Free Website Hosting Options

Here is a list of free website hosting options. I maintain this list because I want everyone to have access to hosting a website, regardless of their financial situation.

For each option, I have created a YouTube video tutorial (link in the last column) to show you exactly how to make a website on that hosting platform. Here is a playlist with all tutorials if you are interested.

#	Hosting	Difficulty	Customization	Limitations	Blogging	Watermarked	YouTube Tutorial
1	000WebHost	Moderate	Some	Yes	Yes	Yes	https://youtu.be/9ihEBbxNNrA
2	AWS Lambda	Moderate	Some	Yes	Yes	No	https://youtu.be/MoupNut6HMM
3	Blogger	Beginner	Some	No	Yes	Yes	https://youtu.be/-sDQfu9XqBM
4	Carrd	Beginner	Minimal	No	No	Yes	https://youtu.be/I8Z_KChRmLQ
5	GitHub Pages	Advanced	Most	No	No	No	https://youtu.be/o5g-lUuFgpg
6	Google Cloud Platform	Advanced	Most	Yes	Yes	No	https://youtu.be/f56PG7QxjFI
7	Google Firebase	Moderate	Most	Yes	Yes	No	https://youtu.be/gtcUIQNhgyQ
8	Google My Business	Beginner	Minimal	No	No	Yes	https://youtu.be/-hJveJKkFys
9	Google Sites	Beginner	Minimal	No	No	No	https://youtu.be/RPtyPYJHCEY
10	InfinityFree	Moderate	Some	Yes	Yes	No	https://youtu.be/oXB1D8J3yZs
11	Oracle Cloud	Advanced	Most	Yes	Yes	No	https://youtu.be/yWVD6qmQrb8
12	Weebly	Beginner	Some	Yes	Yes	No	https://youtu.be/nqTNZ7Mzhyk
13	Wix	Beginner	Most	Yes	Yes	Yes	https://youtu.be/x2cYwzzb3Gc
14	WordPress.com	Moderate	Some	Yes	Yes	Yes	https://youtu.be/cxQ53JAPJgE

The colored columns summarize some important factors when choosing a hosting platform including:

Difficulty: beginner friendly, moderate technical ability, or highly technical
Customization: how customizable is the hosting platform?
Limits: some free hosting platforms have limits like monthly pageviews, storage space, etc.
Bloggable: is it possible to have a blog?
Watermarked: some free hosting platforms put their branding on your free website unless you upgrade

There are always trade offs when picking web hosting, so try to find a balance that meets your requirements.

What is the Best Free Website Hosting?

The list is in alphabetical order because I do not see one better than the other. It all depends on what kind of website you want to make. Likewise, all web host platforms are not created equal, and the same goes for free website hosting options.

My recommendations are as follows for beginners (i.e. no technical ability):

Want a blog? Blogger
Want a website for your business? Google Sites is better than Google My Business
Want a simple website with social media links? Carrd

If you are technically inclined, Oracle Cloud and Google Cloud Platform (GCP) are both great options with root access for the ultimate customization, but they do come with resource limits. Google Firebase is just a wrapper around the GCP with stricter limits, but it’s much easier to work with.

For those of you who fall somewhere in the middle, GitHub Pages is a good option for a simple static website (i.e. a website without a database). AWS Lambda also falls into the static category, but its monthly limits make it an inferior option.

I see the rest of the options as too limiting and/or advertisement-infested.

Other Free Hosting Options

Another option to host a website without paying is to sign up for a free trial. This will give you a certain amount of time to experiment with the platform, anywhere from 30 days up to a year.

I also maintain a list of free trial web hosting at the bottom of my resource page.

Hope this helps!