The Best 16 Windows VPS Hosting Providers in 2023

Kamatera is a name that pops up increasingly often in discussions about cloud platforms. The provider is reliable, features superb scalability, and offers a broader range of services than the majority of hosts.

Kamatera is also an approved Microsoft business partner, meaning it is certified to provide services featuring Microsoft’s software.

Let’s see what its Windows virtual private hosting can offer to users and businesses.

Specs

Kamatera runs a robust cloud setup on top of its already impressive hardware. The systems feature full redundancy, Intel Xeon Platinum Cascade Lake processors, 10Gbps connectivity for each virtual server, and excellent failover server clustering.

Eighteen servers spread across the US, Canada, Israel, the Netherlands, Germany, the UK, and China give the provider a worldwide presence. The coverage is better than you can expect with the vast majority of providers.

As for the actual Windows virtual private servers, Kamatera offers maximum resource flexibility and scalability. You can choose the amount of CPU, RAM, disk space, and bandwidth you need and freely add or remove virtual hardware components.

Kamatera charges you hourly for the resources, so you can even adjust your setup on the go. You’ll never lack resources or have to pay for those you don’t use.

The smallest blank Windows Server has 1 vCPU core, 1GB RAM, and 20GB SSD storage, which is great for a low-end start. You can scale this up to 72 cores, 512GB RAM, and around 4TB storage.

And that’s just accounting for one virtual machine. You can just as well scale horizontally and add multiple servers. You can start small but still have the opportunity for near-infinite scaling. The service is self-provisioning, so you can handle all the scaling yourself.

If managing a cloud infrastructure sounds daunting, though, you can go for Kamatera’s managed support. If you do, the tech team will work on optimal resource allocation, handle backups, and configure the server-side technologies.

Features

You can get Windows VPS hosting with licensing for various versions of OS. Windows Server 2008, 2012, 2016, and 2019 are available in multiple variants. You can get a Plesk license too, if you need a control panel.

If you go for the standard service, you’ll just get a blank server and superuser-level access. You’ll have full freedom to install any technologies you want (or get managed support to do it for you). This is fantastic for private users and developers who want to set up a web application on something more robust than your standard Windows VPS provider.

However, this is not where Kamatera’s real power lies. In fact, the provider has amazing business application. This is due to its managed services for Microsoft Exchange, Microsoft CRM, Microsoft SharePoint, and Microsoft AX.

The Windows VPS servers work a bit differently based on the app.

For instance, if you need to set up an Exchange server, Kamatera will handle things like installing the app, making sure your servers don’t get blacklisted, and potentially integrating the solution with SharePoint. You can use Kamatera’s beginner-friendly panel to manage user mailboxes and take advantage of content analysis tools.

Whichever software you choose, the benefits are similar. Kamatera’s tech team sets everything up, takes care of server scaling, and makes sure the Microsoft app works and integrates with what you need.

For businesses, this eliminates the need to run an expensive IT department to maintain the applications. Kamatera can take care of the technical side of things, and you can just concentrate on putting the apps to good use.

In summary, while Kamatera works excellently even for private users, its business solutions are beyond fantastic.

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Kamatera is one of the most beloved Windows VPS providers among developers and businesses. Many users particularly praise the tech team for how efficient it is.

There are practically no negative reviews to speak of. Kamatera does the job and does it well.

Support

You can contact the support 24/7 via live chat, phone, and email—pretty much expected from a decent provider.

You can choose unmanaged or managed Windows VPS. Unmanaged support is more for technical users and businesses that already run an IT team. At this level, Kamatera will maintain the base infrastructure and software, while you take care of your applications and virtual server management.

If you go for the managed service, Kamatera’s team will take care of the majority of technical operations. It will help you with resource scaling, setting up and maintaining various technologies, and even provide instructions on using Microsoft applications like SharePoint or Microsoft AX.

The service at this level is absolutely stellar. The support agents are quick, friendly, and, most importantly, well-trained. They have a solid grasp of both the platform and Windows apps. They can efficiently pinpoint and resolve issues.

Kamatera doesn’t mess around when it comes to support.

Price

Kamatera’s Windows VPS server hosting prices are a bit complicated. This is because there are several levels of support to consider, as well as a pretty much infinite number of different server setups. Kamatera offers a helpful price calculator that can help you estimate spending.

To give you an idea, the smallest unmanaged server would cost you $23/month, Windows 2019 license included.

If you want basic managed support, you would need to pay $50/month extra. The basic service means the tech team will configure your virtual hardware as well as handle the standard tasks like server stack installation and updates. This is completely fine for private users who don’t need advanced application management.

Companies running Microsoft Exchange or Microsoft CRM on larger Windows virtual private servers ought to go with extended support. This just means the tech team will handle practically everything your in-house IT department would—all the virtual server management plus software installation, maintenance, and optimization.

For those apps, the pricing would work a bit differently. The smallest typical server would be around $150/month. Extended management is an additional $125, and there’s a small licensing fee of $2.50 per user.

It’s a similar deal for Microsoft SharePoint and Microsoft AX. The only difference is that the management fee is calculated on a per-user basis.

You would pay between $8.90 and $10.90 per user, depending on the scale of your operation—no extra licensing fee. This type of service also gets you discounts on the cloud Windows VPS resources.

The extended management might seem a bit pricy. However, it’s not really that much considering you typically have to hire at least one developer (possibly several) to do the same job. Plus, as your hosting needs grow, the price becomes an absolute steal.

Verdict

If there was one word to describe Kamatera’s offer, that would be stellar. The service works splendidly for regular webmasters. That said, businesses can take even more of an advantage of the affordable prices and the potent but flexible hosting infrastructure. If you’re looking for a robust, premium-grade service, there’s a lot to love about Kamatera.

Hostwinds might be young, but the provider has already distinguished itself with cutting-edge technologies, affordable pricing, and a “customer comes first” attitude. The VPS plans are a highlight of the entire offer.

The servers are also optimized for Windows, so here’s what you get with them.

Specs

Hostwinds runs three SAS Type II certified Tier-4 data centers – in Seattle, Dallas, and Amsterdam.

The provider runs some impressive hardware. The data centers feature fully redundant systems, several layers of security, and compliance with all the latest standards.

The machines run Intel Xeon E3-12xx v2 series processors running at 2.49GHz and are hooked up to a 100Mbps, 1Gbps, and 10Gbps networks. Hostwinds users full KVM virtualization to create the VPSs, which is one of the more common solutions.

As for the actual plans, Hostwinds offers ten varieties of unmanaged and ten of managed Windows VPS. Managed and unmanaged plans scale exactly the same, so the only difference is the features. (And, well, the price tag.)

You can also upgrade from unmanaged to managed VPS at any time. You’ll have something to fall back on if an unmanaged server turns out to be too much for you. Hostwinds is the only host that lets you switch this easily, making it an awesome opportunity to take a swing at server management.

The smallest plan includes 1 CPU core, 1GB RAM, 30GB SSD storage, and 1TB bandwidth. You can scale this up to 16 cores, 96GB RAM, 750GB storage, and 9TB bandwidth.

Hostwinds allows you to scale up any time you need more resources. You can also customize individual resource limits, so the plans fit almost anyone’s needs.

You can also add load balancers for an extra performance boost.

It’s safe to say Hostwinds can handle massive workloads, even more so than some dedicated solutions. And you can get a rather fast Windows VPS, at that.

Features

Let’s start by pointing out the latest OS Hostwinds offers is Windows Server 2016. This is fine since Windows Server 2019 is essentially just an upgraded version of 2016. Most of its benefits have to do with cloud hosting, which is kind of irrelevant for classic VPS.

Still, if you’re set on running Windows Server 2019, a few other providers, like InterServer, support it.

Unmanaged servers come with a monitoring solution, firewall, nightly backups, and the possibility to take server snapshots. This is more than many unmanaged hosts offer.

