Running your own server

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2023-01-24 21:00:05

A domain name. This is how you and others will access your server and how you and your users will be identified on the network.

How to get: Namecheap, Gandi, any of the infinite number of domain name registrars. Comes with a yearly cost that varies depending on domain name choice.

How to get: DigitalOcean, Hetzner, Exoscale, Scaleway, any of the infinite number of hosting providers. Comes with a monthly or yearly cost that varies depending on hardware specifications.

An e-mail provider. Mastodon needs to send confirmation links and various notifications through e-mail, and hosting your own SMTP server, while possible, is much more difficult to do reliably than to use a third-party provider.

How to get: Mailgun, SparkPost, Postmark, Sendgrid, any of the infinite number of e-mail hosting providers that expose a SMTP API. Comes with a monthly cost based on volume of e-mails sent.

Optional: Object storage provider. Mastodon can save files that you and your users upload on the hard disk drive of the VPS it runs on, however, the hard disk drive is usually not infinite and difficult to upgrade later. An object storage provider gives you practically infinite metered file storage.