All products 
VPS in Mumbai: the main network gateway to India
Mumbai is India's financial capital and the densest point of its internet infrastructure. Cables linking the country with Europe, the Middle East and Africa land here, and the city hosts nodes of the national internet exchange NIXI and of international exchange operators, including DE-CIX. Global clouds opened their first Indian regions in Mumbai, and most hosting providers followed. That is why "India" and "Mumbai" in the catalogue most often mean the same place.
Mumbai on the route map
For users inside the country Mumbai is convenient because it is central in network terms rather than geographically. Typical latency from the city:
- Pune, Ahmedabad, Bangalore: 10–25 ms;
- Delhi and Chennai: 25–35 ms;
- Dubai and Muscat: 25–40 ms, Singapore: 55–70 ms;
- Frankfurt and London: about 110–130 ms;
- the US East Coast: usually 190–220 ms, with traffic going through Europe.
Hence a clear role: a Mumbai server covers western and central India and gives acceptable latency to the north and south of the country. If your users are concentrated in the east or in Bangladesh, compare Chennai; if your audience is spread between the Gulf and India, look at Dubai, and for Southeast Asia at Singapore. The overall picture of the country and its rules is on the VPS in India page.
Where the metro area's data centres are
Mumbai island itself is densely built up, so data halls are spread across the metro area: the business districts of Andheri, Powai and Bandra-Kurla, and the industrial zones of Navi Mumbai and Thane across the harbour. Latency between them is a few milliseconds, but reliability varies. Mumbai's monsoon season runs roughly from June to September, and downpours regularly flood the city. A good site is built for this: equipment above potential flood level, multiple power feeds and fuel reserves for generators. So it is worth asking the host about the data-centre tier and how it coped in past seasons.
What a Mumbai VPS is used for
- Mobile app backends for the Indian market: the vast majority of users go online from their phones, and API response time is more noticeable than page load speed.
- Fintech and e-commerce. The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) requires payment system data to be stored inside the country, so companies handling Indian payments keep such data at local sites.
- Game servers for players in India and neighbouring countries, where ping from Europe exceeds 100 ms. CPU and bandwidth requirements are on the VPS for a game server page.
- An Indian IP for checking regional ads, prices and app stores.
What to check if a plan says "Mumbai"
Part of the selection consists of plans from international providers for whom Mumbai is just one of dozens of locations. When ordering, make sure that is the one selected, and after launch run a traceroute: if the first hops are in Singapore or Europe, the server is not where it was promised. Look at routes to the major mobile carriers as well: peering quality between Indian networks varies, and a good host connects directly to several of them. Measure speed not only during the day but also in the evening local time: between eight and eleven p.m. Indian traffic peaks, and on plans with a shared port the speed to users can drop noticeably at that time.
Check the address separately: cheap Indian plans sometimes use NAT and shared IPv4, and outbound traffic in Mumbai clouds is often billed above the quota. Finally, sign-up rules: local providers collect and keep customer data under CERT-In requirements, so give your real details. If you process data of Indian users, take the 2023 DPDP Act into account too.
Payment
Mumbai plans can be paid by card, PayPal or invoice for companies; some hosts also accept cryptocurrency as a payment method. Indian hosts add GST to the bill for local customers, and the calculation may differ for foreigners, so check the final amount at the last step of the order. The "Payment" column in the table shows the methods for each plan, and the filter above leaves only the suitable ones. Mumbai is three and a half to four and a half hours ahead of Central Europe, so support replies during your morning and early afternoon.