Going for managed VPS adds a bunch of services. The technical team can set up a custom configuration for you and install any apps you want to use.

Malware scanning, firewall management, and speed optimization services will ensure maximum availability and speeds. The techies can also set up custom automated tasks.

The Windows VPS server management includes a host of other services, but the ones above add the most value.

All in all, both VPS variants are fantastic solutions. You can get top-of-the-line Windows VPS from Hostwinds.

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Hostwinds elicits mostly positive reactions from its customers. There’s a lot to like about its hosting, so there’s no surprise here.

A few users did complain about the billing. You’ll find the starting and renewal prices below.

Just keep in mind the initial price only applies to the first term of hosting. Hostwinds is pretty clear about this on the product page, so the provider isn’t really to blame.

The Windows VPS hosting is relatively affordable across the board, so the initial discount is an added bonus.

Support

The support team is responsive and helpful.

Even with unmanaged hosting, you get more help than you’d expect. If you’re a managed user, the support will help you with any issue that might come up.

The agents are extremely responsive and eager to help. Every time I contacted the support, I got a practically instant response with exactly the info I was looking for. Enough said.

The knowledge base is rather decent. You can access a bunch of articles helpful for Windows server admins.

It’s an overall decent service.

Price

Hostwinds applies an initial discount to all Windows VPS server hosting plans. It’s 10% for all unmanaged plans and 65-69% for managed ones. You can get up to three years of VPS hosting at once, and the discount will apply to the entire period.

This is what the pricing looks like in practice.

The smallest unmanaged plan starts at $9.89/month and renews at $10.99/month.

The managed VPS starts at $5.95/month and renews at $16.99/month.

The plans can scale quite massively, with the largest being over $200/month. That said, it’s worth pointing out the largest solution might not be the most cost-effective. If you need that much resources, you might get better value out of a smaller dedicated server.

The rest of the offer gets you amazing value across the board, though. The offer is truly fantastic, and even includes some of the cheapest Windows VPS out there.

Verdict

Whether you need an affordable starter plan or a powerhouse of a VPS, Hostwinds has you covered. Few providers have as complete an offer as this one.

Liquid Web specializes in high-end, high-quality services. This includes powerful Windows VPS hosting plans.

Here’s what you can get with them.

Specs

Liquid Web runs three data centers. The two in the US are SSAE-16 certified, and the Amsterdam facility is compliant with a range of standards, including PCI-DSS, HIPAA, ISAE 3402, AMS-IX, and more. You can read more about the data centers on Liquid Web’s website and even test server response times.

Liquid Web runs cutting-edge technologies in its data centers, complete with redundant hardware components, a Tier-1 network, and on-site security.

The VPS plans start relatively large. The smallest Windows plan includes 4 CPU cores, 4GB RAM, 100GB SSD space, and 10TB bandwidth.

You get much more resources than with a typical starter plan. A gigabit connection, combined with generous bandwidth allocation, makes Liquid Web super effective at handling data-intensive apps.

You can scale up to 8 CPU cores, 16GB RAM, and 200GB storage with the same bandwidth. The plan is more suitable for CPU-heavy apps, but the resources are more than enough for most users.

Liquid Web specializes in robust plans, and its Windows VPS server hosting reflects that.

Features

Liquid Web lets you select the exact level of management you need. This doesn’t affect the price, though. You should go for fully managed VPS if you have no reason to do otherwise.

The full management includes services like server setup, updates and patches, website migrations, vulnerability assessment, PCI-compliance scanning, and more.

The Windows VPS servers come with layers of security features, CDN, emailing, and automated backups with 100GB of free backup storage. The Plesk control panel is also included in the offer.

In short, you get everything you need to run a decent Windows VPS server.

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Numerous users rated the support as excellent. Many also enjoy the powerful servers and how well everything comes together.

Liquid Web did get a few negative reviews recently due to a pricing policy change. Occasional price increases are inevitable if you want a provider that keeps up with the current technologies.

Still, some providers have more stable prices. If you’re interested, check out Windows VPS providers with a price-lock guarantee, like InterServer.

Support

Liquid Web is so confident in the speed of its support, it gives you a fast response guarantee. The support answers all live chat and phone queries in under a minute and email tickets in under an hour.

The support team is one of the best in the industry. You can rely on them to provide prompt and effective solutions for even tricky issues.

Pricing

The smallest plan starts at $74/month. This includes a Windows Server license and Plesk control panel. The plan renews at $129/month.

The shopping cart only lets you purchase up to one year of hosting. If you want to extend the discount by purchasing two years, though, you can contact the support.

The largest plan starts at $169/month and renews at $219/month. The solutions are optimal for a larger VPS, and Liquid Web offers a smooth transition into dedicated hosting once you outgrow them.

The solutions start fairly robust. If you do need a powerful VPS, Liquid Web offers top-notch deals. The price is more than fair for the features and resources, even though you couldn’t strictly classify any of the solutions as a cheap Windows VPS server.

Verdict

Liquid Web is more of a high-end VPS hosting provider. The Windows VPS plans can handle all kinds of demanding apps. To top it off, you can enjoy awesome support, and at a reasonable price at that.

Liquid Web is an excellent performer if you need a more robust solution.

Founded by two enthusiastic teenagers, InterServer might’ve had humble beginnings. However, that’s not stopping it from contending with the top names in hosting today.

It offers virtual Windows server hosting, so let’s check it out.

Specs

It would be tough to list all the cutting-edge technologies InterServer employs. With tight security, highly redundant systems, and robust networking hardware, it’s no wonder InterServer records excellent performance.

The provider has a total of four data centers, all in the US. This makes it an excellent choice for US-based consumers and companies, but kind of subpar for other markets.

The provider uses Microsoft Hyper-V to virtualize its servers. The virtualization technology is a favorite among Windows server admins, and it works splendidly.

As for the actual virtual servers, the specs are determined according to a slice-based model. Here’s how it works.

One “server slice” gets you 1 CPU core, 2GB RAM, 30GB SSD, and 2TB bandwidth. You can get anywhere between 1 and 16 server slices, and you can add or remove slices, even after purchasing a Windows VPS server.

The scaling is completely linear, and you can obviously get everything from a basic to a massive solution.

The catch is that you need at least four slices to get server management. This makes InterServer a poor fit if you need a small managed solution.

Features

InterServer is one of the few hosts that have already implemented Windows Server 2019 into VPS hosting. You can also opt for the 2016 and 2012 versions, though.

Other than that, you can get complimentary backups. You can also get Plesk or DirectAdmin, but that’s about it. InterServer’s Windows virtual machine hosting is geared towards technical users, even with server management.

Speaking of, there are two management levels.

Basic support is available for all solutions. This covers hardware maintenance and reinstalling the OS in case of a problem.

If you get a control panel and at least four server slices, you can get the next level of support. This includes services like control panel installation, Windows update assistance, installing certain web servers, and repairing these features if they break.

Any services beyond that are paid extra.

InterServer’s offer is respectable, even though the provider won’t exactly hold your hand.

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InterServer generally gets positive reviews of the Windows VPS plans. Most users, especially ones that transferred from less reliable providers, praise the speed and uptime.

InterServer has a few disgruntled customers. The complaints are so few, though, it’s unlikely there are any legitimate problems behind them.

Support

InterServer has a decent technical support team working behind the scenes. While the agents are hosting experts, though, the service is definitely meant for technical users. You can rely on the support to resolve any major issues, but you’ll have to do the fine-tuning yourself.

One complaint is that InterServer doesn’t have live chat. The channel might be unnecessary, given the nature of the service, but it still puts InterServer at a bit of a disadvantage.

Pricing

InterServer’s pricing model is as straightforward as they come. Each server slice costs $10/month, no matter how many slices you get. You can get the first year of hosting at a 10% discount. Afterward, the price will go back up to the standard $10/month.

If you want managed Windows VPS, you’ll have to pay a small fee for the control panel. Charging for a panel license is pretty much standard practice, though.

