A few years before now, we transferred files through different manual methods. Files were packed in envelopes and sent through messengers to the desired destination.

Later on, the postal services and many other agencies specializing in package pickup and delivery came up.

These agencies take some time before getting the files to the appropriate quarters, and if you don’t take proper care, the files can sometimes be misplaced or delivered to the wrong person.

It makes your data vulnerable in the wrong hands. These and many more factors gave computer scientists many reasons to provide online channels for sending files from place to place within fractions of a second.

Also, since we have computerized every aspect of human endeavors, it is only proper that file transfer also follows suit.

WHAT IS FILE TRANSFER PROTOCOL?

Protocols are a set of rules put in place to guide the transfer of data over a network. File Transfer Protocol (FTP) is the rules guiding files between two or more computers.

FTP is the most popular protocol when it comes to sharing data over the web. You can use it when downloading, uploading, or sending files to and from servers.

There must be an FTP client and an FTP server to transfer files to occur using this protocol. The client accesses the server and gets all the required files.

In web hosting, FTP is used to display the contents of your website on your web browser. Most times, the server that hosts your website is also an FTP server.

The FTP clients and server each have unique IP addresses, enabling seamless communication between the two systems. Some FTP services, such as Filezilla, can communicate with FTP servers and download or upload files.

WHAT IS FTP SITE HOSTING?

FTP site hosting is a platform for sharing and exchanging large over the internet through an online file storage system that is secured and reliable. FTP site hosting allows one person to send files to many other people without using the email services.

Emails have a file size limit of 25MB. If you work with big companies handling extensive data, you might not be able to send many of your files via email. Also, emails have a restriction on the file type. You might not be able to send the file format (e.g., .zip, .tgz, etc.) you are working with over mail. It can be a severe challenge.

Thankfully, we have FTP hosting to the rescue. You can send any file format irrespective of its size to anyone with an FTP account. You do not only send; you get to receive files too.

FTP SITE HOSTING VS FTP SERVICE FOR WEB HOSTING

These are two terms usually used in place of the other. While they are closely related and similar, they are two different concepts entirely. Let us get this right before we proceed any further.

FTP site hosting affords you the opportunity of owning up to a thousand FTP accounts. Passwords protect these accounts. FTP site hosting is a medium of transferring large files between individuals and companies without worrying about the file size.

The FTP service for web hosting, on the other hand, is used by a website owner or developer to send files to a website on a server. It is just a single FTP account used to upload files to websites.

They are two different scenarios, even though they base on the same principles.

BENEFITS OF FTP SITE HOSTING

If you are a small business, you might not be needing this hosting for now. It is more beneficial to companies and individuals who need to transfer large volumes of data to different people.

There are multiple accounts, one for each person, and passwords protect each account. It further ensures data privacy and security. Files meant for one person will not be accessible to another.

Large companies, businesses, and individuals such as engineering firms, transcriptionists, accountancy firms, designers, printers, lawyers, artists, developers, medical practitioners who need to transfer large files over the internet safely will find FTP site hosting useful.

BEST FTP HOSTING PROVIDERS

Let us now look at the hosting companies who have distinguished themselves by providing excellent FTP hosting services. They include:

1. A2 HOSTING

A company founded by Bryan Muthig in 2001, A2 hosting is a swift web hosting company with turbo servers that can provide 20 times the speed of any standard hosting.

A2 offers around-the-clock server monitoring and malware scanning, so you don’t experience any break out on your site. It does this by featuring HackScan, a tool that helps you monitor and scan for malware.

This hosting provider provides top-notch developer-friendly tools and CMS for you to explore. It makes it easy to install WordPress, Drupal, OpenCart, Magneto, and Joomla in just a click without a developer’s help.

A2 Hosting packages provide free Cloudflare CDN and enhanced plugins to help make your content management systems faster.

What’s more? The hosting provider offer webmaster or agencies who want to host various site under the same roof. You’ll get free server rewind backups, multiple versions of Phyton, Apache, MySQL, Ruby, etc.

We also like that A2 offers free site migration, reliable uptime of 99.97%, and a money-back guarantee for its entire plan if you’re satisfied with the features.

It has an FTP rating of 4.8/5 (according to hostingadvice.com). It clearly shows that they provide seamless and excellent FTP hosting. Some other features of A2 hosting are:

  • Super-fast and reliable hosting services.
  • Free solid-state drives(SSD)
  • Unlimited data storage and transfer capabilities
  • High-quality tools are available to developers.
  • Customers support is accessible 24/7 via phone, email and live chat.
  • Once you open an account, it is activated instantly.
  • A2 hosting is eco-friendly. They rely on green energy sources to power their systems.
  • You have the freedom to choose any FTP client you desire. Examples of FTP clients are SmartFTP, FileZilla, etc.
  • There is awesome support for FTP and SFTP (Secure File Transfer Protocol) with free SSH access.
  • 99.9% uptime guaranteed.
  • Migration to A2 hosting is free.
  • 30-day money-back guarantee.
  • Multiple back-ups carried out to secure your files.

PRICING: FTP hosting on A2 hosting goes for $5 monthly. It is the starting price. It will be a little higher upon renewal.

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2. HOSTINGER

It is another massive option when considering FTP hosting. You get a lot of value for a meager price. Amazing, right?

