Free Host Review

To begin your journey on the Internet world, it seems a bit risky to invest any money. So, most people, who wish to build their first website, choose free web hosting as their startup agenda. Let’s discuss some of the advantages and disadvantages revolving around this decision.

Advantages:

* You’re skeptical in the beginning and are not sure whether to invest any money on the fraud internet world, so it makes perfect sense to choose a free web host.

* You get your personal space for free where you can test out your skills and show off. Or you could create some demo sites. Never choose free web hosting for live production sites, as they are not reliable.

* Some free web hosts, such as 000webhost provide great security, reliability, and features that you only expect in paid hosting. So, you need to spend some time in searching your host. We recommend Free-WebHosts.com, as they have a regularly updated directory of free web hosting providers and user reviews as well to help you choose.

Disadvantages:

* Most free web hosting providers disappear with time. And their site shuts down suddenly without any warning and your entire site’s reputation built through the months, your entire data and database is lost(So, you need to take regular backups once on free hosting), and moreover, you are stranded alone suddenly with nowhere to go. It’s a nightmare, and has happened to me a few times until I switched.

* You should expect unwanted advertisements on your web pages which are displayed by your hosting provider. Sometimes, it gets really frustrating to see a huge banner dazzling at the top of your site. Although, nowadays, many free hosts do not display any ads on your pages. Its perfectly logical for ads display, because these hosts are providing you space on their servers, and also you are burning their bandwidth. So, they too need to pay for these services. Which they accomplish using the money they earn when people click on the ads shown on your pages.

* You should also expect less features than paid hosting and also the loading speed of your pages will be quite slow. Some undesirable features of free webhosting are : Less Webspace, Less Bandwidth, Less/No SQL Databases, Limited Usage/No Webmail, Less/No Mail Accounts, No Cronjobs, No SSL/SSH, Less Security, Limited Support, Less Trustability

* If you don’t have a domain name, then most probably you will be stuck with a subdomain, like yourname.freehostname.com, which is quite embarrassing to share with others. Even if you have your domain name, some hosts do not allow to host your domain, you have to choose a subdomain strictly.

* Free hosting services don’t provide any support, and if you are stuck with some problem, then you need to search out a solution yourself, or you have to be content with that problem. Support is quite essential for running a website as there are umpteen errors/doubts which might crop up, and you need someone to sort them out.

There are lots of restrictions of the type of sites you can create on free web hosting, as stated in their terms and conditions. Be sure to read the TOC, because, if you don’t abide by it, you could have your hosting cancelled permanently.

If you need to get the feel of your first website.

If you need some webspace for demo/test site that you need to create. If you are short of cash. If you don’t care that there are ads on your page. If you don’t care that your hosting gets shutdown suddenly. – Then opt for free webhosting. Else, you can get some pretty inexpensive paid hosting solutions from our Web Hosting Directory.

There are basically two forms of web hosting service. One is the free web hosting service and the other one is the paid web hosting service. Today, you can easily come across so many free web hosting services on the internet. You also usually come across paid hosting advertisements which boast of various unique hosting features. There are many web hosting service providers which offer their web hosting packages which are almost the same with regard to pricing. Online websites are growing day by day. We all are aware of the fact that every website needs a web host, in order to get widely exposed on world wide web. Since there is so much of demand for web hosting service, it is the hosting market that is getting more and more crowded with web hosting companies, trying to carve a niche for themselves and thus wanting to earn money through web hosting service. Before one tries to make use of the service of any hosting company, look out for a reliable hosting company.

It becomes a bit difficult at times to decide upon the right web hosting service for your website. We need to understand that free hosting plans are used for personal and non commercial websites. On the other hand, the paid web hosting plan is considered to be suitable for a business related website. The difference between a web hosting service and a paid web hosting service is explained as follows:

1) Restrictions toward hard disk space or storage facility: In a free web hosting plan, there are restrictions in terms of web space. Such a situation is not suitable for any respectable business. A website is considered as a collection of files that are produced on the Internet for viewing. In such a case, it becomes necessary to store them at a particular place for accessing it as and when required. The place where web files are stored is called a web server. This web server is being offered by the web hosting company. Usually, free web hosting solution offer less storage place(Approximately about 500 mb or even less than that). A 500 mb web space, will not be sufficient for a business related website. Even personal websites that has many video and music files, will not be able to accommodate all the files in the concerned web based server. However, if you opt for a paid server, all your web based files can then easily fit on the server space. If you still require more space, you can pay a particular service fee and thus expand the storage facility. In other word a paid server can provide extended storage facility by paying a small extra service fee amount.

