So you want to make a website for free. You have already found many free website builders that will host your website for free, but none of these sites allow you to have your own domain.
WordPress, for example, will give you a free website. That looks pretty good, but your website will always be found as a WordPress subdomain, like YourBlog.WordPress.com. WordPress will allow you to host your own domain through them, but you will have to pay.
So, can you create a website with your own domain name for free? Or is it impossible? Today, we’re here to help you answer that question.
Editor’s Note: I’ve been using BlueHost since I started my website and I trust them completely. . . I was able to grow my website to over 100,000 visits a month with Bluehost and I love their customer support and reliability.
I highly recommend using Bluehost for your first website, and you can start now for $3.95 /month, which is an exclusive offer available only here from Bebusinessed. If you choose to make a purchase, I’ll earn a small commission.
Yes, you can
First, some people may tell you that it’s impossible to create a website with your own domain for free.
That’s not true! You can certainly create a website with your own domain for free. The only restriction, and the only thing you really have to pay for, is the domain name itself.
Usually when you set up an account with a free website builder, you get a free subdomain that it acts as your site’s temporary address while it’s under construction.
Once your website has been set up, however, you can attach a new (or previously purchased) domain name to your hosting account free.
Yes, you paid for the domain (which is about $10 per year), but the rest of the website is free.
Remember that a custom domain name is an asset Valuable for any company. It gives your business and website a more professional look. It shows clients that you’re willing to pay that small $10 fee for a more professional presence on the internet.
With that in mind, it’s not surprising that modern website builders often allow you to connect your own custom domain name.
Here’s a list of website builders that let you do just that.
Website builders that let you connect your own custom domain name domain
Weebly
Weebly is one of the most popular website building tools on the Internet today. It has free hosting accounts as well as an educational account for teachers. The drag and drop interface makes basic website creation and blog hosting surprisingly easy. Best of all, you can connect your own custom domain to Weebly.
Squarespace
Squarespace is a web hosting service that offers an all-in-one solution for your website creation needs. websites. The service specifically caters to bloggers, musicians, podcasters, and designers, but many small businesses use the site builder as well. No matter what type of business you run, you can connect your own custom domain to Squarespace for free and without much hassle.
LetsEat
As the name suggests, LetsEat is a site builder website that specifically caters to the restaurant industry. Helps restaurants design, host, and manage their own online websites. You can connect a custom domain to this website builder to present a professional front for your website.
Wix
Possibly the best looking free website builder available today, Wix is a popular solution for both businesses and individual users. The company offers free hosting plans, though paid hosting plans start at around $5 per month. The website builder itself is extremely easy to use and is built in HTML5. You can drag and drop elements to your site, drag to rearrange elements, and take advantage of free templates. Wix encourages you to purchase a domain name through their service, although you can also bring your own custom domain to the platform.
Ultimately, the vast majority of website builders allow you to import your own custom domain. The only real restriction is trying to find one that offers it for free with a reasonable amount of bandwidth.
Most website building tools offer free hosting and free custom domain setup. , for example, but many of these services only offer their most basic bandwidth and storage tiers (think 20-100MB of free storage and less than 1GB of bandwidth, for example).
How do I get a free domain name?
Nobody really gives a free domain name online without getting something in return.
Fortunately, many website builders will offer you a free domain name registration when you buy, say, an annual plan.
Of course, after that first year expires, you’ll be forced to pay the annual domain name renewal fee.Sometimes the site will bug you into renewing the domain through its own renewal service, which is priced at, say, $15 per year instead of the usual fee of $10 or so. If that’s the case, then don’t be afraid to buy your domain through a third-party site.
Unless you win a contest or get a domain through a friend, there’s no way to get a free domain name online without paying at least something in return.
How to create a website for free using a previously purchased domain name
If you already bought a domain name on the past, or if you’ve purchased a domain name from someone else, then connecting that domain to your free website hosting account is easy.
Usually all you need to do is log into the site where you registered your domain name. then modify the NS records for your domain according to the instructions provided by your custom website builder (typically you just change two fields in your domain control panel to something like NS1.YourNewWebHost.com and NS2. YourNewWebHost.com).
Once you’ve done that, it tells your domain to look at your web host’s servers for content information. Your domain will then be populated with content from their free web host.
How to Buy a New Domain Name
If you don’t already own a domain name and want a custom domain for your new site, you may have to work hard and pay the fee.
Registering a new domain requires you to work with a domain registrar like NameCheap or GoDaddy.
No matter where you shop, You can expect to pay around $10 USD for one year of your custom .com domain registration. If you lock your domain for an additional 2, 3, 4, or 5 years, you might get a small discount, but that $10 USD fee is still pretty hard to beat.
Of course, certain extensions vary in price. Websites ending in .net, for example, tend to cost $2 or $3 more than a .com domain, as do websites ending in .org.
Today, there are dozens of of new top-level domains, or TLDs, that allow your website to end up with all sorts of crazy combinations, including .club or .us.com. These TLDs vary greatly in price and are often owned by private resellers. In general, .com is the safest bet when you’re buying a new domain. It’s the one that’s recognized around the world.
Why you should consider paying more than “free” for your website
Editor’s note: I recommend using BlueHost for your first website, and you can get started now for just $3.95/month. BlueHost makes it incredibly easy to create a new site with its automatic one-click WordPress blog installation. Creating a free website with your own custom domain sounds like a great way to save money.
In the long run, however, free websites are rarely a smart way to go.
For example, free web hosts usually don’t allow you to display your own ads on the site. In fact, many of these sites will display their own ads (they have to make money somehow, right?)
Another problem is that when you sign up for free hosting, your website will go ridiculously slow, especially if you have images or videos hosted on your site. Web hosts can’t afford to give free users loads of bandwidth, so you’ll end up getting whatever trickle of bandwidth is left over after paid users have had their fill.
Many free website hosts will also fill your website with their own branding. They may not allow you to edit the footer of their website, for example, which is where they display a link to their own site and other branding information. Not only is this unprofessional, but it can encourage users to click away from your own site.
One last problem is lack of storage space. Free web hosts may only give you 20MB to 100MB of storage space, for example, which is barely enough to upload more than a handful of images.
For all these reasons, creating A paid website is always the best option for legitimate businesses or individuals who want to show a professional face to the world. It’s a small price (often priced at just $4 or $5 per month for basic hosting) that will give you a big return on your investment.
And of course, as soon as you upgrade to hosting paid web plan, no web host will give you trouble using your own paid domain name.
To sum it up: yes, you can create a website for free with your own domain. But it’s usually a better option to pay $4 or $5 a month plus the $10 a year domain registration fee.
Editor’s note: I’ve used BlueHost ever since i started my website and i trust them implicitly. I was able to grow my website to over 100,000 visits a month with Bluehost and I love their customer support and reliability.
I highly recommend using Bluehost for your first website, and you can start now to $3.95/month, which is an exclusive offer only available here from Bebusinessed. If you choose to make a purchase, I will earn a small commission.
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