You can’t have a website live on the internet without hosting. WordPress is a great option for hosting websites, with many new WordPress sites popping up from businesses and individuals every day. What is WordPress? Do you need hosting for WordPress?
Is it something you need and can benefit from? You probably have a lot of questions, and we’ve highlighted all the answers below so you can create and show off the professional-looking website you’re looking for.
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What is WordPress Hosting?
Web hosting, in general, is essentially storing your items from your website in a specific place on the internet. All your files will be in one dedicated server for you to access. The web hosting provider that you choose determines your storage and manages the server where your items are stored in. Thanks to their effort, people are able to check out your website from anywhere in the world.
WordPress is one of these hosts that you can choose from. Basically, WordPress hosting is hosting that’s been optimized to meet the already existing security and performance needs for WordPress. It includes another few things too, like one-click WordPress installations that help you start creating your website with WordPress that much easier.
Y may even get automatic updates to your software. This varies depending on which host you select.
Do You Need It?
You’ve logged onto WordPress, chosen your premium theme and want to create your website. But do you really need WordPress to host your website? Well, the short answer is no.
WordPress has minimum requirements that are actually quite small. Just about any web hosting company will work with a WordPress website. You may still want to consider using WordPress though.
Not all hosts are equal
When it comes to running WordPress, a better host may be more beneficial for your needs. You can technically run a WordPress website on any hosting service, but using a WordPress host can help you run it more efficiently.
There are more features that come with hosting on WordPress that are meant to help specifically WordPress users. This is why people who do use WordPress as a host report higher levels of satisfaction with their experience.
Without WordPress
You don’t necessarily have to use WordPress. With WordPress, you have full control over the content and hosting of your website. But you will need to handle a few other things on your own, such as updates and maintenance.
This means you’ll be using up more time to configure your website and download everything when WordPress would do that for you automatically if you chose it as your host. If you don’t have any technical knowledge, you may find that it’s too much effort to figure it out on your own.
Separate Packages
If you don’t use WordPress as your hosting provider, it’s easy enough to buy a separate hosting package. Of course, you’ll need to go through those to find out which one is best, and which one you can use most efficiently. You’ll also need to check on storage restrictions.
There may be storage problems for your items if you host your own website or try to find another host.
With WordPress
By using WordPress, you may save yourself some time. You don’t need to worry about setting up your website when the WordPress support team will help you with everything. You’ll have customer support available to you at all times.
Things like server performance and disk space aren’t a problem since WordPress can ensure these things with a few clicks.
That being said, if you do use WordPress as your web hosting service, you may not like that you don’t have full control of the website. You’ll have to ask the provider to make any changes you need. You also won’t have a full domain, but just a subdomain.
This might not be enough to dissuade you from using WordPress as your host.
What Are the Benefits?
You have a lot of different hosting companies to choose from. If you want to invest in a website that you can control, it’s up to you to pick one of them.
Having a WordPress hosting account can set you up for success, specifically in providing you and your website support, and thankfully, it doesn’t cost you that much either.
More Control
You have more control over your website when you choose WordPress. In contrast to choosing a platform like Tumblr, you don’t have to worry about them taking down your website because you violated a certain rule or condition.
You can keep your website online constantly without worrying about losing visitors who wonder what happened to your website in the time it was taken down.
Fast Servers
Hosting your WordPress website specifically on WordPress means that you have fast servers. This is because your servers are configured just for WordPress. They work fast when there’s a lot of traffic heading to your website so that it stays up regardless of how many people are visiting at the same time.
This means that you’ll never have any downtime for your website. Even if you do have a lot of traffic on your website, the servers will never go down. WordPress uses its website status monitoring service so that it can provide you with uptime statistics to keep all your data safe and in operation.
Better Customization
You will share your branding with WordPress when you use them as your host, but rest assured that you have complete control over the look and design of your website. You’ll have full access to any plugins and tools that you need to help your website grow. Customize everything in the way you would like: you’ll only be limited by yourself.
Increased Security
The security on WordPress makes it pretty much hacker proof. There are multiple layers to security on WordPress that will constantly work to scan for malware and viruses while blocking all hacking efforts. This means that you won’t need to install any security plugins to keep your website safe.
