# Hosting requirements worksheet

Complete this before comparing providers. Requirements should describe the
workload and the consequences of failure, not a preferred vendor.

## 1. Website and audience

- Website or project:
- Primary purpose:
- Primary audience and countries:
- Revenue-critical journeys:
- Content management system or framework:
- Current provider, if any:
- Planned launch or migration date:

## 2. Workload

- Typical monthly visits:
- Expected peak concurrent users:
- Number of websites or applications:
- Storage required now:
- Expected storage growth over 12 months:
- Largest media or download files:
- Dynamic features (checkout, membership, search, API, jobs):
- Scheduled or background work:
- Traffic seasonality or campaign spikes:

## 3. Reliability and recovery

- Maximum acceptable outage:
- Maximum acceptable data loss:
- Required backup frequency:
- Required backup retention:
- Who performs restores:
- Latest restore-test date:
- Staging environment required:
- Rollback capability required:
- High-availability or regional redundancy required:

## 4. Operations and support

- Person or team responsible for updates:
- Person or team responsible for security:
- Managed updates required:
- Managed backups required:
- Monitoring and alerting required:
- Support hours and response expectation:
- Email hosting bundled or separate:
- Number of mailboxes:
- Control-panel or command-line preference:

## 5. Security and compliance

- Personal or regulated data processed:
- Required access roles:
- Single sign-on or multifactor requirements:
- Web application firewall required:
- Log retention requirement:
- Data residency requirement:
- Vendor or legal review required:

## 6. Commercial boundaries

- Monthly budget target:
- Maximum acceptable renewal cost:
- Acceptable prepaid term:
- Migration budget:
- Exit or data-export requirements:
- Contract and cancellation requirements:

## 7. Provider questions

- What exactly is managed, and what remains the customer's responsibility?
- How are backups stored, retained, restored, and tested?
- What changes at renewal?
- Which limits can stop or throttle the site?
- What is the upgrade path, and does it require a migration?
- How are incidents communicated?
- How can the site and data be exported?
- Which add-ons are required for email, staging, security, or support?

## Decision record

- Shortlisted hosting category:
- Shortlisted providers:
- Chosen provider:
- Deciding requirements:
- Known drawback accepted:
- Reviewer:
- Decision date:

Original worksheet by WebmastersGallery. Verify provider answers in the
current contract and official documentation.