What is reseller hosting?

[TechZentri]

What exactly is reseller hosting? Is it like when you buy hosting and then dont want it so you sell it to someone?

[NumBa1Stunna516]

Well to put it simply its when hosts buy server space to offer to customers.

[TechZentri]

Okay that makes sense, so how do you know if your host is a reseller?

[NumBa1Stunna516]

Most hosts out there are indeed resellers. You can know that your host is not a reseller if they tell you they have the computers that your information is stored on in their location.

[TechZentri]

Is rescue hosting a reseller or do the own their own servers?

[NumBa1Stunna516]

I think that they have their own servers. Not absolutely sure.

[BigRed]

Yeah, it is difficult to tell if a company is really a reseller or not. A reseller does not have their own server. they are basically selling another company's plan and making commission off that.

[TechZentri]

Ah okay, it makes sense to me now. Thanks.

[GibboNet]

Generally, most small hosts are resellers. Bigger hosts would find it cheaper to run multiple dedicated servers, though they might in fact have them managed by the server provider.

There are generally numerous levels of service - Starting with the person who owns the physical location of the server. 'The Planet' are a good example, they own a massive server complex with thousands of servers running.

Many people rent servers or many servers from these big providers, and then manage them - to resell to others as managed servers.

Down again are your general hosts. They rent managed servers and distribute users among the accounts. These hosts often have reseller accounts available.

Further still you have the people who buy a reseller account, and set themselves up as a host. They may only rent a small share of a server to run their operation from.