Free Web Hosting Pros and Cons

Free webhosting exists solely to allow small business and those who desire personal websites to get online with no cost so they can provide their service, or personal point of view to the world. This has become such a great issue over the last few years that companies are now providing this service to clients in order to allow them access to the web like never before. The idea behind free web hosting is simple. You get the space and tools you need to build a website for free. In exchange the web host company gets to place advertisements on your website to make use of your traffic to gain their fees back. These web hosts are completely financed by their advertisements and also have some limitations you should be aware of.

The web hosts take advantage of the desires of small businesses wanting no cost websites to make money by utilizing the traffic from those sites. The free websites often display popup advertising, banners, or other sidebar advertisings placed there by the hosts which the client has no control over. There are even some hosts that offer these services with the provisions that the clients themselves that may appear in the control panels or other management areas of the website, or put those advertisements there hoping the clients will click them.

The search for free hosting services has lessened over time with the development of many companies providing low cost web hosting with greater flexibility and no ads. Since these services offer great savings over most high cost web hosting plans with much more options and capabilities than free space business are now choosing these over free plans. The newest marketing and social crazy, blogging began to give free services a boon. As those blogs became easier to set up and use, however, that too is taking a backseat to the ability to blog on a cheap site without the additional technical help that used to be required.

How reliable are free web hosts?

Since the prime objective of a web host is to make money, and a free host makes money off the ads on your website it is in their best interest to keep you up and running. There are some occasions that will cause a problem with service. Some clients report the free company for spam, or hacking and also complain about the free hosting company utilizing automatic installation of features like PHP or CGI that can cause slowdowns. All of the extra add-ons can create instability and down time. Those problems do not usually happen to large established companies, but more often with small start up web hosts.

The upside of free web hosts:

1. These free websites are terrific for students, or homemakers looking to make money online in their spare time. It gives users with a very limited budget a platform for their views, as well as products and services. These sites can be used to store data or other information thereby making it a great learning resource for students. Some people use the free websites for testing purposes. When doing that a user can test the website concept to see if it will work on a larger scale for their purposes before investing large amounts of money. As an example boinc.ch gives free space to users in order to test its UNIX applications. Most free websites are aimed at students along with developers, and people interested in creating a personal website.

2. There are several voluntary organizations and non profit institutes who want to send their messages to public via internet. Since internet is the best possible way to reach out to the world, such organization would definitely find it useful and would like to utilize them. There may be several web hosts who would serve them free of cost due to emotional reasons. But apart form this, general free web hosting services, utilized by small businesses and students, can be equally fruitful to these organizations. They usually have a dearth of capital but an urgency to communicate with the world. They can use these services and create a basic website where information and news on their activities can be published.

3. Another great use of the free web host service is for groups and communities who need to share their information between each other. They can share their ideals, and feelings on many issues great and small for free. The free web hosts are great for groups with limited financial resources but a lot to share with the world, and other like-minded communities. They can share data and mutual links to their websites and allow more people to find them through these services. From a purely SEO standpoint these free services offer great benefits to this type of organization.

4. Family websites can make great use of the free web hosting services too. They allow families to share information between each other and also with the world. Pictures, and other vital data can be shared in an almost diary form online where others can read and enjoy the experiences. Be sure to check for a web hosts authenticity before embarking on any program that shares your information online.

Cons of free web hosting

The cost of operating a free website are nil, but there are other costs to consider. Consider all of the advantages and disadvantages carefully before deciding on this type of service.

1. The free host does not provide domain, or even second-level domain names. You will be allocated a subdomain which can be less impressive to viewers.

2. The bandwidth offered by the free web hosting service provider is reasonably very low and is hardly comparable to paid hosting services.

3. Since the free space provided is generally low, any file size cannot be uploaded freely in the website.

4. Your site will have many banners, pop ups, pop unders, and other distractions to visitors placed on it. This can look very unprofessional for an organization and diminish the value of the website. It also creates a negative impression to the visitor when they see all the ads and the subdomain name.

5. There is usually no guarantee of uptime.

6. Not all types of files can be uploaded in the websites. Free websites have restrictions to files like MP3, MPEG, ZIP etc.

7. There is little to no support. Your ability to operate the site is a low priority to them. If it is offered it is usually short-term just to get you up online so they can make money.

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