A website is almost must for everyone in today's world. You may wish to have a personal blog, or business website, or family website, or just want to share photo's with your friend. For a website, you need two things, domain name and web space. You can buy web space and domain name from any web hosting company or you can also purchase domain name and web hosting separate from two different companies. There are many of web hosting companies offering different types of web hosting and different plans. Your web hosting need will depend on your website. If you have small website with average trafffic, you are good on shared web hosting. Hosting can be shared hosting, reseller hosting, virtual private server (VPS) and dedicated hosting. I will explain each type of hosting in details.

• Shared Web Hosting

In shared web hosting the server is shared with many customers who also use same web hosting server. Thus server host thousands of website. The server equipment and server is owned by web hosting provider. The web hosting providers manage and monitor all shared accounts and the server.

Why shared hosting??
For many people shared hosting is just perfect. Shared hosting is much cheaper, affordable and efficient. Server is managed fully by web hosting company, and so customer doesn’t need to take tension about server management. But web hosting company put certain limitations on shared web hosting plans. You can read limitations of shared hosting plans on their "terms of services" page.

What should I ask web hosting company before buying a shared web hosting?
Customer should ask few basic question before buying shared web hosting plans. Many web hosting companies offer unlimited space and unlimited bandwidth on shared hosting at dirt cheap price like say 20$ per year. But truth is that, there is nothing called unlimited. Truth is hidden in their "terms and condition". You must read "terms and condition" of web hosting company before buying any web hosting plan, and ask few basic questions mentioned below.

1) Allowed CPU and server resources usage.

2) Allowed file type, and content type to host.

3) Support system for customers. Prefer one which has live chat support most of time. Most companies provide live chat support only for sales.

4) Any backup feature provided, like daily backup or weekly backup.

5) server configuration and datacenter details.

6) Control panel type, like cPanel, Directadmin etc. cPanel is very easy to use and most widely used.

7) Features available in control panel.

8) Scripting languages allowed.

9) All limitations like number domain that can be hosted, number of database allowed, number of send mails per hour allowed etc.

I would recommend www.whost.in for all types of shared web hosting plans.

• Reseller Web Hosting

In Reseller web hosting, you can resell web space. You can create and sell shared web hosting under you. You are free to create you own package and set your own price and sell them under your brand. With a Reseller web hosting, you can start your own small web hosting company. In other word we can say that, reselling web hosting means that you contract with the hosting provider to sell their server space under your brand. Thus it is a cheap way to start your own small ecommerce business. It is your responsibility to provide support to your clients. Means The web hosting provider will not provide any support directly to your customers. However, some web hosting also provide end user support. Means original host will provide support to your clients. Many web hosting companies also provide free domain reseller account with reseller web hosting plans. However domain reseller account from any web hosting company can be costly and you also won't get any TLD to sell. If you want cheap domain reseller account, I would suggest you www.resellerclub.com If you are a web designer, you can buy a reseller web hosting and offer your clients complete web hosting service including web hosting, domain registration and web designing. It is also good for those who have multiple sites. They can manage all sites under one control panel, and also can create his own web hosting account anytime. Reseller web hosting is slightly expensive than shared web hosting plans but reseller hosting has many good features.

Reseller web hosting plans also have certain limitations. You must ask about limitations and read "terms of services" before buying a reseller web hosting.
You must these basic questions before buying a reseller web hosting plan:
1) All question mentioned above for shared web hosting.

2) Number of accounts that you can create under your reseller account.

3) Overselling is enabled or disabled.

• Virtual Private Server (VPS) Hosting

Virtual Private Server (VPS) are also referred to as Virtual Dedicated Server (VDS). A complete server is actually divided into few VPS. Each VPS behaves like a complete dedicated server. The user of VPS can also have root access. Each VPS runs its own full-fledged operating system, and can reboot independently. However, the VPS have no direct access on server hardware and are usually booted from a disk image. As VPS runs its own operating system, user can install any software on its VPS.

If you want to have complete control of your server environment, and don't want to host your website with hundreds other website, than your should consider VPS. It is very cheap compared to dedicated servers and have almost same features.

• Dedicated Server Hosting

Dedicated server hosting gives you complete control and access to an entire server. You can host many sites on your dedicated server. Dedicated hosting is specialized and the customer gets dedicated hosting benefits such as secure, high quality physical infrastructure and high speed internet connectivity.
Cost of dedicated server mainly depends on its hardware configuration. A dedicated hosting solution especially attractive for large high-traffic websites, custom development projects creating complex web based applications, and web sites that require a high degree of uptime and total control of the hosting environment. But dedicated servers are costly, and very few persons buy dedicated web server hosting.