How to Host a Website for Free — The halo-ai Way

This entire website — halo-ai.studio — costs nothing to host. Zero. The only cost is the domain name (~$13-17/yr). Everything else is free.

Here is exactly how we did it so you can replicate it in under 30 minutes.

What You Get

A fast, static website with unlimited pages
Free SSL (HTTPS)
Free global CDN (your site loads fast everywhere)
Free DDoS protection
Custom domain
Multilingual support (we run 7 languages)
Auto-deploy from GitHub — push code, site updates
Zero hosting fees. Forever.

The Stack

Component	Purpose	Cost
Hugo	Static site generator — builds HTML from markdown	Free (open source)
Cloudflare Pages	Hosting — serves your site from the edge	Free tier
Cloudflare DNS	Domain resolution + protection	Free tier
GitHub	Source code + auto-deploy trigger	Free tier
Namecheap	Domain registrar	~$13-17/yr

Total annual cost: one domain name. That’s it.

Step 1: Install Hugo

Hugo is the fastest static site generator. It builds hundreds of pages in milliseconds.

Arch Linux:

sudo pacman -S hugo

Ubuntu/Debian:

sudo apt install hugo

macOS:

brew install hugo

From source (the halo-ai way):

go install github.com/gohugoio/hugo@latest

Verify: hugo version

Step 2: Create Your Site

hugo new site my-site
cd my-site
git init

Create a simple theme or use one from themes.gohugo.io. We built ours from scratch — a single CSS file and a handful of HTML templates.

Minimal theme structure:

themes/my-theme/
  layouts/
    _default/
      baseof.html    # base template
      single.html    # single page
      list.html      # list/index page
    index.html       # home page
    partials/
      head.html      # <head> tag
      nav.html       # navigation
      footer.html    # footer
  static/
    css/style.css    # one CSS file

Minimal `hugo.toml`:

baseURL = "https://your-domain.com/"
title = "My Site"
theme = "my-theme"

Add content:

mkdir content/about
cat > content/about/_index.md << 'EOF'
---
title: "About"
---

Your content here in markdown.
EOF

Build and preview:

hugo server
# Open http://localhost:1313

Step 3: Register a Domain

Go to Namecheap and register your domain. Tips:

.studio domains are ~$13/yr
.ca domains are ~$16/yr (Canadian)
.com is classic but often taken
Enable WHOIS privacy (free on Namecheap) to hide your personal info
Skip all upsells — no hosting, no SSL, no premium DNS

Step 4: Set Up Cloudflare

Create a free account at cloudflare.com
Click Add a Site and enter your domain
Select the Free plan
Cloudflare will give you two nameservers (e.g., dale.ns.cloudflare.com)
Go back to Namecheap → your domain → Nameservers → switch to Custom DNS
Enter the two Cloudflare nameservers
Save and wait for propagation (usually minutes, up to 24 hours)

Add DNS records:

Type	Name	Content	Proxy
A	@	192.0.2.1	Proxied (orange)
CNAME	www	your-domain.com	Proxied (orange)

The 192.0.2.1 is a placeholder — Cloudflare Pages will override it.

Step 5: Deploy to Cloudflare Pages

Option A: Wrangler CLI (what we use)

# Install
sudo npm install -g wrangler

# Create project
export CLOUDFLARE_API_TOKEN="your-api-token"
wrangler pages project create my-site --production-branch main

# Build and deploy
hugo
wrangler pages deploy public --project-name my-site

Get your API token from Cloudflare → My Profile → API Tokens → Create Token → “Edit Cloudflare Workers” template.

Option B: GitHub auto-deploy

Push your Hugo site to GitHub
In Cloudflare → Workers & Pages → Create → Pages → Connect to Git
Select your repo
Build command: hugo
Build output directory: public
Deploy

Every git push automatically rebuilds and deploys your site.

Connect your custom domain:

In Cloudflare → Workers & Pages → your project → Custom Domains → Add your-domain.com

Step 6: Add DDNS (Optional — for game servers)

If you want a subdomain pointing to your home IP (for game servers, VPN, etc.):

In Cloudflare DNS, add an A record:
- Name: home
- Content: your WAN IP
- Proxy: DNS only (grey cloud — important for game servers)
Set up auto-update on your router or server:

# Simple DDNS update script
ZONE_ID="your-zone-id"
RECORD_ID="your-record-id"
TOKEN="your-api-token"
IP=$(curl -s https://api.ipify.org)

curl -s -X PUT "https://api.cloudflare.com/client/v4/zones/$ZONE_ID/dns_records/$RECORD_ID" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  --data "{\"type\":\"A\",\"name\":\"home\",\"content\":\"$IP\",\"ttl\":1}"

Run this on a cron every 5 minutes. Your home.your-domain.com always points to your current IP.

Step 7: Add Languages (Optional)

Hugo has built-in multilingual support. We serve 7 languages from the same site.

In hugo.toml:

defaultContentLanguage = "en"

[languages]
  [languages.en]
    languageName = "English"
    contentDir = "content"
  [languages.fr]
    languageName = "Francais"
    contentDir = "content.fr"
  [languages.es]
    languageName = "Espanol"
    contentDir = "content.es"

Create translated content in content.fr/, content.es/, etc. Same filenames, translated text.

What This Costs vs What People Pay

What people pay	What we pay
Shared hosting: $5-15/mo	$0
SSL certificate: $50-100/yr	$0 (Cloudflare free)
CDN: $20-50/mo	$0 (Cloudflare free)
DDoS protection: $200+/mo	$0 (Cloudflare free)
Website builder: $12-40/mo	$0 (Hugo is free)
Domain: $10-15/yr	$13-17/yr
Total/yr: $500-2000+	$13-17

That’s not a typo.

The halo-ai.studio Numbers

151 pages across 7 languages
50ms build time
Zero JavaScript frameworks
Zero hosting cost
Zero data retention
Built in one session, deployed in seconds

The website you are reading right now runs on this exact stack. No secrets. No proprietary tools. Everything listed here is what we use.

Replicate it. Make it yours.

Designed and built by the architect.