Available Support
If you do notice any problems though, you’ll have customer service for WordPress always available to you. Talk to their staff if you have any issues or if you notice anything that doesn’t look quite right.
The WordPress staff is highly educated in WordPress hosting, and can help you not only with any problems, but can give you advice on plugins and problem-solving. Ask them which plugins might work best and how they might impact the performance of your website. They’ll respond quickly to help you with any issues.
Data Backups
When you use WordPress, all of your data will be safe. WordPress hosts create a backup so that you can restore your data to an earlier point if you would like. You don’t need a backup plugin like this since your web host will do it for you.
Updates
Using WordPress means that you don’t have to handle updates on your own. The host will update your website automatically and should be efficient too. You shouldn’t have to roll back a WordPress update since the hosting company should take care of that for you.
More Tools
WordPress includes developer tools that are meant to make the operation of your website that much easier. They’ll work for you so that you don’t have to do anything on your own. Instead of fiddling around with website tools such as google analytics, you can use your time more efficiently to run your business and your blog better.
Different Types of Hosting
There are multiple types of hosting in general, with WordPress sporting a few types from you to choose from. You can get WordPress web hosting plans for just a few dollars a month or can choose something that’s over seven hundred dollars if you’re running a massive business.
It all depends on your needs, as well as the price you’d like to spend, how easy each host option is to use, and how quickly your pages load time will be when they’re online.
Shared Hosting Plan
This is the cheapest available option when it comes to hosting. Essentially, shared hosting is when you rent server space with hundreds of other sites, so the resources on that server are shared between all of you. No technical knowledge is needed to run shared hosting, making it a great option for beginners who are only getting started.
Shared hosting is usually the option most people choose when they begin their WordPress website. Bloggers tend to prefer this option for the price when they begin, and it can handle low amounts of traffic without a problem. When you begin to gain more traffic on your website, you’ll need to upgrade to an option with better performance though.
Managed WordPress Hosting
Managed hosting on WordPress is a great option for larger websites. If you’re starting out large and need features like automatic updates, increased security, backups, and support, managed hosting is preferable. Pay close attention to your content and leave the rest to WordPress. They’ll take care of all the software problems.
This type of hosting will have a good performance since it is already optimized for WordPress. Many people prefer this option since all the logistics are taken care of for them by the host, and they can focus on the website.
Virtual Private Servers
If you want more power than a shared host can handle, but don’t want to break the bank, a VPS, or Virtual Private Server might be the best option for you. This type of server is somewhat like a shared server, where you’re technically still sharing space on a server, but you get a certain amount of space all to yourself.
Your information will be isolated from the other servers, so you don’t need to share resources and will have more control over your server. With a VPS, you can get an unmanaged or managed server. You also get cpanel access and access to your WordPress dashboard. If you do choose the unmanaged option, this just means that you’ll be responsible for managing your server instead of your host managing it for you.
Cloud Hosting
This may be exactly what you need if you’re beginning small but anticipate getting more traffic on your website. Cloud hosting can accommodate any sort of hosting environment while still being cost effective and allowing you to scale the server to your personal needs.
You’ll only pay for the features you use and can add or remove resources depending on your needs. You may need a little more technical knowledge to use it more effectively though.
Dedicated Server Hosting
A dedicated server is an option for you if you’re looking for the most amount of control and customization. Your website will be the only website on the server, meaning that you have more access to server resources and will have higher site performance.
Usually, this makes dedicated server hosting more expensive, but also a great option for higher traffic websites that need more power and resources.
Most dedicated servers are mostly used for larger businesses due to the price. Many of them cost at the very least almost $100 a month, with better options even pricier than that. You will have full control of both the server and all of your information though and will continue to get full support from the provider, being WordPress.
If there are any problems, you’ll get your money’s worth in terms of help.
Conclusion
In the end, you don’t need WordPress hosting necessarily, but there are many legitimate benefits to using it for your WordPress website.
It works well and provides you with software and features that you don’t need to download separately as plugins. You can also choose a less expensive option, meaning that you can get the features without breaking the bank.
Consider WordPress as one of your options at least when you navigate the multiple servers you can choose from. With the right host, you’ll be able to run your website efficiently and hopefully be more visible on search engines and increase your traffic.