Shared Web Hosting Secrets
Shared web hosting is often the best option to choose when you’re ready to put your website online. However, the number and variety of web hosting options can be overwhelming. Let’s try to cut through some of the confusion and see why shared hosting is usually your best choice.
Shared hosting, sometimes referred to as “virtual hosting”, is where most people start out. In this arrangement, the same server or computer is shared by many different web sites. All of the sites have their own individual slice of data storage capability, and they are securely separated from other sites on the same drive.
Shared hosting will provide sufficient disk space and resources for most individual, hobby, or small business sites that don’t have a lot of traffic or tons of multimedia running on their site. A certain amount of system resources are allocated for all the sites on the server, and they share these resources.
In a shared hosting arrangement, if any one site suddenly explodes with traffic or starts running a large number of high-bandwidth applications (such as video), it can negatively affect the performance of all the sites on that server. Bandwidth is the amount of data that you can transfer to and from the website.
If you put some really cool videos on your site and promote them heavily, this can result in a lot of traffic and a lot of bandwidth being consumed. Too much of this will affect the other websites hosted on the same server, and possibly cause slowed performance. The top hosts anticipate these issues, and have people on staff around the clock who monitor and adjust things as needed.
Shared web hosting prices have come down dramatically in the last few years. For less than $12 a month, you can host several personal sites and have plenty of disk storage and bandwidth allocation. Be careful to sign up for monthly service at first, to see how well the host performs for you. Later, you can take advantage of excellent incentives to sign on for longer periods.
Many hosts offer site creation tools. These tools make it easy to design and publish a respectable web site from scratch. One thing to be careful of - find out if the site creation tool is proprietary to the host. In some cases, these tools are tied in with the actual site in such a way that moving to another host would be difficult. Others are standalone and the site you create is like any other, and easy to move if desired.
In conclusion, I believe that shared web hosting works well, and is the best solution for most users. For just a few dollars per month, you get more space and options than you’ll probably ever use. There is always the option to move over to dedicated hosting later, if your site grows large enough to warrant it.
Looking for the most practical hosting plan for your website? Learn more about the economical plan that performs well for most people - shared web hosting.