The price includes a Windows Server license of your choice. This makes purchasing a couple of server slices a dirt-cheap way to get a decent Windows-based VPS.

The deals stay pretty good even if you need a larger solution. Still, since the price scales linearly, you get the best deals with smaller VPSs.

InterServer also spices up the offer with a price lock guarantee. The rates will stay the same for as long as you’re hosted with it. A hosting price increase at a bad time can destroy a business, so this is a fantastic feature if you’re on a budget.

Verdict

InterServer offers incredibly cheap Windows VPS if you’re going for a smaller solution. You can also get decent midrange servers and powerful high-end plans. If you’re a technical user, you’ll be amazed at what InterServer can do.

AccuWeb is an established independent provider. Unlike many specialists, it strives to cover a wide range of platforms and solutions.

This includes several types of Windows VPS. Let’s see what they work for.

Specs

AccuWeb runs highly secure data centers in 15 locations, providing excellent geographic redundancy. The servers are equipped with Intel Xeon E5-2650 V2 processors, 128 GB ECC/Registered DDR3 RAM, Raid-6 redundant storage, and are configured for minimal power consumption. All virtual servers have a 1Gbps network port open, which means the connection is unlikely to bottleneck your load times.

The host uses Hyper-V for virtualization, like most Windows hosting providers. This is a leading solution by Microsoft itself, so you can be assured it works fantastically.

AccuWeb Hosting also offers several variants of VPS. The unmanaged Windows VPS, or “VPS Classic” actually features HDD storage, and it’s best to avoid it unless speed really isn’t important (which it usually is).

Most users are best off with the so-called Windows SSD VPS, which is essentially managed Windows VPS.

The smallest plan starts you with 2 vCPU cores, 1GB RAM, 40GB storage, and 500GB bandwidth. You can scale up to 4 CPU cores, 8GB RAM, 200GB storage, and 1TB bandwidth.

You can generally get a good amount of resources. Still, the bandwidth caps are sort of low with all plans. It’s best to take advantage of AccuWeb’s processing power for more CPU-intensive apps.

The servers are self-provisioning. You can add or remove load balancers and scale on-demand, which makes things dramatically simpler.

Features

You can choose between Windows Server 2012 and 2016 with all plans, and you can monitor your Windows VPS hosting platform through an intuitive management panel.

MSSQL Express and MySQL come preinstalled. If your MSSQL database reaches 10GB (which is the limit), you can purchase the paid license through AccuWeb and continue growing your application.

You can get managed security, load balancers, automatic health checks, and weekly backups.

A daily backup option is available, but it is paid.

The management includes the initial server setup, proactive server monitoring and management, third-party software installation, and OS and control panel management.

If you’re looking to run an accounting software, the servers are particularly optimized for supporting QuickBooks. The tech support will install any edition of QuickBooks you want, and optimize it for top-notch performance and ease of access.

AccuWeb also offers VPS specialized for forex trading. The solutions are similar to the Windows VPS SSD. They are a few bucks more expensive, but they can help you get started as a forex trader easily.

AccuWeb offers overall decent VPS hosting, especially if you want to use QuickBooks or try your hand at forex trading. Still, free daily backups would go a long way.

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AccuWeb is well-loved. Its clients love how well everything works together and how helpful the support is.

There are a couple of negative reviews, but the ones concerning the Windows service are few and far between. There’s little worth mentioning here.

Support

The support is helpful and fast—it even guarantees one-hour response times to all email tickets. In practice, the agents are amazingly effective regardless of the support channel.

One fairly unique feature is that AccuWeb gives you 2 hours of one-on-one time with a server admin each month. You can use it to get some custom changes in your Windows virtual private server. Alternatively, you can just get expert consulting from the admin.

These sessions can be extremely helpful to just about anyone, and they add tons of value to the overall hosting service.

Pricing

The starter plan costs $10/month if you prepay for a year of hosting. After that, it goes up to $14/month, which is still a pretty affordable deal for managed VPS.

This includes the cost of a Windows license. You can use a free SolidCP control panel, or pay $10/month for Plesk. SolidCP does most things Plesk can – you can even use it for reselling hosting plans – so it makes for a cheaper alternative.

The servers scale decently, and the overall price remains affordable. AccuWeb lets you customize the resources, but the resource addons are sort of costly. It’s usually more worthwhile to monitor resources and upgrade an entire plan when the time is right.

It should be pointed out all but the largest plans have a higher price tag if you choose a data center other than Denver. AccuWeb offers excellent coverage, but the price increase makes it tough to capitalize on this advantage.

The pricing is fair, but it pays off to plan everything out in advance to ensure you’ll get a cheap Windows VPS server.

Verdict

AccuWeb features plenty of unique and robust features, as well as excellent support. It’s an exceptional offer, even though there’s a bit of room for improvement.

UK2 is one of the top UK providers, and it now looks to spread its business internationally. Like many providers from the UK, it has a reputation for powerful hosting and great support.

Its broad offer includes Windows virtual server hosting. Let’s see how it compares to all the competition.

Specs

When configuring a plan, you can choose a data center in London, Canada, Amsterdam, or one of four US data centers. In simple words, UK2 has awesome coverage in Europe and North America.

All data centers are equipped with a 200Gigabit network and robust Cisco hardware components and are highly secure and reliable.

UK2 deploys Windows Server on top of its standard VPS plans, but the smallest plan is off-limits due to Windows Server minimum system requirements.

All plans let you access 4 CPU cores. The rest of the resources are:

• VPS2GB—2GB RAM, 50GB SSD storage, 4TB bandwidth
• VPS4GB—4GB RAM, 100GB SSD storage, 5TB bandwidth
• VPS8GB—8GB RAM, 200GB SSD storage, 6TB bandwidth
• VPS16GB—16GB RAM, 400GB SSD storage, 7TB bandwidth

The smaller servers are a bit better at handling CPU-heavy apps, while the larger ones can handle high data transfer more easily. Still, you get enough resources to handle most projects.

If you need more CPU power, you can go for the Windows cloud VPS plans. They are similar to the standard VPS, but they are more expensive, and sort of poor value.

Features

The servers support Windows Server 2012. The plans are unmanaged, so you only get assistance with the OS setup.

You can use UK2’s proprietary management panel. This lets you monitor or reboot the servers, create backups, or make any changes.

That’s about it for the features. UK2 has a couple of add-ons, like an advanced monitoring system, labeled as “coming soon.” Still, it’s tough to talk about these before they’re an actual part of the service.

All in all, you get a standard unmanaged Windows VPS server hosting service.

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UK2 gets mostly positive reactions. Many reviewers are long-time users that have experienced years of smooth service.

UK2 does get some negative reviews, but most of them have to do with email hosting problems. If you need emailing with hosting, but want to try UK2, your best bet is to get an inbox from another provider. This is pretty easy to do, and many experts recommend getting such services from separate providers anyway.

Support

While billing and sales support aren’t available 24/7, the techies are there round the clock, and that’s arguably what matters most. The agents are responsive, although you don’t always get through instantly.

UK2 is vocal about running amazing in-house support, and it has good reason to be. The support agents are awesome at handling all sorts of issues.

The VPS plans are unmanaged, though, so you’ll mostly have to rely on the support for guidance and fix issues yourself.

Pricing

UK2’s overall pricing is a bit tricky.

The smallest Windows virtual private server is £15/month ($19.64). Each plan after that doubles the price, and you can prepay for a year and get 33% off.

UK2 adds a £15/month Windows license price to whichever VPS you choose. Also, the website doesn’t display the price in dollars, which is a bit annoying

Did you get your calculator yet? Jokes aside, the pricing is a mess, so I’ll break it down both in pounds and dollars:

• VPS2GB—£25/month($32.75/month) for the first year, £30/month($39.30/month) after that
• VPS4GB—£35/month($45.85/month) for the first year, £45/month($58.95/month) after that
• VPS8GB—£55/month($72.05/month) for the first year, £75/month($98.25/month) after that
• VPS16GB—£95/month($124.45/month) for the first year, £135/month($176.85/month) after that

Keep in mind the prices exclude VAT.

