{"id":3237,"date":"2025-01-23T09:56:53","date_gmt":"2025-01-23T08:56:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mijn.host\/blog\/what-is-shared-hosting\/"},"modified":"2026-07-23T16:28:00","modified_gmt":"2026-07-23T14:28:00","slug":"what-is-shared-hosting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/my.host\/blog\/what-is-shared-hosting\/","title":{"rendered":"What is Shared Hosting? Everything You Need to Know"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Here is the (very) short answer: with shared hosting, you share a server with other users.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">It&#8217;s the most popular type of hosting in the world. If you&#8217;re reading this, there&#8217;s a pretty good chance you need shared hosting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This article will further elaborate on what exactly shared hosting is and how it works, what its pros and cons are, for which type of website and user it is most suitable, where you can best obtain shared hosting, and more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 id=\"what-is-shared-hosting\" class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>What is shared hosting?<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Shared hosting is a type of web hosting where multiple websites are hosted on a single server, and the server resources, such as storage, bandwidth, and computing power, are shared by all users. It is an affordable and user-friendly option, ideal for small to medium-sized websites and beginner webmasters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 id=\"how-does-shared-hosting-work\" class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>How does shared hosting work?<\/strong><strong><\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">A hosting provider distributes a server (a powerful computer that is connected to the internet every second of the day) among multiple users.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">A single server often hosts up to 1,000 customers, with each customer being able to manage multiple websites. As a result, one server can support thousands, or in exceptional cases, even tens of thousands of websites.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 id=\"past-problems-with-shared-hosting\" class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Past problems with shared hosting<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In the past, problems could arise when a website suddenly experienced a large spike in visitor numbers. This could consume so much server capacity that other websites became slower or even temporarily went offline.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Nowadays, most reliable hosting providers use virtualization software, such as CloudLinux. This sets individual limits for server resources so that a customer can never use more resources than allocated in advance. As a result, all websites on the server remain stable and accessible.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">An additional advantage of software like CloudLinux is improved security. The Linux system, used by most hosting providers, was not originally designed for use by a large number of different, uncontrolled users. This makes it extra vulnerable to hacking attempts. CloudLinux provides a solution by isolating users on a server from each other, preventing them from seeing each other&#8217;s files and stopping malware from spreading between different accounts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Additionally, the less you pay for shared hosting, the more customers you generally share the server with. Think about it: a server can easily cost more than \u20ac20,000 and has a lifespan of about 5 years. If you only pay \u20ac5 per month for your hosting, the hosting provider must have a lot of other customers on the same server to make it financially viable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 id=\"advantages-of-shared-hosting\" class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Advantages of shared hosting<\/strong><strong><\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Affordable.<\/strong> Since you share a server with many other users, the cost for you as an end-user can be kept modest. The cheapest shared hosting costs no more than a few euros per month.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Secure.<\/strong> Even though multiple customers share the same server, reliable hosting providers invest heavily in security. They use tools like CloudLinux (which separates files of different customers), Imunify 360 (to nip malware in the bud), and offer free SSL certificates.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Easy to use.<\/strong> Shared hosting is catered to beginners. You don&#8217;t need any technical knowledge to get started with shared hosting.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Customer service.<\/strong> Depending on your hosting provider, you get access to customer service that can help you if you encounter any issues. For example, with unmanaged VPS hosting, this is often not the case.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>No server maintenance.<\/strong> This is entirely handled by your hosting provider.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 id=\"disadvantages-of-shared-hosting\" class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Disadvantages of shared hosting<\/strong><strong><\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>No control over server settings.<\/strong> Here, you are dependent on your hosting provider. In some cases, this can be inconvenient. For example, your hosting provider could decide that instead of 20 websites, you can only install 10 websites on your hosting package. With options like cloud hosting, you don\u2019t encounter these kinds of issues.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Limited capacity for growth.<\/strong> Shared hosting is primarily suitable for small and medium-sized websites. If you outgrow this size, you need to switch to another type of hosting.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Limited room for customization.<\/strong> Your shared hosting package works exactly the same as that of all other customers of the provider.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Higher chance of downtime.<\/strong> Typically, shared hosting has more downtime than, for example, VPS hosting.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 id=\"for-which-type-of-website-is-shared-hosting-most-suitable\" class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>For which type of website is shared hosting most suitable?<\/strong><strong><\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Shared hosting is best suited for small to medium-sized websites. You can host virtually any type of website on it: a blog, a webshop (of modest size), a business website for your company, or a hobby project.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I personally manage multiple websites (a number of blogs and a webshop) which receive between a few hundred and 20,000 visitors per month. All these sites are on the same shared hosting package (albeit a fairly robust shared hosting package).