What Is Colocation? A Plain-English Guide for IT Buyers

Colocation (colo) is the practice of housing your own servers inside a third-party data center. You own the hardware; the facility provides space, power, cooling, and network connectivity.

How Colocation Works

• You ship your servers to the facility and pay monthly for cabinet space, power, and bandwidth
• The facility provides redundant power, cooling, physical security, and carrier connectivity
• You manage everything above the physical layer: OS, applications, networking

Colocation vs. Alternatives

• vs. Cloud: Colo = predictable costs, you own hardware. Cloud = variable costs, provider owns hardware.
• vs. On-premises: Colo offers data center-grade power/cooling/connectivity at a monthly fee vs. capital buildout.
• vs. Dedicated hosting: Colo = you own the servers. Dedicated = provider owns the hardware.

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