Website hosting is an online service that makes your site’s content accessible on the Internet. When you buy a domain and hosting plan, you ensure that your site is accessible to visitors.
To ensure the hosting resources and technology required for the secure and effective operation of your website, you must have a web host.
Let’s see how web hosting works and the types of services made available by web hosts.
Understanding What is Web Hosting
Web hosting involves a service provider that allows renting server space for a site’s data, enabling online access. It allows a site’s components, like media and code, to be viewed on the Internet. Every visited website is stored on a server.
How Does Web Hosting Work?
The server that hosts your site is known as a physical computer that continuously runs to keep a website available for visitors at all times. Buying servers for website hosting will enable you to store all your site’s data on the servers of your service provider.
Once a user types your domain name in their web browser’s address bar, the hosting provider’s server will transfer all the data necessary to load your site. You can host a site; however, extensive technical skills are required.
Self-web hosting demands setting up and configuring a web server, including hardware, software, infrastructure, and equipment. Moreover, you will also have to deal with all the ongoing maintenance.
A website hosting provider ensures that your site performs optimally and has enhanced security protocols. Additionally, it simplifies the several complex aspects of hosting a site—from software installation to technical support.
Types of Web Hosting Services
Let’s look at different types of web hosting services available-
1. Shared Hosting
With shared hosting, several sites share the same server resources, including storage space, processing power and memory.
Because of its affordability and simplicity, this hosting solution is an excellent option for personal sites and small businesses that do not need higher bandwidth and advanced configurations. Therefore, shared hosting is a great choice for beginners requiring inexpensive hosting.
2. VPS Hosting
With VPS hosting, your site shares a physical server with other websites. However, the hosting provider creates a virtual partition for each website. Therefore, a website hosted on a virtual private server receives an allocated amount of server resources.
VPS hosting is a great choice for eCommerce shops, medium-sized websites, and large-scale blogs with an increasing number of visitors.
3. Cloud Hosting
This type of web hosting solution utilises multiple virtual servers to host websites. Therefore, if one server experiences a problem or high traffic, the remaining servers will take over and maintain the site operation.
Since cloud hosting depends on a cluster of servers to function, businesses with multiple sites and large-scale websites, such as eCommerce shops, can benefit from it, as it offers little to no downtime.
4. Dedicated Hosting
Dedicated hosting allots a physical server for each site. It allows you to configure the server, customise the hosting environment to your specifications, and choose your desired software and operating system.
This type of hosting is ideal for large-scale online businesses with high web traffic.
To Wrap It Up
Whether your site is an online blog, business, or other type of site, the first step to creating an online presence is signing up for a web hosting account.
Website hosting services enable your website to be available online. Understanding the basics of hosting and the types of website hosting services available will assist you in securing a reliable and cost-effective hosting solution for your site.