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In other words, for most types of websites, shared hosting is perfectly deployable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 id=\"what-does-shared-hosting-cost\" class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>What does shared hosting cost?<\/strong><strong><\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Shared hosting generally costs between a few euros and 30 euros per month. More expensive packages usually offer more disk space, more power, and you can host more websites on them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At my.host, you pay \u20ac3.99 per month for their <a href=\"https:\/\/my.host\/webhosting\/\">cheapest shared hosting package<\/a> and \u20ac16.99 per month for their most powerful shared hosting package. On this cheapest package, you can install 3 websites, while on their most expensive package you can host 20 websites. The disk space between the different packages varies between 5GB and 100GB.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"592\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" src=\"https:\/\/my.host\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/mijn-host-shared-hosting-per-maand-1024x592.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1941\" srcset=\"https:\/\/my.host\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/mijn-host-shared-hosting-per-maand-1024x592.png 1024w, https:\/\/my.host\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/mijn-host-shared-hosting-per-maand-300x173.png 300w, https:\/\/my.host\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/mijn-host-shared-hosting-per-maand-768x444.png 768w, https:\/\/my.host\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/mijn-host-shared-hosting-per-maand-1536x888.png 1536w, https:\/\/my.host\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/mijn-host-shared-hosting-per-maand-2048x1184.png 2048w\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h2 id=\"is-shared-hosting-slower-than-other-hosting-types\" class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Is shared hosting slower than other hosting types?<\/strong><strong><\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">On many websites, you read that shared hosting is slower than other types of hosting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The truth, however, is a bit more nuanced than that. For example, a static blog without extreme visitor peaks will often run just as quickly on shared hosting as on a VPS or dedicated hosting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">As I mentioned earlier in this article, all my own websites run on shared hosting. However, I have also experimented with VPS hosting. My sites did not run faster on it than on shared hosting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">When a site has heavy demands (think of a webshop that processes many sales per day), other types of hosting will usually deliver better performance than shared hosting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 id=\"alternatives-to-shared-hosting\" class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Alternatives to shared hosting<\/strong><strong><\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Shared hosting is the best hosting for most people to start with. And most people (including myself) will not outgrow it even after many years. Nevertheless, it&#8217;s also useful to be aware of some other hosting types.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 id=\"vps-hosting\" class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>VPS hosting<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">VPS (Virtual Private Server) hosting is a step further than shared hosting. With VPS, you still share a server with other customers but get your own virtual environment with allocated resources such as RAM and storage. This offers \u2013 in the case of an <em>unmanaged<\/em> VPS at least \u2013 the freedom to configure your server as you wish. It is ideal for websites that receive more traffic or require specific configurations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 id=\"cloud-hosting\" class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Cloud hosting<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Cloud hosting works differently from traditional hosting because your website is not dependent on one physical server. Instead, it uses a network of servers in the cloud. This provides higher reliability because if one server fails, other servers take over. It&#8217;s scalable, meaning you can easily add more resources as your website grows. This makes it a good choice for rapidly growing or dynamic websites.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 id=\"dedicated-hosting\" class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Dedicated hosting<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">With dedicated hosting, you rent a complete server dedicated entirely to your website(s). This means you don&#8217;t have to share with others, and you have full control over the server configuration. It offers maximum performance and security but is also significantly more expensive. Dedicated hosting is especially suitable for large businesses or websites with very high traffic.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Here&#8217;s the (very) short answer: with shared hosting, you share a server with other users. It is the most popular type of hosting in the world. If you&#8217;re reading this, there&#8217;s a good chance you need shared hosting. This article will further elaborate on what exactly shared hosting entails [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1942,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"hide_cta_migrate_site":false,"hide_toc_block":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[222,228],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3237","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-hosting","category-tips-tricks"],"lang":"en","translations":{"en":3237,"nl":1940},"pll_sync_post":{},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/my.host\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3237","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/my.host\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/my.host\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/my.host\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/my.host\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3237"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/my.host\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3237\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3351,"href":"https:\/\/my.host\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3237\/revisions\/3351"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/my.host\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1942"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/my.host\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3237"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/my.host\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3237"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/my.host\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3237"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}