The prices are above average for unmanaged hosting. Still, the platform is robust, so it’s usually worth the slightly higher price

Verdict

UK2 is a solid choice if you need unmanaged Windows VM hosting. The provider has a robust platform, even though there are more affordable ones out there. Plus, a broad choice of data centers ensures awesome performance if you’re targeting specific areas of Europe or North America.

OVH started in France and is now one of Europe’s largest providers. It offers a range of solutions, from miniature to enterprise-grade ones.

Let’s see if its Windows-based VPS can compete with the world’s best providers.

Specs

Let’s preface this by pointing out you should go for cloud VPS plans if you want to host Windows. This is pretty much the same as SSD Windows VPS but set up on a cloud infrastructure which makes it a bit more reliable.

You can set up your VPS in one of many data centers, including European ones in France, Poland, the UK, and Germany, as well as other locations like Canada, Singapore, and Sydney. Funnily enough, there’s no US data center, but the Canadian one should get you decent performance. All in all, OVH has great coverage and geographic redundancy, like many cloud hosting providers.

The facilities feature uninterruptible power supply devices, on-site security, and 10Gbps+ and 40Gbps+ connectivity. The host runs 400,000 of its own servers and has an in-house 20Tbps optic fiber network. If you’re interested in learning more, OVH includes an in-depth breakdown of its technologies as well as a network map on its website.

Keep in mind you have to select a data center when purchasing a plan. Click the “Show product details” button in the data center tab of the shopping cart to do this. It’s not really the most obvious, OVH will default to Canada if you don’t change it.

OVH is so confident in its Windows VPS hosting infrastructure, it offers a 99.99% uptime SLA. This is more than solid, and it’s pretty much only feasible because of the cloud infrastructure.

OVH offers three plans. The specs are:

• VPS Cloud 1—1 CPU core at 3GHz, 2Gb RAM, 25Gb SSD storage, 250Mbps public bandwidth
• VPS Cloud 2—2 CPU cores, 4Gb RAM, 50Gb SSD storage, 500Mbps bandwidth
• VPS Cloud 3—4 CPU cores, 8GB RAM, 100Gb SSD storage, 1Gbps bandwidth

The plans are relatively cheap for Windows VPS hosting, so they provide a great starting point. If you do outgrow them, you can easily scale into OVH’s public cloud, which is much more flexible and robust.

Features

OVH specializes in unmanaged solutions, and the cloud VPS is one. This makes it better for experienced users rather than beginners.

You can choose between Windows Server 2012 and 2016. You can also get a Plesk license if you need it.

Even though this is unmanaged hosting, OVH throws in quite a few features.

OVH has an easy-to-use management area. You can easily handle billing, reinstall or change your OS, add resources, and manage pretty much all aspects of your VPS.

DDoS protection also comes out-of-the-box.

You can also get a versatile backup solution for a small monthly fee. It lets you set up automated backups or take server snapshots. The solution stores three backup copies, ensuring you are safe from data loss. The solution is awesome and worth the extra couple of bucks, especially if you go for one of the largest servers.

OVH has a decent offer, and it’s definitely more than you’d expect from an unmanaged Windows VPS hosting provider.

Around the Web

OVH gets mixed reviews, and there are a bit too many negative ones in the mix.

Most complaints have to do with limited support, though. Apparently, many users don’t realize OVH sells unmanaged services. This inevitably causes conflict if some feature not covered by the SLA breaks.

To give some credit to the customers, OVH does little to make it obvious the services are unmanaged. It even uses some vague language to describe what services the support provides.

Still, it’s not really a con if you’re familiar with the service. As long as you’re aware most of the management is on you, there should be no surprises.

Support

The support team is decent, though it tends to be somewhat slow to respond. It’s not that much of an issue with unmanaged services, though, and the engineers do a fine job of maintaining the entire hosting infrastructure.

Pricing

The Windows cloud VPS pricing is as follows:

• Cloud VPS 1—$15.07/month
• Cloud VPS 2—$28.03/month
• Cloud VPS 3—$54.71/month

If you get a year of hosting, OVH gives you a $1.12/month discount for the initial term. This amounts to a $13.44 total discount with all plans, which is unimpressive, but it can at least cover the domain name cost for the first year

The hosting is overall affordable. Since you get a couple of handy features, it’s one of the best-value unmanaged offers.

Verdict

OVH is an excellent choice if you’re in the market for unmanaged VPS. You can get cheap Windows VPS hosting equipped with surprisingly powerful features. It’s one of the top providers of its kind.

Bisend is a young hosting provider. Like many new providers, it relies on state-of-the-art technologies and expert support to stand out.

Let’s see if its Windows VPS plans stand out as well.

Specs

Aside from the fact it uses Hyper-V virtualization, Bisend is kind of secretive about its setup. It does state its servers feature Raid-10 redundancy and Cisco hardware firewalls, though, which adds reliability.

These are the specs of the actual VPS plans:

• Standard—2 CPU cores, 2Gb RAM, 60Gb SSD storage, 3Tb bandwidth
• Enhanced—2 CPU cores, 4Gb RAM, 80Gb SSD storage, 4Tb bandwidth
• Ultimate—4 CPU cores, 8Gb RAM, 160Gb SSD storage, 5Tb bandwidth

The resources are well-balanced. The plans stop somewhat low, though, so Bisend is better for small and medium projects. If you need massive plans, you should either look into other providers or Bisend’s dedicated plans.

You can also add additional space to the Windows virtual private hosting plans as a new server partition. The add-on is $2/month per 20GB of storage capacity, which is fine if you need a few extra gigs of space.

Also, you can choose between the US and the Hong Kong data center. The entire service is also available in simplified Chinese, if you prefer. It can be tough to find reliable alternatives to Alibaba Cloud hosting in China, but Bisend is one of them.

Features

Windows VPS solutions are managed.

The VPS comes with Windows Server 2016. All plans also include Plesk, which is fine if you want to use that control panel. The tech team likely finds it easier to manage plans under a unified solution, but the practice only drives up the cost for users who wouldn’t otherwise run Plesk.

The default Windows server setup comes with a bunch of out-of-the-box technologies. These include automated backups, monitoring and reports, free SSL, layered security, Git integration, and much more.

You also get a bunch of features useful for web developers. Bisend is obviously looking to cater to website owners, so the plans work best for hosting ASP.NET code or other Windows web development technologies.

Since the Windows VPS servers are managed, the support is responsible for maintaining the server setup and fixing any issues with the software.

It all amounts to a decent service.

Around the Web

Many users love how well Bisend handles ASP.NET hosting. They praise the speed and low-cost pricing of the platform.

Negative reviews really are few. They are mostly individual opinions, rather than something pointing to a problem in the service.

Support

Bisend runs in-house tech teams in both the US and China.

The support is attentive, professional, and efficient. They do an awesome job of both maintaining excellent service and resolving specific issues.

The support is solid—enough said.

Pricing

Let’s start with the plan pricing:

• Standard—Starts at $35.95/month, $59.95/month to renew
• Enhanced—Starts at $47.95/month, $79.95/month to renew
• Ultimate—Starts at $71.95/month, $119.95/month to renew

The price includes a Windows license and Plesk Onyx.

The deals are pretty decent, though you’re not really getting the cheapest Windows VPS hosting out there. If you need a robust Windows plan for website hosting, Bisend’s value is through the roof.

Verdict

Bisend focuses on handling larger ASP.NET websites and does the job splendidly. If you want a powerful website hosting platform, it’s the go-to provider.

MilesWeb started out as a local host in India but is now looking to compete with the global hosts. The provider runs a range of impressive services, including its own virtual servers and management for some of the leading cloud platforms like AWS and DigitalOcean.

