List of types of websites

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

There are many varieties of websites, each specializing in a particular type of content or use, and they may be arbitrarily classified in any number of ways.

Some websites may be included in one or more of these categories. For example, a business website may promote the business's products, but may also host informative documents, such as white papers. There are also numerous sub-categories to the ones listed above. For example, a porn site is a specific type of e-commerce site or business site (that is, it is trying to sell memberships for access to its site) or have social networking capabilities. A fansite may be a dedication from the owner to a particular celebrity. Websites are constrained by architectural limits (e.g., the computing power dedicated to the website). Very large websites, such as Facebook, Yahoo!, Microsoft, and Google employ many servers and load balancing equipment such as Cisco Content Services Switches to distribute visitor loads over multiple computers at multiple locations. As of early 2011, Facebook utilized 9 data centers with approximately 63,000 servers.

Type of Website Description Examples
Affiliate network A site, typically few in pages, whose purpose is to sell a third party's product. The seller receives a commission for facilitating the sale.
Affiliate agency Enabled portal that renders not only its custom CMS but also syndicated content from other content providers for an agreed fee. There are usually three relationship tiers (see Affiliate Agencies). Commission Junction, advertisers like eBay, or a consumer like Yahoo!.
Archive site Used to preserve valuable electronic content threatened with extinction. Two examples are: Internet Archive, which since 1996 has preserved billions of old (and new) web pages; and Google Groups, which in early 2005 was archiving over 845,000,000 messages posted to Usenet news/discussion groups. Internet Archive, Google Groups
Malware website A site created specifically to attack visitors' computers on their first visit to a website by downloading a file (usually a trojan horse). These websites rely on unsuspecting users with poor anti-virus protection in their computers.
Membership website a general term for a closed community that operates on the web using a monthly membership fee system.

It is run by individuals or multiple members who possess specialized knowledge or have excellent skills and experience in a particular field, such as writers, entrepreneurs, athletes, bloggers, etc.

In addition, there are examples of it being utilized as a fan club for artists, idols, models, TV personalities, and athletes.

Since the 2010s, there have been companies that support individuals and corporations who own membership websites as a business or hobby.

Blog (weblog) Sites generally used to post online diaries which may include discussion forums. Many bloggers use blogs like an editorial section of a newspaper to express their ideas on anything ranging from politics to religion to video games to parenting, along with anything in between. Some bloggers are professional bloggers and they are paid to blog about a certain subject, and they are usually found on news sites. WordPress
Brand-building site A site with the purpose of creating an experience of a brand online. These sites usually do not sell anything, but focus on building the brand. Brand building sites are most common for low-value, high-volume fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG).
Celebrity website A website the information in which revolves around a celebrity or public figure. These sites can be official (endorsed by the celebrity) or fan-made (run by a fan or fans of the celebrity without implicit endorsement). jimcarrey.com
Comparison shopping website A website providing a vertical search engine that shoppers use to filter and compare products based on price, features, reviews, and other criteria. Shopping.com
Crowdfunding website Platform to fund projects by the pre-purchase of products or by asking audience members to make a donation. Kickstarter
Click-to-donate site A website that allows the visitor to donate to charity simply by clicking on a button or answering a question correctly. An advertiser usually donates to the charity for each correct answer generated. The Hunger Site, Freerice
Content aggregator site A site that collects content from various online sources and organizes it, republishes it at a fee. wikiHow.com, About.com
Classified ads site A site publishing classified advertisements gumtree.com, Craigslist
Corporate website Used to provide background information about a business, organization, or service.
Online dating service A site where users can find other single people looking for long-term relationships, dating, short encounters, or friendship. Many of them are pay per services, but there are many free or partially free dating sites. Most dating sites in the 2010s have the functionality of social networking websites. eHarmony, Match.com
E-commerce website A site offering goods and services for online sale and enabling online transactions for such sales. Amazon.com
Fake news website A site publishing fake news stories, intending to deceive visitors, and profit from advertising. The Daily Stormer
Internet forum A site where people can hold conversations in the form of posted messages. SkyscraperCity, 4chan
Gallery website A website designed specifically for use as a gallery; these may be an art gallery or photo gallery and of commercial or non-commercial nature.
Government website A website made by the local, state, department, or national government of a country. Usually, these sites also operate websites that are intended to inform tourists or support tourism. USA.gov, Naenara, GOV.UK
Gripe site A site devoted to the criticism of a person, place, corporation, government, or institution.
Online game website Websites where users can play online games Browser games, OGame, Travian,
Online gambling website A site that lets users play online games such as gambling.
Humor site Satirizes, parodies, or amuses the audience. The Onion, National Lampoon digital archive, Encyclopedia Dramatica
Information site Most websites fit in this category to some extent. They do not necessarily have commercial purposes. Most government, educational and nonprofit institutions have an informational site.
Media-sharing site A site that enables users to upload and view media such as pictures, music, and videos YouTube, DeviantArt
Mirror site A website that is the replication of another website. This type of website is used as a response to spikes in user visitors. Mirror sites are most commonly used to provide multiple sources of the same information and are of particular value as a way of providing reliable access to large downloads.
Microblog website A short and simple form of blogging. Microblogs are limited to certain numbers of characters and work similarly to a status update on Facebook. Twitter
News site Similar to an information site, but dedicated to dispensing news, politics, and commentary. cnn.com

