cloud hosting is a type of web hosting that uses multiple interconnected servers to store and deliver website data.

Instead of relying on a single, physical server (like in traditional hosting), cloud hosting spreads resources across a network of servers. This ensures better uptime, improves performance and makes it easier for you to scale as your site and business grow.

What is a cloud server?

A cloud server is a virtual server, not a physical one. This virtual server runs in a cloud computing environment and makes its resources available to users remotely over a network. Cloud hosting relies on a network of cloud servers.

Hosting in the cloud: how it works

When you host your website in the cloud, it lives on virtual servers spread out across the network. This means you’re not limited to the capabilities of a physical server. Instead, cloud hosting gives you the flexibility to scale up or down according to your website needs.

Cloud hosting works thanks to a technology called virtualisation, whereby multiple virtual servers run on a single physical server. Each virtual server has its own set of resources (like memory, storage and CPU) and runs independently, so there’s no need to share with other websites.

Cloud hosting is usually available on a pay-as-you-go plan. You only pay for the resources you use. You can also choose between managed and unmanaged cloud hosting services. A managed hosting service is a bit pricier but it means that the technical stuff (like configuration, maintenance and security) are all taken care of. Unmanaged hosting gives you more control but you’ll need some server knowledge to manage your website effectively.

Cloud hosting advantages and disadvantages

Cloud hosting advantages

Hosting in the cloud is seen as a step up from shared hosting and it offers a range of benefits for a growing business. Here are a few cloud hosting benefits.

Scalability

Cloud hosting doesn’t rely on a single server to store and deliver content. Because it can access servers across the cloud network, it can scale up to meet demand. So whether you have 10 or 10,000 visitors, performance remains the same.

Reliability

When hosting on the cloud, you use cloud-based web servers spread out across the network. So your website gets excellent uptime. If one server on the network fails, no problem. Another server jumps in to handle requests.

Performance

With servers often spread out across the world, you can deliver website content to all customers incredibly quickly. You also use multiple servers to distribute the load, which improves page load times, even during periods of high website traffic.

Cost-effectiveness

Most cloud-based hosting providers operate on a pay-as-you-go model. That means you only pay for the resources you use. If your website traffic tends to fluctuate, this works out well — you don’t have to pay for an expensive plan with lots of resources that only get used once in a blue moon.

Security

With the right configurations, a website that’s hosted in the cloud offers excellent security. Cloud hosting providers offer security measures like data encryption, firewalls, identity management and access control.

Sustainability

If you’re looking to build a sustainable website, cloud hosting can help here too. Cloud web hosting optimises resource use so it’s a more eco-friendly option than traditional hosting. Choose data centres — like those from Google Cloud — that prioritise sustainability and you’ll lower your carbon footprint further.

Cloud hosting disadvantages

We’ve talked about all the benefits of cloud hosting. But here are some of the things you should think about before moving your website to a cloud hosting provider.

Unpredictable costs

Pay-as-you-go plans mean that a month of high traffic results in a higher bill. You need to factor in cost fluctuation so bills don’t take you by surprise. Also, bear in mind that cloud web hosting is more expensive than shared hosting. So if shared hosting still meets your website needs, there’s no need to pay more.

Technical knowledge required

There are both managed and unmanaged cloud hosting solutions. If you choose an unmanaged solution, you need to be confident that you have the tech expertise in-house to deal with server configuration, security and maintenance tasks.

Security and privacy

If they’re not properly configured, cloud environments can be vulnerable to security threats. You also need to be sure that any data you put into the cloud abides by relevant security and privacy regulations, like GDPR.

Traditional web hosting vs cloud hosting

Cloud hosting is a type of web hosting. But it’s very different from traditional web hosting options. Here, we compare cloud hosting to the other types of hosting you can choose from: shared hosting, dedicated hosting and virtual private server (VPS) hosting.

Cloud hosting vs shared hosting

Shared hosting is a web hosting service where many websites live on one server. This spreads the cost of the server between a number of different website owners. But it means that you also compete for server resources.

Shared hosting is cheaper than cloud hosting. But you get what you pay for. Shared hosting doesn’t support the same website performance as cloud hosting. It’s less reliable and less scalable than hosting in the cloud. It also offers weaker security and less control over server settings.

