If you're setting up a new website — or outgrowing your current hosting — you've probably come across three options: shared hosting, VPS hosting, and cloud hosting. They all do the same basic job (keep your website online), but they're very different in how they work, what they cost, and who they're designed for.
This guide explains each type clearly, compares them head-to-head, and tells you exactly which one suits your situation. No jargon. No fluff.
Quick answer: Most new UK businesses start with shared hosting, move to VPS as they grow, and consider cloud when they need serious scale. Read on to understand why — and when to make each move.
What is shared hosting?
Shared hosting means your website lives on a server alongside dozens — sometimes hundreds — of other websites. You all share the same CPU, RAM, and bandwidth. Think of it like renting a room in a house: affordable, but you share the kitchen.
It's the most popular type of UK web hosting because it's the most affordable and easiest to manage. For most small business websites, a personal blog, or a new startup site, shared hosting is perfectly adequate.
Who should choose shared hosting?
- New businesses launching their first website
- Small brochure sites with under 500 visits/day
- Bloggers, freelancers, and personal projects
- Anyone who wants hosting without technical complexity
- Businesses that want their domain, email, and hosting all in one place
What is VPS hosting?
VPS stands for Virtual Private Server. It's the middle ground between shared hosting and a full dedicated server. Technically, you're still on a shared physical machine — but the server is divided into isolated virtual environments. Your resources are guaranteed and completely separate from other users.
Think of it like renting a flat rather than a room. You still share the building, but your space is entirely your own.
Who should choose VPS hosting?
- Businesses that have outgrown shared hosting
- Sites receiving 1,000+ visits per day
- eCommerce stores requiring consistent performance
- Developers who need custom server configurations
- Businesses running multiple websites
- Anyone needing full root access or a specific operating system
Managed vs unmanaged VPS: With managed VPS, Maroon Hosting handles OS updates, security patching, and server monitoring. With unmanaged VPS, you get full control but are responsible for server administration. If you're not a developer, managed VPS is the right choice.
What is cloud hosting?
Cloud hosting runs your website across a network of interconnected servers rather than a single physical machine. If one server develops a fault, another instantly takes over. Resources scale automatically to handle traffic spikes.
The analogy: instead of renting a flat in one building, you have access to multiple properties across the city. You use whichever is most available and closest at any given moment.
Who should choose cloud hosting?
- High-traffic websites with unpredictable visitor spikes
- Large eCommerce stores with seasonal demand (e.g. Black Friday)
- SaaS products and web applications
- Businesses with a global audience requiring low latency in multiple regions
- Enterprise applications requiring 100% uptime guarantees
Side-by-side comparison
Here's how all three types of UK web hosting stack up across the factors that matter most:
| Feature | Shared | VPS | Cloud |
|---|---|---|---|
| Starting price | From £8.99/mo | From £9.99/mo | Variable |
| Dedicated resources | ✗ Shared | ✓ Guaranteed | ✓ On demand |
| Root access | ✗ No | ✓ Yes | ✓ Yes |
| Automatic scaling | ✗ No | ~ Manual upgrade | ✓ Automatic |
| Technical difficulty | Low | Medium | High |
| Best for traffic | Under 500/day | 500 – 50k/day | 50k+ /day |
| Uptime SLA | 99.9% | 99.99% | 99.99%+ |
| Managed option | ✓ Always | ✓ Available | ~ Varies |
| UK servers available | ✓ Yes | ✓ Yes | ✓ Yes |
| Suitable for beginners | ✓ Yes | ~ With managed plan | ✗ No |
Which should you choose?
Here's the honest answer based on where you are right now:
- Starting a new UK business website? Start with shared hosting. It costs less, requires no technical knowledge, and is more than capable for most small business sites. You can always upgrade later.
- Getting 500+ visits a day or running an eCommerce store? Move to VPS hosting. The guaranteed resources will eliminate the performance inconsistency of shared hosting, and the managed option means you don't need to become a sysadmin.
- Running a high-traffic application or global product? Cloud hosting is the right infrastructure — but at that scale, you'll likely want a dedicated DevOps engineer or a managed cloud platform.
The good news: you don't have to decide forever. At Maroon Hosting, you can start on shared hosting today and migrate to VPS when you need to — we handle the entire migration for free.
Not sure? Every Maroon Hosting plan includes free migration. That means if you're currently on shared hosting elsewhere and want to upgrade to VPS, we'll move your site at no cost. Talk to our team →
Why UK hosting matters
Wherever you choose to host, one thing matters enormously for UK businesses: server location. A website hosted on UK servers will consistently outperform one hosted in the USA for UK visitors — both in raw page load speed and in Google's UK search rankings.
Google uses page speed as a ranking factor. A server in the UK reduces the physical distance your data has to travel to reach a UK visitor, which directly reduces your Time to First Byte (TTFB). This is one reason why "UK web hosting" is worth specifying — not just hosting that happens to be sold in the UK.
At Maroon Hosting, all our plans run on UK and European infrastructure by default. We also have data centres in the USA, South Africa, and Africa — so if your audience spans continents, we can serve them from the closest location.