Why is it beneficial to have a dedicated IP address?

When it comes to hosting a website on a shared server, there is always a fairly common controversial topic: is it necessary to have a dedicated IP address for your website and why, if you can only use a shared one? Using a dedicated IP address provides certain crucial advantages.

What is a dedicated IP address?

IP stands for “Internet Protocol” and is defined as a unique address assigned to each computer that is connected to a certain network. The IP address Internet Protocol It serves the function of a unique identifier used to provide a valid location of a machine or website on a given network.

What is the difference between a shared and dedicated IP address?

The difference between shared and dedicated IP addresses is quite simple. A shared IP address is a single address used by multiple websites within a web server. In this case, the web server would have to do extra work, parsing the user's request to the correct website. Having a dedicated IP address means that the website has its own address, and you can use this IP address or your website's domain name to access it from the web. For a more obvious example, check the diagram below:

Is having a dedicated IP address beneficial?

There are many reasons why it is recommended to use a dedicated IP address for a website hosted on a shared server, but we will look at the main ones here:

Gives you access to your website whenever you need it using your IP address: A dedicated IP address will provide the ability to access the server directly without changing the DNS settings for the domain name.

It is beneficial for the reputation of the email sender: There are some situations where a user who shares the same IP address with you is banned or blacklisted for spam, possibly affecting your email service as well. Using a dedicated IP address for email insulates your service from the consequences of abuse where others are at fault.

Good for a business identity: If you are going to host your own online store or other e-commerce related website, and are not going to use additional third-party services to handle payments, it is quite necessary to obtain a dedicated IP address and SSL certificate for the website to Provide security to your customers' data.

Required for third party applications/scripts: Sometimes a particular application or script that you want to run on your server requires a dedicated IP address.

SNI technology and incompatibility with some older browsers: With a recent update to cPanel, we started supporting SNI technology that allows multiple SSL certificates to be installed on a shared IP address. However, having a few SSL certificates on a shared IP address can cause problems with older versions of some browsers. In this case, all visitors to such websites will receive a message containing information about the untrusted connection. A dedicated IP address helps avoid these problems.