Self-hosting

Self-hosting means running your own software on servers you control, instead of using a service like Vercel, Netlify, or Squarespace.

Most websites are "hosted" by a company that manages the servers for you. You pay them, and they take care of the technical details. Self-hosting is the opposite: you choose the server, set up the software, and manage everything yourself.

This gives you more control. You can choose a hosting provider that runs on green energy. You decide how the server is configured. You know exactly what is running on your infrastructure.

The downside is that it takes more time and skill. You need to understand servers, security, and maintenance. That is why I describe my current Cloudflare setup as an exploration — I am learning whether the extra control is worth the extra effort.

Self hosting is not only for websites or apps but is also the core of each Homelab. Currently I have a NAS to store photos and have a Raspberry PI to run PI-hole. The latter being a cool piece of software that blocks adds and trackers accross my local network.