This employee-owned company which was founded in 2004, now has over 29 million users. All thanks to the quality hosting services they have provided over the years.

According to our good pal, hostingadvice.com, Hostinger has a 4.7-star rating out of 5. Let us see the features that account for this:

  • You have access to unlimited FTP accounts on almost all their plans.
  • Improved security by having Automatic FTP over SSL
  • Reliability and high performance are guaranteed.
  • The backup of files is carried out every week.
  • Hostinger uses CPanel as its control panel.
  • Hostinger’s file manager is browser-based. It makes supervision of your files easy.
  • Hostinger provides support over the phone, email and via live chat 24/7.
  • High quality hosting services despite cheap fees
  • Free domain and for a year and a free SSL certificate
  • Up to 30GB SSD disk space
  • Hostinger boasts of a 100GB bandwidth
  • 30-day money-back guarantee

PRICING: Hostinger’s monthly starting price is $0.99. Getting so much value at that price is rare. If you’re on a slim budget, you can take advantage of this hosting platform.

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3. SITEGROUND

This is currently one of the best web hosting services providers globally. They have done excellently well in the past few years. Also, they provide wonderful FTP hosting. They got 4.6-star reviews on hostingadvice.com.

SiteGround was founded in Bulgaria in 2004 and currently hosts over 2 million websites globally, with large numbers of staff always working hard to ensure things are in order.

They have remained consistent in providing seamless hosting services to their clients all over the world.

Some of the nice features SiteGround has put in place to make their platform one of the best includes:

  • (SFTP) SSH file transfer protocol is allowed by default.
  • 99.99% uptime guaranteed.
  • You get to choose your client, either FileZilla or CuteFTP hosting.
  • No file size limits on anonymous FTP
  • Free email accounts.
  • Unmetered data transfer.
  • HTTP/2 enabled servers.
  • FTP server setup allows for secure transfer of files over TLS/SSL.
  • Up to 30GB SSD disk space.
  • Free domain name and SSL certificates
  • 30-day money-back guarantee.
  • Automatic backup is carried out daily.

Gain access to technical support 24/7 concerning any FTP related problems. You can get help via phone, live chat and tickets.

PRICING: SiteGround’s start-up prices start at $6.99 per month. It was discounted from $14.99 monthly. If you’re not satisfied with their services, you can take advantage of the 30-day money-back guarantee.

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4. HOSTGATOR

This is another web hosting provider that also provides amazing FTP hosting services. They are a very popular company now owned by the Endurance International Group (EIG), alongside a host of other web hosting companies such as Bluehost.

Based in Houston, HostGator, founded about 19 years ago, has now grown into a big company with over a thousand staff and millions of clients. Some of their mouthwatering features are:

  • Uses cPanel as control panel
  • Easy file manager interface.
  • 4.4-star rating for FTP hosting.
  • You gain access to unlimited FTP accounts.
  • Unlimited numbers and volume of files can be transferred
  • Anonymous protocols and secure FTP, FTPS, SFTP
  • Unlimited disk space and unmetered bandwidth
  • It is free to transfer websites to HostGator from WordPress or cPanel.
  • 45-day money-back guarantee.

PRICING: HostGator’s starting price is $2.64 per month. It is quite cheap compared to the great value you will be enjoying.

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5. GODADDY

Godaddy is a big domain and web hosting company that has helped millions of businesses succeeded in their pursuit of excellent web services.

They are an American domain registrar and web hosting company. They also perform amazingly well when it comes to FTP hosting, with a 4.3-star rating from hostingadvice.com.

With headquarters in Arizona, GoDaddy can boast of over 20 million customers. They are a big player in the game. Founded in 1997 by Bob Parsons, GoDaddy now has over 7,000 staff.

This reflects in their excellent service delivery over the years. Some of the features of this hosting company include

  • Offer free domain name and SSL certificate
  • Unmetered bandwidth is available on all their plans.
  • 99.9% uptime guaranteed.
  • Office 365 is included in the first year package. This will come in handy for businesses and firms.
  • At least 50 FTP accounts will be provided to you for a start.
  • Between 100GB to unlimited disk space
  • Free database backup and restores are done periodically.
  • Unlimited data transfer
  • cPanel is used as the control panel.
  • 24/7 customer support is available
  • 45-day trial period and money-back guarantee

PRICING: The monthly starting price is about $2.99.

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6. INMOTION HOSTING

Inmotion provides high-powered hosting with awesome performance and security. It provides hosting services to over 170,000 happy customers.

With a team of over 300 staff and over 15 years of experience, Inmotion still dishes out appetizing web hosting services. They also have a 4.2-star rating on hostingadvice.com.

Some of the great features of Inmotion hosting include:

  • 99.93% uptime guaranteed
  • Free SSL certificate.
  • Unlimited disk space
  • Customer support available 24/7 via live chat, phone and knowledge base.
  • FTP is easy to set up. It also works with any client of your choice.
  • Automatic backups periodically
  • Speed-boosted Ultra Stack server configuration.
  • 90-day money-back guarantee.
  • Always secure and safe.

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CONCLUSION

FTP Hosting is the way to go if you deal with large files you will need to send over the web. The above-discussed web hosting platforms are a good pick. You just need to go for one that suits your needs and pocket. You must do this if you want to get value for your money. The physical location of data centres and servers can also be considered when choosing a hosting provider.