Web hosting is everywhere. People speak of it more than they know the intricacies of it. Whether or not you are building a website or web application at present, understanding what web hosting is will nonetheless be helpful if you wish to have an online presence in the future for your business, freelance work, etc.
What exactly does web hosting mean and how does it work? How is the price calculated? Today we will discuss everything that you would want to know about web hosting- how hosting works, the different hosting options and what are the most popular Web Hosting providers.
Introduction to Web Hosting
In its simplest form, web hosting is a service that offers to store your website files such as images, HTML files, scripts and other resources on the Internet so that you can remotely access them. It also provides you with monthly bandwidth. With this bandwidth, you will be able to host your website online.
Web hosting is like renting an apartment. You might have your own bed and kitchen, but there’s no way you can have total ownership of other people’s rooms or kitchens. It’s the same with web hosting. You have your website on a server that belongs to someone else and they have total control over what happens to your website while it’s there.
Why Do You Need Web Hosting?
When you learn how to design a website for a given device, you’ll be able to utilise it on that device. When you’re ready to share it with the public, you’ll need more than the few devices you have. Web hosting servers give a location where your website can go live and be saved while still being available to the rest of the internet. Buying and maintaining one’s own private web server is both costly and inconvenient since servers need regular maintenance, adequate climate control, and advanced management abilities. With a good web hosting plan, you are freed from the hassle of hiring a developer or spending time handling hardware.
Thankfully, a lot of web hosting providers like Niobe Hosting offer additional features to accentuate the look and performance of your website once it goes online; including boundless traffic, access to hundreds of custom apps, free memory backup and much more.
How Does Web Hosting Work?
Web hosting is the process of uploading the files that make up a website from a local computer to a web server. The resources of the server (RAM, hard drive space, and bandwidth) are divided among the websites that use it. Depending on the hosting plan selected, the server resources are divided differently. To determine the best hosting package for your needs, you must first understand the various hosting services. Let’s use a basic analogy- imagine you are looking for office space. What criteria do you use to determine which sort of office space is best for your needs? Is a workstation in a shared coworking space or an office in a business centre sufficient? Do you plan to expand fast, or do you anticipate a lot of people coming and going? Would rent a complete building appeal to you or would it be more appealing to create your own space?
Aside from the type of workplace you utilise, there are a few additional things to think about. The ease with which the rooms may be accessed, the features they provide (such as a whiteboard, high-speed internet, and other amenities) as well as the total cost. These factors will help you identify your needs and which sort of workplace is best for you. Now let’s relate this decision-making process to finding the right web hosting.
Renting a workstation in a crowded, loud open planned office or co-working environment is akin to shared hosting. You have all of the contemporary comforts, such as a workstation, internet access, and some stationary, but you share the space with other coworkers, who also have access to the kitchen, printer, and washroom. You are unable to make any changes to the room, such as placing whiteboards. This is a popular choice for small-scale commercial projects, but it is not suitable for large-scale commercial projects.
A virtual private server (VPS) is an excellent alternative to shared hosting. Renting an office in a business park will assist a medium-sized company. Users on a VPS are separated from one another. You have neighbours, but you are less reliant on them, and you can do whatever makeovers (customisations) you want to your workstation and arrange it yourself.
A dedicated server is akin to renting a whole office building. It’s a more expensive choice that’s appropriate for websites that place a premium on dependability and speed. You have more say over configurations and lots of room because you control the entire space, but it’s not worth investing in if you won’t use the space provided.
What Does it Cost? Types of Web Hosting
Once you’ve decided that you require web hosting from a legitimate brand, you’ll need to work out how to budget for it. Because there are so many different plans and features, determining how much web hosting costs may be difficult. What you pay will be determined by the company you choose, the sort of plan you want, and the services you choose.
Most newbies to the world of web hosting believe that there is really only one plan – the shared hosting plan. This is because they are told that all hosts offer this type of service and have, perhaps, never looked outside this category. There are five types of hosting used to power various sized websites. These include shared, reseller, VPS, dedicated and cloud hosting.
1. Shared Hosting
The most popular plan by far is shared hosting which is also the least expensive option and offers the least amount of features. This is a good choice for when your website starts small or when you need it for personal use but doesn’t need much disk space or bandwidth.
2. VPS Hosting
This type of hosting is ideal for small to medium-sized businesses. They are costlier than shared hosting. Your website shares servers with other websites that are lesser in number as compared to shared hosting, but you get larger access to servers. If your website needs more storage than what is provided by cloud hosting/shared hosting or gets too much traffic then VPS hosting could be the right web hosting plan for you.
3. Cloud Hosting
Cloud hosting is the best budget plan for large businesses that want to save up on their money and are expecting more traffic or more storage space than shared hosting. With cloud hosting, you get fewer limitations when it comes to storage, faster load times and more scalability than shared hosting.
4. Dedicated Hosting
When you invest in a dedicated hosting platform for your website, you do not have to share servers with other websites since you get the storage, resources and bandwidth that the server provides just for yourself. However, this also means that you need to manage the costs of your web hosting provider and outsource the maintenance work. So the maximum budget of a dedicated hosting server may be more than any of the other hosting options.
Some of the Best Hosting Providers
If you want to publish your website online, you must choose a web hosting provider. There are many providers in the market (over 450+). Some of these providers offer free services while others don’t. Always check out their features and read reviews before signing up for any hosting provider or consult a professional or an expert to guide you in choosing the best host for your needs.
- Cloudways: Cloudways is a hosting provider that comes with free website migration, proactive chat support and 30-day free trial offers. According to this Cloudways hosting review, this provider is the most popular choice for cloud hosting.
- Hostinger: Hostinger is quite a popular platform that is known for its superior speed performance. It also comes with additional features like Git and SSH access and plans based on the requirement that come with a 30-day money-back guarantee.
- GoDaddy: Picking a hosting plan is quite easy with GoDaddy. Besides offering a great uptime speed of 99.9%, GoDaddy’s cheapest plans also come with spam detection for email accounts.
- Hostgator: One unique factor about Hostgator is that it uses a malware removal tool for added protection and provides easily configurable daily backups that can be adjusted as necessary.
- Niobe Hosting: Niobe Hosting plans come with offering many paid services at different service providers for free. Holding 20 years of web hosting experience, it extends customisable services based on your needs.
Over to you
We hope this answered your questions about web hosting. When you’re ready to start building a website or web application, it’s best to consult with a professional or a company that specialises in hosting. They’re best equipped to answer your questions and offer you their services.