Cloud hosting vs dedicated hosting

Dedicated hosting means storing your website on a dedicated server. This server is exclusively reserved for you, meaning you get total control over server settings, including those relating to security.

Dedicated hosting beats cloud web hosting in terms of security and performance. But costs tend to be high and scalability potential is limited. Your dedicated server is a physical server without cloud hosting’s ability to quickly scale up and down according to your needs.

Cloud hosting vs VPS hosting

Virtual private server (VPS) hosting uses virtualisation to create a virtual environment, hosted on a single server. It’s sometimes referred to as the “private cloud”.

Compared to cloud hosting, VPS hosting is more affordable. You’re charged a fixed monthly fee for dedicated server resources. VPS hosting offers good reliability and performance. But it can’t compete with cloud hosting in terms of scalability and flexibility because you’re still reliant on the hardware and resources of a single server.

6 of the best managed cloud hosting services for small businesses

If you decide that a cloud-based website is the best option for your business, there’s no shortage of cloud hosting providers to choose from.

The three big cloud providers include Amazon Web Services (AWS), Google Cloud Platform (GCP) and Microsoft Azure. But these services can be very complex for individual developers, small businesses and start-ups.

So, with that in mind, here are six of the best managed cloud hosting services for small businesses and start-ups.

Cloudways

With Cloudways, you can choose from a variety of cloud providers, including AWS, Google Cloud and DigitalOcean. There are also lots of plans to choose from across these providers, so you can be confident of finding a good fit in terms of budget and resources. Plans come with a free content delivery network (CDN) and DDoS protection thanks to Cloudways’ partnership with Cloudflare but this provider doesn’t offer email and domain registration as standard.

Pricing: 3-day free trial. Then, the most basic plan starts at around £9/month for 1 core, 25 GB of storage, 1TB of bandwidth and 1GB of memory.

SiteGround

SiteGround is another of the best cloud host services for small businesses. It uses Google Cloud infrastructure, which means top-notch security and environmentally friendly hosting. SiteGround comes with a built-in CDN, which makes it easy to boost site speeds. And it’s easy to add CPU or RAM at any time.

Pricing: Plans start from £60/month excluding VAT with fully managed and customisable plans available. The basic plan comes with 4 CPU cores, 8GB of memory, 40GB of storage and 5TB of data.

DreamHost

DreamHost is a great option for small to medium businesses. But you may find that you need to look elsewhere as you grow and need more from your website server. This cloud hosting service is at the more affordable end of the scale and puts a maximum monthly price in place so you don’t go over budget. You get good control over the operating systems and software environments you use, and speed and performance are up there with the best.

Pricing: Plans start from around £3.60/month for the most basic plan, which includes 1 vCPU, 100GB of storage and 512MB of memory.

IONOS

IONOS has a range of scalable packages to choose from, with both unmanaged and managed cloud hosting on offer. They provide unlimited bandwidth, email accounts, SSL certificate and DDoS protection. You can choose between Linux and Windows operating systems and count on data centres in both the EU and the US.

Pricing: IONOS charges £0.007/hour up to a maximum of £5.04 for 30 days for its most basic plan. This plan includes 1 vCPU, 2GB of memory and 60GB of storage.

Liquid Web

Another excellent cloud-based hosting provider, Liquid Web offers a 100% uptime guarantee, which makes it one of the most reliable cloud hosting providers out there. The company is also known for its customer support and a handy auto-scaling feature that automatically deals with unexpected surges in website traffic.

Pricing: Managed cloud hosting plans start from around £52/month, including 4 cores, 16GB of memory and 10TB bandwidth.

Choosing the right hosting options for your business

Website hosting has a huge impact on your website. And — if you want to go beyond the limits of shared hosting without stretching the budget too far — cloud hosting could be just what you need.

Hosting in the cloud offers scalability, flexibility and reliability. It also tends to be cost-effective and pretty kind on the planet. But whether it’s the best choice for your business depends on your needs, budget and how much control you want over your hosting environment.

Still not sure whether cloud hosting and the providers above are a good fit? Then we can help.

At Radical, we’re all about creating high-performing, future-proof websites — and hosting plays a big role in that. Whether you’re launching a new site, scaling an existing one or just trying to make sense of your hosting options, our web design and development team can give you all the advice and support you need.

Give the Radical team a call to chat about your website project.