2) Restriction towards web traffic: A proper business promotion activity can lead to large amount of traffic towards your website. A free based web hosting service provider will provide limited access with regard to the traffic that is coming towards the concerned website. Free web hosts, usually allow about 5 GB(max) of traffic to your website. Anything beyond that results into no display of website. In other words, in a free web host package, if the traffic towards the concerned website crosses more than 5 GB, you will immediately not be able to see your website on line. In order to make your website appear on line, you will have to call the hosting service provider to rectify the issue in the form of re-setting the web host server or you will have to upgrade your web hosting plan toward paid hosting package. A paid web hosting package gives you the advantage of allowing much greater traffic toward your business related website. This is the basic advantage that you get through a paid hosting service provider.

3) Restriction with regard to email account: Free web hosting service provide about 2 to 5 email accounts. However, if you need email addresses for each employees who are working within the business organization, then in that case you will have to switch towards a paid web hosting service provider who will allow a greater number of user email accounts.

Mostly, new people get attracted towards the concept of free web hosting plan. However, they don’t know about the actual issues involved in a free web hosting plan, until they use it. One must understand that a paid web host provider has got better services to offer, compared to free hosts. Free web hosting facility might be suitable for personal homepages and other types of websites which do not depend on online advertising or sales revenues. more visit to:-www.instant-audio-mastery.com A paid hosting service is ideal for those in business and who are interested in online selling or just want to have a professional web presence with regard to their business.

You might be hunting for an appropriate host for your website and then suddenly you feel like asking yourself, “why should I pay for a web hosting plan, when I can get easily acquire a free website for myself?” Well, it all depends on the type of website that you are dealing with. With a free hosting plan, you might end up being frustrated due to various reasons. Some of the points are explained as follows:

1) Down time is common in free hosting plans: It is common to experience downtime issues with free web hosts. Since you do not pay for the service, free hosting providers feel less obligated to offer good service. The free web hosting providers don’t really value a free subscriber, since they feel that this group is not really beneficial to them. Hence, free web hosting providers are not bothered if their users are dissatisfied with the service.

2) Free flow of advertisement: In a free hosting service, you will definitely be disturbed by constant, unwanted ads on all your web pages. You may even see a pop up banner as soon as you click a link etc. You can hardly do anything about this situation because many free hosts rely solely on these advertisements in order to make money. So, you must be aware of the fact that these advertisements will reduce your professional image just because you have opted for a free web hosting plan.

3) Bad customer support: Most of the free web hosting providers cannot effort to provide customer support facility to their users. In such a case, it is always better to rely on the FAQ page (frequently asked question). The FAQ can come to your rescue when in case, live or email support is denied by the free web hosting provider.

4) Restricted hard disk space: Think twice before you opt for a free web host. If your website is large enough, you might then experience free web host being quite limited. Mostly, free hosts can provide hard disk space of about 5 to 10MB. more visit to:-www.29-web-design-tricks.com You will experience difficulties when your website is growing and you are thinking of expanding your website beyond your allotted disk space.

5) Lengthy domain names: In a free hosting plan, customers are not allowed to use their own names, as in the case of paid hosts. Those users who are opting for free hosting services are required to choose a sub domain off the host’s name. Thus, you land up having a lengthy domain name for your website. Visitors will find it difficult to remember your lengthy domain name. Hence, you are then likely to loose potential customers. If customers want to access your website, they will have to bookmark your site instead of depending on their own memory.

In web world the biggest decision is to decide between choosing a free web hosting and paid web hosting for one’s web site. After preparing web site the next step is to establish a web presence. This is considered, as one of the most important steps as this step enables one’s business to reach more customers, not only this it also enables one’s site to get more exposure, and online recognition.

There is a cost for all, in the same way space, bandwidth and domain name all incurs some cost but there is possibility to get them free of cost. Resource management principles advise one to choose the free solution.

