How to choose the best free webhosting companies (Factors to consider)

Looking through hundreds of free web hosting companies out there and feeling overwhelmed? Read to learn about how you can choose the best ones and note some of the very important factors to consider in choosing a free host for your web site.

Difficulty: Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Google

1. 1. Advertisements:
   
   Many free hosts obligate you to accept their banner or popup ads on your web sites. To me this is one of the major factors to consider, and ofthen what turns me off about a free host. Obviously this is how they can pay for the expenses on giving you the free hosting service, but often the ads (1) have no value-added, even any relatedness to your content (2) annoy the heck out of your visitors.

2. 2. How long have they been in business? Or How reliable are they?
   
   You have to choose only the web hosting provider you can trust. Not only is it crucial that the quality of the web hosting server delivers what it promised, but is very important that they STAY the degree of satisfaction and stay IN BUSINESS for a long time. Don't underestimate the importance of this. Free hosts come and go, ofthen a lot faster than you think.

3. 3. Disk Space:
   
   Free hosts offer vastly different disk space available, ranging from 10 MB to 2 GB. Generally, you'll require at least 50 MB for a beginner's site (100 MB = ideal) as long as the site won't carry a high level of contents.

4. 4. Uptime Gurantee:
   
   You'll offen see 99% or 98% uptime guranteed for your websites. Don't be fooled into thinking that 98% or something even lower is good enough. 1% makes the world of a difference in terms of hours lost for connection and don't forget. If a visitor loses a connection to your website, you may lose the vistor forever.

5. 5. Scripts Supported:
   
   If you're thinking of starting a basic HTML content site, this may not mean so much to you, but if you're interested in starting a site that require a script such as PHP, ASP, make sure to check out all scripting options available.

6. 6. Number Of Current Websites (Customers) Being Hosted: This one is obvious. More websites hosted, the more reliable and trust worthy a company tend to be, as long as they have enough capacity to carry them.

Tips & Warnings

• There're hundreds, maybe thousands if you count non-english sites we haven't found yet, and hundreds of various free web hosting companies. Yes, you don't have to pay for any disk space with these companies, but you still have to put in countless hours setting up your websites only to discover that your trusted free host "suddenly" disappeared, or their server isn't performing the way you wanted it to be. Then what? You're back to square one, going through the list of free hosts and having to move your domain/site as well as the valuable traffic you've built to a new site and start all over again. Don't make the same mistakes I've made. Nothing is free. Well, it could be if you do the work and put in time to research before you sign up and when you do be sure to factor in the following key issues when you choose your free hosting company.

Resources

• Free Hosting Resources

[vivaherblady]

on 8/23/2009 great article, great help, thanks