Hosting basics
What is web hosting?
Website hosting is the service that stores your site and shows it to visitors when they type your domain. This guide explains web hosting in plain English, without the tech jargon.
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Web hosting explained
Web hosting (or website hosting) is rented space on a server connected to the internet. Your website files live there. When someone visits your domain, hosting serves those files to their browser.
A hosting company (also called a hosting provider or web hosting service) runs the servers, keeps them online, and gives you a way to connect your site. You pay them monthly or yearly. For a typical small business site, that is often around $10 to $30 per month if you shop around yourself, or managed for you through a provider like SiteSubs.
Domain, website, and hosting: what is the difference?
These three work together and get mixed up all the time.
Domain name: your address online (e.g. yourbusiness.com.au). You register it separately through a registrar.
Website: the pages, text, images, and code people see when they arrive.
Web hosting: the server that stores your website files and makes them available on the internet. Without hosting, your domain has nowhere to point.
People sometimes say "domain hosting" when they mean either registering a domain or the hosting account your site runs on. In practice you usually need both: a domain from a registrar and hosting from a hosting company. See our guide on what is a domain name if that part is still unclear.
What is a web hosting service?
A web hosting service is what you buy from a hosting company to run your site. They provide the server, uptime, and usually tools to upload or manage your site (often through something called cPanel or a similar control panel).
When you sign up, you get a hosting account. That account is linked to your domain through DNS settings so visitors reach your site when they type your address.
For most Australian small businesses, you do not need to understand the internals. You need hosting that stays online, loads at a reasonable speed, and has HTTPS (the padlock in the browser).
How it works
Types of web hosting (the ones that matter for small business)
Hosting companies sell many plans. For a normal business website, only a couple of types usually apply.
- 01
Shared hosting
Your site shares a server with other sites. This is the most common and affordable option for brochure sites and small WordPress sites. What is shared hosting in practice? Enough power for most local businesses, as long as the host is reputable.
- 02
Managed hosting
Someone else handles hosting setup, SSL, and support for the hosting side. SiteSubs offers managed hosting for small businesses, typically around $20/month for a standard site.
- 03
What you can ignore for now
VPS, dedicated servers, and cloud hosting are for developers or high-traffic apps. If you run a tradie, clinic, or local service site, shared or managed hosting is almost always enough.
- 04
Email is separate
Business email (hello@yourbusiness.com.au) usually comes from Google Workspace, Microsoft 365, or similar, not from basic web hosting. Web hosting stores your site; email hosting is a different service, though DNS connects them. See our email setup guide if you need that next.
Questions
Frequently asked questions
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