With growing competition every where, the cost for web hosting services is coming down partially because of the technological progress and partially because of the cut throat competition between various web host providers.

Thus why to pay for a thing which can be procured free of cost?

Free web hosting

In web hosting world there are hundreds of free web hosting providers offering their services on the Internet. But to one’s surprise there is hardly one that is able to meet the needs of one’s business.

Just to state clearly this article is not against hosts or advertisers rather its sole purpose is to assess and understand how best can the hosting needs of a business be met.

Now coming straight away to the point as stated above also nothing is for free in this world but then the question, which puzzles everyone, is how can anyone sell hosting for free? According to The New Lexicon Webster’s Dictionary, “free” can be defined as –

1. Not subject to external restraints or domination; not captive, at liberty; not having to be paid for; unhampered; open to all without restrictions; etc.

2. Without expense; without penalty

3. To release from constraint, set free

Thus a free web hosting means there are no fetters, no operating cost and no restrictions for the user. The work of Webmasters would be only restricted to designing limited by their imagination and skills and all the space and the bandwidth would be provided free of cost as desired by the user.

But why it is free?

As everyone knows nothing is for free and same is the case of web hosting. Here the price one needs to pay for free web hosting comes in several forms other than money, as even the free web-hosting providers needs to pay for bandwidth, as well as other costs.

There are some free web hosts that places ads or banners on one’s site and some other place pop up ads, or flashing advertising messages. Thus it is absolutely free until one is fulfilling their set of requirements and meeting their conditions. Not only this one should very clearly set in his/her mind that host’s service is free with just 25 Megs of space and for more space than this there are different conditions which one has to fulfill and also have to pay for it.

Now we are going to discuss other hosting, which is not free.

Paid web hosting

If one pays for anything he/she surely possess anything in return. As soon as one pays there emerges a binding contract, where the other needs to deliver anything in return. Thus as soon as one pays to web host provider in return provider is bound to offer his services. Possession gives more control of one’s online presence. However just ownership is not an important advantage that one gets in case of paid web hosting.

In case of paid web hosting the identity of one’s business reflects from his/her URL down to one’s web content, which is without banners confusing one’s customers.

One who is in business usually has sufficient e-mail addresses to accommodate the needs of his/her business. Now one can imagine by his/her own what will be the impact of a business card with e-mail like Poll.pe@afreewebhostingprovider.com. On him/her and most important would anyone like to do business with him?

With paid web hosting its very common to offer features like PHP and MySQL, that allows one’s site to grow along with the business needs. With these features one can easily have an online store, can offer easily his/her customers the possibility to track their orders etc. Not only that often the web hosting provider guarantees for the uptime of the server, and this relieves the customers from problems afterwards. Last but not least paid web host providers offer support services of higher quality that allows one’s business to overcome possible technical problems easily and faster.

Below are the evaluations for both the free and paid web hosting.

Free web hosting:

(+) It’s totally free i.e. no money for space, bandwidth and domain name

(-) One’s URL will contain the mark of the free web-hosting provider and thus would not reflect the identity of his/her business. Moreover switching to another providers might result in loosing some or all the traffic to one’s online business

(-) Unprofessional look -advertising items such as banners, frames etc have a negative effect on one’s content in terms of accessibility and look making it look unprofessional.

(-) If one plans to use banner exchange on his/her site then one must read carefully their Terms and conditions as there are several free hosts who doesn’t allow it

(-)Low bandwidth and space restriction would be there in case of free web hosting.

(-) Features like PHP and MySQL are mostly absent in case of a free web-hosting provider. There are some who even don’t offer FTP access to one’s website

(-) It’s almost usual that free hosting providers change their Terms and conditions in between. One must consider that no adds today could mean a banner or a popup tomorrow and such changes reflects that the free hosting service is canceled and only paid web hosting services are offered. Now the choice that remains is either to pay, or loose the web site.

Paid web hosting:

(-) It needs to pay. Usually one have to pay for hosting i.e. for space, bandwidth and for the domain name

(+) One can host his/her own domain. With unique domain name it’s very easy to change web-hosting providers without loosing traffic

(+) Best support is offered by most paid web hosting providers in form of 24/7 support via email or live chat and, in some cases, toll-free phone support is also provided.

