6 Key Features To Look For In A Web Hosting Provider

If you’re comparing different web hosting providers, whether SaaS, Self Hosted, or fully managed, here are 6 features to help you determine what you need.

Web Hosting Provider

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Every website, if you want it to be more official and seem more legitimate, should look for a reliable web host provider.

A web hosting provider’s services include giving you the technologies you need for your website to be on the Internet in the first place. To be more specific, they usually provide space on a server for your website’s data. This server is where they will store all of your website files Web hosting providers can also offer additional services such as security, backups, email hosting, and more.

Having a great web hosting provider can provide many benefits to your business or organization. It can make your website have faster loading times, better uptime reliability, and more secure servers, and even help you save money in the long run by providing discounts for larger plans.

Choosing a trustworthy web hosting provider can also make a huge difference in keeping your website secure plus updated with the latest technologies when it comes to website security features. This way, you can have peace of mind that your visitors will have an excellent online experience without compromising their digital security.

If you’re planning to get a web hosting provider but don’t know where to start, there are a few qualities that you should be watching out for that this article will be covering. Let’s start.

1. Know What Your Site Needed

Before you even think of subscribing to a web host, it’s a good idea to take a step back and figure out your website’s future needs so you know what web host provider can help you with it. You should take into consideration factors such as the type of hosting plan, server resources, and customer service.

Understanding your website’s requirements will help you find the right web hosting provider for your needs.

Different types of websites have different web hosting requirements such as shared hosting for small websites or dedicated servers for large eCommerce sites.

Having a firm understanding of these details can help you weed out web host providers that don’t give you what your website needs. Also, it can help you avoid any unnecessary costs because you chose a package from a web hosting provider that has features you don’t even need yet.

2. Hosting Security

Website security has become an increasingly important factor for digital businesses with a website. Cyber attacks aren’t anything new these days, so it is necessary at this point that your web hosting provider has measures in place to fight and defend against them without your prompting.

It’s also important to make sure that your web host is using the latest security measures such as firewalls, encryption protocols, and malware scanning.

Security issues aside (although they are important, don’t forget that), a secure web hosting provider can also increase your website’s performance and reliability.

A trustworthy web hosting provider should already have advanced security features in place so that you can ensure your website and the users that will visit it won’t be subject to these malicious entities.

3. Pricing and Renewal Cost

While it’s easy to get excited about features, discounts, and other offers, you should also consider your web hosting provider’s pricing and renewal cost.

Some providers only have one price while others have more options. For example, WPX hosting has multiple pricing tiers so that you can choose based on the price that you can afford while seeing the features that come with the tier that you chose.

It is important to understand how much you will be paying for the service you are getting from your web hosting provider after you finish the first sign-up discount that they likely have. These expenses include any hidden costs that may occur when it comes time to renew your service.

4. Site Backups

Your website is a valuable asset, especially when it’s your form of livelihood. Therefore, it would be in your best interest to make sure that it’s secure on all fronts. Hence, you should be aware of your web hosting provider’s site backup services.

A reliable backup system in place is essential for protecting your website from data loss due to various reasons such as:

  • server crashes
  • malicious attacks
  • accidental deletion
  • other unforeseen events.

Your web hosting provider should have a comprehensive backup system that regularly backs up your website data. If something goes wrong, you can easily restore your site and get back online quickly with it.

5. Reliability

Of course, when you’re looking for a service provider, including a web hosting provider, you’ll hear people say you want them to be “reliable.” But how can you tell if a web hosting provider is reliable in the first place?

The key is to look for certain features that indicate the provider’s reliability. Some elements that you can check up on would be the following:

  • their customer service responsiveness and quality
  • uptime guarantees
  • security measures
  • transparent pricing
  • scalability

By evaluating each of these aspects carefully, you can determine if the web hosting provider is reliable or not.

6. Functionality

Nowadays, plenty of web hosting providers are trying to one-up each other and one way they’ve done that is by increasing their overall functionality. Therefore, you should keep this element in mind when you’re choosing to get one for your website.

Check out the other abilities and features that come with their hosting packages and window shop to find one that has a great middle ground. You want one that’s not promising too much. Otherwise, it’s suspicious or too good to be true.

Conclusion

It requires some time and effort of research on your part before you can guarantee that you have a good web hosting provider before you. However, since you’re dropping a considerable amount of money on their services, you shouldn’t hesitate to do enough research to help you find the right one. Therefore, consider these key features if you’re currently trying to find a great web host provider for your website.