While all our Shared Hosting plans offer above and beyond technical specifications as compared to many of our competitors, there may be some limitations that are placed there strictly for helping with proper functionality of the server.
So, what are some limitations a shared server can have?
For starters, a shared server means that you are using all the server resources with several other users who hold an account on that particular server. As such, storage capacity, CPU usage, RAM, Cache and other shared resources are used by all. Some more than others, but we try to keep it as balanced as possible for all users within a server.
Most notable Limitations:
- Databases: All our shared hosting servers allow up to 25 MySQL databases to be used with your account. If you require more databases or a different type of Database Server such as Oracle, you will need to upgrade to a VPS or Dedicated server. But for most users, this limit is well above their needs.
- SWAP Memory: Consider it the amount of RAM for your server account. Since this is shared among several other accounts, if your website uses a lot of SWAP memory, caused by a heavy website or extremely high web or email traffic, it will slow down your server and in rare cases, it could become temporarily unavailable. This is rare, but usually happens if someone is DDoSing your account, your website has files much too big for every user to load, or you have too much email to synchronize among multiple devices.
- Server Storage: Some of our accunts have specific limitations to the amount of storage your account can handle. This includes limitations for MySQL, Email and your web data. For Unlimited accounts, the limitations will vary based on various factors. The most important one, the nodes, or individual files in your account. If you exceed 200,000 you'll be very likely to receive storage errors. However, if you are within the limit and your server still acts up, it could be related to your email quota.
- Email Storage: Even though it is directly linked to your web hosting account, it may actually be what is eating up all your swap and storage capacity. Because email will have a few issues based on the user, we will dedicate a full heading for it, below.
While there may be some other limitations that are typical to a shared hosting plan, the above mentioned are usually the only limitations that are not as rare. In reality, most shared hosting users never reach these limits.
EMAIL STORAGE LIMITAIONS & GOOD PRACTICES:
All our hosting plans allow you to have multiple email accounts for your server account. Under cPanel you are able to specify a strict quota for some accounts, or have the choice for an unlimited quota.
If you specified a strict quota for an email account, and you reach or exceed it, you will not be able to receive new email and may have trouble sending out email. For this, you should simply delete old or unwanted email to resume service.
However, if you specified unlimited quota for an email account, it does not mean infinite. Instead, it ust refers to not having a top cap limitation. So you'll be able to send and receive email as long as the available server storage is available. So if you have a 5GB server account, that is as unlimited as it can get, minus the other server data in your account (website, databases, etc.).
What if you have an "unlimited" plan? Does that mean that your email storage is also unlimited? In a way yes, but no. It is still not "infinite". Based on the amount of email accounts in your server account, and how many emails you receive on a daily basis, your account could get full quickly. You could potentially have a million or more emails on one account, but another account has a few hundred with very large attachments, then its quota gets reduced because it takes too many resources to sinchronize with your linked devices.
If you use multiple email accounts with a lot of folders to sort out your email, then IMAP is definitely useful for you. However, keep in mind that it'll also try to stay synchronized with your other devices and that can cause issues for extremely large email folders.
However, if you prefer to organize your email directly on your main computer but just access email occasionally on your mobile device, then you should opt out for POP3. Your mobile device will still use IMAP, but your main email software on your MAC or PC will use POP3. All email will be downloaded directly to your desktop and your email server will be freed up. This also allows you to have a copy of all your email on your desktop, but will remove copies from the server, based on your settings.
KEEP IN MIND
Even though the storage on a shared server can be labeled as unlimited, it is limited to the fixed or dynamic amount currently allocated for your machine. While the limit is pretty high, in average it'll be between 40 and 50GB per shared account or 200,000 nodes. whatever happens first.
Even though we set that limit as a base, it could vary or increase at any time, based on the type of account or usage. However, this will also have a great impact on your server performance. The more data it needs to process, specially from email accounts, the more burden it will cause on your website and other servre features.
If you start to see that the server is giving you trouble with either your email, website or both; you may need to upgrade to a Cloud, VPS or Dedicated Server plan.
If you have any questions that have not been covered in this article, please use the Support Ticket System and one of our agents will assist you.
