There are advantages and disadvantages for both paid and free web hosting. But it actually depends on what ones requirements are and what one is trying to achieve.
Advantages of Free Web Hosting
– As it is free it is the one of the most obvious advantage.
– Free web space can be used to practice programming. Some free web hosting plans support a programming language such as PHP, ASP, CGI/Perl, Cold fusion or JSP but several do not support all the languages.
– For creating a small personal website free web hosting plan is great.
Disadvantages of Free Web Hosting
– The majority of free web hosts cannot afford to offer 24/7 or any support as they are offering free hosting.
– Many free web hosts do not allow FTP access, which is an obstacle if one has many files to upload this one of the major flaws with free web hosts.
– Many free web hosts place their banner and text ads on the website.
– Very few free web hosts with their plans offer control panel.
– Ones website is placed in a sub-domain or a folder with a large number of free hosts, which results in poor search engine rankings most of the time.
– Much disk space or data transfer is not offered by free web hosting plans. This can be a problem if one have a lot of large files or if ones website generates a lot of traffic.
Advantages of Paid Web Hosting
– Most paid web hosts offer 24/7 supports.
– One will not have any unwanted text or banner ads placed on ones website with paid hosting.
– Control panel such as cPanel, Vdeck, Plesk or Ensim which offer features like web stats, the ability to password protect directories, and the ability to create web based email accounts are being offered by a lot of paid web hosting plans.
– One will have ones own domain name (consumerswebsite.com) which will not only result in better search engine rankings, but will also look more professional. Thus ones website will not be placed in a sub-domain or folder.
– As with paid web hosting one gets more disk space and data transfer, one can add more files to ones website and it can also handle more traffic.
– Most paid web hosts are offering FTP access.
– Couple programming languages such as PHP, ASP, CGI/Perl, the majority of paid web hosting plans is supporting Cold fusion and JSP.
Disadvantage of Paid Web Hosting
– It’s not free this is the only major disadvantage of paid web hosting.
