6 Best VPS Hosting for Developers – Detailed December 2024 Report

So you just developed a cool web application or started learning a new programming language, and now you are looking for a good VPS hosting for developers to host your code. Well, you are in the perfect place! In this article, I will outline the 6 Best VPS hosting providers for developers. This list was born after extensive research and detailed investigations.

Introduction

Choosing the right VPS hosting provider can make a big difference in the success of your projects. A VPS (Virtual Private Server) gives you more control and power compared to shared hosting, allowing you to scale your resources as needed, customize your environment, and deploy applications with greater speed and reliability.

But with so many VPS hosting providers out there, it can be overwhelming to find the right one for your specific needs. That’s why I’ve put together a comprehensive report of the top VPS providers for developers.

Note: This report was carefully reviewed by our team of Cloud specialists and DevOps engineers to bring you accurate and up-to-date data.

Best VPS Hosting for Developers

1. Best Overall: SSD Nodes
2. Best for Scalability: DigitalOcean
3. Best for Choice: Vultr
4. Best for Resources: AWS
5. Best for Low-Level Developement: Kamatera
6. Best for Experienced Developers: Akamai (Linode)

1) Best Overall: SSD Nodes

SSD Nodes is a top choice for developers seeking high-performance VPS hosting at an affordable price. SSD Nodes provides impressive price-to-performance ratio, offering powerful servers with fast NVMe SSD storage and generous resources at an extremely cheap price.

The long-term pricing plans for SSD Nodes give you substantial savings, where you can save as much as 8,649$ in comparison to other VPS hosting providers. This pricing advantage makes SSD Nodes an excellent option for you, especially if you are looking to maximize your budget without compromising on quality.

As for support, in my experience, SSD Nodes provides excellent responsive support, and offers a user-friendly control panel for easy server management.

For deploying your applications and code, you can choose a wide range of operating systems including Ubuntu, Debian, and Rocky Linux, among many others. Obviously, you can also install Docker and containerize your application code for reliable deployment, no matter the programming language you use.

SSD Nodes Limitations

The main limitations of SSD Nodes are the lack of cloud-managed services such as managed databases, load balancers, and managed Kubernetes. However, if you are a developer who prefers full control over your server environment, SSD Nodes offers an excellent balance of performance, low prices, and flexibility.

Why SSD Nodes is the Best VPS Provider for Development Projects

SSD Nodes long-term plans are particularly best-suited for you if you are a developer working on long-term projects or want to minimize your hosting costs over time.
SSD Nodes VPS servers come with full root access, allowing you to customize your environments as needed.

Hardware-wise, SSD Nodes' servers rely on the latest Intel CPUs and NVMe SSDs, giving your applications optimal performance for resource-intensive applications and development tasks.

SSD Nodes Pricing

Here's a pricing table to give you a general sense of what you might spend on SSD Nodes VPS servers for your projects:

Here is a brief look at potential savings with SSD Nodes compared to other VPS providers:

Note: Check out this VPS pricing comparison for more information. As I’ve previously mentioned, you can save as much as 8709$ in comparison to other VPS hosting providers.

2) Best for Scalability: DigitalOcean

DigitalOcean is a VPS provider known for their managed cloud solutions that gives you the ability to scale up servers on-demand. DigitalOcean has a robust infrastructure ensuring that your applications can handle increased loads for large projects.

For developers, DigitalOcean provides an intuitive interface, comprehensive documentation, and a variety of developer tools to streamline your workflow. Whether you are launching a small application or scaling a large enterprise project, DigitalOcean offers flexible pricing options to suit your needs.

DigitalOcean especially shines with its managed cloud services, including managed databases, Kubernetes, and Spaces for object storage. These services enable you to focus on coding and deploying applications without worrying about underlying infrastructure complexities.

The Downsides of DigitalOcean

The excellent scalability of DigitalOcean leads us to the main limitation: the cost.

Costs can rise quickly, especially with additional managed services and scaling needs. This can make your budgeting more complex as your project scales. In some cases, you may be surprised at the total amount you have to pay at the end of the month.

DigitalOcean also has a bit of a learning curve, and if you’re new to cloud services, you’ll likely find it challenging to navigate and utilize their features correctly.

DigitalOcean Pricing

3) Best for Choice: Vultr

Vultr is a good choice for developers due to its wide range of customizable server options. They offer a variety of CPU, RAM, and storage configurations, allowing you to tailor your VPS to your specific project needs. Vultr also provides high-performance features like NVMe SSDs and a global network of data centers.

Vultr is a good choice for developers who want a balance between customization and ease of use. If you have a lot of development projects, you may find yourself needing one of their managed cloud solutions such as Managed Databases, Cloud GPUs, Load Balancers, and CDNs. However, if you like doing things yourself, then a simpler VPS provider like SSD Nodes is all you need.

