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Is Shared Web Hosting Right For Your Small Business?

Is Shared Web Hosting Right For Your Small Business?

Companies, organizations, or individuals just starting with their web business often opt for shared web hosting because it does not require much management and control. Here, you will get detailed insights into the advantages and disadvantages of using shared web hosting. But before anything else, let us attempt to comprehend the term “Shared Web Hosting” and how it actually operates.  

What Is Shared Web Hosting? 

Shared Web Hosting includes a single physical server that is being shared among numerous users. The hosting provider provides the space to users on the server for hosting their websites. All the users share the server resources such as random access memory, central processing unit, bandwidth, disk space, etc. All the granted services utilized to cater to the demands of all clients are operated on a single chunk of resources. 

The hosting provider takes charge of managing the shared server and providing the network. Since the resources are shared among all the users, the cost of hosting on a shared server eventually becomes less. Therefore, for people who have no experience in hosting their websites on the server or are new in the field of web business, shared web hosting serves as a great option as it does not need any administration from the user and is available at the most affordable prices in the industry. However, there are many debates among the users, which points out how shared server web hosting can be a trouble to the websites. 

You will be able to judge whether shared server web hosting can become an ideal choice for hosting your website by identifying its pros and cons in the subsequent sections. 

Advantages Of Shared Web Hosting 

Cost Efficiency

As we have already discussed, the most cost-effective web hosting service you can find in the industry is shared server web hosting. The other web hosting services come up with relatively higher prices. With the increase in the competition between hosting companies over the web market, you also get to expect the prices of additional resources to go down. The shared server web hosting provides a cheap and easy pathway for various small businesses to establish their online presence and introduce themselves to Internet users all over the globe. 

Customization

Though in shared server web hosting, you have to share web resources of the physical server with other neighbor users, it does not mean that you will not be able to control your website the way you want. There are various shared web hosting platforms that will let you have a control panel (cPanel) toolset. The toolset will permit you to customize your website. You will be able to make your website function effectively. Moreover, your hosting provider will keep adding new features that will let you have more precise insights into the popularity of your website.

Efficiency

To administer a website’s performance, you need to keep control over two of the most significant parameters. They are disk space and bandwidth. Along with the shared server hosting, your hosting provider will give you the benefit of buying additional storage and bandwidth. Thus, you will be able to make up for the inflating requirements. You will not have to spend much time and money. Furthermore, you also will not have to call for the support team or assistance in requesting these resources. That is because, generally, you will have a portal that gives you access to resolve such necessities without delays.

Convenience

Many individuals who wish to grow as travel bloggers, food enthusiasts, makeup artists, etc., are not really experienced enough to handle a website. Moreover, most of them also do not possess any interest in learning tasks. In this fast-paced world, convenience is a priority. This is where shared server web hosting finds its place. In shared server hosting, highly trained professionals handle the core construction blocks of the website and major software services. It allows the users to work solely on their website. They do not require to become technically sound with software such as Apache, MySQL, etc. They receive the already set up hosting environment from their hosting provider. 

Therefore, you can understand how accessible the shared server platform turns out to be for hosting your website. Moreover, you will be able to set up your website with utmost ease, and your hosting provider will make your website live within 24 hours of purchase. Whereas, in other hosting services, you may find this a little difficult. For instance, a dedicated server hosting environment needs extended dry runs and testing of your website to make it live over the web. 

Disadvantages Of Shared Web Hosting 

Security

Shared server web hosting possesses one of the major issues of security. As the users share the same resources on the physical server, it increases the chance for your website to get affected by other websites’ functionalities. 

On the other side, shared services are always in the eyes of hackers, which makes them suffer notable malicious activity that can affect the entire clientele. Moreover, there have been many cases where a malicious script running on a particular website has harmed it’s neighbor websites as well. Unfortunately, this also makes your website an easy target for hackers and other security threats. 

Additionally, your website is being provided with a hosting platform and not with an infrastructure itself. So, it prevents you from installing specific antivirus or firewalls to secure your website.

Limited Resources

In the shared server web hosting service, all the websites operate on a single server and share the same resources. It leads the server prone to congestion and performance hits. For example, if any website gets a spike in traffic, it may take up more resources, and you will have to wait. Consequently, your website will face downtime that will count to the loss of potential customers and profit. 

On the other side, the shared server is also not designed in a way to handle the high volume of traffic spikes. This way, the outcomes will be damaging for other websites as well, along with the one acquiring traffic. The websites’ functions will slow down, and their performances will become limited. In the worst of all cases, it can even result in a system crash.

Other Alternatives to Shared Web Hosting

Besides shared server web hosting, you can encounter two famous web hosting services – Dedicated server hosting and Virtual Private Server Hosting. 

Dedicated Server Web Hosting

In this, you will have the entire server solely working and hosting your website. Your website will acquire dedicated resources. It will also acquire an independent and isolated hosting environment as you will not have to share the server space with other users. This also makes dedicated server web hosting more secure and reliable. It comes up relatively with a higher price. However, it gives value to your money due to the privileges it renders. You will have complete control over your server, and you can configure, customize and handle your server the way it suits the best for your website. 

Virtual Private Server Web Hosting

In this, you will be sharing the same physical server with the other users. However, you will have an independent virtual private server to host your website. Your website will also acquire the resources that it does not have to share with the other websites residing on the same server. It is an ideal option for those who want to overcome the shared server web hosting limitations but cannot afford to buy the dedicated server. The VPS web hosting service comes up with the affordable rate and advantages of dedicated server web hosting. 

Summing Up

After comparing the advantages and disadvantages of Shared Web Hosting we can conclude that it could be an effective and cost-friendly hosting alternative for small businesses. Further, as your business grows and starts gaining traction you can switch to VPS or Dedicated Server.

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