Shared web hosting providers use a single server to store the files of multiple websites, making hosting relatively inexpensive for small businesses. We evaluated 30 top shared hosting providers to find the best six—including the best overall—based on price, features, customer service, and reliability.
Top 6 Shared Hosting Providers 2019
| [Shared Hosting Providers] | Best For |
|---|---|
| InMotion | (Best Overall) Businesses needing feature-rich web hosting with robust security features. |
| HostGator | Businesses needing shared hosting plans with an easy-to-use site builder. |
| Bluehost | Businesses needing a full-featured, shared hosting provider for their WordPress website. |
| A2 Hosting | Businesses needing extra memory and multiple processors to host high-speed websites. |
| SiteGround | Businesses needing internationally-based servers for sites that serve global users. |
| 1&1 IONOS | Businesses that need no-frills shared hosting for $1/month. |
How We Evaluated Shared Web Hosting Providers
Many small businesses need reliable, easy-to-use web hosting at an affordable price, and therefore often turn to inexpensive shared hosting plans. With so many available, however, it’s hard to know which are the most reliable. To get started, we reviewed shared hosting providers to find the top six that best suit small businesses based on storage, bandwidth, security, breadth of features, customer support, and ease of use.
Based on the needs and wants of the reader, the criteria we used to evaluate the best include:
- Price: We looked for shared hosting providers that offer at least one full-feature plan for under $5 per month.
- Storage: To ensure small businesses have the tools to run a reliable and complete website, we preferred shared hosting plans that offer at least 10GB of storage.
- Bandwidth: Because small businesses often have unpredictable website needs due to seasonal or promotional traffic peaks, we preferred shared hosting plans that offer more flexibility via unlimited or unmetered (unmonitored) bandwidth.
- Domains: Small businesses cannot build a website without first having a domain name. We preferred shared hosting providers that offer free domains as part of their shared hosting plans.
- Security: We chose providers that offer a basic Secure Socket Layer (SSL) certificate to help small businesses protect their customers’ sensitive data. We preferred those that also offer domain privacy to shield small businesses from spam.
- Ease of use: We preferred shared hosting plans that offer the industry gold standard cPanel (control panel) for a more intuitive website management experience.
- Customer service: We know small businesses must often work around the clock to keep their businesses thriving. That’s why we chose shared hosting plans that offer 24/7 support to answer customers’ questions.
Based on the criteria above, we chose InMotion as the best shared hosting provider for 2019. It not only offers extremely affordable and robust shared hosting plans, but they top it off with plenty of security so small businesses can rest easy using their websites to market and sell their products online. Learn more about InMotion’s shared hosting plans below.
Best Overall Shared Hosting Provider for Small Businesses: InMotion
InMotion is a web hosting provider that stands out by providing full-featured plans starting at $3.99 per month with extra security in even their basic plans. In addition to a free domain and unlimited storage, bandwidth, and email, they also offer a ton of website security features like daily backups and hack protection. With security at the forefront, InMotion is best for small businesses that need to securely accept credit card payments to sell products and services.
InMotion Pricing
InMotion’s Launch Plan is $3.99 per month (for three years) with two business websites, a free domain, SSL certificate, and hack protection—plus unlimited storage, bandwidth, daily backups, and email. Their Power plan offers two times the speed and six websites, while their Pro plan offers six times the website speed and unlimited websites.
InMotion Tiered Features
| Price | |||
| Money-back Guarantee | |||
| Websites Hosted | |||
| Storage | |||
| Bandwidth | |||
| Domains | |||
| Domain Privacy | |||
| Subdomains | |||
| SSL Certificate | |||
| Backups | |||
| Uptime* | |||
| One-click Installations |
* InMotion offers a one-month credit should your service uptime fall under the 99.999% uptime guarantee due to failure of their network or equipment.
