Hosting with F2G.NET is free which is kind of awesome. It does come with PHP support, MySQL databases, and a generous allotment of storage space (though "generous" is relative – it can range from 200MB up to 1GB depending on the plan you get – still not huge but plenty for a test site or a simple personal project). You can access your account via FTP so you can upload files however you want rather than relying on some questionable web-based interface.
The downside (aside from a very limited number of resources – there’s always a downside) is ads. Their banner ads are plastered all over your site (annoying, but we’ll get to that in a second). Hey, you get free hosting – don’t complain about a little advertising! If you’re setting up a personal site or if you’re just starting out with web development, it’s not a big deal. If you’re trying to launch something professional though, stop right now. Ads completely undermine any professionalism you could have had for your site. Oh – and don’t get your hopes up on performance either. Servers are slow and loading times can suffer, especially during peak usage when every other free user is swarming the shared hosting space. You know what they say, you get what you pay for. Or in this case, what you DON’T pay for.
Storage space and bandwidth, both important criteria, are as you’d expect in the mid-range for free hosting. You won’t get unlimited in any category (nobody does) but you will get a solid amount to run most small blogs and portfolio sites, or maybe one landing page for a side project. As for bandwidth, there’s enough to support normal visitor loads. F2G’s stated specs for both of these factors are typical of middle-of-the-road free providers, so take that as good but not stellar.
The control panel is, well, OK. It’s not cPanel which some people love and others can’t stand but it works fine. Manage databases, add/remove email accounts (but the deliverability of those accounts is a crapshoot with free hosting), set DNS settings – the usual. It’s a little dated in appearance (looks like a webpage from the early 2010s) but whatevs – it works. Which is sometimes all you need. Give me a drab but ugly interface that works any day over a pretty one that breaks every other day.
Server performance and uptime, at least in the short-term, are decent but not exceptional. Bear in mind this is free hosting we’re talking about so you won’t get the type of speed and stability that a premium or mid-level provider would afford. Since all of the services on a F2G server are sharing limited resources, sometimes your site will run quickly, and sometimes it won’t. The uptime is fine most days, but again the occasional hitch is just par for the course. When times get tough on the server and sites get throttled, free sites will often take a performance hit in lieu of those who pay. If you need solid uptime and speed for your website, this is not the place to look. But if it’s a testing environment, or personal project site, this will be fine in that regard.
In addition to basic web server stuff, F2G supports PHP and MySQL. So if you want to run a WordPress site, Joomla, or your own simple PHP scripts you should be able to do so without issue. This hosting environment will not support particularly resource-intensive back-end processes or resource-hog scripts, there are limits to that. CPU usage is capped and PHP execution time limited, so if you’re just planning on doing standard CMS installs and run-of-the-mill sites this will be more than enough. FTP access is available, and works just fine, if you prefer to upload files that way, as most people do in any case.
Let’s address the elephant in the room, shall we? What is the catch? Because of course there is a catch. F2G’s main “trade-off” for offering you a service for free is the inclusion of ads. Yes, they will plaster their name in one form or another across your pages. The advertising isn’t all that intrusive or terribly in your face (but of course that’s subjective) but it’s still the biggest deterrent for people signing up, and really the main catch. Customer support is also, well, lacking. They have a forum and a knowledge base (something you will be using a lot with a free provider), but if you want an actual real human being to answer your email or chat live with you, that’s not a feature offered for free accounts, just ones on a paid plan (they clearly want you to upgrade to one of those eventually). Terms of service for F2G are pretty much standard in being restrictive and censorious. You can’t have sites with high traffic loads, you can’t abuse system resources, you can’t host illegal content and you can’t generate excessive spam. Violate any of those and expect a suspension.
Uptime is probably about 95-98% which sounds pretty good until you remember that means 15-30 hours of downtime every month. It could be a planned maintenance outage, or it could be they’re down for… reasons. No warning, no explanation. Server’s down. Come back later. Hopefully. Your server load trumps their desire to keep the lights on. Since this is a hobby or personal project server this should be fine but any site or service that has business-critical information should NOT be hosted on a free server. In fact if you’re hosting anything of business or financial importance on a free server I’ll personally come to your house and smash your computer. Yes, I know where you live. Kthx.
So who is this host for? Web developers or people interested in the ins and outs of web hosting (a fun project for anyone who’s more hobbyist level), students with class projects they want to host, those wanting to test out a site design or some concept without spending any money, or personal hobby sites with very low traffic. Don’t use it for anything important or commercial that can’t handle random dips in uptime and performance issues. This is more a trial or testing phase ground, or a sandbox environment in which to dabble or work out your kinks and issues before you take your “real” site elsewhere and shell out for a paid provider. “Free” has a trade-off in every direction, but if your expectations are aligned with what free hosting can actually deliver instead of pinning hopes on the promise of premium service performance you likely won’t be disappointed in what F2G.NET has to offer.
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