Is Hosting Necessary for WordPress?
I’ve seen many business owners struggle with the decision of whether or not to host their wordpress site. After all, the platform is incredibly easy to use and can offer incredible opportunities for growth.
For those who’ve never hosted a wordpress site before, it can be a little overwhelming deciding whether or not to go the extra mile. After all, hosting a website means taking care of the server and security for that site. There’s a lot of responsibility that goes along with being a host.
Why Should You Host Your WordPress Site?
If you’re reading this, I assume you’re considering either launching a new site or are in the midst of deciding what to do with your existing one. Fear not — we’re here to help!
WordPress is one of the most popular content management systems (CMS) available, and it’s constantly growing in popularity. This is mostly due to the fact that the platform is extremely flexible and can be customized to suit any taste. If you’re looking to launch a lifestyle blog, for example, you can use wordpress to quickly and easily build out a functional site that suits your needs.
What’s more is that wordpress offers incredible opportunities for growth. It has an extensive directory of third-party extensions (add-ons) that can be used to enhance almost every aspect of the platform. As a result, you’re bound to discover more uses for wordpress every day. Even if you have experience with websites and building out content, the extensibility of wordpress will undoubtedly prove to be a valuable learning experience.
What Does Hosting a WordPress Site Mean?
If you’re considering hosting a wordpress site, here’s a quick breakdown of what you need to know:
The Server
The first and most important part of hosting a wordpress site is acquiring a solid server. Even though there are free options available, ultimately you’ll want to choose a hosting solution that’s reliable and has great performance. If you’re looking for a shared hosting plan, make sure to choose a reputable provider that’s dedicated enough to handle high traffic.
While not always the case, shared hosting can be a safer bet than a VPS or dedicated server. Why? Because you’re sharing the hardware (i.e., the server) with other sites. If there’s a hardware failure or network issue, it could seriously impact the performance of your site. In fact, a poor performing server is one of the most frustrating website issues that anyone has to face. It brings down the overall performance of the sites that are hosted on that server, and it can pose serious security risks. This is why shared hosting is usually reserved for lesser-prepared sites or blogs that are looking for a more simplistic approach to running their site. (e.g., a lifestyle blog.)
The Database
Next up is the database. You’ll want to choose a relational database such as MySQL or MariaDB over an NFGSQL database. These are the two most popular databases used for hosting wordpress sites. The difference between MySql and MariaDB is that MariaDB is a free and open source alternative to MySQL. It supports full text search, complex foreign keys, and more.
If you have limited resources, opting for an NFGSQL database may be your best bet. They’re pretty much identical in functionality to MySQL and MariaDB, but they don’t require as much maintenance. In other words, it’s a common misconception that a database requires a lot of work. It requires a lot of work to ensure that it’s operating correctly, but other than that, it’s fairly easy to use.
The Email
Last but not least, we have email. You’ll want to choose a provider that offers good support and makes it easy to manage both your inbound and outbound email. Just remember that every email requires a significant amount of storage and a lot of bandwidth. As a general rule of thumb, if you’re looking for a free solution, you’re better off opting for a paid option that provides good email forwarding and a fast email client.
Dedicated Or Shared Hosting?
While we recommend the shared hosting option, if you have the budget, you could opt for a dedicated server. A dedicated server is a physical server that is hosted by a web host company and is solely dedicated to your use. In other words, it won’t be shared with any other websites or blogs. If this is the route you’re considering, make sure to read our in-depth review of the Dedicated server section of HOSTING COMPARISON, where you’ll discover all the perks and bonus features that come with dedicated hosting.
Security
Finally, we have security. You’ll want to choose a hosting solution that has all the security bells and whistles. Most web hosts provide some sort of malware scanning, daily backups, and security certificates. (e.g., Let’s Encrypt)
If you have limited resources, you may opt for a less complex hosting solution that doesn’t require as much maintenance. In fact, a lot of the smaller hosts don’t even offer daily backups or malware scanning. If you’re looking for something simple and don’t want to spend a lot of time managing this aspect of your site, look for a more basic host.
Now that you’ve got everything planned and organized, go ahead and sign up for a reliable host that offers good performance and support.