Uberspace - Web Hosting Done Different

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Hello everyone,
First of all let me make it clear that Uberspace is not my brand, nor am I affiliated with them.
They are a german provider that has been established for many years and although I had never hosted anything with them I thought it was worth sharing the fact that…they are there. That they are different.

Pay what you want
The first thing that comes as a surprise is that Uberspace has been around many years, however its pricing model is a “pay-what-you-want” style. On the landing page you are presented with an explanation about what their motives are and also what they need to pay for (Colocation, Traffic…), explaining why you may consider paying more than 1€/month (which is the bare minimum). They suggest something in between 5-10€, but technically for 12€/year you are settled for a year.

No Web GUI. All text/console based Webhosting - They want you to learn the shell!

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All you get is your document root folder (your “uberspace”), 10GB of Disk Space and 100GB of Traffic (after which they will contact you). They offer very personal support and a thorough Wiki/Knowledgebase introducing you to the shell, how it works etc. Their German Wiki is even larger, but the English shell is also covering a lot of topics. To be honest I have looked up some things there, and it’s interesting reading into some articles for the fun of it.

They also clearly state Uberspace isn’t for everybody:

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Get technical! Be a geek! Run that app!

Going with their very technical and open approach to new ideas, crazy projects etc they also offer A LOT of technical features your average webhost doesn’t, like:
Automatic HTTPS, HTTP/2, SSH. Perl. PHP. Python. Ruby. node.js. Erlang. Lua. Compiler. FastCGI. MySQL. CouchDB. MongoDB. MariaDB. Cronjobs. HTTPS. IMAP. SMTP. Webmail. qmail. vmailmgr. maildrop. Spam­Assassin. ezmlm-idx. DSPAM. ~/service. runwhen. Own Logs. Daily Backups.

Furthermore on their website they explain quite a lot about their philosophy, mindset, the fact that they consider their hosting environment as a digital playground for you etc .

So why am I sharing this project? Honestly, feel free to remove it, if it sounds like spam, shill or whatever but do you know that feeling when you get excited about something (for a longer time) and have the feel to share the joy? That’s Uberspace for me. Let’s be clear. There also are some limitations of what you can do with Uberspace and obviously most users here come from another forum, are techy and some run VPS at 2-3$/years and probably could have the same possibilities and even more freedom than Uberspace can offer. But that’s not the point. The reason I am sharing this is actually, because I hope someone can make use of this. I don’t have any use for it right now and I didn’t have use for it in the past, and it pains me to say this honestly as I open up their web page ever so often to check how things are going…and always fall in love with them again. To that end they also share their changelog on how their Uberspace progresses: Changelog — Uberspace 7 manual 7.15.1 documentation
The latest Uberspace Version is v7.

So, if you are looking to learn the shell in a “safe”, predefined environment and (from the reviews I’ve read and the impression I have) are looking for an extra level of personal support or just need a new home for your web project and are sick of cPanel/Plesk and just wanna rock the shell: By all means, give it a try, report back and tell me how it went :slight_smile:
Trustpilot, but also other reviews/sources I’ve been looking at these past years were thoroughly positive and I can imagine why.

Oh, did I say the first month is free without entering any personal data?
Just choosing a username/hostname and off you go: https://uberspace.de/register

I wish you a great day,

Ympker

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I must say, when I first saw the thread title I was tempted to crack a joke, but damn I’m actually surprised to read something so unique. Thank you for sharing! This is such a cool idea!

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Indeed. It’s one of a kind. I don’t know a lot other hosts that go the extra mile to provide something like this. But one can only imagine how their clients must love them if they have been around for so many years with a pricing model like this. I was actually trying to find out for how long but Internet Archieve did not have any records; I know for a fact that it has been many years though. To be honest it’s all the things you are usually warned about: Don’t offer “free” hosting (I consider offering the possibility of paying 1€/month, paid monthly, like offering free hosting because there is just no way for this to be profitable), don’t give your clients too much access/power/ssh. It’s obvious here that they offer something that many people love and care about and probably also quite a few pay a fair share more than what is recommended because of that. Alone their Wiki is huuge with much attention to detail tbh.

This is something however I wish more companies (not only hosting) would apply. The way some IT companies such as Google seem to work. Focusing on motivating your employees, instead of overworking/demotivating them. Motivating people to like your product/service rather than having them pay quite a lot of the bat. Giving them the possibility to choose themselves what they consider your product’s worth. Of course there will be some Ubernauts grabbing the 12€ plan but that’s probably not the majority. Working hand in hand rather than against each other. Too often if things go south the client starts blaming the provider and the provider is putting all effort into trying to prove that’s not the case instead of the two working together to solve the actual problem. Here’s a secret: Humans are not born as the reincarnation of evil. They can very well treat you well you do the same.

Anyway I might just try that 1 month free for fun. Because I feel like it could actually just be that: Fun :slight_smile:

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There’s english on that site? Where?
WTF. why is manual in english but the website is german only?

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Haven’t you heard the phrase -

“Deutsch über alles*”

*Except regarding documentation

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I’m afraid I haven’t found an English version from their site either. Guess google translate has to do the trick.

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Seem like quite unique provider the more I research them the more I wanting to sign up.

There was something that caught my attention on the feature list netqmail haven’t seen anyone using Qmail for years not sure why you would use software that not been updated for over 10 years.

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Hehe same for me. The more I read about them the more I wanna sign up.

Perhaps some legacy customers like it or they just haven’t removed it yet :slight_smile:

Looking at their changelog they keep adding new. things. What even is Fish Shell? Haha :smiley:
Btw… yes I can google it, it’s just…so many possibilities.

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Never used their service but they are around for a long long time. A friend of mine worked there and if the other technical people are as experienced as he is they know how to run their services.

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