Which cloud server to choose for my algo?

There are lot many cloud providers out there. You have to choose as per your requirement and budget

Below are the top 3 cloud providers

Amazon Web Services (AWS)
Microsoft Azure
Google Cloud

Other Discount Providers who has data center in India

Digital Ocean
Linode

We prefer and recommend Amazon Web Services (AWS)

Why AWS?

Mumbai Data center
User Friendly dashboard
Per minute billing
Custom Image support
Latest Generation CPU
Easily upgrade instance type when needed
Network level firewall
Easily attach/detach additional volumes
Lamda to schedule power on/off
Most broker’s hosted their API server in AWS (Ex: Zerodha, Upstox)

Note Having cloud server (data center) very close to broker OMS will have low latency, which may help in better order filling and reduced slippage
Ex: Zerodha API server is hosted in AWS (Mumbai), it takes ~16ms* to place an order from Mumbai cloud server

Note With per minute billing, you can reduce your cost by running your cloud server during market hours only from 0800AM - 0400PM (~200 hours /month)

Which instance type to choose?

It’s really depend on the load of your algo.

Algo which needs to process millions of data will need high CPU instance.
Algo which just uses few hundreds data may work fine with single CPU.

So, you have to choose the instance type for your algo by trial and error

Here are the 4 most common instance types

*The approximate cost mentioned is based on the assumption that the server is running for 200 hours/month and the cost does not include GST
*Hard Disk size is 30GB and data center is Mumbai

Basic

Purpose : For very minimal load
Example: EtaTrader and Excel with ~50 symbols, simple math based algo

Instance Type: t2.micro
vCPU: 1
RAM: 1 GB
Cost: $10/month (Rs780/month*)

(This server is offered free by AWS for first year. For T&C check https://aws.amazon.com/free/)

Standard

Purpose : For nominal load
Example: EtaTrader and AmiBroker with ~50 symbols, simple math based algo

Instance Type: t2.medium
vCPU: 2
RAM: 4 GB
Cost: $20/month (Rs1530/month*)

High Performance

Purpose : For high speed calculations and data processing
Example: EtaTrader and Excel OR AmiBroker with ~50 symbols, execution algo’s like Peg2Market

Instance Type: c5.large
vCPU: 2
RAM: 4 GB
Cost: $42/month (Rs3150/month*)

Ultra High Performance

Purpose : For high speed calculations and data processing, and multiple systems
Example: EtaTrader, Excel and AmiBroker with ~100 symbols, execution algo’s like Peg2Market

Instance Type: c5.xlarge
vCPU: 4
RAM: 8 GB
Cost: $78/month (Rs5850/month*)

Note You can reduce your cost further by ~ $4/month by not using fixed IP. In this case, you have to get the floating IP from the dashboard every time you power on your cloud server

Note If you are in AWS free tier, then the cost will be little lower than the above for the first year as some features are free (Ex: 30 GB volume is free for the first year which will reduce your cost by ~ $3.5/month)