Buying domain & hosting for small side projects is a waste of money.
I think you shouldn't purchase domain name & hosting if your project is small and you don't intend to monetize it. Instead, I think using hosting solutions like Now from Zeit or Netlify is a better choice. I recently created a very small and niche Chrome extension (https://colorgrab.now.sh/) so instead of buying a domain name I hosted it on Now for free.
Do you agree or not? Let me know what you think!
I disagree.
You can grab $2,5/mo VPS hosting from Vultr and you can get .com domains for $2 from GoDaddy with promo codes.
MVP's for many people are hobbies. Are you really not willing to spend $5/mo on your hobby that:
a) help you introduce self-learning into your life
b) help you to develop yourself
c) teaches you organization, marketing and other valuable skills that are accessible only through experience
d) exposes you to networks of like-minded people
e) helps you to build a portfolio (even if you are not programmer or marketer - you can add your projects to CV, it will increase its value)
f) helps you to spend time much better than just sitting in front of the TV and watching some bs.
g) gives you a small chance, that your MVP will become viral and you will make passive income out of it.
h) it's safe - you won't lose fingers or get sick when doing it.
All of that for $5 a month (assuming you create 1 new MVP a month). Damn, that's a cheap hobby!
You can also host several sites on the same server by having multiple virtual hosts/domain mapping.
Totally, that's why I have put $5/mo ($2,5 for one server and $2 for the domain, rounded up 🤑 ). Thanks for clearing this!
+1. At the very least you can buy a domain and add it to tour current hosting.
Hi Bart! you have raised really good points! And I totally agree that this is worth it for just $5 a month. But If you are launching products every month or even a couple of products a month it adds up pretty quickly.
P.S I didn't know you could get .com domains for $2 dollars! I always buy mine from Namecheap the lowest I paid was $10 dollars.
Anyways thank you for your input and definitely have given me something to think about!
When you buy domains from Namecheap, you can get a promo code directly from them. Domains cost below $9 then.
$2 domains (including fees) are offered occasionally by GoDaddy as a promo (this promo pops up quite often).
Even if you release MVP once a month/two, then the server cost won't go up unless you are doing server-straining work. If that's the case, you can grab a Bare Metal box from Scaleway for like $4 or Hetzner cloud for $7. They are enough to keep you going as long as this is MVP.
If you want to release few products a month, you can grab one domain that will "hoard" them, call it "tool suite" and add the new MVP's as tools to your toolbox. At least you will own the domain.
GoDaddy often has domains on sale for 1 year for $0.99.
Yeah, $0.99 - $1,49 + ICANN fee and taxes, so I just rounded up to $2 to make it easier on reader.
I disagree.
Nothing is free, and what might look like free, is still not free. Do you get me? :) Sometimes paying for domains or anything else serves as a good motivation for keeping us pushing to get closer to our goals. If you believe in your ideas, go for it. Invest.
Strongly disagree.
In my opinion, these two costs are worth it for the following reasons:
Let me explain;
Domaisn are not expensive, and the benefit is they add trust, ease discoverability, and boost SEO.
In terms of hosting, it gives you control over your app. And you don't need to spend thousands either - just host your projects on a $5/mo server on DigitalOcean. You'll have much more assurance hosting it there than on any free host.
One alternative is to register a generic domain and then host your projects on subdomains. That way you have a real domain off the bat (with full control over dns) and can still host for free with netlify/GitHub Pages/etc.
For example, I have simon.codes set up so the root mirrors my personal site, while I host projects on subdomains like analytics.simon.codes and gchat.simon.codes.
If you do this, just be careful with things like cookies and CORS headers: you probably don't want these to be shared across subdomains.
To each their own, but personally I disagree. The nominal cost gives you a legitimacy that users will trust a lot more and also motivates you to build upon it (kind of like when you incorporate, but on a much smaller scale). I guess if you don't really care about attracting users or building a business it doesn't matter, but that's not what IH is about.
When I bought https://vidhug.com, it motivated me to build something on it. I was also happy to find a sensible 6-character domain that wasn't taken. Even the search for a domain name itself can help force you to do some thinking about your brand and market.
As of this moment, my goal with these side projects is to build up an audience and as I replied to Bart it could get expensive really quick if I am paying $10 for each domain each year.
But if you intend to monetize it somehow I think that cost could be justified.
I always buy a domain name but use free Netlify hosting when I don't need a backend
If you are using subdomains from your own personal site, what makes it so much different then a subdomain from a free hosting solution? Maybe if your target audience is more technical it might matter, but if they aren't it might not make a difference. I do get the branding yourself aspect of hosting on your own domain.
You are probably right. I can't even recall all the domains I've bought that I discarded after a few months. At least I re-use the same hosting.
It's smart to watch your costs. $15 here, $30 there... Before long, your discounts expire and you're paying $300/year for hosting and $500/year in domains. Something similar happened to me when I was just starting out! :)
Here's how I like to decide:
You can also get free hosting with Netlify if you decide to build a static marketing site, serverless React app, etc.
I disagree.
I have a very small vps por 1€ + vat /month, and there, I do what I want.
I disagree. Having your own domain and hosting adds credibility to the project.
In a similar vein as the other posters I disagree. Launching MVPs and side projects is actually quite cheap when compared to a lot of other hobbies. It also generates quite a lot of value for the makers involved (even if not monetized).
If you want to you can cut costs by hosting multiple sites on one VPS. You can also register a personal domain and then use the subdomains to host some projects.
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huh! I hadn't even noticed that! 😀