Launch Plan
InMotion’s basic plan is $3.99 per month (for three years). It offers two websites, an SSL certificate, daily backups, and unlimited storage, bandwidth, and email accounts. This plan stands out by offering a free domain for the duration of the contract. Further, their proprietary Hack Protection continually scans your site looking for vulnerabilities and patches them to prevent hacks. They cover servers with Denial-of-Service (DDoS) protection to prevent attacks that disrupt service.
With two websites hosted and extra security suitable for thoroughly protecting customers’ sensitive data, this plan is great for brands wanting to build two complementary ecommerce sites. For example, a clothing brand can build sites for men’s and women’s fashions, or a travel booking site can use the plan to build two websites for business and vacation travel to target two different markets.
Power Plan
InMotion’s Plus plan is $5.99 per month when you sign up for three years. It offers all the features of the Basic Plan, including a free domain, an SSL certificate, daily backups, DDoS protection, hack protection, and unlimited storage, bandwidth, and email accounts. It further offers six hosted websites. They also boast that this plan is two times faster than the Launch plan because it offers more central processing units (CPUs) and memory.
With four more websites hosted than the Basic plan, plus the same impressive security, this plan would be great for small statewide regional distributors that take online orders. For example, a car rental service could build a website for each of their locations, then allow customers to book their rentals online and pick them up in person. Similarly, carry-out restaurants could create a website for each of their locations so people can order food to be delivered to their homes.
Pro Plan
The InMotion Pro plan is $13.99 per month when you sign up for three years. Like the Power plan, it offers unlimited storage, bandwidth, and email, plus an SSL certificate, hack protection, DDoS protection, and daily backups. It differs from the Power plan by offering unlimited websites instead of just six. This plan also offers double the website speed of the Power Plan due to more CPU and memory.
With thorough protection against hacks and unauthorized access to customers’ sensitive data, along with unlimited hosted websites, this plan would suite a growing regional brand with local store locations. For example, once the statewide local distributors we mentioned in the Power plan decide to build regional stores, they could upgrade to create websites for each new location.
Ease of Use
InMotion’s shared hosting accounts can be managed using cPanel, the preferred panel of most website owners. Once you log in, you can scroll to find sections labeled Preferences, Email, Domains, Top Applications (like Joomla and WordPress), Security, and more. In each section, you can complete tasks by clicking on clearly labeled tiles. For example, under Email, you can click to manage your Spam Filters and Forwarders with a few clicks.
Customer Support
InMotion offers 24/7/365 customer service through phone, email, chat, or Skype. To access it, click the “Support Center” homepage tab and scroll all the way down to the bottom to find listed phone numbers, a chat button, a “Submit a Support Ticket” link, and an email address. There is also a Skype button at the top right-hand corner of this screen. Additionally, you can use the bar at the top of the page to search for tutorials from InMotion’s expansive online knowledge base.
What InMotion Is Missing
Compared to Bluehost, InMotion’s domain privacy is quite expensive. Their mid-tiered plan also falls short of SiteGround, A2 Hosting, Bluehost, and HostGator by hosting just six websites instead of unlimited websites.
What Users Think About InMotion
Users love the quality of InMotion’s customer support. The staff answers customer questions almost immediately, and are friendly and knowledgeable. Users also love their added security and how robust even their basic web hosting plans are. They do find it frustrating when InMotion does not warn them before conducting maintenance that disrupts service.
Where to Find InMotion
To learn more about InMotion’s shared web hosting plans, visit their homepage and scroll down to find their row of plan types. Click on the “Business Hosting” tile on the far right. You can also click on the “Sales Chat” button at the top of any InMotion page to ask questions. They offer a generous 90-day money-back guarantee so you can try them with no risk. Click here to get started with InMotion.
Best Provider With an Easy-to-Use Site Builder: HostGator
HostGator is a full-featured shared hosting provider that stands out by offering lots of tools to help even novice designers build a fully-functional website in just a few minutes—all for under $3 per month. Tools include an intuitive website builder, predesigned website templates and sections, and thousands of applications you can install with one click. It is best for businesses with very little technical knowledge needing to design their own websites quickly using a builder.
