Web hosting is a service where a client rents disk space on a server. Some advantages to renting web space as opposed to setting up your own are as follows:
- Less overhead (no need to purchase servers, firewalls, etc)
- Less maintenance
- Faster deployment
Web hosting services are generally offered for incremental amounts of time (monthly, yearly) and are usually pretty flexible in the sense that a client can upgrade his or her account at any time, allowing their website to grow (or shrink) with their needs.
There are different types of hosting:
- Shared - Hosting where�numerous clients may share the same server, but their accounts are completely separate. Shared hosting is by far the most affordable option as hosting providers are able to fit many clients onto one server, thus reducing the amount of profit that must be generated by each client.
- Dedicated - A service that provides a fully dedicated web server for use by the client. No other clients will be using this server.� This is more expensive, but a better choice for large eCommerce clients.
