10 Best free web hosting platforms in 2024

If you’re looking forward to starting a blog or just a static site for your business or hobbies, chances are you’ve thought of the cost involved with hosting websites. Most premium hosting providers offer different categories of plans, mostly shared basic plans and VIP. 

For a single domain, prices can be as low as $0.8 and go up to $400 per month for premium hosting services. The prices depend on the type of hosting you choose.

However, not everyone can muster up the cash to host a website, or you’re not just ready to spend money on web hosting services. This begs the question; “Can I host my website for free?”. Hell yeah! You can host your website for free. Everyone loves “free,” but you should know that not all free things are equal. There is a famous saying, “if a service is free, you’re probably the product.”

You get what you pay for. Free hosting services attract a lot of unforeseen incidents. For example, if your website crashes while being hosted on a free platform, it’s up to you to fix it. Free hosting services offer little or no customer support.

Best free web hosting platforms

However, should you still want to proceed to choose free hosting providers, we’ve compiled a list of the top 10 best free web hosting platforms.

1. InfinityFree

InfinityFree is constantly ranked no.1 among the best free web hosting services. InfinityFree stands out for good reasons. InfinityTree has a well-developed website that immediately strikes confidence in the platform.

InfinityFree is powered by iFastNet. They’ve been around for over six years, and according to their website, they have over 400,000 active users to date. One of the primary reasons why InfinityFree stands out among other free web hosting services is that they offer users unlimited bandwidth and unlimited domains. They generously allow your site to clock 50,000 daily hits while maintaining a standard load time. 

Most free services often have hidden fees, but InfinityFree is entirely free. Infinity tree has 5GB disk space and 400 MySQL databases, whereas other free services only give you a handful. Despite this being a free service, you’re guaranteed up to 99.9% uptime. However, if your site goes down, you’re entirely on your own.

InfinityFree has a very cheap premium plan at about $6.9 per month if you can spare the cash. The premium plan includes everything in free plus customer support, and free Cloudflare railgun that drastically reduces load times. You should note that you won’t put up ads on your website.

2. 000WebHost

000Webhost is a branch of Hostinger that offers free web hosting services. 000Webhost is one of the oldest free web hosting platforms, they’ve been around for over ten years, and they have successfully hosted over 22 million websites from millions of users. Unfortunately, due to the large number of websites hosted on the platform coupled with it being a free service, it’s a honeypot for hackers. 

In 2015, 000Webhost’s entire database was compromised, with about 13.5 million accounts stolen. Since then, they’ve overhauled their security infrastructure, but users will never forget that day.

If you sign up for a free account, you’re provided with a cPanel, a website builder, and a WordPress auto-installer. Unlike InfinityFree, your bandwidth and disk space are limited; you’re given 3GB bandwidth and 300MB disk space. Like most free web hosting services, there are no SSL certificates, but surprisingly there are no subdomains, email accounts, and absolutely zero customer support.

3. Wix

Wix isn’t traditionally a web hosting provider. Wix is a drag-and-drop website builder similar to WordPress, Weebly, or Squarespace. Wix simplifies the creation of websites by eliminating the need to code before developing websites. 

Wix is a premium service, but it features on our list of best free web hosting providers because they also offer a free plan for hosting websites with minimal features. Wix provides you with a unique way to build websites quickly. It is one of the most reliable free web hosting platforms. 

When you sign up for the free plan, you get access to a free Wix.com domain, beautiful, customizable design templates, 500MB disk space, 500MB bandwidth, Free SSL, Decent load time. Most surprisingly, Wix’s free plan offers customer support, so you’re not entirely left in the dark when something goes wrong.

4. Byet

Byet is a branch of Byet Internet, a US-based provider of hosting, domain names, and reseller services. Byethost currently hosts over 1 million websites globally. According to Byethost, they offer the most effective hosting service designed solely for free hosting worldwide. 

Byet provides you with an ad-free load balanced, free hosting service that includes PHP, MySQL, FTP, and more. New users are provided with 1GB server storage, 50GB bandwidth monthly, FTP, PHP, and Vistapanel; a specialized control panel designed solely for Byethost. Although, sites hosted on Byethost always carry a subdomain, e.g., yoursite.byethost.com.

Byethost features the well-known Softaculous script installer inside the control panel. It also installs additional scripts like blogs, online shopping carts, social networks, etc. Byethost has both free and premium plans. Surprisingly, Byethost offers technical support with their free plan.

5. Google Cloud

Google cloud hosting is more of a “freemium” option in the sense that; it is not entirely free, but it offers a one-year free trial. Being a product from Google, one would expect premium services. However, being a partially free service, Google limits the features available in the free plan.

With the free plan, users can host one website, unlimited storage, and extensive support documentation if things in your website go sideways. All you need to get access to this service is a Google account. The free trial is calculated in two ways; 12 months or until you’ve used up the $300 credits it offers.

However, Google does a great job calculating the cost after your free trial has expired. Google uses a price calculator to help estimate your costs. 

6. GoogieHost

People frequently confuse GoogieHost with Google cloud. However, both are two different hosting providers. GoogieHost has been around for over eight years and is one of the most reliable free hosting providers in this not-so-great list of free web hosting services.

GoogieHost has over 2 million active users around the world. GoogieHost is the only free hosting provider that offers a cPanel and inbuilt Cloudflare protection to protect your site from DDoS attacks.

The process of creating an account with GoogieHost is a bit unconventional. New users are presented with some form of Recaptcha that can only be completed by providing a good reason why they should host your site. They do this to weed out spammers and automated bots. 

7. FreeHostingNoAds

FreeHostingNoAds is one of the best alternatives to GoogieHost. The platform does basically what its name says; free hosting but with no adverts meaning you can’t monetize your website. They offer both free and premium plans. In the free plan, users are entitled to one domain, 1GB disk space, one email account, one FTP, one MySQL database, and 50GB monthly traffic.

The control panel allows users to install Wordpress, Joomla, and Grav with one-click installs. The account creation process is pretty simple. Although, one major downside is that emails originating from websites hosted on this platform often end in the spam folder.

8. AwardSpace

AwardSpace is a top-rated web hosting provider. Like all the service providers on our list, they have free and paid plans. AwardSpace’s free plan provides users with one website, three domains, 1GB disk space, 5GB bandwidth, MySQL database, and most impressively, a 24/7 live chat feature that offers users support in real-time.

AwardSpace also features one-click installs for your Content Management System, coupled with the Zacky site builder. One significant advantage of AwardSpace is that it lets you monetize your site by allowing users to set up ads on the site. They also help you track your bandwidth usage so that you don’t end up wasting it.

9. Freehostia

Freehostia is a reliable web hosting provider that – as you guessed – has both free and paid plans. Freehostia provides users with a website builder packed with prebuilt templates. In addition to the website builder, they allow you to host up to 5 websites, offer 250MB disk space, 6GB monthly bandwidth, one MySQL database, and surprisingly no domains.

Freehostia provides users with an FAQ and ticket support system if they ever run into issues.

10. HyperPhp

HyperPhp is another free web hosting provider owned by iFastNet. The free plan offers users 1GB disk space, a free domain, MySQL database, free IT support, and a supportive community forum.

HyperPhp aims to make the process of launching a website a stress-free one. They allow you to transfer your existing domain and offer an automatic script installer that can be accessed through its VistaPanel.

Conclusion

Free web hosting platforms are never going to be perfect. However, they provide a great alternative to folks who don’t desire to purchase domains, SSL, and other things needed to launch a website.

Finding the right free hosting service is no easy task. However, we hope that this article has helped you narrow down your selection and can help you select the best free hosting provider for launching your next website.