The Downsides of Vultr

One downside of Vultr is that their advanced features, like High Frequency or High Performance plans, can get pricey. While these options deliver top-notch performance, they do come at a premium, which might stretch your budget if you’re looking for something more cost-effective.

Another challenge with Vultr is its pricing structure. With so many products and configurations to choose from, it can get a bit complicated to figure out exactly what you'll be paying. This complexity is not beginner-friendly, especially if you like keeping things simple.

Vultr Pricing

4) Best for Resources: AWS

For developers, AWS provides the EC2 (Elastic Compute Cloud) service, which offers a wide range of instance types optimized for different use cases. These instances provide scalable compute capacity in the cloud, allowing you to quickly provision and scale VPS servers. AWS EC2 instances come with various CPU, memory, storage, and networking capacity options, enabling you to choose the most suitable configuration for your specific application needs.

The Downsides of AWS

• Price: AWS EC2 is not be the most budget-friendly choice, particularly if your needs are minimal. The cost can add up quickly, making it less ideal.
• Learning Curve: If you’re new to VPS hosting, AWS can be a bit hard to navigate.

AWS Pricing

5) Best for Low-Level Developement: Kamatera

Kamatera is a VPS provider with a wide range of cloud solution for developers such as VMs, VPS, cloud firewalls, load balancers, block storage, and other services.

Kamatera can be an good choice for low-level programmers due to its flexibility, control, and support for a wide range of operating systems and configurations.

Low-level programmers often require fine-tuned control over the hardware and software environment to optimize performance or program things at the system level.

Kamatera allows users to customize virtual machines (VMs) with specific configurations of CPU, memory, storage, and network settings.

The Downsides of Kamatera

While Kamatera offers many strengths, it also has some downsides that users should be aware of:

1. Complex Pricing Structure: Kamatera's extensive range of services and customization options come with a pricing structure that can be difficult to navigate. You may find it challenging to estimate costs accurately, especially when scaling up resources or using multiple services.
2. Higher Long-Term Costs: Kamatera has a pay-as-you-go pricing model, and this can lead to higher long-term costs compared to providers that offer discounted rates for longer-term commitments.
3. Steep Learning Curve for Beginners: Kamatera’s platform is powerful and packed with advanced features, but this can be overwhelming for beginners.

Kamatera Pricing

6) Best for Experienced Developers: Akamai (Linode)

Akamai is a VPS hosting provider that offers experienced developers a wide range of choices for customizing their server environments.

You can set up your Akamai VPS depending on your specific hardware needs. For example, you can choose between dedicated CPU, shared CPU, High Memory, and GPU servers.

Akamai also provides block storage and fully-managed MySQL and PostgreSQL database clusters, in addition to a Kubernetes service called Akamai Kubernetes Engine (LKE), which allows you to deploy and manage containerized applications at scale.

Akamai Pricing

Akamai Downsides

Akamai’s user interface is powerful, but it can be hard to navigate compared to more beginner-friendly platforms. The pricing of Akamai servers is also a bit on the higher end, especially for long-term use.

Conclusion

Choosing the right VPS hosting provider for your projects depends on your project needs and your level of expertise. SSD Nodes is a great VPS provider for developers seeking affordable, high-performance hosting. DigitalOcean excels in scalability. Vultr offers fantastic customization, and AWS is the go-to for those who need extensive resources.

No matter your requirements, this guide should help you make an informed decision, so you can focus on what you do best: developing great applications!

FAQ

How is a VPS different from shared hosting?

In shared hosting, multiple websites or applications share the same server resources, which can limit performance and flexibility. A VPS, on the other hand, allocates specific resources to your virtual machine, giving you more control, better performance, and the ability to install and configure software as you wish.

What should I look for when choosing a VPS provider for web development?

As a developer, you should consider factors like performance (CPU, RAM, and SSD storage), scalability, uptime, support for your desired operating systems, and whether the provider offers additional features like managed services, backups, or security tools. You should also check pricing transparency and the ease of managing the VPS before you purchase a VPS.

Can I run multiple projects on a single VPS?

Yes, a VPS allows you to run multiple projects simultaneously. A great way to manage multiple applications on a single VPS is by using Docker, which allows you to containerize each project. With Docker, you can isolate applications, so that they don’t interfere with one another, even if they use different dependencies or programming languages.

Is a VPS suitable for beginners, or is it only for experienced developers?

Because VPS hosting provides more control and flexibility, it would require a bit more technical knowledge compared to shared hosting. However, if you have a basic understanding of server management you can quickly get up to speed with a VPS.