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Hosting Account Resources Exceeded and CloudLinux Resources
In every modern web hosting environment, where different accounts run simultaneously on the same server (e.g., shared hosting, reseller hosting, semi-dedicated hosting), the stability and performance of your website depend not only on the available resources but also on how effectively these resources are distributed among users sharing the same server.
Our servers with DirectAdmin panel and CloudLinux offer powerful user isolation and resource allocation per user, increasing security and stability in shared, reseller, and semi-dedicated hosting environments. This means that your website is protected from potential resource overconsumption by other accounts and operates with predictable performance.
What does the term Resources mean in CloudLinux?
The LVE Subsystem
CloudLinux uses a subsystem called LVE (Lightweight Virtual Environment) to fairly distribute the server’s resources to each hosting account. Each website operates in its own isolated environment with specific resource limits, so that it is not possible for one website on the server to unfairly overconsume resources causing malfunctions to other accounts on the same server.
Controlled Resources
The main resources that are controlled, and applied per user account, are:
- CPU (Processor): The processing power your website can use
- RAM/Memory: The memory occupied by your site’s processes
- Entry Processes (Concurrent Web Server Processes): The maximum number of active processes the Web Server can execute simultaneously
- Processes (Concurrent System Processes): The maximum number of active parallel system processes (Linux Processes)
- Disk I/O and IOPS (Disk Operations): The read/write speed on the disk
It should be noted that in our shared hosting plans we provide unlimited IOPS and unlimited I/O Usage. This ensures the best possible performance of your website without restrictions on disk operations, even during periods of high traffic.
When and How to Check the Resources Your Hosting Uses in DirectAdmin
You can view the resources your site uses at any time, but you should check your account resources in DirectAdmin when your website displays periodic temporary errors such as:
- 508 Resource Limit Reached
- 507 Insufficient Storage
- 500 Internal Server Error
- 503 Service Unavailable
To view your account’s resource usage:
- Log in to the DirectAdmin control panel
- Go to the “Extra Features” section
- Select “Resource Usage”
On the “Current Usage” screen, you will see detailed resource usage. The main columns are:
Usage
Shows the resources your account is currently consuming in real-time.
Limit
Shows the maximum limits your account’s resources can reach.
Fault
If there is currently a resource overage, the corresponding line will have a non-zero value. The higher the value here, the more times the system temporarily denied service due to resource overage.
Further down on the same Resource Usage page you will find:
- Separate usage charts for: CPU, Physical Memory (PMEM), Entry Processes (EP), Number of Processes (NPROC), I/O, IOPS
- Timeframe: Ability to select the period you want to examine (last 10 minutes, last 4 hours, 24 hours, 7 days, etc.)
- Consolidated faults chart: An overall graph displaying all faults (limit overages) that occurred on your account by type and time
- Tables with detailed data: Average values, maximum values, and number of faults per time point
Using these charts and statistics, you can:
- Identify trends in resource usage
- Recognize exactly when faults occurred
- Make informed decisions about optimization or upgrades
Practical Example of Limit Overage
Below we can see a typical example of a website that exceeds limits in almost all resources throughout the current day:
- CPU Usage: The graph shows that CPU usage often touches the limit (red line), with multiple faults during the current day
- Physical Memory: Does not reach limits but we see high consumption peaks close to the 4GB limit
- Entry Processes: Often approach the limit of 100 parallel processes
- Processes: The total number of processes repeatedly reaches the limit of 200
- Faults Graph: The last graph clearly shows the distribution of faults by type (CPU, NPROC) during the current day
Important: Special attention is required for the last Faults chart, as it provides immediate indication if there is a limit overage. Normally this chart (Faults) should be a straight line without any peaks, meaning no resource overage is occurring.
Below the charts on the same page, there is a table where you can see specifically the number of overages (Faults) that have been recorded per hour (these are the values from the graphs, but in table form).
Common Causes of Limit Overages and Remediation Suggestions
The duration and frequency of errors (limit overages) provide important information to find the cause of the problem and then address it. Below we present common causes of limit overages, how you can recognize/identify them, and what you can do to address them.
Recent Site Changes, Softwarewise or not
If the overage started after some change, carefully check what was modified. For example:
- If a plugin update was performed, you need to downgrade to the previous version
- If plugin activation was performed, you need to either deactivate it or make the appropriate configurations to fix the problem
- If changes to settings/configurations were made, examine whether restoring them solves the problem
- If programming changes were made or custom code was added, you should check if, for example, the new code contains loops without optimization, heavy database queries, or executes external API calls that cause extra latency
- If a theme update or theme change was performed, try returning to the previous theme
Generally, try to disable the changes one by one to identify where the problem is caused.
Increased Bot Visits
If the overage was recorded for only a specific time period during the day or appears at irregular time periods, then it is advisable to check the possibility that it is caused by bots. Whether they are known bots (e.g., Google, Facebook, Pinterest, etc.) or malicious bots, an increase in visits from bots can cause increased resource consumption and possibly overage. Check if from the logs you can identify specific IPs or bots that made many requests during the periods when limit overages occurred. Use a firewall plugin and consider rate limiting or blocking specific bots or IPs. Our servers already operate multi-level protection against malicious bots and attacks. In any case, if you see increased traffic from malicious bots you can contact us as well so we can help immediately.
Scheduled Tasks / Cronjobs
If you notice that limit overages are recorded uniformly only at specific times or periods during the day systematically, then it is critical to examine whether scheduled tasks (crons or scheduled tasks of your application) are running during those time periods. Try to disable or move these tasks to a different time during the day to see if the overage time also changes, or to solve it try to “split” the process into more parts (e.g., import in groups). Generally, schedule heavy tasks during low-traffic hours.
“Heavy” Website and Increased Traffic
If you have started marketing campaigns (e.g., newsletter campaigns, Instagram promotion, Viber), it is natural for traffic to increase and with it, resource usage. Especially if it is a website with many plugins executing complex and numerous queries on each request, third-party scripts that delay response, etc., moderate traffic from a promotional action can cause hosting limit overages in a short period of time. In this case, you will see that limit overages start after your promotional actions begin. You can try to implement some of the optimizations we suggest below.
General Resource Usage Optimization Recommendations
Regardless of the cause, there are steps that can generally reduce resource usage and improve website performance.
- Install or enable caching features, e.g., a caching plugin
- Upgrade PHP to a newer version (it is faster and consumes less memory)
- Check plugin and theme compatibility before each upgrade
- Reduce plugins to the essentials
- Prefer tested and proven lightweight themes
- Debug periodically to identify potential problems, for example during the development process keep track of loading times
- Regularly check your website’s error logs
If after all the above optimizations your website continues to exceed limits, you can contact us. If, for example, your website reaches the above limits because it is growing and traffic and size are increasing, then of course we can suggest the appropriate upgrade of your hosting plan so that it is very fast and can serve many visitors simultaneously.