KVM VPS · FFmpeg pre-built
A whole virtual machine with guaranteed vCPU, full root access and FFmpeg already compiled, so long encodes run to completion instead of being killed halfway through.
Two sizes
Same machine, same software, the only difference is core count. We measured what that is worth: the eight-core plan finished the same encode 1.9× faster, for 1.7× the price.
One encode at a time, on your schedule.
US$402.96 due today for 24 months
Renews at the same price: no increase, no setup fee
Pick this if: Queued or overnight jobs, H.264 delivery renditions, podcast and audio work, anywhere finishing by morning beats finishing in the next ten minutes.
Choose FFStart30-day money-back guarantee
Twice the cores, and measured at 1.9× the speed.
US$690.96 due today for 24 months
Renews at the same price: no increase, no setup fee
Pick this if: Turnaround matters, you output HEVC or AV1, or you need live 1080p, which FFStart cannot hold at real time but FFPower can.
Choose FFPower30-day money-back guarantee
We measured the curve: going from four cores to eight nearly doubled throughput, but eight to sixteen returned only half as much again. Past this point extra cores keep helping, just less per core, and the same FFmpeg setup moves across unchanged, same OS, same build, same scripts.
Two ways to start
Both options run on the same machine with the same specs. The only difference is how much you want set up for you before you log in.
Deployed pre-configured with FFmpeg, CloudPanel and Ubuntu 24.04 LTS, so you can run your first encode as soon as the server is up. Nothing to compile, nothing to install.
FFmpeg
Ubuntu 24.04.3 LTS
CloudPanel
Selected by default when you order. The panel and its database sit at about 1 GB of memory, which still leaves roughly 7 GB free for encoding on FFStart.
Prefer a different distribution, a different control panel, or none at all? Pick them on the order form and start from a clean install.
Skip the panel entirely and a clean Ubuntu install idles at a few hundred megabytes, leaving almost the whole machine to your encodes. Control panel licensing is charged separately where a panel requires it.
Choose the right tool
This is a server for running media pipelines: transcoding, packaging and automation you control. It is a strong fit for some projects and the wrong tool for others, so here is both sides.
A strong fit
Probably not the right tool
You are responsible for the material you process and store. Content prohibited by our terms of service: including media you do not hold the rights to, and any illegal material, is not permitted, and accounts containing it may be suspended or removed without prior notice. Monthly traffic is 6 TB on FFStart and 8 TB on FFPower; if you expect to exceed that, raise it with us before you order. We do not provide DDoS mitigation. Not sure where your workload lands? Ask us before you order.
Isolation and recovery
Your server is a full virtual machine, not an account on a shared one. That distinction matters most when you are processing files other people uploaded.
KVM gives your server its own kernel and its own virtual hardware. There is no shared filesystem and no neighbouring accounts, so a malformed upload cannot reach anyone else.
No process or cron time limits. A four-hour encode finishes instead of being killed part-way, and nothing throttles the cores you paid for.
Take a restore point before a codec upgrade or a configuration change, and roll back if it turns out badly.
Drives sit behind a hardware RAID controller in our Detroit, Michigan data center, backed by redundant UPS and generator power.
Because you hold root, the security posture is yours to set: you apply the updates and configure the firewall. To be explicit about what we do not do, we provide no DDoS mitigation, no managed backups, and we run no malware scanning inside your server.
How the work flows
Video on demand and live streaming use the same tools in a different order. Both run end to end on your own server, with nothing handed to a third-party service in the middle.
Take an upload, pull from object storage, or accept an RTMP push.
ffprobe reports codecs, duration, streams and frame rate before you decide anything.
ffmpeg builds your renditions with libx264, libx265 and the rest of the software encoders.
Segment to HLS or DASH, write the manifests and the bitrate ladder.
Serve from the machine itself, or hand the segments to a CDN.
On demand
Live
Built for people who work over SSH. You get root, so your own toolchain installs the way it does anywhere else, your language runtime, your queue, your deployment method. Scheduling comes from cron and systemd timers, and logs sit where you expect them on the filesystem.
Why not shared hosting
This is not a knock on shared hosting: it is the wrong tool for this particular job. Shared plans are tuned so that one account cannot monopolise a machine, and transcoding does exactly that by design. It is why searches like “does shared hosting support shell_exec” are so common. If you are weighing providers, see how Ahosting compares to Hostinger, or read our overview of shared web hosting to see what it is genuinely good at.
