You are shopping for Minecraft hosting. Some plans cost 3 euros per month. Others cost 50. The expensive ones say "dedicated." The cheap ones say "shared." What is the difference and does it actually matter?
The Three Tiers
Shared Hosting (Game Server Hosting)
Your Minecraft server shares a physical machine with other customers' servers. The hosting company manages the hardware, operating system, and panel. You get a control panel (usually Pterodactyl) with buttons to start, stop, and configure your server.
What you get:
- A Minecraft server with a set amount of RAM (2 GB, 4 GB, etc.)
- Access to a control panel (file manager, console, settings)
- SFTP access for file uploads
- Shared CPU cores with other customers
What you do not get:
- Root access to the operating system
- Full control over the CPU (you share it)
- Custom software installations outside the panel
Best for: Small to medium servers (2-50 players). Friends playing together. Community servers. Anyone who does not want to manage an operating system.
Price range: 2-20 euros per month depending on RAM.
VPS (Virtual Private Server)
You get a virtual machine with its own operating system. You have root access and can install anything you want: Pterodactyl, custom Java versions, monitoring tools, databases, web servers. The physical hardware is still shared with other VPS customers, but your resources are guaranteed.
What you get:
- Full root access to a Linux installation
- Guaranteed CPU cores and RAM
- Install any software you want
- Run multiple servers on one VPS
What you do not get:
- Physical hardware dedicated to you
- Maximum possible performance (VPS has virtualization overhead)
Best for: Server administrators who want full control. Running multiple game servers. Custom setups with reverse proxies, databases, and monitoring stacks.
Price range: 10-60 euros per month depending on specs.
Dedicated Server
An entire physical machine is yours. No sharing. All CPU cores, all RAM, all disk I/O belongs to your servers. You have root access, full control, and maximum performance.
What you get:
- An entire physical machine
- All CPU cores and RAM are exclusively yours
- Maximum disk I/O performance
- No noisy neighbors
What you do not get:
- Hand-holding. You manage the operating system, security, updates, backups, everything
Best for: Large networks with 100+ players. Multiple game servers. Maximum performance requirements.
Price range: 50-200+ euros per month depending on hardware.
Real-World Comparison
| Factor | Shared | VPS | Dedicated | |---|---|---|---| | Setup difficulty | Easy (panel provided) | Medium (install OS + panel) | Hard (full server management) | | CPU performance | Good (shared) | Good (guaranteed) | Best (no sharing) | | RAM | Fixed allocation | Fixed allocation | Full machine RAM | | Disk I/O | Shared (can be slow) | Better (SSD/NVMe) | Best (NVMe, no contention) | | Monthly cost (typical) | 5-15 euros | 15-50 euros | 60-200 euros | | Player count | 2-50 | 10-100+ | 50-500+ | | Technical skill needed | Low | Medium-High | High | | Root access | No | Yes | Yes | | Multi-server | Usually no | Yes | Yes |
The "Noisy Neighbor" Problem
On shared hosting, other customers' servers run on the same physical machine. If someone else's server spikes to 100 percent CPU usage, your server might lag even though you did nothing wrong.
Good hosting companies (like Space-Node) limit CPU allocation per customer to prevent this. But on cheap shared hosts with oversold hardware, noisy neighbors are a real problem.
VPS hosting guarantees your CPU allocation. Even if other VPS instances on the same machine spike, your cores stay available. Dedicated servers eliminate this entirely.
When to Upgrade
Stay on shared hosting if:
- You have fewer than 30-40 players
- You run one Minecraft server
- You do not need custom OS-level software
- Your budget is under 15 euros per month
- You prefer managed infrastructure over managing it yourself
Upgrade to VPS if:
- You need root access for custom software
- You run multiple game servers
- You want guaranteed CPU performance
- You are comfortable with Linux command line
- You need a web server, database, or monitoring alongside your game server
Upgrade to dedicated if:
- You run a large network (100+ concurrent players)
- You need maximum single-thread performance
- You run a BungeeCord/Velocity network with multiple backend servers
- You need full hardware isolation
- Budget is not the primary concern
Does Shared Hosting Mean Bad Performance?
No. Good shared hosting on proper hardware performs well for the majority of servers. Most Minecraft servers have 5-20 players. These do not need a dedicated machine. They need 4-8 GB of RAM on a fast CPU, which is exactly what shared hosting provides.
The key is the hardware underneath. A shared plan on an AMD Ryzen 9 3900X with NVMe storage performs better than a VPS on old Xeon hardware with spinning disks.
Space-Node's Approach
Space-Node offers shared game server hosting on AMD Ryzen 9 3900X processors with NVMe storage in the Netherlands. Plans range from 2 GB to 16 GB RAM.
For servers that need more than shared hosting can provide, contact our support for custom VPS and dedicated solutions. Check the plans here.
