Why we only run ARM: Ampere VPS hosting from a UK business
VPS GB sells ARM and nothing else. Every virtual server, web hosting account, load balancer and game server we run is on 64-bit Ampere Altra processors, in the UK. This post explains why an ARM cloud server in the UK is the only thing we sell, what that means for an Ampere VPS, how we compare with going to a hyperscaler for ARM (if you are looking for a Graviton alternative in the UK), and what we gave up to do it.
The short version is on our ARM page. This is the longer one.
One architecture, done properly
Most hosts sell x86 and offer ARM as an extra, if at all. That is a reasonable business, but it means ARM gets whatever is left: fewer images, tools that were written for x86 and adapted later, and support staff who see an ARM question once a month.
We went the other way. Every operating system image we offer, every rescue tool and every load balancer is built and tested on the hardware it runs on. Our own website, its database and its control panel run on the same ARM machines we sell. When something does not work on ARM, we are the first to find out, because we use it.
We could sell x86 alongside. We chose not to, because doing one architecture well is a better product than doing two adequately.
Why Ampere Altra
Our servers use the Ampere Altra Q80-30: 80 cores at 3.0 GHz, built on Arm's Neoverse N1 core design. Three properties of that chip shape what you get.
A whole core, not half of one. Altra cores are single-threaded. There is no simultaneous multithreading (Intel calls it Hyper-Threading), so there is no sibling thread sharing a core's execution units and caches with someone else's workload. On shared x86 hosts, a busy neighbour on the other half of your core is a common cause of unexplained slowdowns. This is a property of the processor: whenever your virtual CPU is running, it is not splitting a core with a sibling thread.
No turbo. Altra runs its cores at a fixed clock rather than boosting some cores when others are idle. Turbo looks good on a benchmark run on an empty machine; on a shared server it means your speed depends on how busy everyone else is. A fixed clock means a core runs at the same speed at 3am and at peak, so what you measure in testing is what you get in production.
Designed for this kind of work. Ampere designed Altra for performance per watt: many simple cores at a steady clock, rather than a few cores boosting hard. That is Ampere's claim, and the design matches the shape of hosting work. Web servers, APIs, containers and databases spread across many cores and rarely need one core to sprint.
We have not published efficiency figures of our own, and we will not quote somebody else's as if they were ours. When we have measured it on our own hardware, we will write it up.
Where this sits next to Graviton
If you want ARM servers in the UK, the best-known option is AWS Graviton in the London region. Microsoft Azure (Cobalt and Ampere-based machines) and Oracle Cloud (Ampere A1) also offer ARM in UK regions. We are not the only way to run ARM in the UK, and we do not claim to be.
What we are is different in kind:
- ARM-only. A hyperscaler offers ARM alongside everything else. It is all we do.
- A UK business, hosted in the UK. Your servers, and the people who support them, are here.
- Plain products. Virtual servers, web hosting and load balancers with a monthly price, rather than a cloud platform to learn first.
Graviton2 uses the same Neoverse N1 core design as Altra, so software built and tuned for it runs the same way here. Newer Graviton generations use newer Arm cores, but run the same 64-bit ARM software.
What we gave up
Doing one architecture means saying no to things, and we would rather say so plainly:
- Windows. Windows Server is not something we offer.
- Microsoft SQL Server. It has no ARM64 build for Linux, so applications that need it need x86.
- Many game servers. Plenty of popular dedicated servers are x86 only. We sell the games that run natively on ARM and list the rest as by request.
- Closed-source x86 software. If a vendor has never built it for ARM, we cannot run it.
For most of what people host, none of that matters: PHP, Python, Node.js, Go, Java, Docker, PostgreSQL, MariaDB and the rest run natively. Whether your own stack is in that "most" is what is ARM good for servers? is for.
If you are not sure, ask us. We would rather tell you no than sell you a server your software cannot run on.