You might often see some incredible web hosting offers that brags about unlimited disk space and bandwidth for less than $5 dollars a month or even cheaper. Beware of this type of hosting providers because they tend to oversell. But what exactly is web host overselling?

Overselling happens when a web host company sells beyond their available resources. To give you a clear picture of what it is, here is an example.

If a company has a server of 50 GB and 500 GB bandwidth, it is mathematically sound to sell 1 GB with a 50 GB bandwidth to 50 customers. When the company see that their present customers uses less bandwidth and disk space that they are allowed to use, it decides to get more customers out of their supposedly 50 customers. This is the exact example of overselling.

This is one way of getting more money out of the business but can harm customers in the end. The server can possibly be overcrowded and can cause downtime to the websites the company hosts. It is true that with overselling, the hosting providers can offer rock bottom prices that can be an advantage to consumers. With proper planning and management, overselling can actually work.