bbc.com/news

Personal website Websites about an individual or a small group (such as a family) that contains information or any content that the individual wishes to include. Such a personal website is different from a celebrity website, which can be very expensive and run by a publicist or agency.
Phishing website A website created to fraudulently acquire sensitive information, such as passwords and credit card details, by masquerading as a trustworthy person or business (such as Social Security Administration, PayPal, a bank) in an electronic communication (see Phishing).
Photo sharing website A website created to share digital photos with the online community. (see Photo sharing). Flickr, Instagram, Imgur
p2p/Torrents website Websites that index torrent files. This type of website is different from a BitTorrent client which is usually a stand-alone software. Mininova, The Pirate Bay, IsoHunt
Political site A site on which people may voice political views, provide political humor, campaign for elections, or provide information about a certain candidate, political party or ideology. Rhino Party of Canada website
Question and Answer (Q&A) site A site where people can ask questions and get answers. Quora, Yahoo! Answers, Stack Exchange Network (including Stack Overflow)
Religious site A site in which people may advertise a place of worship, or provide inspiration or seek to encourage the faith of a follower of that religion.
Review site A site on which people can post reviews for products or services. Yelp, Rotten Tomatoes
School website a site on which teachers, students, or administrators can post information about current events at or involving their school. U.S. elementary-high school websites generally use k12 in the URL
Scraper site a site that largely duplicates the content of another site without permission, without actually pretending to be that site, in order to capture some of that site's traffic (especially from search engines) and profit from advertising revenue or in other ways.
Search engine A website that indexes material on the Internet or an intranet (and lately on traditional media such as books and newspapers) and provides links to information as a response to a query. Google Search, Bing, DuckDuckGo, Ecosia
Shock site Includes images or other material that is intended to be offensive to most viewers Goatse.cx, rotten.com
Showcase website Web portals used by individuals and organisations to showcase things of interest or value
Social bookmarking site A site where users share other content from the Internet and rate and comment on the content. StumbleUpon, Digg
Social networking service A site where users could communicate with one another and share media, such as pictures, videos, music, blogs, etc. with other users. These may include games and web applications. YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, LinkedIn[1]
Social news A social news website features user-posted stories that are ranked based on popularity. Users can comment on these posts, and these comments may also be ranked. Since their emergence with the birth of web 2.0, these sites are used to link many types of information including news, humor, support, and discussion. Social news sites allegedly facilitate democratic participation on the web. Reddit, Digg, SlashDot
Warez A site designed to host or link to materials such as music, movies, and software for the user to download. The Pirate Bay
Webcomic An online comic, ranging in various styles and genres unique to the World Wide Web. Penny Arcade, xkcd, Gunnerkrigg Court
Webmail A site that provides a webmail service. Hotmail, Gmail, Protonmail, Yahoo! Mail
Web portal A site that provides a starting point or a gateway to other resources on the Internet or an intranet. msn.com, msnbc.com, Newgrounds, Yahoo!
Wiki site A site in which users collaboratively edit its content. Wikipedia, wikiHow, Fandom

See also

References

  1. ^ Perrin, Andrew; Anderson, Monica (10 April 2019). "Social media usage in the U.S. in 2019 | Pew Research Center". PewResearch.Org. Pew Research. Retrieved 20 July 2019. Study was quoted in Forbes. graphic at the Wayback Machine (archived 16 July 2019)