Is Typesense on VPS a good alternative for developers?

[Annie_P]

Is Typesense on VPS a good alternative to Elasticsearch or Meilisearch for developers looking for a simple, fast search solution?

[Paul Schmidt]

I’ve been playing with Typesense for a while. On a VPS it’s surprisingly lightweight compared to Elasticsearch. Setup took me like 10 mins vs hours with ES. Some providers also offer free set-up of Typesense, which makes it even easier to get started. For small to mid projects, I’d say yes, it’s a solid alternative.

[Clay Page]

Depends what you’re after. Meilisearch feels a bit more polished in terms of docs + community. Elasticsearch has way more features obviously, but I find it bloated unless you really need the advanced stuff. Typesense is nice if speed + simplicity are top priorities.

[Annie_P]

Thanks, both! One thing I’m still unsure about—how does Typesense handle scaling on VPS? Like, if traffic spikes, does it struggle compared to Elasticsearch?

[Jimmy_Carter]

Scaling is usually where people think ES has the upper hand, since it’s been around longer with big cluster support. But honestly, Typesense holds up really well on a VPS if you size it right. It’s built for speed and efficiency, so for most apps you don’t need a huge cluster anyway. Unless you’re running enterprise-scale workloads, Typesense can actually be easier to scale because you don’t have to deal with the complexity ES brings.

[wisly.k]

We actually swapped Elasticsearch for Typesense last year on a store site. Running it on a mid-tier VPS. Honestly? Way faster for our use case and cheaper to run. ES was just eating too many resources. Haven’t looked back since.

[Marc_AccuWebHosting]

Some great replies here. From what many developers have seen, Typesense on a VPS isn’t just a practical choice — it’s often the better one. It’s fast, easy to set up, and doesn’t come with the heavy complexity of Elasticsearch. For most projects, that balance of speed and simplicity is exactly what you need. If you’d like a clear comparison, this article explains it well: Typesense: A Better Alternative to Algolia and Elasticsearch. Definitely worth a read if you’re exploring search options.

[Annie_P]

Thanks for sharing that article. Really helpful, cleared up a lot of my doubts about Typesense vs Alternatives.