Unlimited web hosting. Whats the deal?

[dcb1101]

Some web hosting companies give you a certain amount of space. Some have unlimited plans. I love the idea of having unlimited space and bandwidth but I have head that there is really no such thing as unlimited hosting. Is this true? Are there any web hosting companies that actually do have unlimited hosting without having a bunch of hidden limits?

 

[Hostlumina]

Well, Ask yourself this. Is there a hard drive with unlimited storage?

The whole unlimited storage is really just a marketing play. If you read through the fine print you will find more than a handful of limitations. So at the end, it's not unlimited.... Also, servers tend to be a lot more over crowed and higher abusers causing server performance issues (from my own personal experience in the past).

Every host has limitations on resources, it comes down to how well they are managed. Some hosts have managed the "unlimited" very well but rarely.

 

[RDO Servers]

I typically suggest to completely avoid "unlimited" hosts.

Like HostLumina said, there is no such thing as unlimited. Hosts that offer this type of plan, have no good way of keeping up how much resources a can be used up on their servers. Next thing you know, one user uploads a ton of data on their "unlimited" plan, on a server that is already over crowded, and all users face issues!

A quality hosts will offer set limits, and not oversell their servers. i.e. A server with 4TB of space, will hold 400 x 10GB accounts. Even if the average user only uses 1GB of space, they do not put more account on the server.

Unlimited hosts work quite differently. They tell everyone they have unlimited space, but add all sorts of other limits on what you can host, single file size, CPU/memory usage, etc, etc, etc.

Now don't get me wrong. I have seen some quality hosts that offer a unlimited plan. Not all are created equal, but be careful. Read the fine print, ask questions, and to answer No, there is no such thing as truly unlimited!

 

[dcb1101]

Thanks guys. Thats what I was thinking too. Just wondering if that was the case or if there were any actually quality unlimited hosting out there

 

[MightWeb]

Well, there are quality companies that advertise unlimited - but just as has been mentioned, there is no such thing as unlimited. It's always regulated by what you can and can not do in the Terms of Service or in the AUP.
To give you a clear example, StableHost advertises unlimited bandwidth. It's sure not unlimited, but they're a quality company, and their limit would typically be higher than most other hosts. Then again, the major issue is when companies advertise unlimited diskspace.

 

[MrRapidHost]

There is nothing really called unlimited, if you pay close attention to their TOS, you will see a usage policy that will restrict most of your usage.
And mostly unlimited provider are overselling.

 

[ElixantTechnology]

As everyone before has said, there really is no such thing as Unlimited. A lot of people also need to consider, how big is your average website? The average static website will only be a couple hundred megabytes up to a gigabyte. The average dynamic website will usally only be up to 5 gigabytes in size. This defeats the whole purpose of having unlimited space right out of the gates, proving that it is only a marketing ploy. Though companies offer unlimited space, the limit the accounts by inode usage for example, other providers will suspend your account once you hit 5-10GB of storage claiming that you are abusing the resources provided. In the end, what is the point of having such a huge amount of space for one website, when you are only guaranteed 256MB of RAM with these "Unlimited" hosts, it's not like you'll actually be able to serve that much content in the end. Rule of thumb, keep away from Unlimited.

 

[sharplesson]

It is all their marketing strategies, Unlimited is no term in web hosting. Everything is limited in it.

1) Web space - Ask your web host what is unlimited means. Normally you won't cross the space allocated to you.
2) bandwidth - This is most important part, initially website owners are new in blogging, and that is why they will not consume the allotted bandwidth. But as soon as you will get more traffic, it will create a trouble some for those webmasters who will cross their limit.

Before closing a deal, just clear your bandwidth and uptime terms with your web host.

thanks
web hosting tips
sharplesson

 

[MightWeb]

Worth noting that "unlimited" diskspace is a much bigger issue than bandwidth. Bandwidth is dead cheap and you're unlikely to cross the limits with a provider deciding to use the term "unlimited" for it.

 

[proka]

Its acutally really unlimited (not inifnite, but you can get as much space as you need). Because 95% of the clients needs max 100 MB for their websites. The rest 5% needs a bit more, but their costs are paid by the people with <100 MB websites. Its a win for 5% of clients.

 

[ElixantTechnology]

Unlimited and Infinite are one in the same, thus not actually possible.

Un (not) Limited is a term stating that customers have an infinite (in reality) amount of resources, which is impossible. When was the last time you purchased a computer that has unlimited storage on it? Hosts that offer these unlimited plans are also heavily limited in other ways, and unfortunately leave very little room for growth.

 

[Kyrie]

Unlimited = Uncapped

That's the only difference.

 

[lorettalschmitz]

Nearly every hosting provider out there offers an unlimited hosting plan, and they’ll tout features such as unlimited disk space and unlimited bandwidth. Sounds too good to be true, right? Well, yes and no.
Just look through webmastersun.com and you'll find what you are looking for.