(+) Better uptime of the server(s) with uptime guarantee.

(+) Enough disk space and bandwidth is provided as per the needs of one’s business in case of paid web hosting.

(+) Several features like PHP and MySQL are quite common in case of a paid hosting plan. Not only that, one will have FTP access to his/her website.

Thus for a beginner with less visitors and with no knowledge about business free web hosting can be better but for a long term and for growing business paid web hosting is indeed a best option.

If one really wants to save cost while his/her business online, then one must save time instead and register a domain name. Saving small amount of money on web hosting might result in loosing valuable business customers, with loss of goodwill. The cost paid for paid web hosting solution is quite small as compared to freedom offered to one’s online presence. Freedom not only to modify by own rather freedom of one’s image, of the way one would to treat his/her online presence.

Thus the lesson of the article is if one considers his/her online business important, then its better to opt for paid web hosting than choosing free web hosting. One should keep in mind that the success of one’s online presence would play a significant role in the future growth of his/her business.

In web hosting world as soon as one talks about free web hosting the question which strike one’s mind is why to pay for anything when it can be availed free of cost?

In case of free web hosting even the availability is not a problem as they are available in plenty.

If one is not a stranger to web host and is using free web hosting, from him anyone can ask for his/her experience about the free web hosting. Is he/she satisfied with his/her current provider? Is it everything he/she was intending? Answer is in most cases not.

IS free web hosting really worth?

The one who has opted free web hosting, his/her website will automatically turn into an advertising machine that works for the free web host. Not only that banners, pop up windows, frames are also added. By these advertisements the vitality professionalism will get lost.

The user is not allowed to generate revenue by making advertisements on his web site as providers prevent it. Generating revenue by means of advertisements is not a main motive for a user but still it would be a great loss if it were not possible. Thus against this point paid web hosting has an answer.

The facility of having sufficient space will lack in the case of free web hosting. The free web-hosting provider provides mere 5 to 15 MB of disk space, which is not at all sufficient for a user. Another negative point is the user is not in a position to even think for expansion as the provider restricts it. If one wants to expand above the limit provided by the provider then only the paid web hosting is the choice. So choosing free web hosting means nothing because the user needs to pay in all the cases ultimately. Not only that, while in the switching over process the user will even loose the traffic to his/her website.

There is not a single online store that can go without secure server to enable secure online credit card processing. Secure web servers are generally lacking in case of free web hosting. For a free web host it’s very difficult to attract customers as most of the customers feel insecure and remain concerned about their personal information. Thus making survival of free web host providers problematic. Moreover there is not a single online store hosted by free web host, which is running successfully.

In case of free web hosting the uptime of one’s web site is unpredictable just like the weather forecast where one should always hope for good, but at the same time should get prepared for the worst. Unfortunately the downtime through free web hosts is quite uncommon. Free web hosts generate their revenues from advertising and so are not concerned with the web site of a subscriber who doesn’t pay them anyway.

The list of problems is not yet over; free web hosts generally have a limited budget and cant afford to hire large customer support teams. Thus support is also not available in case of free web hosting and user is alone at the time of problems merely staring at the FAQ page.

In case of free web hosting, one’s domain name is just measured in feet and reflects nothing or let say very little of one’s business. The overall result of above is low traffic scores, as the visitors even won’t be able to remember one’s URL. In this era of computerization where companies try to create their own image, one’s web site will loose its importance due to reflection of subdomain of his/her free host. Now the questions which arises are can really one can rely merely on search engines, linked sites and people book marking his/her? Will one’s customers trust a business hosted by a free web host? What credibility will one’s web site inspire? The answers of all above are unfortunately against free web hosting.

The list of factors against free web hosting is not yet over. One more disadvantage is that free web hosts do not always offer FTP access to one’s web site file, or they just offer one email with address like john.peu@freeserver.com. Which bears unprofessional look on the customers?

As against to free web hosting, paid web hosting requires money, but the prices are quite lower in comparison to the benefits one derives from paid web hosting.

Thus the lesson of the article is that if one is searching for a solution to host his/her business or even a professional personal web site, free web hosting is not at all a right choice.