Let’s check out its Windows VPS hosting and see what kind of advantages they offer!

Specs

MilesWeb runs multiple Tier-4 data centers. This means practically all systems are fully redundant, including the air conditioning, network connections, and, of course, the actual server components.

The data centers are located in the US, Canada, the UK, Romania, India, Singapore, and Australia. The numerous facilities offer top-notch geographic redundancy and make an excellent basis to operate international projects.

The physical servers sport dual Intel(R) Xeon(R) E5-2680 v2 processors running at 2.80GHz and 128GB of RAM.

MilesWeb uses Microsoft Hyper-V for Windows server hosting virtualization. The hypervisor is a tool by Microsoft, and it comes included in newer Windows Server operating systems. This can get you the advantages of easier VM live migration and no-downtime maintenance. Plus, it can build pretty darn fast virtual servers.

You can choose from six plans:

• W1—2 vCPU cores, 2GB RAM, 50GB SSD storage, 200GB bandwidth
• W2—2 vCPU cores, 4GB RAM, 100GB SSD storage, 300GB bandwidth
• W3—4 vCPU cores, 8GB RAM, 150GB SSD storage, 400GB bandwidth
• W4—6 vCPU cores, 12GB RAM, 200GB SSD storage, 500GB bandwidth
• W5—8 vCPU cores, 16GB RAM, 250GB SSD storage, 600GB bandwidth
• W6—12 vCPU cores, 24GB RAM, 300GB SSD storage, 700GB bandwidth

In essence, MilesWeb runs powerful machines, and the plans let you scale quite naturally. The bandwidth caps are a bit lower than what most Windows VPS hosting sites set, but they are enough for most apps. As long as you assess how bandwidth-heavy your particular application is, you should be fine.

Features

MilesWeb runs Windows Server 2012 R2 and Windows Server 2016. This is fine for most users unless you need some specific features of Windows 2019.

MSSQL Express and MySQL databases are available. If you want a different database program, you can request it from the support.

Plesk licensing is an option if you need a web hosting control panel.

MilesWeb offers fully managed Windows servers. If you need any technology installed, you can ask the support to do it for you. The tech team will put in reasonable effort to get you your preferred setup. You have root access, so you can make any changes you want to the virtual servers.

The servers come preloaded with a bunch of supported technologies, including IIS, ASP.NET, and various MVC frameworks. If you want to try forex trading, the platform supports MetaTrader 4 and 5.

If you are already hosted on a Windows server with a different provider, you can take advantage of a full VPS migration. The service is free, so there’s no downside to switching providers.

All in all, it’s a decent Windows-based platform and the flexible technology stack can make it work for most people.

Around the Web

Most MilesWeb user reviews are positive. The provider delivers on what it promises, and many customers appreciate the service.

The provider gets many complaints about billing, however. One of the issues is that the host discontinued its money-back policy on most web hosting plans. The cancellation procedure gets kind of complicated as well, which can lead to problems. You should check the provider’s ToS to familiarize yourself with the policies.

But.

It’s important to note that most users praise the provider for top-notch Windows virtual server hosting.

Support

MilesWeb makes it easy to reach the support team. You can do it from any page of the site in a few clicks, and somebody usually answers the query instantly.

The support you get kind of varies from agent to agent. Some provide excellent assistance and fast replies. The best others can do is pass you on to a techie who actually knows how to help. You do get help in the end, but the whole process can drag out.

Fortunately, the knowledge base is chock-full of useful tutorials. Many of these can help you with running a Windows VPS server.

Price

MilesWeb’s pricing plans are as follows:

• W1—$18/month
• W2—$28/month
• W3—$57/month
• W4—$86/month
• W5—$155/month
• W6—$172/month

The provider requires you to prepay for three years to get the best price. The pricing is about 66% more expensive if you decide to pay monthly.

The pricing is generally in line with other Windows VPS providers. A three-year commitment is a bit much for VPS, however, especially with no money-back guarantee. You should make sure MilesWeb works for you before signing up for the long-term deal.

Verdict

MilesWeb runs a well-maintained international operation. It has a well-constructed resource distribution across plans, lets you request installation of custom technologies, and all works on top of a robust hosting infrastructure. As long as you’re okay with the policies I mentioned, the plans should serve you well.

With over 300,000 users and numerous awards under its belt, TMDHosting is a company to be reckoned with. Let’s see if its Windows VPS lives up to the provider’s reputation.

Specs

TMDHosting runs several SSAE-16 certified data centers, all equipped with robust machines and a solid network.

The servers are all supported with fully redundant systems, and all virtual servers are deployed on a cloud platform, adding reliability. Plus, each server runs the latest Intel CPUs, 64GB+ DDR4 RAM, and is hooked up to a 1Gbps+ internet connection. This gives enough room to scale, as you’ll see in a second and ensures there are no hardware bottlenecks to worry about.

TMDHosting promises 99.999% uptime, though. The uptime is nearly perfect, but it’s tough to say how feasible it is to maintain the same results on a monthly basis. Still, you can expect reliable and fast Windows VPS plans.

TMDHosting offers five VPS plans.

The smallest one has 2 CPU cores, 4GB RAM, 80GB SSD storage, and 3TB bandwidth. The largest plan comes with 16 CPU cores, 64GB bandwidth, 1280GB storage, and 10TB bandwidth.

The plans start off a tad larger than average and scale up really high. Each plan essentially adds 2 CPU cores and doubles RAM and storage allocation.

This amounts to real monsters of a server with the largest plan. If you need a bunch of storage capacity in particular, few VPS providers can outclass TMDHosting.

Features

The Windows virtual private server plans come with a Windows Server 2016 license and Plesk control panel included.

You can get free daily backups, security features (spam protection included), a free domain name, and more. You can also purchase domain privacy and SiteLock security at the standard price.

The plans are managed, so the technical team will provide server setup, software installation, updates, troubleshooting, malware removal, and whatever else is needed to keep your VPS in working order.

Around the Web

TMDHosting mostly gets positive reviews. A lot of users like the power of the overall platform.

Negative reactions usually have to do with billing. TMDHosting automatically enables service auto-renewal, so it continues charging your card until you manually cancel a plan.

The cancellation feature works in most cases, but some customers did complain about it being buggy. If you want to cancel the entire service, it’s best to remove the card on file to be safe.

As long as you keep this in mind when you buy your Windows VPS plan, you should have no issues.

Support

The support gets a lot of praise, but it’s really just okay. The technical team does a fine job of maintaining the service, but getting specific issues resolved can take a bit longer than it should.

TMDHosting offers something called premium support. The agents sort of failed to explain this service. Plus, it’s mentioned as a selling point in absolutely all plans, so it’s likely just a marketing gimmick.

All in all, the support will take care of a lot of tasks for you, but it could be more efficient.

Pricing

TMDHosting’s cheapest Windows VPS plan costs $79.95/month. This includes Windows Server and Plesk licensing fees, so the cost is about average for the service. Just keep in mind you have to sign up for at least three months to avoid a $19.95 setup fee.

TMDHosting also automatically adds domain privacy if you choose to use the free domain registration. Make sure to remove it from the shopping cart if you want to opt out of the service.

The largest plan costs $564.95/month, which is also fair, considering the massive amount of resources.

All in all, you’ll get decent value if you opt for TMDHosting.

Verdict

TMDHosting is an overall solid provider, although it has a little room for improvement. You can get fully managed plans with more than enough resources for most projects, all at a reasonable price.

HostPapa is an independent, Canadian web hosting provider. The host offers a massive array of services, including Windows virtual private servers.

Let’s check out what makes the host unique:

Specs

HostPapa runs one primary data center in Toronto, Canada. It does have 100+ other points of presence via third-party data centers, which can help deliver content faster. However, the provider works best in North America.

The main facility sports 24/7 on-site security, disaster aversion systems, and redundant electrical systems. The servers run Intel(R) Xeon CPU E5-2650 v4 at 2.20GHz processors and RAID-10 redundant SSD storage.

