Inodes Limit: The #1 Web Hosting Limit That Hurt- The Definitive Guide

Last Updated on March 7, 2021 by Obaro Alidou K.

Inode is a lost terminology from the hosting industry these days.

Why?

No web hosting company mentions it openly. Thus, I’m 100% sure that 99.99% of hosting service buyers never heard about this topic. In this post, I’m going to reveal what is inode, how it affects your website, and provide a list of some of the world’s top hosting providers where you won’t suffer from inodes limits.

Let’s get started….

What Is An Inode?

According to Wikipedia, an inode is a data structure on a traditional Unix-style file system such as UFS. An inode stores basic information about a regular file, directory, or other file system object.

Coming back to web hosting, an inode (Index Node) is a data structure containing the information about a file in your server or hosting account.

Inode saves basic information such as users, sessions, file permissions (read, write, execute), and the file’s type. An inode doesn’t store the file names or the actual data.

In other words, an inode does not store the file content, it simply points to a specific file or directory.

Sound techy?

Let’s take it simple in plain English…

In plain English, an inode is just the value used to measure the total number of files and folders on your hosting account.

Everything you upload to your server (image, video, audio…), every blog post or page you publish is measured by a file system. In the hosting industry, this file system is known as “inode”.

Inode is simply the number of files you are allowed to upload to your hosting account.

What Is The Minimum Acceptable Inodes Limit?

Within 6 months, a medium-sized website could use somewhere from 90,000 to 150,000 inodes depending on how frequently you upload content, the nature of the content, the frequency of your emails and their amount. For starting a blog or small website, though, inode is not a big deal. But, as your blog is called to grow one day, it is important to have good inodes limits.

Also, bear in mind that inodes limits depend on your hosting level (shared, VPS, Cloud, etc.), your hosting plan, and the type of hosting (cheap hosting or high-end). So, a $15/month hosting plan should normally have a larger inodes limit than a $1.99/month plan.

Anyway, a good company will give you hundreds of thousand inodes per hosting account. However, some bad hosting companies will just allow thousands and even suspend your account if you hit the limit. Run away!

As such, and from my experience, the minimum acceptable inodes limits a company should allow you to be considered as one of the best web hosting in that field are as follows:

Inodes on shared hosting

Shared hosting is the only place you most of the time find Unlimited hosting offers. In order to keep servers clean, up, and running and to prevent over-use from a single account, web hosting companies put a limit on the file’s usage (inodes).

While you are allowed to use unlimited bandwidth, storage, and email accounts, there is always a limit in the number of files you can upload to your server. In shared hosting, inode is the secret behind unlimited hosting offers.

As with most shared hosting you’ll have three plans, here are the minimum inodes limits you should expect per hosting plan.

• Entry-level plan: 100,000-200,000 inodes
• Middle plan: 250,000-300,000 inodes (200k is sometimes acceptable for cheap hosting)
• Highest plan: 400,000-600,000 inodes (300k is also acceptable if the host is cheap).

So, if a web host gives less than 100k on its entry-level plan, don’t bother, just look elsewhere. Similarly, If for the middle plan you don’t get at least 200k, please leave. There are many other offers with larger inodes limits. Moreover, if a web host can’t give you at least 400k inodes on its priciest plan, I beg you, run away. It doesn’t worth the money plus you’ll certainly get disappointed sooner than you think.

If a web host gives less than 100k inodes on its entry-level plan, don’t bother, just look elsewhere. Similarly, If for the middle plan you don’t get at least 200k, please leave.Click To Tweet

Inodes limits on WordPress hosting

For shared WordPress hosting, the minimum inodes limits are the same as for shared hosting above.

• Entry-level plan: 100,000-200,000 inodes
• Middle plan: 250,000-300,000 inodes
• Highest plan: 400,000-600,000 inodes

Inodes Limits on Managed WordPress Hosting

Inodes limits on WordPress managed hosting depend on the control panel. If it is a custom panel/Plesk based hosting, there is no limit on inodes. If you notice there is one, don’t buy; look elsewhere because there is a high chance you will get robbed.

