What is Web Hosting and How Does it Work?
Once you are done with buying a domain name, the next step is to host it on a server. Only the hosted website is visible from all over the world. So, what is this hosting? Hosting is nothing but saving your website information or data on a machine that will be active all the time. The hosting server acts as the central hub and serves the requests from visitors.
After registering a domain name, it will be placed under parking status. Also known as Parked Domain. To remove the parked status, domain registrar has to update the Domain Name Server (DNS) address with the hosting service provider DNS.
Types of Web Hosting:
If you are hosting the website the first time, then definitely you must have some confusion with the plans and hosting types. Below content should help you clear the confusion.
Based on Platform:
Based on the platform, hosting types are categorized into two. They are Linux Based Hosting and Windows Based Hosting. While Windows is most popularly used OS in a desktop environment, coming to hosting Linux occupies the first place. People may choose Linux platform because of its strong security nature. Whereas Windows platform can be an option for few because of the good interface.
The most common words which you see while searching for hosting service providers are cPanel and Plesk. What is this cPanel or Plesk? cPanel is the abbreviation for a control panel. It is a Linux based web hosting control panel with easy to use GUI. Whereas Plesk has the ability to configure and maintain both Windows and Linux servers.
The cPanel or Plesk gives the complete control of a website, add-on domains, and subdomains. Only the user who has access to the cPanel or Plesk can add add-on domains, sub-domains. In simple words, it’s just like an administrator account in the personal computer. In simple, it is similar to the control panel which we find in Windows or Linux operating systems.
Linux platform based hosting service generally features open source tools like PHP, Pearl, etc. Whereas the Windows platform based hosting service features ASP.NET, MSSQL, etc.
Based on Server Space:
Based on the server space or plan you choose, web hosting types are divided mainly into 5 categories:
- Shared Web Hosting
- Reseller Web Hosting
- Cloud Based Web Hosting
- Dedicated Server Web Hosting
- VPS (Virtual Private Server) Hosting
Shared Web Hosting: What is Shared Hosting? Advantages and Disadvantages.
Under shared hosting, each user shares a portion of web space with other users. It’s just like saving multiple websites data or hosting different domain names on a single server. In general, shared hosting services are less expensive compared to other hosting types. But the uptime can be a little bit less and storage space will be limited. Shared hosting type is the one best suits you if your business is a start-up.
Reseller Web Hosting:
Reseller Web Hosting is another type of hosting service partly similar to shared hosting service. In Reseller Hosting, Reseller purchases or rents the dedicated server from hosting services. Then he or she sells hard drive space and bandwidth as portions to the customers. This is the next less expensive way for web hosting and mostly used by the web design companies who offer add-on service for web hosting.
Cloud Based Web Hosting:
It is the third type of web hosting in our list. Cloud based web hosting works by using the resources from several grouped servers. In simple, the website hosted on cloud uses the virtual resources from multiple servers to serve the visitors.
The major benefit of cloud-based web hosting is performance. Load time of website hosted on the cloud is very less, which means faster loading. The drawback of this hosting type is a high price. Compared to shared and reseller web hosting plans, Cloud Based Web Hosting plans are more expensive.
We recommend readers not to go for cloud-based web hosting unless your website is extremely popular and causing a burden on resources provided by shared server. The alternative option is to go for a dedicated web server where website data resides completely on its own server.
Dedicated Server Web Hosting:
A Dedicated Server Web Hosting is a service where service buyer uses total server resources for his own website. Here no server resources will be shared with other service buyers. Organizations often go for dedicated servers as they are more flexible and offer full control like choosing their own choice of operating system and hardware. Dedicated server hosting pricings are affordable and best solution for those who cannot go for cloud-based web hosting.
VPS (Virtual Private Server) Hosting:
Virtual Private Server Hosting is something like the combination of cloud-based plus dedicated server hosting. Here the buyer of service will be provided with a virtual machine. The owner of VPS can run their choice of OS and will have full access.
Most of all Virtual Private Servers are less expensive compared to the dedicated web servers. This is due to physical hardware sharing with others VPS buyers. Performance might be lower and depends on the workload of other running virtual machines.
Conclusion:
These are the few types of web hosting services that are available in the market. Consequently, Managed WordPress Hosting is the new type which is widely popular nowadays.
Leave a Reply