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So, you’d like to start a website or an online blog? You have everything ready, yet all that remains is for you to find a best web hosting India! The best part is that there are so many options to choose from in India between Virtual Private Server, Dedicated Hosting or Shared Hosting.
However, if you are new to all this, you might be wondering what each one means, which allows you to explain what the benefits of each might be.
Top 3 Shared Hosting Providers in India
Here, we will take a look at one of the most popular hosting options – Shared Hosting. Actually, let us rephrase that, we will take a look at the best Shared Hosting companies in India. Before you take your pick, read this web hosting checklist to make a well-informed decision.
Some of the top Shared Web Hosting are listed below,
At HostingClues, we bring to you the most comprehensive and honest reviews about the best web hosting in India such as this Bluehost Review. Our recommendations are based on a series of essential parameters. This will help businesses make the right choice when choosing the best web hosting provider in India for their online business.
What is Shared Hosting?
Shared hosting is a way of sharing website storage space on a server, that is particularly appropriate for those starting out or those low on a budget. Essentially, it can be considered as website hosting on a grand scale, on one server. Although that might sound confusing, it is very easy to understand.
With Shared hosting, multiple websites, in the hundreds if not thousands, all share the same server for hosting. Each website is assigned a partition on the server and “operates” from there. As all the websites will be drawing from the same server, with its finite resources, they have to share these resources. In essence, this means that they each “help” pay the hosting company costs. The resources utilized and shared are internet bandwidth, disk storage space and processing power. Thus, you buy a partition that comes fully packed as if it was a complete server.
A good analogy for the Shared hosting system is how water is piped into homes. Each household enjoys the same water but it is individualized to each home’s pipes. However, these pipes are all fed by a central reservoir. Each household pays for the water it consumes and this is used by the city to ensure that there is always clean water for each household, as well as serve as a source of funding for the city’s coffers. Should something major go wrong, the city would send in engineers or plumbers to come in and fix the problem. They are also there to maintain the system.
In the case of shared hosting, the hosting company would be the city and your server partition would be your home. The water would be the resources your website will utilize and enjoy.
The hosting companies have server administrators who look after troubleshooting and maintaining the server so that it will always perform at its peak for your convenience. This includes, but is not limited to, updates and software that might be needed. You might be wondering why one would go this route instead of just getting a full server for your site? Well, a major factor would be the price.
When compared to the VPS Hosting in India, Shared hosting is much cheaper, as you have to pay only for a single partition on a Shared server rather than shouldering the entire cost of a server. Adding to that the fact that you would get the same resources as when you have a whole server to yourself. The other reason besides cost is the amount of traffic you think your site will receive. If your site is relatively new and therefore not very popular, it will enjoy less traffic, which is perfect for Shared hosting. It will not tax the server to provide for your website as well as the myriad other sites that will be on it.
Features of Shared Hosting
As a newbie to web technologies, you may not know what key features to look out for when it comes to selecting the best Shared hosting. This is the reason why we wrote this guide on the important important web hosting features.
There are many options to choose from when it comes to features being made available. Looking and going through all of them would be an overwhelming task. Hence, we will just look at the three most important features in this best Shared hosting in India guide.
Disk Space and Traffic
Anyone with a rudimentary understanding of computer technology understands the importance of disk space. It is where your files, databases as well as media is stored. It is also the place where you would build your website and as such, one has to take into account how much disk space would be needed for a site. When choosing a Shared hosting provider, this would be one of the factors and features to look into.
As stated earlier, the amount of traffic that your site will get is a crucial point of consideration, particularly in the world of Shared hosting. This is so because the traffic to and from your website cannot be seen as drawing too much of the bandwidth. This could potentially slow down other sites on the server. This is why many hosts will give unlimited bandwidth and yet control the traffic speed, so as to equitably share the resources of the server.
Support
The importance of support cannot be overemphasized. It will serve as a guide as you grow more and more accustomed to the world of Shared hosting. As a beginner, you might undoubtedly need assistance with set-up, maintenance and troubleshooting, which is why good support is invaluable. Therefore, it is very important that you get a Shared hosting provider that has the right kind of support for you.
