Finding Free Web Hosts

I have been using free web hosts for a long time. They offer the opportunity to learn how to create and maintain websites using a variety of technologies while sharing information with others on the internet. Finding a reliable free web host can be challenging. Searching the internet resulted in my finding two articles that provide a good list of free web hosts to consider.

Top 7 Easy and Free Web Hosting Services by Jeffry Thurana on Sep. 29th, 2009. Provides a list of free web hosts offering enough free features for you to  host a wordpress blog site. That means MYSQL, PHP and some other features.

I visited all the sites checking out their various features. Listed below are sites from the article and their features that are most important to me.  You should read the Jeffry’s article for additional information and insight.

• Zymic
  • No required ads
  • 50 GB Monthly bandwidth
  • 15 MB file size stated in FAQ
  • 500 MB space
  • Unlimited web sites per account
  • 5 MY SQL Databases, PHPMYADMIN is provided
  • FTP
  • Sub domains such as 99k.org, zxq.net, zymichost.com
  • Terminated for inactivity but does not state length of time for inactivity.
  • Support forum
  • My Opinion: Good start, 50 GB Monthly bandwidth might be an issue
• XtreemHost
  • 200 GB Monthly Bandwidth
  • 5500 MB space
  • 4 MB FTP file size and 2 MB PHP file size
  • FTP
  • PHP 5.2.12
  • 50 MY SQL Databases
  • 50 add on domains
  • 50 subdomains
  • Sendmail on
  • Custom .htaccess
  • Limited CPU Usage
  • Support from forums, email, knowledge base, chat and vistapanel. The FAQ section is helpful.
  • Premium Services cost $44 a year
  • My Opinion: The 4 MB file size is an issue uploading/downloading zip files when setting up and backing up websites. Everything else looks good or great. New registration as of 1/12/2011 is down because they are updating the free servers. They are at least keeping everyone informed.
• Hosting-Engine
  • 4 GB Data Transfer
  • 150 MB Disk Space
  • 1 Domains Hosting
  • 2 Subdomains
  • MySQL(v.4/5)
  • PHP4/5, Perl, CGI
  • FTP/FrontPage Support
  • POP3/IMAP Email [No SMTP]
  • Upload File size limit 500kb
  • zip,rar, gz and other files types not cannot be uploaded
  • Terminated if site receives no activity for 12 months
  • Purchased service 65.88 to 107.88 a year
  • Some services are disabled on free site such a fsockopen, curl_init
  • No forum found. Support contact them
  • My Opinion: not being able to use ZIP is a big no. I had trouble finding any reviews on it because of its name or lack of reviews.
• Host-Ed
  • 4 GB data transfer
  • 150 MB space
  • PHP 4/5
  • 1 MY SQL database 10 MB size limit
  • 1 domain hosted
  • FTP
  • POP 3
  • Termination after 6 months on inactivity
  • Purchased service: 59.88 – 95.88 a year
  • Same disabled services as Hosting-engine.
  • My Opinion: MySQL 10 MB file size limit maybe an issue.
• Freehostia
  • 6 GB Monthly Bandwidth
  • 250 MB disk space
  • POP3/IMAP E-mail accounts
  • 5 Domains
  • 15 Sub-domains
  • Perl
  • Python
  • PHP 4/5
  • 1 MYSQL Database 10 MB size limit
  • FTP
  • Daily Backup
  • SMTP requires an upgrade
  • Many provided CMS installations
  • Affordable Upgrades. 2.95 – 9.95 a month
  • My Opinion: MySQL 10 MB file size limit maybe an issue.
• PhpNet
  • Site seems down
  • My Opinion: Site was down when I checked it a few times, so a big NO!!!!
• 000Webhost
  • 100 GB Monthly Bandwidth
  • 1500 MB Disk space
  • 5 Add on Domains
  • 5 Sub Domains
  • 2 My SQL Databases – no size limit
  • FTP
  • PHP mail() function and Sendmail
  • Zend Optimizer and Ioncube are enabled on servers
  • Curl, GD2 library, XML, Zend, .htaccess support
  • No ads or banners. Allows your own ads
  • Unlimited accounts
  • No file size limit or extension restriction. On their CPanel  FTP upload screen the show a 5 MB file limit.
  • User account and domain name maybe be the same
  • Premium Hosting 4.95 a month
  • SMTP not available on free accounts
  • Support Forum
  • Free sudomain URL Template http://www.???.host22.com. You provide the ???
  • My Opinion: Two My SQL Database limit but unlimited accounts so I am not sure what that means. It seems to have most things I would need. There are public videos and tutorials  on installing wordpress on this host.
  • I joined this ISP host and learned a few more things. SHTML includes (SSI) are no supported. I have to use PHP include instead which means renaming all my SHTML webpages.
  • Server status checking server uptime, lobrc, and techjunkie

The second article is 40 Places Where You Can Create Your Websites Online by Dicky May 26th, 2010.  These hosts all seem to provide web site making tools to help those with no technical skills to create a web site. Many mention a drag and drop interface. The problem with these type of sites, it is difficult to move your site to another host if you need to. So far I have visited a few of them but have not signed up for any. These sites might be a good starting point for those not wanting to learn HTML and other web browser scripting languages.