On shared hosting
exec() or shell_exec(), and both are disabled on most shared plans.
On an Ahosting FFmpeg VPS
Ahosting Technical Operations test
Nobody publishes this, so we measured it on the plans we sell. Same node, same source file, same command, the only variable is the number of cores.
| Job | FFStart · 4 vCPU | FFPower · 8 vCPU |
|---|---|---|
| Down to 720p, H.264 | 51.5 s 1.16× real time | 27.6 s 2.18× real time |
| Stay at 1080p, H.264 | 88.8 s 0.67× real time | 47.5 s 1.26× real time |
| 1080p, HEVC (x265) | 110.5 s 0.54× real time | 67.7 s 0.88× real time |
| Decoding the source alone | 17.0 s | 10.7 s |
In plain terms: on FFStart a ten-minute video becomes a 720p rendition in roughly nine minutes. On FFPower the same job takes about four and a half.
FFPower costs 1.71× what FFStart does and finished the same work 1.88× faster, so the larger plan is slightly cheaper per finished hour: unusual, and worth knowing before you size.
Switching -preset medium to -preset veryfast cut the same job from 50.3 s to 29.4 s on four cores. For delivery renditions that trade is usually worth taking, and it costs nothing.
Four simultaneous encodes on four cores returned 1.08× the throughput of running them one after another. A single FFmpeg job already saturates the machine, so queue your work rather than fanning it out.
CPU steal time stayed at zero throughout, on both machines. The numbers above are what the plan delivers, not what was left over after the neighbours had finished.
Method. Two virtual machines on the same host node, both running the stock image on Ubuntu 24.04.3 with FFmpeg 6.1.1, differing only in core count. Source clips were Big Buck Bunny and Sintel (Blender Foundation, CC BY 3.0), looped to exactly 60 seconds. Figures are the mean of three runs. Your own results will move with the codec, the resolution, the filters you apply and how busy your source file is, a detailed live-action shot and a flat animated one do not cost the same, and we saw about 30% between them.
What is in the build
The list below is not marketing copy: it is read from the build we ship. The ready-made image runs FFmpeg 6.1.1, and everything here is on your PATH at first login with nothing to compile. Both plans run the same image and therefore the same codec set: the plan changes how fast the work finishes, not what it can read or write.
SVT-AV1, libaom and rav1e all ship in the build, plus dav1d for decoding. SVT-AV1 is the practical choice when AV1 encoding time matters.
The build lists NVENC, QSV and VAAPI encoders, but there is no GPU behind them: NVENC fails with Cannot load libcuda.so.1, QSV with an MFX session error. Encoding here is CPU-based, end to end.
You have root, so you can compile FFmpeg from source with your own configure flags, including encoders we cannot ship for licensing reasons, such as libfdk-aac, which is deliberately not in this build.
What it costs
FFmpeg itself is free and open source: there is no licence fee, ever. What costs money is a machine that can actually run it: guaranteed CPU, root access and no execution time limits. That starts at $16.79 per month on a 24-month term, renewing at $20.79.
If you are moving from a managed service that bills per minute of output, this is the structural difference: a server is a flat fee. Process one file or ten thousand and the invoice is identical, so a busy month and a quiet month cost the same.
How much you can actually push through a plan depends on the codec, the resolution, the filters you apply and how many jobs run at once, an H.264 720p rendition is far cheaper in CPU time than 4K HEVC. Tell us what you are encoding and we will tell you which plan carries it.
Straight answers
Clear answers about the build, the operating system, GPU support, traffic limits and what we do and do not run for you.
Reviewed by Adnan Canturk, Founder of Ahosting with 24 years in web hosting. Last updated:
exec() and shell_exec(): and restrict custom binaries. Even where the binary runs, per-account CPU caps and cron time limits end long encodes part-way through. That is a deliberate design choice on shared hosting, not a fault: it keeps one account from monopolising a machine.Ready when you are
Start with FFStart for queued work on four guaranteed cores, or take FFPower when jobs run in parallel. FFmpeg is already built on both, so your first transcode can run within minutes of the server coming up.
24-month introductory term. Renews at the same price, no increase, no setup fee.
Introductory pricing depends on the selected billing term. Renewal pricing and money-back eligibility are shown before checkout and governed by the applicable terms.