A static website stores a unique file for every page of a static website. Each time that page is requested, the same content is returned. This content is created once, during the design of the website. It is usually manually authored, although some sites use an automated creation process, similar to a dynamic website, whose results are stored long-term as completed pages.

The benefits of a static website are that they were simpler to host, as their server only needed to serve static content, not execute server-side scripts. This required less server administration and had less chance of exposing security holes. They could also serve pages more quickly, on low-cost server hardware.

Almost all websites have some static content, as supporting assets such as images and style sheets are usually static, even on a website with highly dynamic pages.

Advantages of a Static Website Design

• Provide improved security over dynamic websites
• Improved performance for end users compared to dynamic websites.
• Fewer or no dependencies on systems such as databases or other application servers

Disadvantages of a Static Website Design

• Dynamic functionality has to be added separately
• Need to update content locally and then upload on server.
• Difficult to update if there are hundreds of pages in website.