Gandi vs NovoServe: Which Is Better?
We track Gandi and NovoServe prices, uptime and specs 24/7. Here's the live head-to-head for September 2026 — no paid rankings, just the data.
About GandiGandi is one of the oldest independent domain registrars in Europe, founded in Paris in 1999 by French internet pioneers and ICANN-accredited since its early years. It now runs a catalogue of 996 domain extensions alongside LXC-based Simple Hosting (with preconfigured WordPress, PrestaShop and Nextcloud variants), GandiCloud VPS on OpenStack with block storage and snapshots, mailboxes, TLS/SSL certificates, Premium DNS built on Cloudflare and a public API for automation. Its infrastructure sits in private rooms at Equinix PA3 in Paris and LuxConnect in Luxembourg, and the company is certified against ISO 27001 and ISO 22301. Gandi is best known for price transparency — every zone's creation, transfer, renewal, owner-change and restore price is published — and for free WHOIS privacy and free Anycast DNS on every domain.
About NovoServeNovoServe is a Netherlands-based Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) provider specializing in dedicated servers, bare metal infrastructure, and high-performance hosting solutions. The company focuses on delivering fully dedicated computing resources for businesses and organizations that require predictable performance, high bandwidth, scalability, and direct control over their infrastructure.
Founded in 2014, NovoServe has developed from a European dedicated-server provider into an international infrastructure company serving customers across Europe, North America, and other global markets. Its infrastructure is designed primarily for demanding workloads such as enterprise applications, databases, virtualization, streaming, gaming, AdTech, AI, and other high-bandwidth or resource-intensive projects.
Dedicated & Bare Metal Infrastructure
NovoServe's core offering is dedicated and bare metal server hosting. Customers receive physical server resources rather than shared virtualized environments, providing greater control over CPU, RAM, storage, networking, and operating-system configuration.
The company offers a broad range of configurations based on AMD EPYC and Intel Xeon processors, as well as high-storage, high-bandwidth, HPC, and GPU-oriented servers. Custom hardware configurations are also available for organizations with specific technical requirements.
NovoServe emphasizes direct root-level access and customizable infrastructure, making its platform suitable for companies that need more control than conventional shared hosting or standard cloud instances can provide.
Global Network
One of NovoServe's major differentiators is its network infrastructure. The company currently advertises more than 18 Tbps of total network capacity, connections to 10+ Tier-1 carriers, more than 800 peering partners, and 10+ Points of Presence (PoPs).
NovoServe maintains direct connectivity with major Internet exchanges including AMS-IX and NL-IX, helping reduce latency and improve routing efficiency across Europe and North America. Its network is designed with multiple redundant paths and carrier connections to provide resilience during traffic spikes and network disruptions.
For high-traffic applications, NovoServe also offers dedicated network ports with speeds reaching up to 50 Gbps, depending on the server and location. High-bandwidth and unmetered connectivity options are particularly relevant for streaming, gaming, large-scale data transfers, and other bandwidth-intensive workloads.
Data Center Locations
NovoServe operates its infrastructure from multiple strategic locations in Europe and the United States. Its current data-center footprint includes:
The Netherlands — multiple facilities in Amsterdam and Rotterdam
Denmark — Copenhagen
United States — New York
The company states that it works with Tier III data-center facilities and operates more than 7,000 dedicated servers across its infrastructure.
The Netherlands is particularly important to NovoServe's network strategy because of its proximity to major European Internet exchanges and fiber routes. Amsterdam provides direct access to AMS-IX and other major connectivity hubs, while Rotterdam adds additional infrastructure capacity within the Dutch market.
Security & Reliability
NovoServe places a strong emphasis on network redundancy, physical infrastructure, and security. Its data-center infrastructure is based on Tier III facilities, while the company provides network-level DDoS protection as part of its infrastructure offering.
NovoServe also lists ISO 27001 certification among its security and compliance documentation and provides security, privacy, acceptable-use, and service-level documentation for its customers.
The company's network architecture uses multiple carriers, Internet exchanges, peering relationships, and redundant international routes to help maintain availability and minimize the impact of individual network failures.
Support & Custom Infrastructure
NovoServe positions itself as an infrastructure partner rather than simply a server rental company. Customers can request custom hardware configurations, specialized networking, bulk deployments, and infrastructure solutions tailored to specific workloads.
The company supports B2B customers worldwide and provides direct technical support through its engineering and infrastructure teams. NovoServe also works with server resellers, hosting companies, MSPs, and other technology partners.
Who Is NovoServe Best For?
NovoServe is particularly suited to customers that need dedicated physical infrastructure and substantial network capacity, including:
Businesses running resource-intensive applications
SaaS and technology companies
Hosting providers and MSPs
Streaming and media platforms
Gaming infrastructure
AdTech platforms
AI and machine-learning workloads
High-performance databases
Virtualization environments
Companies requiring high-bandwidth or unmetered connectivity
For smaller websites and basic WordPress projects, a dedicated bare metal provider such as NovoServe may offer considerably more infrastructure than necessary. Its strengths become more apparent when predictable performance, physical resources, networking capacity, and scalability are important requirements.
NovoServe at a Glance
Company | NovoServe B.V.