As you’re contemplating starting into this world, it is vitally important that you do your due diligence by properly investigating what options are actually out there. You would go about this by searching for forums and reviews that specifically discuss Shared hosting providers. Through this, you will be able to see what people with firsthand knowledge and experience with these providers have to say. Doing this will save you some trouble in the future.
Control Panel and Pre-installed Apps
Another important factor to take into account as you browse through the plethora of features that the best Shared hosting providers give is the control panel as well as any pre-installed apps that may come with your purchase. It is important to choose a provider and a package that will suit your needs. For example, your website might not need to have eCommerce tools and apps, so buying a package that includes them could be counter-productive to your needs.
As one starts to build their own website and business, it is important to have the necessary tools at your disposal, this is where having a good control panel can make or break your site. The most popular one is cPanel.
However, there are alternatives and some providers even go so far as to provide a custom panel for their server. These are all meant to make navigating the waters of website building and Shared hosting a relative breeze, even for novices. Also, these are merely some of the many different features that are offered by Shared hosting providers. As with most things they are not one-size-fits-all.
Examine the features provided in order to see if they are a good fit for your needs and purposes. If you are offered extra “free” bonuses examine your user agreement with a fine-tooth comb, so that you know exactly what you are getting yourself into.
Is Shared Hosting Right For You?
Now you know what Shared Hosting is. You also know what important features to look out for. Thus, should you decide to get a Shared hosting provider, the next step to look at is whether or not Shared hosting is right for you. If you’re in India, then you would undoubtedly want the best Shared hosting experience, and as such, here are few things that you need to consider.
The first thing that is usually a big seller is the Price. If you are looking to start a blog or a website and you are not sure how popular it will be in the short run, how much space it will need and you want to keep the costs down, then Shared hosting may be perfect for you.
As stated above, Shared hosting is a cheaper option compared to VPS, Dedicate or the Reseller Hosting in India, due to its Shared server nature. It is great for a new site or sites that don’t require a lot of disk space and do not generate a lot of traffic. If these options are all true for you, then you can choose Shared hosting. You can always upgrade later when and if your needs change.
With that being said, it is also very important to look at what requirements your website will have? What features are of importance when choosing a plan for hosting? The type of hosting you require i.e. the Windows Hosting in India or the Linux Hosting in India?
If you need more powerful features that could tax a partitioned server then maybe looking at other options than Shared hosting is a better idea. However, the opposite is also very true. Plus, you can easily switch to another web host if it is offering better features at an economical price and if you want to do so, without any downtime, then here is a guide that you can follow.
Shared Hosting – Advantages & Disadvantages
Shared hosting has its pros and cons, some may argue that the advantages outweigh the disadvantages, but this is a very subjective choice and as such, you would have to determine for yourself how important the advantages and disadvantages are.
Advantages
- Cost: First and usually most important is the cost. Due to their very nature, Shared hosting servers are much cheaper than other hosting options. It goes without saying that this is a major advantage, especially, for those starting out, who may not have as much capital.
- Reliable Uptime: Since a number of websites share the same resources, Shared hosting plans come with guaranteed 99.99% uptime, as downtime would mean losses for numerous businesses. Thus, with a Shared hosting plan, you can be assured of getting an optimal uptime.
- Support and Maintenance: As Shared hosting servers come with their own server administrators to oversee care and maintenance, one would be able to set-up and use a Shared hosting server with little to no knowledge of the deeper workings of website and server administration. Furthermore, their support is a key feature that will help in the continued “health” of your site.
- Control Panel: As stated earlier, this is an invaluable tool to get you up and running with your website. Used effectively it will make your website and your online business that much better, as it is specifically designed to make tasks easier to do with regards to website building and design.
Disadvantages
- Security: A sad fact is that Shared servers have a weakness when it comes to hacking. This is because any malicious activity on one website will infect the whole server and therefore any & all websites on that server. It is also important to note that Shared servers are more likely to being hacked.
- Shared Resources: This is one of those that is both a blessing and a curse. It is a blessing in that it saves on costs, but a curse in that all websites on the server are drawing from the same well. As such, if one website is requesting a lot of resources it can directly affect how much resources are available for your own website to draw on. This can then cause your website to be sluggish, which could affect your site’s ranking.
- Restrictions: As the server is centrally maintained and looked after, the server administrator and hosting provider may opt for software and applications that you may not want to use. However, given its nature, you would not be able to use the software and applications you would want.