
Ask HN: Best place to host a static website with SSL and CDN? - Im_a_throw_away
Hi HN!<p>I&#x27;m building a static website in HTML&#x2F;JS, and I&#x27;m wondering what&#x27;s the best place to host it online. I&#x27;m especially concerned about getting a good SEO.<p>Here&#x27;s what I&#x27;m looking for:<p>1. A custom domain with ssl, for an httpS url.<p>2. A CDN, for super fast loading.<p>3. Be able to create 301 redirects with something similar to an htaccess. So it seems GitHub page are not an option.<p>4. Something simple to use, because I don&#x27;t want to lose time learning&#x2F;configuring stuff. So the Amazon combo S3+route53+cloudfront won&#x27;t be possible for me.<p>5. And not expensive, less than $10 per month.<p>Any idea? Thanks!
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dflock
A small static site on S3 with the free cloudflare plan in front will cost you
~$0.50 per month, with moderate traffic. Probably less than fifty cents,
especially to start with, if your traffic is low.

They support all the requested features.

Yes, hosting this on S3, with either cloudfront or cloudflare, does take some
(one time) setup.

The payoff is that you don't have to rent and deal with a server and ongoing
costs are very very low.

~~~
cheez
+1, very cost effective

------
Kalium
> 4\. Something simple to use, because I don't want to lose time
> learning/configuring stuff. So the Amazon combo S3+route53+cloudfront won't
> be possible for me.

"learning/configuring stuff" isn't time lost. It's the price you pay to get a
lot of functionality for a minimal financial cost. None of these items are
complex, costly, time-consuming, or poorly documented. You're worried about at
most a dozen hours of time _once_.

If you're not willing to learn to do things for yourself, you're going to be
paying someone else to do it. At which point you're either blowing your budget
or compromising on your needs.

The answer to your needs is acquiring the skills you need in order to do it
all for under $10/mo.

~~~
cauterized
Setting up a server has a sufficient learning curve to significantly delay a
project launch for someone who's new to the task.

Configuring such a server to be performant and secure, and keeping the kernel
and all relevant packages patched is another learning curve. It's also a major
time-sink for a small or one-person team, and even more impactful if this is a
side project.

A full server is also totally unnecessary if all you're serving is a static
site.

Is all that stuff worth learning? Probably. If you're a technologist. If
you're interested in web development rather than trying to advertise your
mobile apps. Or if your time has no value.

But if you're just trying to get a static site hosted as quickly and
inexpensively as possible, a $5/mo cPanel shared hosting account plus
something like Cloudflare may be a MUCH better use of your time and resources.

~~~
Kalium
You're right! For sophisticated needs like running a server, it's not
reasonable to expect a random nontechnical person to take on all that
education.

This person clearly knows enough to be aware that they have good options for
hosting a static site without ever having to admin a server. Frankly the
simple S3+CloudFront+Route53 setup can be done in an hour or less following
lots of clearly written documents that don't require one to be a seasoned
sysadmin. And it'll cost less than $2/mo.

~~~
cauterized
You're right. Though frankly, the S3 and cloudfront docs are terrible -
especially if you're not already highly familiar with the services and Amazons
offerings in general, but even if you are. They don't give nearly enough
context or definitions of terms.

I haven't been particularly impressed by any blog posts on the topic either.
What resources specifically would you recommend to someone new to the stack?

~~~
Kalium
AWS has a pretty good doc for this specific case, actually -
[http://docs.aws.amazon.com/gettingstarted/latest/swh/website...](http://docs.aws.amazon.com/gettingstarted/latest/swh/website-
hosting-intro.html)

But this is decent too - [https://www.lambrospetrou.com/articles/migrate-to-
aws-static...](https://www.lambrospetrou.com/articles/migrate-to-aws-static-
website/)

------
ne01
At [https://www.sunsed.com](https://www.sunsed.com) we are working on a
solution exactly as you described! Not ready yet! I just want to see what you
think about it in your case.

In version 3 (currently under development) you'll have a server.htmlpp to
custom route your traffic and a file manager to treat your website content as
static files.

You'll be able to import/export from any static website generators. Also edit
online and use a command line to push/pull changes so you can edit from your
computer.

Please contact me if it's interesting to you!

By the way checkout [https://htmlpp.sunsed.com](https://htmlpp.sunsed.com) for
information about our HTML++ language, you might find it interesting!

Also checkout my explanation of how v3 works: [http://seyedi.org/my-cms-
idea](http://seyedi.org/my-cms-idea)

ETA for v3 is January 2017.

Edit: Made the URLs clickable.

