Web Hosting companies provide services that enable customers to make their web sites available via the World Wide Web. Here is a breakdown of services typically provided by Web Hosting companies.
Free web hosting services
Some companies offer limited hosting services for free. These services are usually funded through advertising. In exchange for free hosting the hosting companies will typically display their banner ads, or text link ads on your web pages. Free hosting packages are usually basic with typical limitations being:
- small bandwidth allowance
- no uptime guarantee
- size limitations on files
Shared web hosting services
Shared Web Hosting typically means that your web site is placed on the same server (computer) as many other sites. The number of sites that share a server can range from from a few to thousands. Typically the hosting company will allocate each customer space on the server and all customers will share resources like RAM and the CPU. Each customer will then be given access to a web based control panel that allows them to manage their websites. Examples of web hosting control panels are cPanel and Plesk.
Shared Web Hosting is typically the most cost effective solution as the cost of building and maintaining the web server can be spread across multiple customers. Another advantage of shared web hosting is that the hosting company is responsible for managing servers and providing technical support. One problem with shared hosting solutions is overselling. This situation occurs when hosting companies offer plans containing features (e.g. unlimited bandwidth) that are not sustainable. If you are sharing a web server with a customer that starts to eat up server resources the performance and availability of your web sites can suffer.
