alt=Usenet Provider Map|thumb|Usenet Provider Map
A news server is a collection of software used to handle Usenet articles. It may also refer to a computer itself which is primarily or solely used for handling Usenet. Access to Usenet is only available through news server providers.
Articles and posts
End users often use the term "posting" to refer to a single message or file posted to Usenet. For articles containing plain text, this is synonymous with an article. For binary content such as pictures and files, it is often necessary to split the content among multiple articles. Typically through the use of numbered Subject: headers, the multiple-article postings are automatically reassembled into a single unit by the newsreader. Most servers do not distinguish between single and multiple-part postings, dealing only at the level of the individual component articles.
Headers and overviews
Each news article contains a complete set of header lines, but in common use the term "headers" is also used when referring to the News Overview database.
Article sizes
Article sizes are limited to what each news server will accept. The larger the article size, the more space it occupies, and thus the fewer articles on each server. This generally means that a server can run with less overhead which makes for a more efficient server, but gives less articles for users to access.
Retention
Retention is simply defined as how long the server keeps articles. Historically, most users want retention to be long enough so that they don't need to access the server every day but not overly long retention that can overwhelm users with slow computers or network connections.