Shared Hosting

Shared server hosting (Also referred to as virtual hosting) is the most common level of hosting available due to its balance of cost and service. It is stated that approximately 95 % of all websites on the Internet are under the power of shared server hosts. The most simplified definition of shared hosting is when multiple Internet sites (with different owners) share a single web server. Shared hosting can be though of as renting out an office or two from a building whose entire business revolves around the renting of their owned space. It is important to have a little bit of knowledge regarding the hosting industry before signing onto any one host. For instance, depending on the speed of the server, a single server could host more than 1,000 different websites without running into any connection / bandwidth problems. If you only have a couple of websites to be hosted, there is no point in renting out server space that you will never use, so anything other than a shared hosting account would be like flushing money down the drain.

The costs associated with shared hosting can range anywhere from $0 (There are many free web hosts whose service resembles that of shared hosting) to $100, with an average cost of $50 per month. Because of the somewhat agreeable price range and the level of services offered, shared hosting offers an economical, flexible web hosting for either small businesses or individuals. A shared host will provide its client(s) with a domain name and matching email unless the client already has a domain name registered. If the client has already registered a domain name, the shared host will help to set it up for use through their server.

Due to the fact that shared hosts’ clients share server space with one another, there is a potential for resources/bandwidth to be usurped by a single website or group of sites. To prevent this from happening, shared hosts generally impose the following restrictions: No root level access to the web server. Restrictions on the types of CGI scripts running on a shared server. Max bandwidth consumption imposed on all sites. Restrictions on the other kinds of servers (database servers.)