In recent years, we’ve seen companies pushing to be more sustainable. From using less paper to changing how they manufacture their goods. Gaming is no different. But instead of looking at the materials in their products, studios need to look at how much energy they’re using.
One big area is your servers. Even the cloud needs a computer somewhere. And that computer needs power.
What are green servers?
Green servers are designed to be energy-efficient and sustainable. They use less power, so have lower emissions when running. To reduce your carbon footprint, there are typically three approaches you can take:
- Use more efficient servers. Find a green provider that uses efficient cooling systems and parts that don’t use loads of power.
- Use renewable energy. Look for green hosting providers that get the majority of their power from renewable sources, such as solar or wind.
- Optimize your build. The less compute power your game needs to run, the less energy it takes. Green providers will often offer you ways to visualize and manage your usage so you can optimize them.
How to choose a green server hosting provider
Not all providers are green. So how do you make sure you’re choosing the right one? Here’s what we tend to look out for when helping our clients pick greener servers:
- Check their credentials: Look for hosting providers with a clear commitment to sustainability. Check their websites for information on eco-friendly practices.
- Certifications: Look out for Green Web Hosting certifications or endorsements. If a server provider has these, then it’ll show you how dedicated they are to providing sustainable servers.
- Energy Sources: Ask about what energy sources they use to power the data centres. A green provider should rely on renewable energy.
- Hardware and Cooling: What hardware and cooling systems do they use? Opt for servers that are more efficient and minimize how much energy they consume.
How to keep your games green:
Once you’ve chosen a green hosting provider, follow these steps to make the most of your eco-friendly server:
- Optimize your code: Write clean and efficient code to reduce server load. The cleaner the code, the less processing power it needs. So the less energy it uses.
- Keep up regular maintenance: Keep your server software up-to-date and do regular maintenance to make sure your games and code are as optimal as possible and stay energy efficient.
- Scale to meet demand: Use cloud-based services to flexibly scale your resources. Adjust your server resources based on demand, so you don’t use any unnecessary energy. That’s what we do. And as an added benefit, this technique can also keep your costs down.
- Manage your data: Back up your data regularly and archive anything that’s not important. This will minimize what storage you’ll need and reduce how much server space you need.
Our orchestrator can help you stay green
Our orchestrator automatically finds the best servers and locations to host your games – saving your team time and money. We work with a huge range of server providers, so if your plan this year is to reduce your carbon footprint and become greener, we can help you find what you’re looking for.
