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How does one determine how many cores and RAM they need on a server?

Discussion in 'Dedicated server hosting' started by Rapture Forums, Jun 22, 2022.

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  1. Jun 22, 2022 #1
    Rapture Forums

    Rapture Forums New Member

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    Hi,
    I'd like to ask how does one decide how many cores and RAM they need on a server? Is there like a standard measure of get twice as much RAM as you are using on a consistent basis type of standard? Or is that just a personal preference as to how many cores and RAM you want?

    Is there a way to tell from looking at the CPU usage area from the control panel? I see the typical 1 minute, 5 minute, and 15 minute CPU usage amounts.

    Is it true that a 1 on these readings means that you are only using 1 core on your server?

    Thank you and I am sorry if this is a real newbie question.
     
  2. Jun 22, 2022 #2
    eva2000

    eva2000 Administrator Staff Member

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    There's no exact formula - only rough estimates which have to be based on past monitored and understood usage metrics. There are 3 sticky threads and one Centmin Mod Insight subforum thread below that have a lot of tools mentioned in them that bring such metrics to light
    Yes CPU load average 1.0 = 100% CPU usage per CPU thread/core. So on a 8 CPU thread/core server, ideal load max is 8x1.0 = 8.0 or 800%.

    For Centmin Mod LEMP stack usage, ideally, you want at least a minimum 2 CPU cores/threads to give Nginx, PHP-FPM and MariaDB MySQL an adequate share of CPU time between them. Though for very light usage 1 CPU core/thread is fine. For forums like Xenforo depending on your forum activity and usage at least 2-4 CPU core/threads to start with and move up based on your monitored cpu/mem/disk I/O server resources usage.

    If you need more exact recommendations, my day job is doing paid server optimization consulting which involves analyzing a client's server resource usage and optimizing their server and also advising on web host and server hardware specifications to meet the client's needs including future growth capacity planning :) Though my rates aren't cheap, they start in 4 figures $$$$ per server.
     
  3. Jun 23, 2022 #3
    Rapture Forums

    Rapture Forums New Member

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    Thank you for the information. I will take a look at the links. :)
     
  4. Sep 11, 2024 #4
    Simon Brown

    Simon Brown Premium Member Premium Member

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    I hope old threads are checked... My questions seems to be a good fit for this thread!

    I have a VPC with ANS Virtual private cloud SMB

    For general Nginx, PHP, MariaDB, Redis performance, would it better to setup a VPC with 2x processors with 4x cores each, or 4x processors with 2x cores each?

    I have a dedicated server with 2x processors with 4x cores processor which they've duplicated the hardware spec's for my VPC, but I was wondering if a different combination would be beneficial.

    I've noticed that MariaDB uses two PID's which continually max out at 100% CPU and after a while I see the SWAP being use (which I have to clear with "swap off -a" everyday). This is the same behaviour as the dedicated server I have. If I had 4x processors with two cores each, would it split the MariaDB load across 4 PID's instead (after I run the Centmin MariaDB tuning script)?

    Obviously, both server have Centmin installed and setup.

    I hope this makes sense.
     

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  5. Apr 23, 2025 #5
    LLHOST

    LLHOST New Member

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    You need to think about concurrency. More cores = more threads that can run in parallel. Web apps benefit from more cores if you're handling many simultaneous users. Background jobs or batch processing? More cores help.
     
  6. Apr 23, 2025 #6
    Simon Brown

    Simon Brown Premium Member Premium Member

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    Hi LLHOST,
    Thanks for your reply.
    So, if I'm reading your post correctly, you're saying that 4 Cores with 2 threads each is better than 2 Cores with 4 threads each.
     
  7. Apr 23, 2025 #7
    eva2000

    eva2000 Administrator Staff Member

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    cpus generally only use SMT/hyperthreading with 1 physical core has max 2 threads.

    So technically, for dedicated servers 8 core dedicated has 8x2 = 16 CPU threads. But for VPS servers core/threads are used interchangeably so VPS with 16 cores can either be 8 physical cores with 2 threads each = 16 CPU threads or unlikely 16 physical CPU cores.
     
  8. May 12, 2025 #8
    Tillwesso

    Tillwesso Member

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    Suggest you looking at your current usage and double it at least, triple is even better because coming half way through the month and running out of bandwidth is probable the worst thing you can do for your website, your users will probable desert you, if they see it isn’t online for a day or two.
     
  9. May 12, 2025 #9
    Hostingsource

    Hostingsource Member

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    Disk space and bandwidth are two of the most essential features of any web hosting plan.
    How much do you require?
     
  10. Nov 5, 2025 #10
    swisslayer

    swisslayer New Member

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    Built-in caching significantly improves website speed.
    Look for providers offering LiteSpeed, Varnish, or other caching tools.
     
  11. Feb 13, 2026 #11
    Grombahen

    Grombahen New Member

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    I think, attractive offers are not the only factor you should depend while selecting a host.
    You should check the reliability and the quality of service also. Read customer hosting reviews.
     
  12. Feb 20, 2026 #12
    Mctokens

    Mctokens New Member

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    If you’re unsure: Start slightly higher than minimum. Monitor for 2–4 weeks. Scale based on real metrics.
    It’s much easier to scale down than recover from an underpowered production server.
     
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