HostPapa uses Xen to create its Windows virtual dedicated servers. It is the virtualization software used by giants like Rackspace, and AWS used it for creating EC2 instances for years.

Xen is an open-source solution, and it brings the advantages of security and reliability while remaining reasonably lightweight. Plus, it has many native device drivers when running Windows Server, so the OS can communicate with the physical hardware components faster. This makes it a bit quicker than hypervisors like KVM, at least when talking about Windows VPS hosting.

You can choose from four VPS plans:

• Venus—4 CPU cores, 4GB RAM, 125GB storage, 2TB bandwidth
• Earth—8 CPU cores, 8GB RAM, 250GB storage, 2TB bandwidth
• Mars—8 CPU cores, 16GB RAM, 500GB storage, 4TB bandwidth
• Jupiter—12 CPU cores, 32GB RAM, 1TB storage, 8TB bandwidth

HostPapa runs an excellent platform with a decent distribution of resources between plans. There are no extremely low-end options, but the plans are excellent for running and scaling midrange and even larger apps.

Features

HostPapa lets you choose between unmanaged, managed, and “fully managed” VPS servers. Most users will want to go for the managed Windows VPS option. It gets you a free web hosting control panel license and only costs $19/month extra. HostPapa handles server patching and installation of various technologies for you.

Fully managed support can be the right choice if you need a custom server configuration, software installation, or website troubleshooting. This is a bit expensive, though, as it costs $129/month. It’s usually a better choice to handle this part yourself, given that you know how to run a server.

HostPapa also throws in the SolusVM management panel. This solution makes it easy to perform basic management operations like rebooting Windows virtual private hosting servers. It also lets you see resource stats and server logs and manage multiple VMs from a single panel.

You can easily combine it with Plesk and a billing system like WHMCS or Blesta. This makes HostPapa a prime option for reselling Windows hosting from your VPS plan.

The deal includes two IP addresses, as opposed to the usual one. This can be handy for email marketing or just as a backup if you’re a reseller.

The plans come with layered security, and the servers are PCI DSS-compliant.

If you need a migration, HostPapa’s team can transfer your entire server for you. You can avoid moving the data yourself.

All in all, it’s decent Windows server hosting, suitable for just about any type of Microsoft app.

Around the Web

HostPapa gets predominantly positive user reviews. The service works reasonably well, and the host delivers on its promises.

Most of the negative attention HostPapa gets is about the “unlimited” hosting plans actually having strict limits. This doesn’t pertain to Windows VPS, though, since all the server resources are clearly outlined in the plans. You’ll always know how much you can spend.

For the most part, HostPapa is a reputable provider.

Support

It’s relatively easy to contact HostPapa’s 24/7 support. The phone, live chat, and ticketing buttons are apparent at the top of the website.

HostPapa handles onboarding better than many Windows VPS hosting sites. Each customer gets a 30-minute one-on-one call with an agent who explains the basics of the service. Most hosts leave this up to automated tips, so it’s nice to see a more personal touch.

HostPapa runs multilingual support as well. There are phone numbers available for numerous countries, including Germany, Spain, France, the UK, Hong Kong, India, and more.

All in all, you can get the help you need from HostPapa, wherever you are.

Price

HostPapa’s Windows VM hosting prices are:

• Venus—$94.99/month paid monthly, $74.99/month with a three-year term
• Earth—$164.99/month paid monthly, $124.99/month with a three-year term
• Mars—$214.99/month paid monthly, $184.99/month with a three-year term
• Jupiter—$314.99/month paid monthly, $264.99/month with a three-year term

In addition to these pricing options, you can prepay for three months, six months, a year, or two years. These options provide a compromise between the best price and the shortest subscription term.

One thing to keep in mind is that HostPapa is making changes to the website. There is currently no product page dedicated to the Windows VPS plans. You can, however, request a Windows Server setup from the support team before you purchase a plan. They will set everything up manually.

HostPapa is not the cheapest host but not the most expensive one either. The provider offers numerous advantages and has a platform that works well, so the price can be worth it.

Verdict

HostPapa runs some of the best Windows VPS hosting in 2021. It’s a decent provider for setting up a robust website, running MS business apps, or reselling Windows hosting plans. It’s an all-round superb option.

MochaHost is one of the older providers in these reviews – it has 18 years of experience in the industry. The host has a reputation for being great for both Windows and Linux users, so let’s check out what its Windows virtual private servers offer.

Specs

MochaHost runs SAS 70 Type II certified facilities in the US and Europe. They sport N+2 and N+1 redundancy and eco-friendly systems. The physical servers run Intel Xeon E5-2680 v4/5 running at 2.40GHz, 256GB+ RAM, RAID-10 SAN storage, and are hooked up to a 1Gbps network.

MochaHost’s cutting-edge systems are GDPR and PCI-compliant, and you can even use a PCI scanning tool to check your app. It’s pretty handy for running a website or a store.

MochaHost virtualizes the platform using Hyper-V. The hypervisor is pretty standard for Windows VPS providers, and it works well.

MochaHost has seven VPS plans you can choose from. These get you 1-10GB RAM, 1-6CPU cores, and 60-300GB SSD space.

Given the large number of plans, you can scale reasonably smoothly. The plans are kind of low-end compared to what other hosts offer, so MochaHost’s VPS is better for smaller and midrange projects.

One cool feature is that MochaHost gives you an additional 1GB of burstable RAM. The function can be a money-saver if you have a website with unpredictable traffic. Just keep in mind it’s not something you can rely on consistently.

Features

MochaHost lets you choose between Windows Server 2016 and 2012 R2. The Windows VPS servers support MSSQL Express, MySQL, and Oracle Database XE. This is pretty handy, since few hosts set up Oracle Database by default, even though many server admins prefer it.

If you want a paid MSSQL version, licensing for various editions is supported. Plesk licensing is available too, and you can purchase a ClientExec (billing system) license if you’re starting a reseller business.

If you dislike Plesk, the SolidCP panel is included as well. This is a free Plesk alternative for Windows VPS server hosting. It has solid functionality and can even be used for reselling. You can save quite a bit of cash by using it over Plesk. MochaHost provides a free demo if you want to try the panel.

Other features include Cloudflare with Railgun, Crystal Reports, monitoring tools, weekly backups, and other freebies and third-party tools. Daily backups are available as a paid add-on. The servers are also optimized for running a VPN or a forex trading system.

MochaHost can migrate an existing setup for you if you already have a hosted application.

Bottom line—you get lots of options to set up your web app on top of some impressive machines.

Around the Web

MochaHost gets its fair share of both positive and negative Windows VPS reviews. Many users praise the platform performance and the help the support provides.

That said, many customers complain about issues with billing. A bunch of them got charged double on occasion.

There are enough complaints to safely assume MochaHost experiences some billing bugginess. But it’s nothing the host can’t correct.

Another thing to point out is that MochaHost extends a 30-day money-back guarantee and a 180-day risk-free guarantee. This means you can request a full refund only during the first month.

Within the first six months of your subscription, you can only get a pro-rated refund. MochaHost does explain this, and it’s nice to have an option to get a partial refund. Still, many users assume you can get a full refund anytime, so it’s worth pointing out.

For the most part, website owners have positive experiences with MochaHost’s managed Windows servers.

Support

MochaHost’s support is delightfully adequate. It is there 24/7 to answer queries via chat, and it tends to respond pretty quickly. If you prefer using the phone, you need to schedule a callback.

The support representatives are polite and to-the-point. Frontline agents aren’t exactly hosting experts, but they can answer the most common questions. If you have a more complex issue, the techies working behind the scenes will have to take over.

The knowledge base is quite extensive. It has a few guides on handling common Windows server hosting tasks, like installing apps through Plesk and using the resource monitor.

MochaHost’s support team does the job well, but it doesn’t really stand out.

