Top 4 Sources of Free Web Hosting
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Let me start by disclosing that I don’t have much experience using free hosing. Most of the services I have reviewed in this post I have begun using in the last few days while doing researching for this post. With this in mind, here is my authoritarian and highly subjective ranking of the “Top 4 Sources of Free Web Hosting”.
The two most basic factors to consider when it comes to free hosting accounts is whether the hosting as ad-based vs. ad-free as well as whether the hosting requires you to provide your own domain name or they provide you with a free sub-domain instead.
While testing each of the four hosting services outlined in this post, I uploaded the same index.html file to each of these hosting services to help you make a sort of “side-by-side” visual comparison. Keep in mind my test page is not at all fancy, all I did was through up the code for the Feedback Secrets email newsletter opt-in box.
1.) 000WebHost.com
Of the four services I reviewed the one I liked the best was 000webhost.com. The best part of the 000WebHost service, from my point of view, is that they offer ad-free, “free” web hosting. What I also like about this service is that they give you the option to use their hosting services either on a domain name that you already own or on one of their sub-domains.
I tried using this service both with one of my own domains as well as with a sub-domain. If you go the sub-domain route then the URL of you site will be http://username.comoj.com. I tried this method first and I found the set up to be fast and relatively strait forward.
I did experienced one snag in this process which was due to user error on my part. The way that their file structure is set up, you can’t start editing your site by uploading an index.html file to your root directory. Instead you have to upload your index.html file to your public_html directory and then delete the default.php file in that same directory.
If you choose you use your own domain name then the system will provide you with 2 name server addresses. Once you have these addresses you will need to log into your domain name control panels with whatever company manages your domains, and change the default name servers to the name servers that 000WebHosting provides you with.
I found this method takes a little longer to set up since I had to wait for the name servers to reset after submitting my request. It took about 24 hours for my name servers to reset after which everything was working pretty smooth.
The amount of disk space provided with 000WebHosting comes in at a sizable 1500MB.
Here’s my example site hosted on 000WebHosting.
2.) Yahoo Geocities
Geocities was my second favorite out of the “free” hosting services I reviewed. The hosting that Geocities provides is based on sub-domains which they provide, so if you use their service, your URL will be http:/geocities.com/username. The hosting at Geocities is ad-based. What I liked about their service, is that of the three ad-based services I reviewed, I found the ads on Geocities to be least obtrusive of the ad layouts.
What’s also nice about Geocities is that they offer you up to 15MB of hosted disk space. The entire Feedback Secrets website takes up about 10MB at the moment, so 15MB is a decent amount of space for a small to medium size site to work with.
Here’s my example site hosted on Geocities.
The free webhosting at Go Daddy is ad-based and works in conjunction with your registered domain names. The way this seems to work is that every time you register a domain name with Go Daddy, you receive a ”free hosting credit” which can be used in conjunction with that particular domain name. It seems that the “free hosting credit” remains valid as long as you maintain your registration of that domain with Go Daddy.
I choose to rank this service in third place since I found its ad layout to be the second least obtrusive after Geocities. Also nice is the total of 10,000MB of disk space which this hosting account provides.
Here’s my example site hosted with Go Daddy’s Free Hosting.
I listed the free hosting at tripod in fourth place mainly because I found their ad-layout to be the most obtrusive of the 3 ad-based “free” hosting options reviewed in this post. Also contributing to this ranking is the fact that I found the Tripod control panels to be less intuitive then those at Geocities.
Like Geociites, Tripod hosting is based on a sub-domain which they provide their users. So your username on Tripod would be http://username.tripod.com.
One nice thing working in Tripod’s favor is the fact that it comes with 20MB of total disk space.
Here’s my example site hosted on Tripod.
If you are working on one of your flagship sites and you can afford it, I would recommend using some form of inexpensive paid hosting. If funds are tight or if you are working on a side project, then you might consider one of the “free” hosting options mentioned above.
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January 19th, 2009 at 6:15 pm
Nice comparative study. But You could well have included other services like astahost, hyperwebenable and profusehost to the list. There was a time when I was foolishly hunting down free web hosting services.
I don’t think I will go for one. The fact that these hosting services expect nothing in return intrigues me. I wouldn’t bring myself to trust such services.
January 20th, 2009 at 3:38 pm
I also have a certain degree of skepticism over any “free” services, and I think that such skepticism is a healthy thing.
You always have to wonder if a company is not making any money “up-front” then how exactly do they plan to monetize. That having been said there are several reputable products and services which are “free”.
Ubuntu comes to mind as s “free” product that may not be perfect, and certainly isn’t bug free, but does provide excellent value considering the cost.
And while those who can afford to pay for services are often able to enjoy less bugs and a higher degree of customer service, there are those out there who can really benefit from the value of a “free” service.
Reputable “free” services having been mentioned, I agree with you 100% we should always be on the lookout to avoid “free” products and services that are potentially malicious, disreputable, or just plain shady.
January 23rd, 2009 at 2:26 am
Seriously! I almost had an impulse to transfer a domain to one of these free web-hosting services. Fortunately, I didn’t do something like that! The concept of Open source, though, is pretty cool! I agree with your point. Anyway, free or not free, a product/company must be reliable, trustworthy and have good features.