Looking at the feedback I’ve got from my previous article about building a self-hosted WordPress blog for free, and from personal experience, I can tell that good free web hosting services are hard to find.Sure, you can get tons of results from search engines. But most of them turn out to be more annoying than useful. In the end, the results that we can count on are those which come from peer recommendation.
So, to help readers with their web-building experiments (and for my own future references), I tried to compile a list of good easy and free web hosting services. Many of the entries are readers’ recommendations, others are the remainder of the search engine results after filtering out the unqualified ones.
The elimination process
Before revealing the list, let’s look at several factors that made a few services good enough to not be eliminated from the list. Please note that I’ve tried my best not to play favorites, but my personal opinion might differ from others.
First, the features that make these web hosting services easy to use. One service offers different arrangements than the other one. But the ones that we are looking for must have:
- an installer script (usually Elefante or Fantastico) for automatic installation of WordPress (and other server-side applications)
- access to a control panel for easier web management
- the latest version of MySQL and PHP (at least not too old)
- FTP access to upload and delete files
- the ability to host our own domain (so we can use the CO.CC address or other personal domain).
Second, the free factors. Most of the time, free is not really free. Some services offer free hosting with ads, some take forever for the activation process, some others require users to make a minimum number of posts in some forum before becoming eligible for the service. The ones that we are looking for should be “as free as possible”.
Again, the list is compiled with “newbies” and “experimentations” in mind. For better features, bigger disk space, monthly data transfer (bandwidth), access to customer service and technical support, and peace of mind, you should go and get yourself a paid web hosting service. Try Resellers Panel for much cheaper resellers price.
The Survivors
Here are the ones that still stand after the showdown.:) In no particular order, of course. I’ll only mention the disk space and monthly data transfer for quick comparison purposes. Please refer to each service provider’s website for the full list of features as they will be too long to list down here.
Zymic
Gives you:
- 5 GB disk space per account with unlimited account per users
- 50 GB of monthly data transfer
XtreemHost
Gives you:
- 5.5 GB disk space
- 200 GB of monthly data transfer
Hosting-Engine
Gives you:
- 150 MB disk space
- 4 GB of monthly data transfer
Host-Ed
Gives you:
- 150 MB disk space
- 4 GB of monthly data transfer
Freehostia
Gives you:
- 250 MB disk space
- 6 GB of monthly data transfer
PhpNet
Gives you:
- 350 MB disk space
- 15 GB of monthly data transfer
000Webhost
Gives you:
- 1.5 GB disk space
- 100 GB of monthly data transfer
Footnotes
I hope this list can help you start your first (WordPress) blog or website (or park some of the domain names that you have).
I’m sure there are more options lurking somewhere out there, but these are the best that I could find within a few days of searching.
I also found out that some of these services don’t last very long. Many of the links that I found are dead. I guess that’s another side of free services that can’t compete with paid ones.
If you know of other good alternatives, please don’t hesitate to share using the comments below.
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