Price

If you visit MochaHost’s website, you’ll notice it looks a bit dated. However, once you look at the pricing, things get really convoluted.

The issue is that MochaHost’s discounts are set up pretty randomly. Prepaying for an extended period often gets you a smaller discount than normal, which simply makes no sense.

MochaHost also advertises lifetime discounts. However, this applies only if you prepay for two or three years. Even with the two-year subscription, the lifetime discount is often smaller than the initial one.

Don’t worry if it sounds complicated. I’ll give you an example.

Prepaying for three years on the smallest Windows virtual private server would cost you $18.17/month forever. Going for two years costs $17.65/month at first, and then goes up to $20.76/month. Meanwhile, prepaying for only a year costs $12.97/month initially and goes up to the full price of $25.95/month afterwards.

And MochaHost has six other plans that have pricing just as confusing. Your best bet is to pick out a plan you like best and take a few minutes (or more) to go over the prices.

Verdict

With lots of features and a decent customer support team, MochaHost is one of the best Windows VPS providers. The provider does have a few issues with billing and a convoluted pricing model. Once you get past that, though, you can take advantage of a top-notch platform.

Many up-and-coming UK hosts inevitably get acquired by giants like GoDaddy. Still, every now and then, a host distinguishes itself without getting sucked in by a larger hosting company. eUKhost belongs to the latter group.

The provider sells various types of hosting, including managed Windows VPS. I checked how well it holds up against other contenders.

Specs

eUKhost likes to boast about its servers. The actual servers feature top-notch hardware and are connected to a solid network. Keep in mind the data centers are all in the UK, so you might have latency issues if your audience is outside Western Europe.

eUKhost offers four Windows-based plans. Here’s what they include:

• VPS SSD Starter—2 CPU cores, 2GB RAM, 40GB SSD storage
• VPS SSD Standard—2 CPU cores, 3GB RAM, 60GB SSD storage
• VPS SSD Professional—4 CPU cores, 4GB RAM, 120GB SSD storage
• VPS SSD Enterprise—6 CPU cores, 8GB RAM, 240GB SSD storage

eUKhost focuses on offering more low-end VPS plans—ideal for most individuals or small and medium-sized companies.

Features

The plans come with Windows Server 2016 preinstalled, along with an optional Plesk control panel.

Other Windows virtual server hosting features include an SSL certificate and MSSQL (only some versions are free). You can also use various tools that make server management a breeze.

eUKhost advertises backups, but they are a paid service. Other addons include extra storage and spam filtering.

The virtual servers are managed, so eUKhost provides security patches, server monitoring, free migrations, and frequent environment fine-tuning.

The features are decent, so it’s a bit of a shame eUKhost charges for backups. You can always set up your own backup tool, though.

Around the Web

eUKhost’s clients leave mostly positive Windows VPS reviews. Between great features, fair pricing, and decent support, there’s a lot to like about the provider.

A few users complained the provider outsourced its support. This is a misconception, though.

eUKhost does run an office in India, but the office is owned and managed by the company. The office employs highly trained software engineers and server administrators, so it provides the same quality of support as the UK offices.

Support

eUKhost takes employee selection seriously. Its staff includes numerous experts with certifications like Microsoft MCSE and Plesk Onyx for Windows Expert.

The support team is available at all times to assist you with any issue that might come up. You can rely on them to keep your VPS in tip-top shape.

Pricing

The smallest plan costs £19.90/month($25.86/month). The second plan is £27.59/month($35.86/month). The third costs £35.99/month($46.78/month). The largest plan is £44.93/month($57.69/month). The prices include VAT.

A Windows Server license is included in the price. You can prepay for a longer period, up to two years. However, you get the same rates this way, so you can just pay monthly and avoid unnecessary commitment.

Considering the features and resources you get, eUKhost is a cheap Windows VPS hosting provider.

Verdict

eUKhost reinforces the positive stereotype that UK providers have excellent service. There are a few hiccups in the offer, but the features are still robust, prices affordable, and support excellent.

If you need a Windows VPS plan for the UK or one of the nearby countries, eUKhost is the go-to company.

Hailing from Germany, 1&1 is one of the oldest, as well as largest, hosting providers out there. The company has attracted over 8 million users with its affordable plans.

Its offer includes Windows virtual machine hosting. Here’s what it can do.

Specs

1&1 IONOS only sells unmanaged plans and lets you deploy an operating system of your choice on top of them.

The plans start small. The smallest plan that supports Windows gives you access to 2 CPU cores, 2Gb RAM, and 80GB SSD space This is a decent amount of resources to get for most users.

The largest plan brings this up to 6 CPUs, 12GB RAM, and 240GB storage. This is pretty hefty, although there are a few more robust VPS solutions.

All in all, the plan specs are what you’d expect from a standard VPS provider.

Features

1&1 lets you select between Windows Server 2012, 2016, and 2019. You can also get a Plesk license, but this is optional.

1&1 throws in security tools, managed firewall, backup solution, email features, and free SSL. These are universally useful tools, so they’ll save you time setting everything up manually.

The admin interface is also intuitive. It makes it easy to manage your Windows virtual private hosting server or upgrade your plan.

That’s about it, though. Unmanaged solutions always leave most of the work to you. It’s best to go for them if you’re confident in your technical abilities or have someone else to handle server management.

Around the Web

1&1 gets mixed reviews.

The positive ones mostly praise how robust and easy to use the service is.

The negative comments have to do with billing. Namely, you can cancel the hosting service, but 1&1’s billing team has to confirm the cancellation via email before it stops billing. This is a pretty ridiculous policy to have.

Most users can cancel their plans just fine. However, there’s still the off-chance 1&1 might charge a customer for a canceled service, which is a disadvantage.

Support

1&1 runs a well-trained support team. That said, the Windows VPS is unmanaged, so you can’t expect much help. The support can assist you with tasks you can’t perform from the admin area, but you’ll have to do most of the heavy lifting.

Pricing

One of the benefits of an unmanaged solution is it’s as cheap as a Windows VPS can get. This gets a bit tricky with 1&1, though.

The issue is that 1&1 sells you the VPS at the same price as Linux one, and tacks on a Windows Server license fee. This is more-or-less standard practice, but the $20/month license fee makes the $10/month plan pretty pricey.

The largest VPS costs $90/month, which would make for a great deal if it came with the same licensing fee.

This makes the overall price relatively steep for unmanaged VPS.

Verdict

1&1 might be one of the top Windows hosting providers, but its Windows VPS offer is just okay. You get a couple of nice features and a reliable service, but the steep price is sort of unjustified.

Contabo was founded in Germany back in 2003. Today, it runs over 15,000 servers worldwide.

The provider boasts about its versatile virtual servers and award-winning customer service. Let’s see if it delivers.

Specs

Let’s start by saying Contabo offers Windows hosting on both HDD and SSD drives. It is better to go for its pure SSD Windows VPS. It simply provides faster I/O (and, thereby, faster load times). Plus, Contabo runs Intel Optane SSDs, which are meant to provide faster performance with Intel processors—hardly an opportunity you should pass up.

Back to the point, Contabo runs two data centers in Germany and one in the States. The facilities are equipped with 100% redundant systems, including n+1 redundant cooling and uninterruptible power supply. The data centers are hooked up to a 220Gbps backbone provided by multiple carriers. Each machine runs 1-2x Intel Xeon E5 2630 v4 at 2.20GHz, 256GB+ RAM, and Intel Optane drives. The virtual machines start on a 200Mbps network port that can be expanded up to 1Gbps.

You can choose from four Windows VPS SSD plans:

• VPS S SSD—4 CPU cores, 8GB RAM, 200GB storage, 200Mbps port
• VPS M SSD—5 CPU cores, 16GB RAM, 400GB storage, 400Mbps port
• VPS L SSD—8CPU cores, 30GB RAM, 800GB storage, 600Mbps port
• VPS XL SSD—10 CPU cores, 60GB RAM, 1600GB storage, 1,000Mbps port

Contabo is excellent for midrange apps. It has decent resources with a massive amount of storage space—fantastic for heavy apps that hold lots of data.