So, most managed WordPress hosting companies that have their own custom panel or use Plesk don’t assign any inodes limits. You will recognize them by the fact they only do WordPress hosting and nothing else. This includes companies like Kinsta and WPEngine.

On another hand, for those managed WordPress hosting services that use CPanel, the minimum inodes limits you should get are most of the time the same as for shared hosting:

• Entry-level plan: 100,000-200,000 inodes
• Middle plan: 250,000-300,000 inodes (200k is sometimes acceptable for cheap hosting)
• Highest plan: 400,000-600,000 inodes (300k is also acceptable if the host is cheap).

Again…..

If a web host gives less than 100k on its entry-level plan, don’t bother, just look elsewhere. Similarly, If for the middle plan you don’t get at least 200k, please leave. There are many other offers with larger inodes limits. Moreover, if a web host can’t give you at least 400k inodes on its priciest plan, I beg you, run away. It doesn’t worth the money.

Inodes on VPS hosting

VPS hosting provides 10x larger inodes than shared hosting. The minimum inodes to expect is 1,000,000-2,000,000 on a VPS hosting plan.

Therefore, if for VPS hosting, a web host allows you less than 1M inodes even on the entry-level plan, again, please look for a better deal. Always ask the support before buying to avoid surprises.

Inodes on Dedicated Server

There is no inodes limit for a dedicated server. You own the entire server and use it as you pleased.

Inodes Limits on Cloud Hosting

The limits here also depend on the type of cloud you purchase. When it is a CPanel based cloud hosting, it acts like shared hosting and you should get the same minimum inodes limits:

• Entry-level plan: 100,000-200,000 inodes
• Middle plan: 250,000-300,000 inodes (200k is sometimes acceptable for cheap hosting cloud)
• Highest plan: 400,000-600,000 inodes (300k is also acceptable if the host is cheap).

However, when it is a fully customizable cloud hosting where you need to choose your OS (CentOS, Ubuntu, Debian, etc), there are no inode limits. You are paying for CPU, RAM, and Storage. i.g: Hostwinds Cloud.

Does Inode Affect My Website If I Reach 100% of The Limits?

When you read 100% of the inodes usage, you have exceeded the limits and yes, it directly affects your website. In most cases, you won’t be able to:

• Upload additional files to your server or publish new blog posts or pages
• Send or receive further emails

In the same way, your website might fail to load due to session files which is the worst issue.

Does Inode Affect Your SEO?

This is a crucial question. Is there any link between inode and your Google ranking?

My answer might surprise you: YES.

Here is how it works…

Every website has session files where every single visit is recorded. And, when you exceed the inodes limits, the system won’t allow any further file or record on your server. As such, your website will be failing to load each time a visitor tries to access it.

The problem?

If your blog keeps failing to load for a long time, it sends a strong “bad user experience” message to Google and, you might be penalized because Google wants the best experience for users.

Inode Can Affect Your SEO when the limit is reached Click To Tweet

How to Check Inode Usage in Your CPanel Account

Due to its importance, you must keep an eye on your inodes usage. To check your inodes usage in cPanel, the only step is to:

• Log into your cPanel account. Then, look at the right panel; you will find a list of useful statistics including your inodes limits and current usage.

How to Reduce Your Inode Usage

To reduce your inodes usage, you just need to clean your hosting account. To do so, follow these 4 simple steps:

#1. Remove useless files and folders

From your cPanel account, use the File Manager to delete redundant/unnecessary files and folders from your server.

#2. Remove cache files

CMSs like WordPress, Joomla, Drupal, etc. more often store some cached files which are used to improve performance on your website. The problem is that when there are excessive cached files on your server, they can consume a huge amount of inodes. So, deleting them could save you some thousands of inode.

