I found out about a web host called NearlyFreeSpeech.net on the awesome website lifehacker.com. The interesting thing about NFS compared to other web hosts is that instead of charging a flat rate for certain bandwidth and storage space, nearlyfreespeech.net charges you based on how much bandwidth you receive or storage you actually use. So instead of paying $6-$15 a month for a web host, even if you don’t use all the storage or bandwidth they’re charging you, you can pay as little as a $1 per month for hosting for the stuff you’re actually using.
I decided to try out nearlyfreespeech.net, and after a month of using them I’d like to share the amount of money I’ve been charged.
Notes:
My period of time using NFS is from June 19th-July 19th.
During this time, my blog has had 606 views (google analytics).
My storage for this time has been around 10-15mb.
June 19-30 2011 Expenses
July 1-19 2011 Expenses
So excluding the $0.30 deposit fee, I’ve run my website for one month for $1.41 (~387 fills). I think that is pretty amazing and I highly recommend signing up and using nearlyfreespeech.net as your web host. Even if I get double, triple, or quadruple the amount of bandwidth usage or storage, I can’t see my monthly bill going higher than $10, which is what a lot of websites are charging as a flat rate, even when you don’t use the bandwidth or storage! NFS charge you on what you use, and from my experience its true.
Caution
Nearlyfreespeech.net is for the intermidiate to advance user. There is no control panel, and they don’t set up anything for you like myphp that wordpress or other types of websites need, you have to set all that up yourself. NFS has everything you need to start and run a website, but its up to you to set it up. You should be able to use FTP, and you should be able to do simple coding, or be able to follow guides online on how to set some stuff up. It’s not really difficult honestly.
yousefq8 