Good quality, reasonably priced hosting service in Japan?

TokyoJoeblow

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Ok, so I plan to create a website for a project, but I don't want to spend a ton of money on an overpriced hosting service. I'm hoping to use a hosting service that is reliable when it comes to SEO and actually helping my website come up in searches on google and other search engines.

I definitely want to go with a hosting service with a server in Japan as it will just allow my website to run much faster for the visitors.

Are there any hosting sites that don't increase their prices as your website grows in popularity with increased traffic or do they all operate this way?

I read that with certain hosting services, your website will just suddenly disappear if the service ends in any way?

Do any of these hosting sites have good quality, responsive online support?

SiteGround
Webomania
GetLark
Jimdo
Ameba Ownd
FastComet
Cloudflare CDN
Cloudways
GreenGeeks
Bluehost
 
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Wow, nobody knows anything?

I thought a lot of people on here, especially the people who run this forum could give me some good suggestions as to which hosting services to use...

Has everyones' wifi just been cut off because the typhoon?
 
You know it`s all that passive aggression.
Sorry but I can`t help on the topic. Hope someone not so aggressive one will help.
 
Wow, nobody knows anything?
To be fair, I think most of the people that work in the IT sector here tend to deal with corporate hosting rather than individual hosting, and the rest of us don’t deal with it at all. Personally, I don’t see what the big deal is with hosting it in the United States, having a host that deals in a language you speak and read fluently might be worth more to you than a slight drop in performance.
 
You know it`s all that passive aggression.
Sorry but I can`t help on the topic. Hope someone not so aggressive one will help.

There is no denying that a lot of people in Japan act passive aggressive.

Well, if you can't help why post at all?

That itself is passive aggressive lol.
 
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Are there any hosting sites that don't increase their prices as your website grows in popularity with increased traffic or do they all operate this way?
How much growth are you talking about? I don’t think there are any web hosting providers that don’t increase price as bandwidth majorly increases.

Personally, I don’t see what the big deal is with hosting it in the United States, having a host that deals in a language you speak and read fluently might be worth more to you than a slight drop in performance.
I agree with this.

Blue host has japan servers? I didn’t know that. I don’t care for their interface but I have friends who love them.

You might have better luck posting this question to stackexchange, xda, Reddit, or some other tech specific forum with more techies on them.
 
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Ok, here is a different question someone might know the answer to:

Does anyone on here know of any free Japanese email services?

The excite mail service just closed down 9/15/2018 so that is no longer available.

Every other Japanese email service I have come across so far charges fees even if they are cheap.

To use a Japanese hosting service I will need a Japanese email and I would rather just set up my own Japanese email than use a friend's Japanese email.

I decided to just use a Japanese hosting site since the website I'm going to put together will be all in Japanese as the target audience are all Japanese people.
 
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I am not an IT specialist but I am not sure why you need separate email address if you are going to buy web hosting and probably register your domain name? Most of the web and domain hosting services already include email hosting as well.
For example, if your domain is something like tokyojoe.co.jp then email might be like tokyojoe@tokyojoe.co.jp or admin@tokyojoe.co.jp etc. Usually you may register several email addresses depending on the service. Just check it before buying the service.
 
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Holy shit, Rakuten's customer service is literally nonexistent lol.

So I go on their website and create a Rakuten email account, username. password, etc. Then I go to log into the website using the username and password I just created and I get an error saying that the password in invalid...wtf?

I made 100% sure that there were no typos and it just won't let me log into the new account.

So I call the office where I bought the phone with the plan and the staff that answers just tells me they can't help with matters like this and to call the customer service number.

I have been calling them off and on all day and literally nobody answers the phone...ever. No matter which keypad combination you press, you can never reach another human being on the phone. It is literally a waste of time and possibly only exists to run up customer's phone bills as you are wasting a lot of time on the phone for nobody, possibly a retarded AI that would be no help whatsoever.

They are much cheaper than Softbank, docomo and AU and now I clearly see why lol.
 
I'm sorry, what in the hell are you trying to do? There is no need for a "Japanese" email to use a "Japanese" hosting service.

You can host anywhere in the world and use a CDN to bring your content to people faster. That's why it's called a 'content delivery network'.

There are plenty of services around that offer servers or hosting units in Japan. It is sometimes more expensive because colocation and rack space here is more expensive that other parts of the world.
TAG was run from U.S. data centers until last year once we determined that it would be more beneficial to be hosted within Japan's border for business and content protection.

If you are trying to develop your own brand - you should create your own domain from a registrar, using any domain you are eligible for... even ".jp" - you can't get a ".co.jp" without a Japan company registration document.

You can setup your own email servers, which we advise against. But you can register your domain with something like Google Suite (paid per user) and you'll have email at your domain but using Google Suite's interface (like gmail) to handle mail plus have access to all the business tools you need that come with the Google Suite. There are other email providers you can use your own domain with, that is just one example.

I have not researched hosting providers in Japan recently - what we use for TAG is intended for professionals who know how to run their own infrastructure.

ProTip:
If you just need a public facing website and you don't need to provide massive amounts of bandwidth: Use Wix or some something similar. (with your own domain)
If you need a physical or virtual server with a significant amount of bandwidth, you'll need a VPN or Dedicated server and the skills to run it.
You can also run a Wix type of site and provide content via a cloud distribution point - for downloadable content, etc.

In my very experienced professional opinion, don't get so obsessed about where a site is hosted these days. As long as the server is configured properly and it's using an effective CDN, it doesn't matter where it's hosted.

Just remember - going with with cheap services will get you exactly what you pay for.... that goes for email too.

And I just saw this post today, I wasn't ignoring it.
 
I’ve helped Japanese friends set up Sakura servers.
I’m not sure if the documentation is just in Japanese now but it used to be.
The services from GMO in general are popular.
I haven’t used them personally.
 