HostGator Pricing
HostGator’s shared web hosting plans start at $2.75 per month and offer one website and one hosted domain, unmetered storage and bandwidth, unlimited email accounts, an SSL certificate, and instant website backups. At $3.95 per month and $5.95 per month, their Baby and Business plans offer additional hosted websites and more security features.
HostGator Tiered Features
| Price | |||
| Money-back Guarantee | |||
| Websites Hosted | |||
| Storage | |||
| Bandwidth* | |||
| Domains | |||
| Domain Privacy | |||
| Subdomains | |||
| SSL Certificate | |||
| Backups | |||
| Uptime** | |||
| One-click CMS Installations |
* Unmetered means the hosting provider does not monitor how much bandwidth you use. There are, however, usage limitations; check your terms of service for details.
** HostGator offers a one-month credit should your service uptime fall under the 99.9% uptime guarantee due to failure of their network or equipment.
Hatchling Plan
HostGator’s Hatchling plan is $2.75 per month ($10.95 per month after 36 months). It comes with one hosted website; unlimited email accounts, storage, and bandwidth; an SSL certificate; and one-click WordPress installations. Like Bluehost, you must pay extra for domain privacy but at the heftier price tag of $14.95 per year. They do offer backups in each of their plans but, unlike SiteGround, they are not automatic; you must manually initiate the backup in cPanel.
With one hosted website and a more limited SSL certificate than the one offered under the Business plan, this plan is great for freelancers wanting to showcase their work or expertise via a portfolio or blog. Each plan offers one-click installations of popular CMS’s and a theme database for easy website design. Freelancers can use unlimited email storage and 35MB attachment limits (email sending only) to keep the conversation flowing with long-term clients.
Baby Plan
At $3.95 per month ($11.95 per month after 36 months), the Baby plan comes with unmetered storage, bandwidth, and email, and an SSL certificate. Unlike the Hatchling plan, it offers unlimited domains and websites. Because this is a shared plan, if you use more resources than are generally expected of a small business, your website may experience slow loading times, which will be an indication you need to scale back site content or upgrade to another plan.
Because this plan offers more hosted websites and domains, it would be a decent plan for freelancers looking to showcase separate websites for each of their skills and areas of expertise. For example, a writer may start a website that showcases their clips for the health industry and another that showcases clips for the technology industry. Or, a graphic designer may have one website that shows their logo designs and another that showcases their website designs.
Business Plan
The Business plan also starts at $5.95 per month ($16.95 after 36 months). Like the Baby plan, it offers unmetered websites, storage, bandwidth, and email, plus instant backups. Unlike the Baby plan and other provider plans on this list, the Business plan’s included Positive SSL certificate offers a warranty of $10,000 should a data breach happen, and a TrustLogo® Site Seal on your website to show visitors they can trust your website to handle sensitive information.
Given the increased website security offered, this plan is the best of the three if you are starting an ecommerce website. It does not serve businesses starting more than one ecommerce site, however, because you can only cover one domain under the SSL certificate. Instead, it’s best for a small, single-location, brick-and-mortar store that sells items online or an ecommerce site that only has one branded domain.
Ease of Use
HostGator offers the gold-standard cPanel, which is known to offer highly-intuitive user experiences. Most tasks can be completed almost instantly with a couple of clicks. You can use it to track bandwidth and storage, create email addresses, block website visitors, create custom error pages, install a blog or CMS with one click, and more. In addition, for an easy hosting experience, HostGator offers free website transfers and a drag-and-drop website builder.
Customer Support
HostGator offers 24/7 customer support via live chat, email, and phone. On their support page, there are also links to tutorials. Tutorials cover topics like how to use WordPress, create a new email account, install galleries on your website, use cPanel to manage your plan features, download website templates, design an ecommerce store, and more. You can browse by topic or use the search bar to find a tutorial that addresses your specific question.
