Pieter Levels is one of the clearest examples that you do not need tons of infrastructure — or a big team — to build a profitable, scalable online business.
He earns millions a year — by some reports around US$ 2.7–3.5 million per year from his portfolio of digital products — all while operating lean, solo, with minimal hosting overhead.
His path gives a useful roadmap: you can start cheap, stay nimble, and grow only when your audience and revenues truly demand it.
How Pieter keeps his costs low — and why that works
Minimal infrastructure, maximum simplicity
- Pieter uses simple technologies: PHP, vanilla JS / jQuery — no heavy frameworks or complex stacks.
- He hosts his sites on a few VPS servers (like Linode or similar), not on a full-blown cloud infrastructure with costly scaling.
- His setup runs with basic tools like Nginx, simple back-end and front-end code, and minimal dependencies — enough to serve his apps reliably.
Launch fast, iterate quickly
He follows a “ship fast” mentality. Instead of building huge, feature-packed apps from day one, he builds small MVPs (minimum viable products), tests ideas quickly, and then improves only what works.
This reduces wasted time and server load, and avoids spending on infrastructure before you know the idea works.
Automate and scale only when needed
Pieter automates much of what he can — job boards, user flows, payments, maintenance — so he doesn’t need a big team.
When a product gains traction, he scales deliberately. Until then, the infrastructure remains small.
What this means for you — and why cheap hosting + hustle can work
If you are building a web app, side project, SaaS or digital product, Pieter shows you don’t need a big budget.
- Start with a small VPS or even shared/cheap hosting.
- Use basic tech — avoid overengineering early on.
- Focus on building something people want, not on complex architecture.
- Automate, avoid unnecessary overhead, keep margins high.
- Once you get paying users and real traction, then scale.
This approach keeps risk low, cash flow manageable, and lets you concentrate resources where they matter: development, growth, marketing.
Why many people misunderstand “cheap hosting” — and how to avoid the traps
It is true that cheap hosting can have downsides: slower performance, possible downtime or support issues, weaker security depending on provider.
That means if you choose this path, you should:
- Monitor performance and usage from day one
- Use simple, efficient code (minimize heavy dependencies)
- Optimize for speed, caching, and efficiency
- Be prepared to upgrade only when your traffic and business needs truly grow
The idea is not to always stay minimal. The idea is to stay smart — avoid wasting money on infrastructure before the value is there.
What you can learn from Pieter — in short
- Success does not require complex stacks or big teams.
- Lean, minimal infrastructure + smart business sense can scale.
- Build for real demand, not hype.
- Keep costs controlled; invest what matters.
- Focus on customers and value rather than tech complexity.