Why Amsterdam
Amsterdam carries a disproportionate share of Europe's internet traffic. There are concrete reasons, and they matter to what your server actually does.
The exchange
AMS-IX is one of the largest internet exchanges in the world, with well over a thousand connected networks. That density means traffic between you and almost any European network can stay local instead of going via somewhere else and back.
The practical effect is fewer hops, lower latency and more paths when one of them has a bad day. See routing problems.
Carrier choice
Because so many networks are present, transit is competitive and alternatives are a cross-connect away rather than a construction project. A provider here can hold several carriers without it being remarkable. That is why multiple upstreams is our normal state rather than a premium feature.
Latency to where your users are
From Amsterdam you are roughly 5–10 ms from the Randstad, 10–20 ms from London, Frankfurt, Paris and Brussels, 20–35 ms from most of the rest of western and central Europe, and around 75–90 ms from the US east coast.
For anything interactive — game servers, trading, remote desktops — that geography is the product. Measure it yourself before you commit; see speed testing.
Power and buildings
The region has a mature datacentre market, which means carrier-neutral facilities with redundant power, generator backup and proper cooling as a baseline rather than a selling point. Our racks sit in that infrastructure, and we monitor at the rack rather than trusting the building to tell us.
Dutch and EU law
For a European business this is often the deciding factor:
- Your data stays in the EU, which removes an entire category of transfer questions under the GDPR
- A published data processing agreement and a privacy statement you can hand to your own compliance people
- A predictable legal system, and a clear process for how authorities must ask for anything — see when authorities ask for data
- No general data retention obligation for hosting services
And the honest limit
Amsterdam is not the cheapest place in Europe to rent a rack, and if your users are all in Asia or South America you should host closer to them. We are in Amsterdam and nowhere else, deliberately: one city where our racks, our network and our engineers are in the same place, so a fault is fixed by someone who can walk to it. If that is the wrong geography for you, a provider nearer your users is the better answer.
Still stuck? Mail support@novogara.com — an engineer answers, at any hour. Back to the knowledge base