How much it costs to set up a website

In today’s business landscape, having a website or email domain is crucial, and South African companies have a variety of hosting providers to choose from. Some offer entry-level website packages for as low as R19 per month, while others provide email-only hosting plans starting at R30 per month. Important factors to consider when selecting a hosting provider include cost, website builders, databases, email accounts, and storage space. MyBroadband compared these factors among providers like Afrihost, Absolute Hosting, Domains, Mweb, Xneelo, and 1-grid. The article also highlights the most affordable and feature-rich options for both website and email hosting.

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How much it costs to host a basic website in South Africa

By Myles Illidge

Having a website or email domain for your brand is a critical aspect of business in today’s age, and South African companies have a range of hosting providers from which to choose.

Several providers in South Africa offer entry-level website packages for as little as R19 per month and email-only hosting plans from R30 per month.

South African businesses used to be able to access entry-level hosting services for under R10 per month, but most companies have done away with those very cheap entry-level services.

Important considerations to make when choosing a hosting provider include the cost of the service and features such as website builders, databases, email addresses, and storage space.

MyBroadband compared entry-level website and email hosting packages available in South Africa based on these factors.

We selected the cheapest options from providers like Afrihost, Absolute Hosting, Domains, Mweb, Xneelo, and 1-grid.

Basic website hosting

Absolute Hosting offers the most affordable entry-level hosting package in South Africa at R19 per month.

This includes one MySQL database, a free domain, and a website builder.

Its nearest competitor is Afrihost’s Linux Silver package for R59 per month, which provides 1GB of storage, 50 email accounts, one MySQL database, a domain, and a website builder.

Xneelo’s Basic package is priced at R89 per month. Subscribers will get 5GB of storage, 100 email accounts, five MySQL databases, and five domains.

However, they must pay an additional R39 monthly for access to a website builder.

Priced at R99 per month, 1-grid’s small and Mweb’s 10GB packages offer 10GB of storage and one free domain. However, 1-grid offers 100 email accounts, while Mweb only supports 5.

On the other hand, Mweb’s 10GB package provides five MySQL databases, compared to one on 1-grid’s plan, and a free website builder, while 1-grid Small customers must pay R119 a month extra to use one.

Domains.co.za’ Sitebuilder Lite is the most expensive and most feature-rich of the lot at R109 per month. It offers 10GB of storage, 100 email accounts, five MySQL databases, and five domains, and it includes a website builder.

It should be noted that Absolute Hosting and Afrihost have similarly priced products with slightly different sets of features.

For example, Absolute Hosting offers a package for R105 per month with 10GB storage, 4 domains, 200 email accounts, and 4 databases.

All of the entry-level hosting packages compared offer unlimited traffic.

Entry-level website hosting comparison
Feature	Absolute Hosting Directadmin SSD Silver	Afrihost Linux Silver	Xneelo Basic	1-grid Small	Mweb 10GB	Domains Sitebuilder Lite
Storage	500MB	1GB	5GB	10GB	10GB	10GB
Email accounts	10	50	100	100	5	100
Traffic allowance	Unlimited	Unlimited	Unlimited	Unlimited	Unlimited	Unlimited
MySQL databases	1	1	5	1	5	5
Domains	1	1	10	1	1 (for 1 year)	5
Website builder	Free	Free	R39/month	From R119/month	Free	Free
Price per month	R19	R59	R89	R99	R99	R109

Basic email hosting

Absolute Hosting’s Silver-tier Email Only package is the cheapest compared to Afrihost, Domains, and 1-Grid’s offerings.

Priced at R30 per month, it provides ten email accounts and 5GB of storage, and includes a free email domain.

For R9 more per month, Afrihost’s Bronze package also offers ten email accounts. However, it doesn’t include an email domain and offers 4GB less storage.

Domains’ Email Hosting 10 package offers similar specs to Absolute Hosting’s plan for R49 per month.

For the same price, 1-Grid’s Email Basic package provides 10GB of storage and a free email domain for one year.

1-Grid doesn’t specify how many email accounts it allocates for its Email Basic customers.

Xneelo and Mweb don’t offer email-only hosting plans.

Entry-level email hosting comparison
Feature	Absolute Hosting Email Only Silver	Afrihost Bronze	Domains Email Hosting 10	1-Grid Email Basic
Email accounts	10	10	10	Not specified
Storage	5GB	1GB	5GB	10GB
Domain	Yes	No	Yes	Yes (free for 1 year)
Price per month	R30	R39	R49	R49

This article was first published by MyBroadBand and is republished with permission.

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