For hosting a forum

No, you don't really need any specialized hosting for a forum. Any hosting which has LAMP installed would be fine. Which means that any hosting that will run, say, Wordpress should be able to run your forum. If you are just beginning, then I suggest using any of the free hosting offered by the forum software people. Most of them have some kind of free hosting. I mean the free forum software usually have some kind of free hosting. If you are past the learning stage and your forum is ready to go into production mode, then I suggest a host which has many options for upgrade.
 
No, you don't really need any specialized hosting for a forum. Any hosting which has LAMP installed would be fine. Which means that any hosting that will run, say, Wordpress should be able to run your forum. If you are just beginning, then I suggest using any of the free hosting offered by the forum software people. Most of them have some kind of free hosting. I mean the free forum software usually have some kind of free hosting. If you are past the learning stage and your forum is ready to go into production mode, then I suggest a host which has many options for upgrade.

I agree with this, forum's don't offer complications which require them to be hosted on special hosting. You just need to read the requirements of the forum software you are using and get a server to meet and/or exceed those requirements. Free hosting should cover most requirements for the leading softwares like Mybb or Phpbb.

Good luck with your forum!
 
I agree with this, forum's don't offer complications which require them to be hosted on special hosting. You just need to read the requirements of the forum software you are using and get a server to meet and/or exceed those requirements. Free hosting should cover most requirements for the leading softwares like Mybb or Phpbb.

Good luck with your forum!

I think we have to differentiate between free hosting in general and free hosting meant for forums. I am talking about free hosting for forums here. Many forum software like SMF and myBB have sites where the forum software is already installed. You only have to register, give a forum name and you are the owner of a forum. Of course, the features are limited in that you can only use whatever has already been installed for you. You cannot add your own modifications. But, hey, it's free and it's a good place to learn how to set up a forum.
 
You can install some popular (free) forums via your Control panel on any standard host. It's pretty much a one click (okay, maybe three click) process, and the forum will be automatically setup, including the database. The two most common free forum types are SMF (Simple Machines Forum) and PHPBB (PHP Bulletin board).

Out of these two I prefer SMF, but it's purely a personal choice, as they're actually really similar. I'd recommend either of these myself. You have to add mods yourself, but this is easy enough to do and they both have excellent support forums to help.
 
Forums can manage off shared hosting, but watch your CPU usage because large forums use up a lot of resources, and some hosts may suspend your account for that. If that happens then it's time to upgrade and get a VPS or dedicated server.
 
Is there any special type of hosting required for a forum?
Means, if I want to start creating my forum, I will prepare it using phpbb or whatever. But, where to host it?
Which hosting will be better?

@Victor Leigh is quite amazing when it comes to knowledge upon forum hosting, as he stated, no there isn't really any need for a special host at all, all you really need is PHP5 and a MySQL database, which is provided by almost every host out there right now, I honestly can't think of one hosting site that I've used, free or not, that hasn't given access to at least one database.
 
Forums can manage off shared hosting, but watch your CPU usage because large forums use up a lot of resources, and some hosts may suspend your account for that. If that happens then it's time to upgrade and get a VPS or dedicated server.

Indeed, you need to read the fine print carefully. My second host (JustHost) did this, cutting all my websites off when my forum went over 10% of the shared server CPU. It was a real pain, and resulted in me moving hosts in the end.
 
Just a shared hosting service is enough for you to start a Forum. You can use it until your sites huge traffic and consumes more resources. Once the site starts consuming more resources you may upgrade your shared package to VPS
 
Is there any special type of hosting required for a forum?
Means, if I want to start creating my forum, I will prepare it using phpbb or whatever. But, where to host it?
Which hosting will be better?

I suggest you can use the VPS or dedicated hosting from 9cubehosting.com for hosting your forum.They provide the quality webservices at low cost and with a beneficial freebie package.
 
Is there any special type of hosting required for a forum?
Means, if I want to start creating my forum, I will prepare it using phpbb or whatever. But, where to host it?
Which hosting will be better?

I suggest you can use the VPS or dedicated hosting from 9cubehosting.com for hosting your forum.They provide the quality webservices at low cost and with a beneficial freebie package.
 
My forum does not require any thing special from the host. I was planning to switch to vbulletin back in December but the conversion went very wrong so I reverted back to ipb.
 
When you choose a hosting provider they will often have pre-written scripts to help install your forum for you. They have this for wordpress too as it is in their best interests to ensure that your website is up and running so you use their services longer. You could try ProphpBB which hosts your forum for you.
 
Yes and No :)

Yes because forum need much resources and if you have good traffic then you should not use shared environment instead go for a VPS or dedicated server.
No because if your forum is just new and you have low traffic then you can continue on shared environment.
 
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