Founded | 2014
Headquarters | Enschede, Netherlands
Business Model | Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS)
Core Focus | Dedicated & Bare Metal Servers
Dedicated Servers | 7,000+
Network Capacity | 18+ Tbps
Tier-1 Carriers | 10+
Peering Partners | 800+
Points of Presence | 10+
Data Centers | Netherlands, Denmark & United States
Server Platforms | AMD EPYC, Intel Xeon and other configurations
High-Bandwidth Options | Up to 50 Gbps on supported configurations
DDoS Protection | Available
Custom Hardware | Available
Primary Market | B2B / Enterprise / Infrastructure
DohoHub Perspective
From DohoHub's perspective, NovoServe stands out primarily as a high-performance dedicated and bare metal infrastructure provider, rather than a traditional shared-hosting or beginner-oriented hosting company.
Its biggest advantages are its large network capacity, extensive peering, European connectivity, dedicated hardware, custom configurations, and high-bandwidth options. These characteristics make NovoServe particularly interesting for developers, hosting companies, MSPs, SaaS businesses, media platforms, and other organizations with demanding infrastructure requirements.
The main trade-off is that NovoServe's infrastructure-oriented approach may be excessive for customers looking for simple shared hosting, managed WordPress hosting, or an entry-level website package. Its value becomes much stronger as computing requirements, traffic volumes, networking requirements, and the need for physical resource isolation increase.
Comparison Table
| Feature | Gandi | NovoServe |
|---|---|---|
| Price / mo | $0.00 win | $67.77 |
| Renewal price | Standard rate after the promo term | Monthly (promos ex. VAT) |
| Datacenters | 2 | 5 win |
| NVMe storage | ✗ No | ✓ Yes win |
| Free domain | ✓ Yes win | ✗ No |
| Backups | Snapshots included | — |
| CDN | ✗ No | ✗ No |
| Support | 24/6 email & chat | — |
| Uptime · 30d | 100.00% win | 99.32% |
Price History
Gandi · SSL Certificate FreeCollecting price history — the trend fills in as we track this plan.
NovoServe · Unmetered 1Gbps Entry ServerCollecting price history — the trend fills in as we track this plan.
Uptime & Performance
Gandi 100.00%
NovoServe 99.32%Pros & Cons
Gandi- French internet pioneer and ICANN-accredited registrar since 1999 — 135 employees, HQ in Paris, ISO 27001 & ISO 22301 certified
- One of the most transparent domain price lists in the industry: 996 extensions with creation, transfer, renewal, owner-change and restore prices published
- Free Anycast DNS with LiveDNS (sub-250 ms propagation), DNSSEC, 2 free mailboxes and a free SSL certificate with every domain
- Simple Hosting runs every site in its own LXC container with dedicated CPU/RAM — not the usual shared-resource plan
- Five languages on the same plan (PHP, Python, Node) with MySQL or PostgreSQL, plus free snapshots and a Varnish cache
- GandiCloud VPS on OpenStack with block storage, volume snapshots and a public API/Terraform/Ansible automation
- Renewal prices are steep on the popular zones — .com renews at $38.38/year and .net at $39.98, well above the market
- Promo pricing covers the first term only; standard rates are 3-4x higher (Starter $3.99 → $15.00 per month)
- No dedicated servers, GPU or colocation — the top of the line is an 8 vCPU / 16 GB VPS
- No money-back guarantee or free trial is published, unlike most US and EU hosts
- Support is 24/6 (not 24/7) by email and chat; phone help is a paid advisory service
- Only two data centers, both in Europe — latency is poor for Asia-Pacific and most of the Americas
NovoServe- Own 18Tbps carrier-neutral backbone with 800+ peering partners
- 5 Tier III data centers: Amsterdam (×2), Rotterdam/The Hague, Copenhagen, New York
- Entry dedicated servers from €59/mo with 25TB traffic included by default
- Unmetered bandwidth lines on 1G, 2G, 5G, 10G and up to 50Gbps dedicated ports
- GPU fleet: NVIDIA V100 / RTX 3090, AMD MI50 / MI210, up to 4× RTX PRO 6000 96GB
- In-house anti-DDoS scrubbing centers on every server
- Most stock servers run older generations (HPE G8/Gen9, Xeon E5/v2)
- Custom builds, HPC and colocation are quote-only — no public price list
- Bare metal only — no shared hosting, VPS or managed services
- Published prices are ex. VAT (21% Dutch VAT for EU consumers)
- No money-back guarantee on dedicated servers
- Only EU + US East Coast locations — nothing in Asia
The Verdict
On the data we track, Gandi wins more rows in the comparison table above (3 vs 2). That said, the right pick depends on which rows matter most for your use case — price, uptime, datacenters or backups.
Gandi & NovoServe alternatives
Cheaper than Gandi / NovoServe
FAQ
Right now Gandi has the lower entry price across the plans we track. Prices update every few hours — the live snapshot above always shows the current starting price for both.
Over the last 30 days of our monitoring, Gandi had the higher measured uptime. We ping both providers every few minutes from multiple locations — see the uptime graph above.
Yes. Both run standard KVM virtualization, so you can snapshot your server, export the image, and import it on the other provider. For most stacks a fresh deploy plus a data copy is simpler.
It depends on your priority: pick the one that wins on the rows that matter most to you in the table above (price, uptime, datacenters, backups). For latency-sensitive apps favour uptime and network; for value favour price and specs.