How to Choose a Good Web Host

September 4, 2008 |

by Chris Channing

Web hosting is the backbone of all websites, without web host companies, the internet be as diverse and vast. A web host company buys an amount of space, and then sells it to site owners for a set price. Generally these payments can be made monthly, yearly, or quarterly. Aside from paid hosting there is also free hosting.

Free web hosting is an option for users who are new to building sites, or cannot afford a paid site. A good free web host will have ads to cover the costs, but will not overwhelm your site with them. Bandwidth is usually lower than a paid site, but this isn’t a problem for small sites with low traffic volume. If you want a high traffic, and large site, its important to look for a free web host or a paid one that can meet these needs.

Keep in mind, free web hosts also have limits on the size of a file you can upload at one time. Some may only allow up to 5MB to be uploaded, or just 1MB. Certain free web hosts are more lenient and allow for larger single files. The rate that your site can be accessed through a free web host is also something to consider.

Paid web hosting is ideal for those with a serious interest in building up their site for fun, or profits. When looking for a great paid web host, consider their reputation. Do users complain a lot? Are there a lot of users that use their services? Are the prices reasonable, for high quality hosting? Uptime speeds should be 99.5% or higher as well as a guarantee if it doesn’t quite reach that.

While free web hosts have very few options, a good paid host should have the exact opposite. There should be a wide range of bandwidth options available for users, as well as payment options, and tech support options. Its very important to choose a web host that has an always open tech support, and even more important to find one that has reliable tech support that can actually help you.

A few other things a good web host will have available to you are, refunds if something goes wrong on their part, a few options for payment, and powerful servers. Things do happen to web host companies, and if they flub and mess up your site because of something on their part, they should refund you your cash. Different payment options allow you test drive it for a period of time, instead of being trapped in a one year payment. Its always good to pay for one month first, and if you like it, extend that payment for however long you want.

Closing Comments

There are several reputable and fantastic web hosts out there, do your research and find the one that meets your needs. Just because one person loves it, doesn’t meant that you will.

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