Drupal Hosting UK

Drupal hosting set up the way Drupal expects

Modern Drupal is built with Composer and has its public files in a web/ folder. Hosts that treat it like a simple PHP site cause problems from day one. On dijitul hosting we:

• point the document root at web/ so vendor code and configuration aren't publicly reachable
• set the PHP version per site: PHP 8.3 or newer for Drupal 11, PHP 8.1 or newer for Drupal 10
• set memory_limit high enough for Composer and for Drupal's cache rebuilds
• configure trusted_host_patterns in settings.php for your domain
• keep the private files directory outside the web root
• run Drupal cron from a server scheduled task

Plesk's Composer and Git tools let your developer deploy updates from a repository.

Drupal 7 after end of life

Drupal 7 was supported for an unusually long time, but official support ended on 5 January 2025. Thousands of sites still run it, often for charities, universities and membership organisations where the content is more important than the technology.

We can host a Drupal 7 site on an older PHP version, isolated from other sites, behind Cloudflare and backed up daily, while you plan what's next. Your options are usually:

1. Migrate to Drupal 10 or 11. This is a rebuild with content migration, not an upgrade button. Drupal's Migrate tools move content, users and taxonomy.
2. Move to Backdrop CMS, a fork of Drupal 7 with a much simpler upgrade path.
3. Rebuild in another CMS such as WordPress, if the site has outgrown Drupal's complexity.

All three are quoted. See old website hosting for how we keep older sites safe.

Moving a Drupal site to dijitul

We copy the codebase, database and files directory, including private files. Then we update settings.php, clear caches, run database updates and check that cron, image styles, search and email all work on a temporary address. Clean URLs are handled by the .htaccess Drupal ships with. More on website migration.

Security and updates

Drupal publishes security advisories on a regular schedule, and keeping core and contributed modules current matters. We look after the server, PHP and firewall, and each Drupal site runs under its own system user. Core and module updates are part of your site; your developer can apply them with Composer, or we can quote for ongoing updates. Daily backups mean updates can be rolled back.

When Drupal needs more than standard hosting

Most Drupal sites for small and mid-sized organisations fit comfortably on dijitul Complete Hosting. Large sites with heavy search, many logged-in users or Solr and Redis requirements usually belong on a managed VPS, which we quote. Tell us about your site and we'll say which it needs. Order online or call 01623 650333.

Common Drupal hosting faults

These are the problems we see most often when a Drupal site arrives from another host:

• White screen during cache rebuilds or module installs: PHP memory_limit set too low for Drupal's container rebuild.
• 'The provided host name is not valid for this server': trusted_host_patterns doesn't include the new domain.
• Missing images: image styles can't be generated because the files directory isn't writable by the site's user, or GD is missing.
• Cron not running: the site relied on Automated Cron, which only fires on visits, so search indexing and update checks stall.
• Composer out of step: the vendor folder was uploaded by FTP and doesn't match composer.lock, so updates fail.

All of these are quick fixes when the hosting is set up properly, and we deal with them as part of the move.

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