Features

Contabo runs Windows Server 2012 R2 and 2016.

Contabo’s default setup is unmanaged Windows VPS, meaning you only get a blank server with the OS installed. You can get add-on tools, like monitoring software, Plesk, a premium SSL certificate, backup storage, and more. You just need to pick what you want when configuring your hosting plan.

You can run the server yourself, which is an option if you have admin skills or an IT team. Alternatively, you can go for managed support, but you have to pay extra.

One thing to remember is that the managed support only dedicates you two hours each month. This includes the time spent doing kernel updates, OS and control panel patching, etc.

This is fine when all you need is routine maintenance. But it is kind of unfair since you might need to pay extra to fix more serious issues.

The setup you run is pretty much up to what you set up yourself or what you ask the support to install.

Around the Web

With a customer satisfaction rate of about 90%, Contabo gets a good deal of positive Windows VPS reviews. Many who praise it are long-time users, and they appreciate the generous resource allocation at accessible prices.

But there are enough negative reviews to cause a bit of concern. Many users complain about DDoS protection not working correctly. To be fair, no security system is perfect, so some attacks can always slip through the cracks. It’s tough to say how effective the system really is without data on the scale and the pattern of the attack. Contabo didn’t comment on the reviews, though, so it’s something to keep in mind.

Most webmasters enjoy the platform, though.

Support

Unfortunately, Contabo doesn’t have 24/7 support. The team is only there 8am-11pm UTC+1, and you can only reach it through phone or email.

The agents do a decent job. Email support can solve even complicated questions.

Still, t’s a bit of a pain that there’s no live chat, especially when you need to contact someone with a quick and simple question. And the lack of 24/7 assistance simply puts Contabo behind many competitors.

Price

One of Contabo’s main selling points is the affordable plans. However, the pricing is not as simple as that. Let’s start with Windows server hosting infrastructure costs:

VPS S SSD—€4.99/month
VPS M SSD—€8.99/month
VPS L SSD—€14.99/month
VPS XL SSD—€26.99/month
The price remains the same if you pay monthly, which is excellent. The only catch is that Contabo tacks on a one-time €4.99 setup fee if you prepay for less than a year. €4.99 is pretty cheap, so you might as well pay monthly to make the prices more manageable.

Still pretty affordable for the resources, right?

Well, Contabo really makes most of its money on the add-ons. For instance, the Windows license price is €4.99/9.99/18.49/36.99 per month (based on the plan). Managed support costs €49.99/month extra.

And that’s not all.

Hosting in the US data center is €2/month extra, monitoring tools are €9.99/month, backups are €3.99/month, and instant Windows VPS setup would set you back €29.99. The last four services are particularly ridiculous since many providers make them free.

All of this is fine if you plan on waiting for the server setup and running everything yourself. For your average user, though, the service is pretty darn expensive. Even with the high resource caps, the add-ons are way too pricy.

Verdict

Contabo is a pretty affordable option if you need unmanaged Windows VPS hosting with plenty of resources. The extra add-on services bring down the service’s value, though, making it unsuitable for most users.

GoDaddy is beyond gigantic. In fact, it has more customers than any hosting provider, despite its declining market share.

GoDaddy’s impact in the hosting world is undeniably enormous. That said, influence does not necessarily translate into quality service. In fact, massive providers often struggle to match smaller companies.

Let’s see if GoDaddy manages to keep up with the best Windows VPS hosting providers.

Specs

GoDaddy runs nine data centers across North America, Europe, and Asia-Pacific. GoDaddy’s infrastructure is top-notch, so the servers perform reasonably well.

GoDaddy runs Intel E5-2620v3 processors with 15M cache. Fortunately, the provider recently moved away from HDD storage. Now, its Windows hosting servers run on pure SSD.

The rest of the hardware GoDaddy runs in its data centers is not a matter of public record. All attempts at questioning the support about it yielded little info, so there’s no way to know what kind of facilities GoDaddy actually runs—not ideal.

The provider handles virtualization with KVM. This is one of the leading open-source solutions and one of the most popular type-2 hypervisors for running Linux. Windows users might prefer something like Xen or MS Hyper-V, which theoretically performs marginally faster. This is only a minor detail, though, and KVM typically still gets fast Windows VPS services.

GoDaddy runs a range of different VPS plans. You can get 1, 2, 4, or 8 CPU cores. The standard RAM plans get you 2GB RAM per CPU core, while high RAM ones raise this to 4GB.

This is a pretty handy way to distribute resources since it’s easier to get just the right amount for your specific app. The disk space ranges from 40GB to 400GB, which is plenty for most users and businesses.

GoDaddy runs a decent infrastructure, though the info about the data centers is scarce.

Features

GoDaddy’s VPS servers run Windows Server 2016, which is fine. If you go for the managed windows server option, your virtual server will come with a Plesk Obsidian license. This control panel is a recent upgrade to Plesk Onyx. It is more secure and has more advanced monitoring tools, among other things.

The managed service gets you monitoring, managed backups, patches, etc. The tech team can handle migrating up to five websites for you. A full VPS migration would be better for resellers, but this is still better than nothing.

Additional security tools and a CDN are available but paid extra. Upsells are a common occurrence with GoDaddy, so there are no surprises here.

GoDaddy offers the features you’d expect, but there’s little to appeal to Windows users specifically. You’d have to set up apps yourself – or, perhaps, go for the unmanaged Windows VPS plans and handle the entire setup top to bottom.

Around the Web

GoDaddy gets its fair share of positive reviews. The issue is that the provider pools a lot of resources into keeping up appearances. It sponsors many posts that praise the service, and the PR team looks to skew user reviews in GoDaddy’s favor.

That is not to say all positive reviews should be dismissed. However, you’ll notice GoDaddy does get plenty of negative attention as well. Plus, review sites that are more difficult to manipulate usually give it a worse ratio of positive to negative reviews. For instance, on HostAdvice, GoDaddy barely gets a customer satisfaction rate of 10%.

Users complain about poor customer support, costly renewals, the buggy platform, and a bunch of other things. The provider has a worrisome reputation. If you’re looking for cheap Windows VPS hosting, services like Hostinger inspire more confidence.

Support

GoDaddy offers 24/7 support through live chat and phone lines for 52 countries. Unfortunately, this is where the good news end.

Poor, outsourced support is perhaps GoDaddy’s most significant issue. The support agents can barely hold their own in a conversation and seem to focus on quickly dishing out answers, inaccurate as they might be. It’s understandable the support team is stretched thin, considering GoDaddy’s massive user base. Still, that is hardly an excuse for abysmal support.

GoDaddy’s support department simply lags behind those of the best Windows VPS hosting providers.

The knowledge base does little to redeem the lacking customer service. There are some tutorials, but most are outdated or meant to upsell you on additional services.

Just check out the provider’s guide on fixing a hacked website. According to it, you can either try changing passwords or pay GoDaddy $25/month to clean out the malware.

I could go on, but suffice it to say the support team is not GoDaddy’s best feature.

Price

GoDaddy sets the same price for both Linux and Windows VPS plans. The managed Windows server pricing starts at $99.99/month if you prepay for two years. If paying month-to-month, the plan would set you back $104.99/month.

This plan comes with 1 CPU core and 2GB RAM, making the price outrageously high. For reference, Hostwinds offers the same resources for only $27.99/month, making it almost four times less expensive.

The pricing does get more reasonable with the higher tiers. That said, even with the Windows Server and Plesk licensing fees included, GoDaddy doesn’t have the most affordable deals.

Verdict

All things taken into account, GoDaddy doesn’t have the most attractive offer. Poor support, unimpressive features, and unreasonably high prices plague the service. GoDaddy makes it to this list, but it can’t really compete with the best Windows VPS services.