The global web hosting market rose from $94.64 billion in 2022 to $124.80 billion a year later. It is anticipated to increase by 17.35% a year from 2024 to 2029, ultimately reaching $355.80 billion in 2029.

Shared hosting holds an estimated 37.64% market share and is still the most popular web hosting choice in 2024. It is projected to amount to $72.2 billion in 2026, growing at the impressive rate of 15% a year.

There is a reason for its popularity. Shared hosting is the most affordable type. Websites are hosted in bulk on shared servers. There can be hundreds of websites on the same server, and they share an IP in most cases. Shared hosting might cost as little as $3, but it comes with hidden fees and potential performance issues. Here's what you should consider if you're using or just considering a cheap shared hosting platform.

The hidden costs: backups, setting adjustments, and external help

Most shared hosting providers don't back up the websites on the server. The best ones perform backups once a week. Each new backup overwrites the previous one.

Backups are important because they allow data recovery. If your website crashes, gets hacked, or someone on your team makes a mistake and deletes content, you can't restore the data without having backed it up.

Backups can cost a pretty penny. Cloud backup for individual accounts can cost as much as $50 for 500GB of data or $100 for 2TB.

Most shared hosting platforms don't let clients change the server settings. You might want to run a specific PHP version while other sites on the server are using another version. If this happens, the provider will suggest you "upgrade" your account, i.e., paying more.

Few shared hosting platforms have adequate support, much less support around the clock. Your website might crash right before an important event, like launching a promotion. If you run a business, you face a drop in revenue, reputation damage, etc. You must fix any issues that arise due to inadequate maintenance or hosting. You might need to hire someone to improve website performance or purchase special software.

Buying an SSL certificate separately

Shared hosting providers don't normally offer free SSL certificates, which are critical for security. You would then need to buy an SSL certificate from the hosting provider or a third party, and it will cost more than what you're paying for hosting a year.

As of August 2024, there were almost 318 million SSL certificates online. While the most basic ones cost a few dollars a month, you can expect to pay as much as $169 for more reliable products.

Two last issues with low-cost shared hosting are that just one website per account is allowed and you need to pay for cPanel separately. You might have more than one website or want more than one environment – one for development, one for production, etc.

There are cPanel licensing costs to reckon with. Other than that, it's an excellent user interface for managing multiple shared hosting accounts.

Performance issues with shared hosting

Shared hosting providers tend to offer limited RAM, CPU, and storage capacity. If your website experiences growth, the limitations begin to manifest as poor scalability and slow loading times.

Website owners don't get root access to the server, so no changes to its configuration are possible. This limits the hosting environment's flexibility and customization.

They should consider using a content delivery network to address the lack of control. CDNs reduce the load on the server by distributing the content across several servers. As you probably expected, this also costs extra. The CDN market is growing dynamically. It was worth $23.66 billion in 2023 and is expected to reach $408 billion by 2036. As of September 2024, more than 42 million live websites are using a CDN, and another 54 million have used one in the past.

If you're set on shared hosting, choose an intuitive content management system. It can help you manage your content without a technical background.

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