The Secrets of Unlimited Shared Web Hosting Service

This is a guest post by Nina, a contributor to our sister site, Honest College.

There is a popular term available in the hosting industry called “unlimited” web hosting. What does this mean? Read on to figure out the truth and secret behind the so-called unlimited hosting.

At present, there are lots of web hosts claim to offer an unlimited allocation of disk space and monthly data transfer; even some of them include the add-on domain numbers, databases, e-mail accounts, and FTP accounts into the “unlimited” policy.

It sounds great apparently. However, do you really believe that you can get everything without restrictions by only spending less than $10 per every month? Move on to find the answers.

Is It Possible?

The answer is definitely not. We are in a physical world where nothing is unlimited actually. It is impossible to store unlimited files on a web server; impossible to transfer unlimited data every month; impossible to create unlimited MySQL databases for your website. Unlimited hosting is nothing but a marketing gimmick for sellers to attract customers.

1. Overselling
   The reason why many companies are able to offer the so-called unlimited web hosting is that the majority of webmasters only utilize a small piece of the server resources entitled. After all, the budget web hosting is designed for personal blogs, small websites, or home-based online stores, but not for large e-commerce sites or corporate portals that are best suited to a dedicated server. If the majority of websites hosted on the same web server only consume a small volume of space and bandwidth, the hosting provider is able to re-sell a single server to thousands of customers for the generation of more profit. This practice is known as overselling.
2. Unlimited Hosting is Actually Limited
   If you have done some researches, you can find that every web host that claims to offer an unlimited hosting service has a “Usage Policy and Definition” in Terms of Services. This policy states that you are free to utilize an unlimited amount of server resources, but the prerequisite is that you are not overusing this benefit. If your consumption has exceeded the given allocation, your account might be temporarily or permanently suspended without any notification, unless you upgrade the package for more resources. For instance, GoDaddy may penalize you if your account stores more than one gigabyte sized files and data, or consumes 5% of CPU usage at a time.

Is Unlimited Hosting Worth Going?

Without doubt, winning customers by offering “unlimited” web hosting seems dishonest, but it doesn’t mean that the hosting services offered by these companies are bad. The quality of a service relies on several factors, so you should focus not only on the marketing trick of unlimited hosting, but also on these criteria that include cost-effectiveness, page loading speed, uptime, industry reputation, and technical support.

Therefore, if you decide to set up a simple website consuming a moderate volume of server resources, you need to choose a reliable provider like the ones listed in this top 10 list. After all, they are much more budget-friendly than a limited hosting solution with clear usage restrictions. Always remember to check out the Terms of Services for usage policies before purchasing.

How to Choose a Quality “Unlimited” Web Host?

Almost all the web hosts provide customers with the same unlimited benefits, such as unlimited storage, unlimited monthly bandwidth, unlimited e-mail accounts, and unlimited sub/parked domains. Thus, to pick up the best option, you can:

1. Sign up with a famous and award-winning company to have a try. Test the hosting service based on affordability, features, hosting performance, and customer service. If you feel dissatisfied, you can cancel your account within the refund period and get all your money back.
2. Read the reviews from some professional hosting review sites like HostingReview360, which are focusing on the testing and comparison of hosting service, with which you can make the ultimately right decision by referring the objective and in-depth results.

Summary

Now, you know that it is impossible to get an unlimited web hosting solution. However, if a provider succeeds in offering an affordable hosting package with rich features, fast hosting speed, no downtime, and responsive support, then the service is totally worth going.