@testsnake Private instances are perfectly fine! There is nothing wrong with wanting to explore the Fediverse on an instance that is yours and yours alone!

For context though, I am biased towards self-hosting. I am running the private Calckey instance I am replying from, I've ran a private Akkoma instance before, and I am running a low user Kbin instance.

Generally speaking, the resources required to host a private Fediverse instance are low. You could likely get an instance running on the equivalent of a Raspberry Pi! (Would recommend getting as much RAM as possible though) Though, some instances are harder to initialise than others! Akkoma and Calckey are a breeze to set up, but Kbin is a nightmare if you don't know what you're doing (or, Docker-wise if you don't use the V2 docker instructions). Luckily, the Fediverse tends to be a nice place, so there is help to be found if you find yourself stuck somewhere!