I use VPS's for things that need to be more internet facing as well as Pangolin for then connecting to a few of my home based services securely. IMHO, it's not as good for things that require storing lots of data like video, though, since storage costs have exploded. And any private data I prefer to only have on servers I own, not a VPS. Only encrypted backups of critical data go to online storage.

I use netcup for most things though I still have one server on Hetzner that I haven't migrated. Hetzner's prices went up and server responsiveness went down, so I started moving away, though I also still have the storage box server there for backups as well as the one VPS.

• Hetzner: I've rented a dedicated server with them for years and it's been very solid. There are reports of people getting blocked during the first sign up, but I didn't have that problem nor any other issue since. For bulk data storage their file share offering is also unbeatable imo, I've also used that for years and my Nextcloud files plus acquired media still live on such a share.
• Netcup: I have a small VPS here for monitoring, also no issues. It's somewhat annoying that you need to take the server offline and run a media optimisation task when you delete snapshots (not sure how necessary it actually is, but you get a warning at least)

Some anti-recommendations as well

• Vultr: Years ago I wanted to get their very cheapest VPS offering, but that is only available sometimes in certain locations and at the time they didn't tell you any of that before you signed up and deposited their minimum fee. I did get the money back though
• Contabo: My previous monitoring VPS lived here. After a while they declared the VPS I was using was a "legacy" product and wanted more money to keep running it. I feel this could have been handled with a forced migration of some sort.
• Digital Ocean: They just donated 3 million USD to a racist's pet project financing other weird guys

When I need to run something that I can't or won't run at home, I usually spin up a machine at Hetzner. Cheap, reliable, and setup is fast. The server auction can give you a pretty nice hardware stack at a low cost, and you can cancel at any time.

However, the cases were I use hosting providers are becoming fewer and fewer, as I'm in the stages of rebuilding my "homelab" the way I want it. If only those UPS batteries could arrive soon...

There’s a large group of folks here that swear by renting a VPS. A common argument is that when you fully self host and expose anything to the internet (incoming connections), you’ve always got some security risk you might not know exists.

A VPS offloads a lot of the low level security concerns to someone else (it’s the whole cloud sales pitch) and if someone breaks in, there’s little for them to steal (assuming you’re not putting anything personal and sensitive on the VPS).

The nice thing is that you can start with a small and cheap VPS and set things up and decide if you even want to self host, or to what extent. Then you have data to make a decision as to whether you need to upgrade to a better VPS, or port your setup to a local server (which you can now buy with a good idea of what sort of specs it should have).

On the flip side, you could also self host on whatever computer you have laying around (leave the laptop open) and play with some services there. If you decide you want to open it to the internet, you could just as easily port your local playground to a VPS and keep going.

I don’t think there’s anything in the self hosting world that really paints you into a corner.

I don't like it, the whole point to me is to not pay anyone to store thing on a computer that I don't own. If you have a dedicated IP I would always prefer a homelab

I've been a customer of SoYouStart, now the OVH Eco series for many years. For $30/mo, I get 32GB of RAM and 480GB of disk space. Plenty of space for me to run my too many different services.

I've found them cost effective

no shame in getting a VPS. it might cost you more over the long term if you want to run any real workloads or store anything on it.

what i would do is get your hands on some sort of computer you can attach storage to.

what i do is i have a small VPS that i expose to the internet that routes traffic to my home server(s) over my Tailscale VPN. that way i get the benefit of having a stable public IP, some traffic protection from the provider, and a stable failsafe in case my home internet or power or whatever goes out, and it’s a lot cheaper to run workloads and store files on my local machines than to rent all that out. my workloads can be pretty heavy, so i would end up paying hundreds if not over $1k per year, which is easily enough for a machine that can do most anything you need.

Taking this at different levels...

Offsite storage (assuming you have something at home): Hetzner storage boxes (2 different countries to choose from)

VPS for actually doing something, also Hetzner, but, I also use MythicBeasts for a UK specific host and they also host Raspberry Pi servers (not checked the price), so maybe that's something to consider to dip your toe into the waters

Not a server, but a storage box from Hetzner I use for my most important off-site backup. At home I have a small Dell Optiplex that runs Jellyfin and is exposed outwards via Tailscale. It does consume a lot of electricity, was cheap, great performance. I don't know what is holding you back from self-hosting, but it does not need a lot of effort.

Used both Hetzner (storage) and Netcup (VPS), no issues with either.

I've found Hetzner to be reasonable for VPSs and even bare metal servers, especially if you keep an eye on their auctions.

Whether you're hosting it all at home, all on a remote server, or some combination of the two, it's worth taking the time to first learn some form of automation tooling, so that your setup is reproducible and you know exactly how everything is set up. From the first time you have to rebuild everything due to a hardware failure trashing your server, or a careless rm -rf, you'll be glad of it.

Ansible is a good place to start as it's pretty straighforward to get going, and your playbook can grow with your requirements. If you're using a lot of containers, make sure you understand docker, and maybe consider Kubenetes, especially if you want to split your workload across servers.

Data storage: you can do pretty much whatever, they won't look at your stuff unless you do something that attracts attention. Of course encrypt it anyway.

Streaming: yes that attracts attention if you stream to the public. If it's edgy or pirated content you can't use the big providers. If it's your private collection that only a few people know about, it's like the situation with storage.

If ypu have the hardware but not the forwarding capability like me, you can use cloudflare tunnels for free, or setup headscale on a free orical vps. Otherwise go with the cheapest vps you can find (Im using Hetzner, but ive heard good things about netcup, or even Oricals free teir vps and move off of it if you end up not ditching selfhosting), play around, and if you need more power its as trivial as backing up your services and putting them on a more powerful server