I’ve helped Japanese friends set up Sakura servers.
I’m not sure if the documentation is just in Japanese now but it used to be.
The services from GMO in general are popular.
I haven’t used them personally.

Yes, I think I'm going to go with Sakura because I don't like Wix.

I hate how with Wix, they automatically set your web address to something like: https://john.smith.wixsite.com/mysite

Yes, you can customize your own web address name but that of course isn't free and isn't even that cheap.

What is annoying is...who the fuck wants to have their full name their web address?

Of course since this site is for business, I'm planning to use my business email, which happens to be my full name as that makes sense...but I don't want my full name as the web address too. I want the company name to be the web address.

So that is lame and I'm not going with Wix.
 
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Yes, I think I'm going to go with Sakura because I don't like Wix.

I hate how with Wix, they automatically set your web address to something like: https://john.smith.wixsite.com/mysite

Yes, you can customize your own web address name but that of course isn't free and isn't even that cheap.

What is annoying is...who the fuck wants to have their full name their web address?

Of course since this site is for business, I'm planning to use my business email, which happens to be my full name as that makes sense...but I don't want my full name as the web address too. I want the company name to be the web address.

So that is lame and I'm not going with Wix.

/sigh.... that’s not how it works - and no service worth its salt is free or cheap. Wix is 10,000 yen for a year and you can use your own domain. (835 yen a month)

You can buy whatever domain you want - from a registrar.

Edit: if you use the free version, you get the long ass domain name. Rikako.tokyo and Tokyomeltykiss.com are based on the wix platform. (For example, but there are other sites similar to wix - you just don’t have to worry about maintaining a server or site Config panel)
 
I’ve helped Japanese friends set up Sakura servers.
I’m not sure if the documentation is just in Japanese now but it used to be.
The services from GMO in general are popular.
I haven’t used them personally.

I’ve worked with GMO in the past - not a bad choice as far as I can remember.
 
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I’ve worked with GMO in the past - not a bad choice as far as I can remember.

Ok, well then I might just pay for Wix for a year and see how it goes, but which hosting services in or out of Japan get the best SEO (from your experience)?
 
Ok, well then I might just pay for Wix for a year and see how it goes, but which hosting services in or out of Japan get the best SEO (from your experience)?
That's up to you, the user. Both Wix and other various platforms (Wordpress, etc) have tools available for dealing with SEO. The server and back-end doesn't really have any impact on actual SEO. Page load speed is a factor in some calculations, but again, that's up to the operator to apply caching and preload mechanics to make the page loads quickly. (i.e. TAG loads static content in the cache so it's instantly provided instead of having be called up from the database or file system each time a hit (client request) comes in. TAG, however, uses 4 primary production servers to deliver content to its readers in a timely fashion. We have another 3 for staging and development/test work.)

Many people that need a web 'presence' do fine with basic site services such as Wix. Going with a standard host means configuring the site panel and choosing a platform to develop on (Wordpress, Drupal, etc... See CMS platforms here) These require some amount of skill to install, configure, design and manage. Otherwise, you can develop your own web design if you have programmers and designers to help build from the ground up. Here again, most people I run into don't have the skill or desire to spend the man hours to manage the hosting platform and related CMS. Thus, services like Wix, Squarepace, Weebly all exist to give users a easy to use front-end with enough control to give the end-users a decent experience.
 
So I go on their website and create a Rakuten email account, username. password, etc. Then I go to log into the website using the username and password I just created and I get an error saying that the password in invalid...wtf?

Did you wait an hour before trying like they tell you to?
 
Here again, most people I run into don't have the skill or desire to spend the man hours to manage the hosting platform and related CMS.

Also, IMO of course, if you are not in the business of providing web services then managing and running those instead of getting them outsourced is just plain silly. First they can be had pretty cheaply and second you should use your time developing and advancing your business, not get involved in the nitty gritty details of some obscure IT systems. Makes pretty much as much sense as building your own parcel service to get your products to the customers.
 
I was adding my business location on google maps and I noticed that there is an option to "get a free website based on your info".

Would I be able to edit this free website at all or would it be a really basic site that can't be changed at all?

Has anyone on here ever tried out this option using google my business?

Of course, I will most likely not do this and just create a Wix website, but I thought I would ask anyway.
 
Well, I made a website the other day and I was messing with the Wix SEO wiz feature and it basically requires you to purchase a premium account just to be able to connect to Google.

I knew that if you wanted your own unique domain name for your website, then you would have to purchase a premium account but I didn't know that the free accounts are completely unable to connect to Google...

So I made this website thinking I will just make the free website and then pay for the most basic connect domain plan, which is the most popular option (only 416 yen a month).

https://www.wix.com/upgrade/website

In this link it shows that the basic connect plan is included as one of the premium plans. I sure hope so because I want to purchase a domain name and have my website show up in search engines but I can't afford the other more expensive options right now.

Does anyone on here use Wix?
 
Purchase a domain from somewhere else - I do not recommend purchasing a domain through a host provider. Using someone like namecheap, ghandi etc ensures you own your domain and control where it points.

You can buy the domain and have it point to your site, wherever it’s hosted.

Domains need to be renewed each year or paid in multi-year payments.
 
Purchase a domain from somewhere else - I do not recommend purchasing a domain through a host provider. Using someone like namecheap, ghandi etc ensures you own your domain and control where it points.

You can buy the domain and have it point to your site, wherever it’s hosted.

Domains need to be renewed each year or paid in multi-year payments.

Will that work for co.jp?

Does @OP want co.jp?

I know you have to jump through a few extra hoops if you want a co.jp domain. You have to prove that you are a resident first and a lot of registers don't provide them.
 
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