#3. Delete Older Backups

Backups are huge disk space and inodes drain. The proof, InMotion stops backing up your files when you exceed 10GB of usage. With HostGator, if you exceed 50,000 inodes, only your databases will get backed up. Your static files won’t be included.

Consequently, it is important to delete your older backups to free up inodes. Just use the File Manager in cPanel.

Note: I will repeat this 1,000 times: Download your backups to your own PC regularly before deleting them. It saves your back in case a whole hosting system failure occurs.

#4. Remove SPAM/Junk Emails

As said by Hostwinds, emails also add to your inode usage on your account. Remove SPAM/unsolicited emails and archive important emails to your local machine. If you are using webmail to delete any emails, be sure to delete them from the trash folder so that they are removed from the server entirely.

Most Popular Web Hosting with the Worst Inodes Limits

Do you know which popular web host has the lowest inodes limits? You won’t believe it, it is BlueHost.

In fact, BlueHost only gives you 50,000 inodes on every plan, which is the most miserable inodes limit ever seen from all the big brands.

In short, for the price they ask for, BlueHost is the worst hosting company for inodes limits and much more.

Web Hosting Providers with the Best Inodes Limits

#5 Best Web Hosting with Large Inodes Limits

As the amount of files you can use on your hosting account depends on the inodes limits assigned by your hosting provider, it is important to buy your hosting from reputable web hosts with large inodes limits. Here are the world’s best web hosting companies where inodes won’t be a huge problem.

#1. A2 Hosting

Lite: 600,000 inodes

Swift: 600,000 inodes

Turbo: 600,000 inodes

Go To A2 Hosting

#2. FastComet

StartSmart: 250,000 inodes

ScaleRight: 350,000 inodes

SpeedUp: 500,000 inodes

>> Go To FastComet

#3. HostArmada

START DOCK: 240,000 inodes

WEB WARP: 350,000 inodes

SPEED REAPER: 500,000 inodes

Visit HostArmada

#4. Hostwinds

Shared Hosting

BASIC: 250,000 inodes

ADVANCED: 250,000 inodes

ULTIMATE: 250,000 inodes

Business Hosting

BASIC: 600,000 inodes

ADVANCED: 600,000 inodes

ULTIMATE: 600,000 inodes

Check Hostwinds

#5. ChemiCloud

Starter: 150,000 inodes

Pro: 200,000 inodes

Turbo: 350,000 inodes

Go To ChemiCloud

Large inodes limits Web Hosting Table

	Inodes limits	cost
A2 Hosting	600k on every plan	$3.92/mo	Details
FastComet	250k-500K	$2.95/mo	Details
HostArmada	240k-5500k	$3.95/mo	Details
Hostwinds	250k-600K	$3.29/mo	Details
ChemiCloud	150k-350k	$2.95/mo	Details

Web Hosting with Unlimited Inodes Limits

Here are some web hosting services that do not put any limit on file usage (inodes)

	Inodes limits	Price
Kinsta	Unlimited	$25/mo	Details
WPEngine	Unlimited	$25/mo	Details
BIONICWP	Unlimited	$27.5/mo	Details
Cloudways	Unlimited	$10/mo	Details

Wrapping up

Inode is an important metric to consider when shopping for the best web hosting. It is even more important when you are switching to a new web host. So, make sure to always get information about inodes limits before buying.

However, you don’t need to go through the pain; just pick one company with large inodes limits from the list above. They not only have the best inodes limits, but they are also part of the world’s best web hosting regarding, performance, uptime, security, scalability, price, and support.

Now, It Is Your Turn

What do you think about this article? Do you have any question or problem about inodes? What will be your next step? Will you reduce your inodes usage or just switch to one of the best web hosting providers with the largest inodes limits from the list above? Comment down below.

Sharing is caring; share, pin, and tweet this post to help others. We are all here to share and help.

Cheer!

Obaro

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