Hosting, explained plainly
A five-minute read for anyone getting a website for the first time. No sales pitch until the very last line.
Den här sidan finns än så länge bara på engelska. Fråga oss gärna på svenska via info@mobuhost.com.
- Domain, hosting, emailThe three parts and how they connect
- Kinds of hostingShared, VPS, dedicated, and which one we are
- How to choose a hostSix questions worth asking any provider
Domain, hosting, email
Think of a shop. The domain is the street address people type in, like yourbusiness.se. You rent it by the year from a registry, through a company called a registrar.
The hosting is the shop itself: space on a server that is switched on all day, holding your website's files and answering when someone visits.
Email on your domain, like hello@yourbusiness.se, usually lives with the hosting, but it does not have to.
The domain points at the hosting through a few settings called DNS records. That is why you can keep a domain at one company and host at another, and why moving hosts does not mean changing your address.
Kinds of hosting
| Kind | What it is | Good for |
|---|---|---|
| Shared | Many sites on one server, each in its own walled-off account. The provider runs the server. | Business websites, WordPress, email. Most small businesses. |
| Managed WordPress | Shared or virtual hosting with WordPress updates, staging and backups handled for you. | People who want WordPress without the upkeep, and will pay for it. |
| VPS | Your own slice of a server with its own operating system, which you manage. | Developers, custom software, Node.js or Python apps. |
| Dedicated | A whole physical server for you alone. | Large, busy sites with a technical team. |
mobuhost is shared hosting, with cPanel, on servers in Frankfurt. We do not sell VPS or dedicated servers, and our WordPress page explains what is and is not managed.
How to choose a host
Six questions worth asking any provider, us included:
- What does it cost when it renews? Many hosts advertise a first-year price and renew at two to four times as much. The renewal price is the real price.
- Where are the servers? Inside the EU keeps your data under GDPR.
- Are there backups I can restore from, and how often? If the answer is vague, keep your own copies.
- Can I leave easily? Standard tools like cPanel mean another host can take your site as it is. Make sure the domain is registered to you.
- Who answers when something breaks? A chatbot, a ticket queue or a person.
- What does an uptime promise actually pay out? A percentage with no measurement and no compensation behind it is decoration.
If you want our answers to all six, the FAQ has them, including the ones that are not flattering. Or email info@mobuhost.com.