Host Your Own Website for Free

Free website hosting is a great option for a website with low traffic, such as a personal website. It's also great for those of us who aren’t tech savvy and just want a free and easy way to put information online. You don't have to let money or tech skills keep you from making the website you want to make.

Steps

Free Third-Party Hosting

Below is a list of legitimate services, offering free website building and hosting. Most have a variety of professional themes to choose from or the option to customize a theme by changing colors, fonts, and images. Do an online search for specific advantages and limitations before deciding on the best option for you.

  • Pros of using the below services include:
    • Free hosting and support
    • Easy to set-up and manage
    • DIY tools
    • Professional looking templates/themes
    • Automatic backups
    • Built-in security features
  • Cons of using the below services include:
    • Advertisements on your website
    • Limited customization of templates/themes
    • You will not have your own domain name
    • Limited space and bandwidth
  1. Wordpress: Wordpress isn’t just a blog. You can build and host an entire website for free, and there are many professional looking templates to choose from.
  2. Weebly: Named one of TIME’s 50 Best Websites of 2007, Weebly is a drag-and-drop website builder. If you’re a visual person, this is a great choice for you.
    • Do an online search for Weebly to find the site.
    • Tour features and see if Weebly is a good match for your needs. Click the blue button at the bottom of the main page to begin.
    • Sign up with an email address and follow the directions to get started.
  3. Other Web hosting services: Some hosting companies offer free hosting, in addition to their paid services. Do your research on the best service to use and keep in mind that your space and bandwidth will be limited.

Hosting on Your Own Computer (Windows)

  1. Make sure you're permitted to host a site on your ISP. Many internet service providers (ISPs) restrict users from doing so.
  2. Find out your IP address.
    • Open Start, click Run, type "cmd" (without quotes) and press OK.
    • Enter "ipconfig/all" (without quotes) and press Enter.
    • Write down the shown IP address, subnet mask, default gateway and DNS servers. You will need them later.
  3. Open the Network Connections folder.
  4. Right click the internet connection you use.
  5. Select properties.
  6. Scroll through that menu until you see Internet protocol. Highlight it and click properties. Keep the command prompt window open.
  7. Click "use the following IP address." If it is already checked, skip to the step where you return to the command prompt window.
  8. Enter the info you copied down. The last digit of the IP address should be different than the one you copied down. Click OK.
    • If you get a message saying IP address is already in the network, choose a different last number.
  9. Go back to command prompt. Type in: "ping www.yahoo.com" (without quotes).
    • If it came back as "Reply from 67.195.160.76" or something similar, you're good to go.
    • If it came back as "Request timed out," contact your internet service provider. Because this problem is the DNS servers, they will be able to tell you which DNS servers to use.
    • You have completed the first step which is to setup a static IP address. Please note: This usually requires a router to do. The reason being, you are just giving your router a static IP. If you do not have a router, you need to pay for a static IP from your ISP, or sign up for a free static DNS service.
  10. Download Wampserver. Wampserver is good because it contains Apache and automatically configures itself.
    • Note: During installation it will ask for a server name. type "localhost" for the server name. You must type it exactly as shown here, but do not include the quotes. When asked for an email address, enter your email address.
  11. Create a folder in the www directory. Save the files for your site in that folder.
    • The address for your site will be: yourstaticipaddress/yourfolderinthewwwdirectory/. Except if you signed up for a static DNS service.
  12. Register a domain name and point it to the address to your site.

Warnings

  • For self-hosted sites, your site will go down if you lose your internet connection, your computer loses power, or your system crashes.
  • Not all advice on the Internet is legal or accurate. Unless you're a tech guru and know what to look for, stick to suggestions from reputable sources.
  • Note that if you host your website on your PC, the your site is likely to respond more slowly than traditionally-hosted sites.
  • You usually get what you pay for. If a free hosting service or method seems too good to be true, it probably is.

Things You'll Need

  • A computer with an internet connection.
  • A working email address.

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