AwardSpace Free vs Shared Hosting: Which Plan Fits Your Site?

AwardSpace's free hosting is built for small sites — think a personal blog, a news page, or a project you're just launching — and the company sizes it at roughly 5,000 monthly visits. Its shared hosting plans target bigger operations: blogs with real traffic, eCommerce shops, and working businesses, with an estimated range of about 15,000 to 150,000 monthly visits. If you're under that free-tier ceiling and don't need a custom domain or eCommerce features, free hosting is the sensible starting point. If you're planning to grow past it, or you need more domains and a real business presence, a paid shared plan is the one to look at.

What the free plan actually gives you

AwardSpace has offered free hosting since 2003 and describes it as ad-free, running on PHP and MySQL, with a free subdomain included. The company positions it for small blogs, news media, and idea launches, and gives an approximate monthly visit figure of around 5,000.

That's the whole pitch: a working PHP/MySQL environment, no ads forced onto your pages, and a subdomain so you can get online without buying a domain. It's a fit if you're testing an idea, running a low-traffic personal site, or learning your way around hosting before committing money.

What the shared plans add

The shared hosting line is where the paid tiers start, and the differences that matter are domain count, the domain-for-life perk, and the traffic ceiling the company attaches to each tier.

All three paid tiers list MySQL, PostgreSQL, PHP 5/7/8, Perl, a 30-day money-back guarantee, and 24/7 support. Max Pack Plus additionally lists ASP.NET. AwardSpace advertises 99.9% uptime and a one-click CMS installer across its hosting services.

The WordPress hosting service sits alongside shared hosting and is aimed at the same traffic band — roughly 15,000 to 150,000 monthly visits — for anyone who wants to build specifically on WordPress.

How to choose

Work through these in order:

1. Estimate your monthly visits. Under ~5,000 and not growing fast? Free hosting covers it. Heading toward 15,000 or beyond? Move to shared.
2. Count your domains. One site on a subdomain → free. Two sites → Basic. Up to ten → Web Pro Plus. More than that, or you want room to add sites freely → Max Pack Plus.
3. Decide whether you need a real domain. Free hosting gives you a subdomain. If you want your own domain name, the paid tiers are where that becomes part of the package — Web Pro Plus includes one free domain for life, Max Pack Plus includes two.
4. Check whether you're running a business. AwardSpace explicitly frames shared hosting for eCommerce shops and working businesses, and free hosting for small blogs and idea launches. If customers are paying you, the paid tier is the intended fit.
5. Factor in the safety net. Paid plans carry a 30-day money-back guarantee and 24/7 support. The free tier doesn't list those.

Pricing signals worth noting

AwardSpace's page shows a shared hosting entry point at $2.99 for the first year, and the plan cards list monthly rates: Basic at $0.25–$0.30/month, Web Pro Plus at $7.57–$9.08/month, and Max Pack Plus starting at $9.83. Currency alternates between USD and EUR on the page. Treat these as the figures AwardSpace publishes rather than fixed commitments — check the pricing page for current numbers before ordering, since promotional first-year rates and monthly rates are not the same thing.

The short version

Start free if your site is small, you're fine on a subdomain, and you're not selling anything yet. Move to Basic when you need two domains and unlimited resources. Choose Web Pro Plus or Max Pack Plus when you want a free domain for life, more domains to host, and the support and refund guarantees that come with a paid account. The dividing line AwardSpace itself draws is traffic and purpose: ~5,000 visits for free, ~15,000–150,000 for shared, with business use pointed at the paid side.