What HostGator Is Missing
HostGator does not offer a free domain or automatic WordPress installations like Bluehost. It also doesn’t offer automatic daily website backups like Bluehost does. In addition, you can’t choose your server location like you can with SiteGround.
What Users Think About HostGator
Users love that HostGator offers an affordable and reliable hosting service with lots of features as part of even their basic plans. They especially appreciate all of the convenient add-ons in each plan, including unlimited email accounts, one-click CMS installations, and an intuitive cPanel. They don’t like that the support team often takes days to respond to customers with a solution to their problems, meaning they often have out figure out solutions on their own.
Where to Find HostGator
To learn more about HostGator’s shared web hosting plans, visit their homepage and click on their “Web Hosting” tab. All plans come with a 45-day money-back guarantee so you can try their services at no risk. Click here to get started with HostGator.
Best Provider for WordPress Websites: Bluehost
Bluehost is a full-featured web hosting provider that stands out as WordPress’ recommended hosting provider. Plans start at $2.95 per month and come with automatic WordPress website installations and updates as well as a separate staging area that allows you to experiment with designs before applying them to your live WordPress website. It best serves small businesses needing a quick and easy WordPress website that can be customized as they grow.
Bluehost Pricing
Bluehost’s WordPress shared hosting plan starts at $2.95 per month for 36 months and offers one website, a free domain for a year, 50GB of storage, unmetered bandwidth, an SSL certificate, and an email account. Their Plus and Choice Plus plans offer unlimited websites and storage, while the Choice Plus plan also offers website backups.
Bluehost Tiered Features
| Price | |||
| Money-back Guarantee | |||
| Websites | |||
| Storage | |||
| Bandwidth* | |||
| Domains | |||
| Domain Privacy | |||
| Subdomains | |||
| SSL Certificate | |||
| Backups | |||
| Uptime** | |||
| One-click CMS Installations |
* Unmetered means the hosting provider does not monitor how much bandwidth you use. There are, however, usage limitations; check your terms of service for details.
** Bluehost does not offer a refund for failure to maintain a 99.9% uptime.
Basic Plan
Bluehost’s Basic hosting plan is $2.95 per month ($7.99 per month after 36 months). It offers one website, 50GB of storage, unmetered bandwidth, a free domain for a year, an SSL certificate, and five email accounts. All Bluehost plans offer automatic installations of the latest version of WordPress, which they keep up to date for you. You also get a WordPress staging site—a replica of your site so you can try out changes with zero risk before pushing your site live.
With 50GB of storage, a website, a free domain, an SSL certificate, and automatic installation of WordPress, this plan is perfect for freelancers or new entrepreneurs who are just opening their first website and don’t expect a lot of traffic right away. The staging environment helps them experiment with how they want their brand to appear online before launching it publicly.
Plus Plan
Bluehost’s Plus plan is $5.45 per month ($10.99 per month after 36 months) and offers unlimited hosted websites hosted, unlimited storage, unmetered bandwidth, an SSL certificate, a free domain for a year, and five email accounts. It differs from the Basic plan by offering more storage and hosted websites. It also offers automatic WordPress installations, a WordPress staging environment, and automated WordPress updates as new versions hit the market.
While this plan offers the same website security as the Basic plan, this security, coupled with more storage, bandwidth, and hosted websites, makes this plan more suitable for small ecommerce businesses that are branching out. An online fashion store, for example, could start complementary websites that focus on jewelry or niche fashion lines, like one just for children.
Choice Plus
The Choice Plus plan is also $5.45 per month ($14.99 per month after 36 months). Like the Choice plan, it offers unlimited storage and bandwidth, an SSL certificate, automatic WordPress installation, a WordPress staging environment, a free domain for a year, five email accounts with a custom domain, and unlimited websites. It further offers Bluehost’s CodeGuard Basic Backup to back up your website daily and store those backups in multiple locations.