~~~
marktangotango
Why is this being down voted? If user can't promote their service in a thread
asking for options the service directly addresses, what good is this site? In
fact, this is accepted:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12559012](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12559012)

------
nickthemagicman
How is Openshift now mentioned here? You have all that stuff you asked for
plus insane amount of additional stuff plus the bronze plan is free!

Its a hobbyests dream!

I love openshift from what Ive been using it for so far.

------
seanwilson
Netlify seems like an easy choice as it does everything you ask for and is $9
a month if the free version isn't enough. It couldn't really be much easier to
deploy with it (push via Git or drag and drop in the browser).

For what it's worth, you can do redirects on GitHub Pages with HTML redirects:
[https://help.github.com/articles/redirects-on-github-
pages/](https://help.github.com/articles/redirects-on-github-pages/)

I'm with you on avoiding AWS for static sites as there are much easier options
like the above.

------
detaro
maybe [https://www.netlify.com](https://www.netlify.com)?

------
kennycox
If you are looking for cheapest and best options to host your website, then
you should choose
[http://www.web.com/landing/hosting50](http://www.web.com/landing/hosting50)
\- 0.50/month.

As we talk about SSL certificate for cheap price, you can choose
[https://www.ssl2buy.com](https://www.ssl2buy.com) where you will get free
installation support.

For CDN, [https://www.cloudflare.com/](https://www.cloudflare.com/) is the
best option. You can go with free plan as well paid plans to enable more
features.

------
AaronSmith
There are cheap and best web hosting plans available in your budget and
requirement here: [http://b2evolution.net/web-hosting/budget-web-hosting-low-
co...](http://b2evolution.net/web-hosting/budget-web-hosting-low-cost-
lamp.php) and you can install SSL certificate to secure your domain at
cheapest price here: [https://www.cheapsslshop.com/comodo-positive-
ssl](https://www.cheapsslshop.com/comodo-positive-ssl), which will cost you
$4.95 per year.

------
marktangotango
No CDN or 301, but our service [1] offers file hosting, custom domains, https
via Lets Encrypt certs. We also offer API creation with what we call "API
Queries" (SQL queries executed via POST requests). You can post forms with
captcha. We built our service to be very simple to use, just upload your html,
css, javascript, and assets.

Just curious about the 301 requirement, what is your use case for this? Ie
wondering if this is something we should consider supporting.

[1] [https://www.lite-engine.com](https://www.lite-engine.com)

------
tylercubell
GitHub Pages and Cloudflare.

~~~
Im_a_throw_away
GitHub Pages already have a CDN, so why add cloudflare?

And as mentioned in my post, Github doesn't let you have some kind of
htaccess, so no 301 redirect are possible. And I need that feature.

~~~
tylercubell
Cloudflare allows you to perform redirects.

[https://support.cloudflare.com/hc/en-
us/articles/200172286-H...](https://support.cloudflare.com/hc/en-
us/articles/200172286-How-do-I-perform-URL-forwarding-or-redirects-with-
CloudFlare-)

~~~
evolve2k
And cloudflare let's you add free SSL/https to your custom domain.

Github pages supports auto-redirect between www and apex domains (redirecting
from whichever you make the primary approach from the other) does that cover
your 301 needs or are you needing it more broadly than that?

------
VertexRed
For $10 per month I'd say your best bet would be shared hosting (or a VPS at
best) together with Cloudflare's free plan (for the SSL and CDN).

------
mmosta
AFAIK there are no static host services that offer user defined response
codes, you'll most likely have to prepare your own.

~~~
detaro
netlify does, according to their documentation.

------
csallen
Let me add my voice to the chorus of people championing Netlify. When HN took
down my website [https://IndieHackers.com](https://IndieHackers.com) a few
months ago (primarily due to a config error on my end), I was able to move the
site over to Netlify and have it up and running in minutes.

------
stevenhubertron
I use Netlify to host a number of sites that get 40k visits a month for $9 a
month. It's been a great service.

