How to Choose the right Web Hosting

So you want to build a web site... but you need somewhere to host it! A browse on Google will tell you there are a ton of different companies out there offering web hosting so what do you do? Buy the cheapest? Buy from the biggest? How do I know they will have the features I want?

Here are a few rules of thumb which might help:-

How much space do you need?
If you are running a small website or blog with mainly text and images something as low as a few hundred Mb will probably be sufficient. If you will be running a larger website with maybe sound and video then you may well need something more like 500 or 1000Mb. Remember large files such as videos can often be hosted on free third party websites such as Youtube and then embedding into your website so using these type of free services may mean you don't need as much space on your own website as you think.

How much data transfer (bandwidth) do you need?
Data transfer will depend largely on how many people visit your website. The more people visiting, the more bandwidth will be used. The best rule of thumb here is to start small and upgrade if you find you need it.

How many email accounts do you need?
You will most likely want to receive email with your new account so how many do your need? Ensure you are buying enough capacity for your needs.

Do you require a database?
If you are building your own website you will know if you need this. If you are using third party software such as Wordpress to run a blog then the answer to this question will probably be yes. Most third party content management systems these days use a database to efficiently store information. Ensure your web host supports the use of databases if you need it.

Additional software needed?
Some web hosts provide easy installable software so that you can quickly install popular packages such as Wordpress, phpBB, etc in just a few clicks. These can make life really easy for you if you are not familiar with uploading and installing server software manually. If you think you will be using this type of software then check to see if your web host already has these packages pre-installed.

Control Panel Software
Check to make sure your web host has an easy to use web hosting control panel such as cPanel or Plesk. These allow you to manage many aspects of your web hosting account from one single control panel login area.

Its quite common for web hosts to claim unlimited bandwidth on their hosting plans. While this might seem a great option, what can often happen is that web hosts oversell the bandwidth that they actually have available. Bandwidth ultimately costs money as whatever lines and connections the web host is buying do carry a real cost to them. If some accounts use more bandwidth than others this can degrade the performance for all the customers using the service. If this happens, some web hosts 'throttle' the high usage web sites which has the effect of slowing them down.

Best advice is to either check with the web host before buying as to what their 'unlimited' bandwidth really means, or choose a web host that has plenty of bandwidth for your needs. A good web host won't usually suspend your website for simply going over your quota in any given month but they might email you to consider upgrading if you will be regularly going over your bandwidth allowance.

A web hosting control panel gives you easy access to manage many aspects of your web hosting account. The most common is setting up of youe email accounts and email forwarders. Also, they may also give you easy access to your web logs and web stats as well as managing other more advanced features such as password protecting directories, scheduling automated (cron) tasks, apache handlers (affects how the server treats different file types), and much more. If you utilise mySQL databases on your websites then you can usually setup and manage these also from your control panel.

One of the most important parts of these control panels is the backup and restore functions. These make it very easy to download a compressed backup of your whole website and/or database. Although many good web hosts do daily backups anyway, its always a good idea to have your own backup of your website and its also essential if you decide to move to a different web hosting company at any time.

There are many different web hosting control panels but some of the most popular are cPanel, Plesk and DirectAdmin.

Make sure when you choose a company to host your website that they have some sort of control panel in place to allow you to easily manage your web hosting account. Choosing a company that for instance advertises cPanel web hosting will ensure you get cPanel as a control panel with your account.