The extra backup feature and SSL certificate makes this an ideal plan for large ecommerce sites with lots of content and items to sell. If a part of your website gets deleted or a hacker brings it down, you stand to lose a lot of money quickly; a backup helps you regain control, start making money again, and quickly serve those customers who have already purchased from you and are waiting for their items.
Ease of Use
In Bluehost’s Customer Control Panel, plan features are arranged under row headers. For example, under the “Website” header, there are tiles with labels like “Website Manager,” “WordPress Themes,” and “Page Speed Grader” for installing different types of CMS’s, reviewing and installing themes, and understanding website issues that may slow your website down. Tasks can be performed by filling out simple forms or clicking buttons.
Customer Support
Bluehost offers 24/7 phone or live chat customer support. You can also contact a specialist who deals with topic-specific questions by visiting their customer support contact page and finding the relevant number to call. Support areas include website speed problems, website security, and website services and solutions for exploring new tools that may help you get more done on your website.
What Bluehost Is Missing
Bluehost doesn’t offer unlimited storage in their basic plans like InMotion does. It also doesn’t offer unlimited email accounts or unmetered storage in their Basic plan. For unlimited email, unmetered storage, and website backups in basic plans, consider HostGator.
What Users Think About Bluehost
Customers like that Bluehost’s user interface is easy to use and they offer a lot of features in their plans. They feel like the initial term pricing (36 months) is very affordable but don’t like that the price rises significantly upon renewal. Their customer service has mixed reviews, with some saying they were very helpful and others saying they were slow to respond and not very helpful.
Where to Find Bluehost
To learn more about Bluehost’s shared WordPress hosting plans, visit their website and click on their “WordPress” tab, then on “WordPress hosting.” They also offer a 30-day money-back guarantee so you can sign up for a plan and try it out at no risk to you. Click here to get started with Bluehost’s shared WordPress hosting.
Best Provider for Website Speed: A2 Hosting
A2 Hosting is a web hosting platform that stands out by offering extra features to boost website speed and performance for under $10 per month. Their Turbo servers boost website speed by up to 20 times what standard servers offer, and their Performance Plus feature adds memory and extra processing units (CPUs) to maintain website speed during traffic spikes. It best serves businesses that are focused on fast load times, including ecommerce and breaking news sites.
A2 Hosting Pricing
A2 Hosting’s Lite plan is $3.92 per month with one website hosted, unlimited storage and bandwidth, a Let’s Encrypt SSL certificate, and 25 email accounts. The Swift plan is $4.90 per month and adds unlimited websites and email. The $9.31 per month Turbo plan uniquely offers a 20x boost in website speed.
A2 Hosting Tiered Features
| Price | |||
| Money-back Guarantee | |||
| Websites Hosted | |||
| Storage | |||
| Bandwidth | |||
| Domains | |||
| Domain Privacy | |||
| Subdomains | |||
| SSL Certificate | |||
| Backups | |||
| Uptime* | |||
| One-click CMS Installations |
* A2 Hosting offers a service credit of 5% of each month’s fee should your website become unreachable due to failure of their network or equipment.
Lite Plan
A2 Hosting’s Lite Plan starts at $3.92 per month, then renews at $7.99 per month after three years. It comes with unlimited SSD storage (which offers faster load times than HDD storage), unlimited bandwidth, one website, and 25 email accounts. It also includes a Let’s Encrypt SSL certificate, which does offer encryption of customers’ sensitive data but not liability insurance to protect your company should a breach happen.
Because the Let’s Encrypt SSL certificate doesn’t offer your company financial coverage in the event of a breach, this plan is best for bloggers, online portfolios, and non-ecommerce business websites. For example, it could work well for building websites for brick-and-mortar stores like a grocery store, hardware store, or boutique, as long as all purchases are done in-store. Its 25 email accounts could be used for employees and internal communication.