------
asteadman
I use s3+cloudfront (route53 not strictly necessary, almost any dns host will
do). Honestly, its a one-time config and after that its very simple. Cost
would be well under $10 unless you've got crazy traffic (Problems I wish I
had...)

------
jgowans
You might be interested in checking out Aerobatic.
[https://www.aerobatic.com](https://www.aerobatic.com)

disclaimer: I work at Aerobatic

------
arikr
Surprised no-one has suggested this: Firebase. Free, incl SSL. Not sure about
CDN, but you could use Cloudflare for that.

------
ThatGeoGuy
> 1\. A custom domain with ssl, for an httpS url.

This is pretty straightforward as long as you're setting up any VPS or have
access to the server itself. If you wanted something like SquareSpace or
Github Pages, this is much more difficult.

> 2\. A CDN, for super fast loading.

I honestly have no idea what this means. A CDN can help if you have a large
website over multiple data-centres, but really seems to be overshooting what
you are trying to do here. Are you just thinking Cloudflare? What's the reason
for this? You're hosting a static website, it's not like you've got to send
massive amounts of data over the wire, so I can't see how having some large
CDN backing you is going to provide much if anything at all. You should maybe
specify what you really want here, since it sounds like you're worried your
site won't be mirrored and may have downtime or might be slow in some
countries, but instead you're phrasing it as if a CDN is a requirement. Why is
a CDN a requirement?

> 3\. Be able to create 301 redirects with something similar to an htaccess.
> So it seems GitHub page are not an option.

As long as you set up nginx / apache yourself, I don't see why this is hard to
come by. Any VPS service would work for this.

> 4\. Something simple to use, because I don't want to lose time
> learning/configuring stuff. So the Amazon combo S3+route53+cloudfront won't
> be possible for me.

Indeed, something "simple-to-use". Perhaps this goes back to "simple is not
easy", and it sounds like you want easy based on everything so far.

> 5\. And not expensive, less than $10 per month.

This seems to be the part that I don't quite get. How are you supposed to use
a CDN for a service that has running costs of $10 / month? I mean, that could
be the cost of one server. Take DigitalOcean for example (I don't work for
them, but am a customer). You could pay $5 a month for a small VPS, with very
little storage (20GiB). This would allow you to host your website, with your
own domain, with LetsEncrypt certificates for TLS. You wouldn't have any CDN
backing you, but you could set the whole thing up just as you would any other
server, and if you know what you're trying to do you could even do the whole
setup on a Docker container and just deploy the whole thing through their API.

That said, keep in mind if you want the total cost under $10 / month you're
probably not gonna make it. Your domain could be anywhere between $25 - $40 a
year (assuming it's cheap), which means that monthly you'll probably be paying
about $8-$9 a month just for the VPS service and your domain. Any cost on top
of this (excluding time, which will be the major investment at first) will
pretty much put you over your limit. Also, if you end up deciding that the $5
DigitalOcean plan doesn't provide good enough specs / limits, then you'll be
shifting to the $10 and $20 per month plans which will definitely put you over
budget here. Another VPS provider, [http://edis.at](http://edis.at), that I've
heard good things from provide some differing plans based one what you're
looking for, but total overall cost is pretty similar.

There's lots of information about stuff like DigitalOcean online, but I fear
that I don't understand your needs in depth enough to just recommend getting a
VPS and going for it. It seems like the best path to take for a static site,
but the remarks about CDNs and such seem to make me wary pushing that advice.

~~~
Im_a_throw_away
Thanks for the detailed answer! Here are some comments to answer your
questions:

> 2\. A CDN, for super fast loading.

I just want my website to load fast from anywhere in the world. I especially
want this since page load time impact SEO. Something like cloudflare.com which
has a free plan.

> 5\. And not expensive, less than $10 per month.

$10 per month excluding the domain name. I don't think that's unresonable for
a simple static html website. As mentioned above there are some CDN that have
a free tier.

Overall I'm trying to find the simplest way to host my static website online,
and make sure it works well with search engine (ssl and fast to load). All of
that for less than $10 per month.

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J0rdanVa1dez
> 1\. Custom domain with hosting. You don't neet Https and SSL.

> 2\. A CDN, for super fast loading.

> 6\. oryginal content on your pages.

