What is web hosting?
Web hosting provides the infrastructure required to make a website or application accessible on the internet, typically servers, storage, networking, and related services.
What is the difference between shared, VPS, and dedicated hosting?
Shared hosting places multiple sites on one server. VPS (Virtual Private Server) allocates virtualised resources on a shared machine. Dedicated hosting gives one customer control over an entire physical server.
How is cloud hosting different from traditional hosting?
Cloud hosting uses virtualised infrastructure across multiple machines or regions, allowing flexible scaling, redundancy, and managed services for databases, storage, and networking.
Why is hosting important for digital performance and SEO?
Hosting quality affects speed, uptime, and reliability. Fast, stable sites provide better user experiences, support stronger SEO, and reduce the risk of downtime during key campaigns.
What should businesses consider when choosing a hosting solution?
They should assess performance, scalability, security, support, geographic locations of servers, integration options, and overall cost relative to expected traffic and growth.
How does hosting impact security and compliance?
Hosting providers offer security features such as firewalls, DDoS protection, SSL, backups, and compliance certifications. Correct configuration is crucial to protect data and meet regulatory requirements.
How does managed hosting differ from self-managed infrastructure?
Managed hosting includes provider support for maintenance, updates, monitoring, and sometimes application-level assistance, while self-managed requires in-house teams to handle most operational tasks.
What is a CDN and how does it relate to hosting?
A Content Delivery Network (CDN) caches your static assets across multiple global locations, serving content from the nearest node to users, improving speed and reliability.
How does hosting influence deployment and development workflows?
Modern hosting setups integrate with CI/CD pipelines, enabling automated builds, tests, and deployments, which supports faster iteration and safer releases.
When should an organisation consider upgrading or changing its hosting?
When traffic grows significantly, performance issues emerge, security requirements increase, or new architectures (such as microservices or headless experiences) are introduced.
