Question 1

Does 100% Free Web Hosting Exist?

Accepted Answer

Website hosting companies are far too common nowadays on the internet, and all of them claim to be the best value for money. Now and then you may come across a host offering free web hosting. Is there really such a thing, does it exist and if so what do you actually get for free?

The simple answer is YES - There is such a thing as free web hosting, but it does come with expected restrictions and we’d highly recommend investigating what these are and how they will impact your website.

Having your own website has become essential for small and large businesses alike, and extremely beneficial for a plethora of other reasons (freelancing, CVs, portfolios, services…), everybody could use one. To have your own website, it needs to be hosted in some way, whether that be through a website building service, entering shared hosting, even going all out and purchasing your own server for the site to be hosted from. If your site isn’t hosted nobody will be able to access it, apart from yourself, which isn’t very useful for getting your business’ name out there.

Perhaps this is your first attempt at building a website. If that is the case some of the compromises associated with free web hosting may be perfectly acceptable to you. Everybody has to get started online somewhere and it makes sense to practice producing and managing a website without spending any money. If you choose to opt for free hosting, you will need to evaluate the importance of areas such as features, uptime and connection speed, because these are where the hosts have cut corners. These restrictions make free hosting an unlikely solution for any website expecting any sort of sustained traffic. With traffic, you will also require your own custom domain which all of the options will not allow. Instead your website will only be accessed via a subdomain of the hosting company, for example, yourwebsitename.hostingcompanyfree.com. Finally, it is likely to be plastered with intrusive adverts as that is where the company will be making their money.

Some website builder companies offer free web hosting as part of their free accounts, which is a great option for anyone looking to practice website building and develop their skills. In general, website building packages are much more substantial, for example for a fee you can add a store to your website and track your site’s performance. We would say, for a starter who’d like to practice, it is far better to go through a website builder to get your free hosting.

To conclude, if the site you want to host is just for you, you are not building it for any customers to visit and you want to try out some of the building tools available, free hosting could well be a viable option for you. Free web hosting is only beneficial if the limitations are not deal breakers for your website. If you just want to get your website off the ground, free hosting is a great starting point. Do bear in mind, however, how you can then move your site over to a more substantial hosting plan once you need to connect a domain and start accepting traffic.

It is possible to host a website for free, but before you jump at the first opportunity, do some research as to which option is more worth your time. Despite the fact there is no monetary cost, you will still be spending valuable time building your site that could end up being a waste if you haven’t done your research.

Question 2

Is Free Web Hosting a Sensible Option?

Accepted Answer

Free website hosting is a mixed bag; it usually insinuates poor load times, uptime and feature set. Therefore, one way to decide if a free website hosting package is a realistic option is to look at their load times, uptime and how useful the features included actually are. You can also gauge how good these aspects of each company are by reading reviews, customer comments and simply seeing for yourself.

In terms of features, an option to consider is using hosting via a free website building service. These tend to offer more of a complete website managing service and means you can practice more aspects of website management from one system, such as tracking the site’s traffic, flow and adding ecommerce stores. Uptime and site speed are usually stronger with free hosting packages from hosting companies as it’s what they specialize in, so the quality is likely to be higher.

A common set up with a free web host to be aware of, is that your website will likely have adverts on it. It’s important to check the amount of adverts that could show and their size. If you are going to be sharing or promoting your finished product, adverts can massively hinder the appearance and integrity of the site, which isn’t great if you’ve spent days if not weeks building and perfecting it!

Another feature to be aware of is that you will likely only be able to use a subdomain for your website, not your own custom domain. You should consider how professional the subdomain will look. If you are building a brand or business you want your domain to promote that business and a lengthy and messy subdomain won’t do this. A custom domain is also important if you want to gain visitors to your website. A more simple and clean domain is very important in terms of Google search position and memorability. Visitors are much less likely to (sometimes simply can’t) revisit a website if they can’t remember the domain name!

Overall, we’d recommend evaluating your purpose for hosting a website. If you are trying to build up a new business or promoting a new brand, you will be looking for different attributes to someone just looking to familiarize themselves with how websites and the internet work. Priorities in terms of features will be different, so it is a great time saving activity to take a moment and think about what you want from the experience and pick an option accordingly.

A free web hosting package is never going to be exactly what you want it to be; after all, it is free! You can’t expect everything for nothing, but as always, you can maximize what you get by comparing the options available. Some companies have strong features, solid uptime stats, less intrusive ads, snappier subdomains… and some have the opposite! Consider your priorities, read some reviews, test them yourselves, then make a decision and get stuck in!

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