In this era of technology and telecommunications, the internet has brought significant transformations in the digital world. Nowadays from companies to business houses and from educational institutions to government organizations, everything has found a prominent place on the web, popularly referred to as 'www'. Whenever we are looking out for something, the internet at first comes to our rescue. But rarely do we think that how come such a large number of individual units are on the world wide web. Well, it simply starts with a service that is known as 'web hosting'.
What exactly is web hosting?
If you are looking out for creating a space for yourself or your entity on the web, it starts with web hosting. Web hosting refers to a service that enables and allows individuals and other bodies to post a web page or a website onto the internet. For facilitating viewing of websites and webpages on the internet, you primarily need either a web host or a web hosting service provider. Your specific website or webpage is hosted or stored on special devices that are known as servers. When people who are using the internet need to access your website, they simply type in your web address into their browser and the servers enable them to have access to your website. Your system gets connected to the servers and the results displayed by the servers appear on your browser.
Types of web hosting
In today's digital space, there are different kinds of web hosting services that simply provide you with numerous options and features. It enables you to choose specific hosting services accordingly suiting your requirements. The different types of web hosting services distinguish on the basis of control, technical knowledge requirement, reliability and server speed. Broadly classified, there are six main types of web hosting. Let's have a look at them.
1. Shared hosting
In shared hosting, your website is stored on the same server similar to other websites. All domains share similar resources in a shared hosting plan.
2. Virtual private server(VPS) hosting
VPS hosting is suitable for website owners that want more control on the website without needing a dedicated server.
3. Dedicated server hosting
Dedicated server hosting is ideal for website owners who want greater control over the server on which their website is stored. But at the same time dedicated server hosting can prove to be a costlier option too.
4. Cloud hosting
In cloud hosting, with the use of combined computing resources, many computers run applications and work together in synchronicity. If you are looking out for greater speeds in your website's accessibility along with being cost efficient, cloud hosting can be your ideal choice.
5. Managed hosting
Managed hosting allows the user to look after the daily management of the hardware, standardized applications and operating systems.
6. Colocation
As compared to normal office servers, colocation provides the user to have access to higher levels of bandwidth.
Which type of web hosting should you go for?
If you are reading this article quite attentively there are greater chances that you are a newbie who is trying to make a prominent presence on the web. As a newbie, you might get confused about which type of web hosting service you should go for. Well, in that case, we are here to guide you well. Your selection of web hosting service depends on your individual preferences and requirements. As a beginner, you might prefer starting with a small website to just present your content on the web. In such cases, shared hosting can serve to be your ideal choice. Several shared hosting providers are available at cheaper prices including bluehost, a2hosting, siteground, namecheap etc. They provide you the best web hosting services at affordable prices. However, if you are one of those whose prime motto behind opening up your website is to generate revenue, you need to make sure that your website is having sufficient speed to make its browsing efficient and thereby attract more traffic. Dedicated server hosting providers can aid you in fulfilling such requirements. As their name suggests, they provide you a server that is dedicated to your website only. It thereby results in a greater amount of control and browsing speed over your website. This helps in attracting more traffic to your website which results in generating more revenue. However, enjoying the facilities of dedicated server hosting can prove to be a pricier proposition.
Why is web hosting needed?
You might have developed a clearer understanding of web hosting. In simple words, it can be stated that if you are looking for a prominent place on the world wide web for your website, web hosting will be the first step towards it. Many people have a preconceived notion that when the domain name is registered, your website gets active. However, this notion is partially true. A domain name can make your website recognizable, but if you want a website having active involvement of viewers, web hosting becomes compulsory. The prime motive of a web hosting company is to make your website accessible to everyone on the internet and consequently attract more traffic onto your website. To understand this more clearly, web hosting is the space that you buy on a web server. It helps in storing your website files. In web hosting, to place your web files, you rent server space on the web server. This further leads people to get to your website by simply browsing your domain name. You can design your website all by yourself but to get it more accessible you need to upload it on a hosting server using web hosting services.
Now, you might be thinking that why you should need a web hosting company when you can design a web server all by yourself. Well, designing a web server is a costly process. Apart from that, to design a web server you need a specialized computer system along with some technical skills to further run the server effectively. To avoid such complications, web hosting companies can serve you well. From maintaining and repairing your servers from time to time to manage all the other backend concerns, web hosting companies can save a lot of your time and investment.
Benefits of fastest web hosting
Everybody wants a website that is faster to access. Such websites simply help in conveying your idea and message to the visitors. With their ability to load faster, they automatically tend to generate more revenue for yourself. Out of the other types of web hosting, dedicated web hosting is the fastest. But at the same time, it is on the pricier side. In such a case, you need to decide in advance whether you want to go for speed or not for your website. There are numerous benefits of fast web hosting but primarily it can be classified into three types:
1. It gives you more speed
A faster website allows you to put more content inclusive of pictures, videos and audios on your website without your website slowing down. In order to catch the attention of your visitors, you need a website that has faster access. Otherwise, if your website takes too much time to load up, your potential visitors may switch on to the website of your competitors.
2. Security features
When you are looking out for web hosting servers, you should always go for a server that is more secure than shared web hosting. Along with speed, security features also play an important role in determining the ideal web hosting service that you should go for.
3. Generating more revenue
If you intend to have a website with the sole purpose of generating revenue, you need to go with fast web hosting servers. Fast web hosting servers provide you with sufficient browsing speed and help you in attracting greater traffic to your website. This further helps you in generating more revenue from your website.
Final thoughts
Web hosting serves to be the primary step if you want to hold a prominent position on the web. It not only engages your viewers to your website content but also provides you with a variety of other services to make your website run effectively. A web hosting service allows you to focus more on your business while it tends to manage your website efficiently. A professional web hosting service opens up the door for your irreplaceable presence on the world wide web. If you further have queries about the various aspects of web hosting, you can let us know about it in the comments section. Thanks for reading.