Swift Plan
The Swift plan starts at $4.90 per month and renews at $9.99 per month after three years. Like the Lite plan, it has unlimited SSD storage and bandwidth and a free Let’s Encrypt SSL certificate. It also offers unlimited email accounts and websites. You can purchase Performance Plus for $1.47 per month with this plan, which adds another 1GB of memory and another CPU core to help your website handle traffic spikes.
With greater storage limits, unlimited websites, and Performance Plus available—but still without an ecommerce-appropriate SSL certificate—this plan is best for brick-and-mortar business websites that experience traffic spikes due to promotions or peak business seasons. For example, it would work well for a statewide car dealership that is showcasing time-limited promotions and deals on their website.
Turbo Plan
A2 Hosting’s Turbo plan is $9.31 per month for 36 months. It includes unlimited storage, bandwidth, email, and websites, plus a Let’s Encrypt SSL certificate. While Bluehost offers SSD storage for website speed, this plan also offers Turbo Charge, which boosts website speed 20 times the normal speed of an A2 site. It also has advanced caching for faster data retrieval, while the $8 per month CloudFlare Plus add-on provides an ensured SSL certificate and greater speed.
With unlimited storage, lightning-fast load times, and a liability-protecting SSL certificate add-on option, this plan can handle complex ecommerce websites with lots of moving parts. It’s best for ecommerce sites with content that changes based on user behavior, including vacation booking sites where customers can instantly create their own packages. It can also easily accommodate sites with lots of pop-up content.
Ease of Use
A2 Hosting uses the industry-standard cPanel, which has become very popular due to its intuitive and uncluttered interface. By clicking on prominent buttons and filling out simple forms, you can manage domains, bandwidth, email, SSL certificates, and more. With intuitive organization and navigation, it is easy enough for even first-time website owners to navigate.
Customer Service
A2 Hosting offers 24/7/365 customer service via ticket, phone, and live chat. To access customer support, click on their “Sales & Support” button at the top of any A2 Hosting website page. They also offer a searchable knowledge base with tutorials on products and features, including a cPanel guide, a domain name configuration guide, and answers to questions like “What makes A2 Hosting fast?”
What A2 Hosting Is Missing
A2 Hosting does not offer free domain names like Bluehost, InMotion, and 1&1 do with their basic plans. They also don’t offer ecommerce-appropriate SSL certificates for free with their shared hosting plans like InMotion, Bluehost, and InMotion do.
What Users Think About A2 Hosting
We were hard-pressed to find negative reviews for A2 Hosting because of their combination of high website speed and knowledgeable customer support. However, a few users said support representatives can sometimes take a few minutes to answer when customers reach out via live chat. Overall, users like that A2 is focused on features that produce high website speed, even though their plans have otherwise limited features.
Where to Find A2 Hosting
To learn more about A2 Hosting’s shared hosting plans, visit the A2 Hosting website and click on their “Shared Hosting” header menu tab. If you have questions, you can click the “Chat” button at the top of any A2 Hosting website page. All plans also come with anytime money-back guarantees so you can try out plans at no risk to you. To get started with A2 Hosting, click here.
Best Provider for International Websites: SiteGround
SiteGround is a web hosting provider starting at $3.95 per month that stands out by offering full-featured shared hosting plans, complete with five global data centers website owners can choose from to ensure their websites offer the fastest loading times for global website visitors. It is ideal for website owners who intend to serve global audiences, like ecommerce customers.
SiteGround Pricing
SiteGround’s Startup shared hosting plan starts at $3.95 per month and comes with one website, 10GB storage, unmetered bandwidth, automatic daily backups, and unlimited email accounts. Their GrowBig plan starts at $5.95 per month and offers another 20GB storage and unlimited websites hosted. Their $11.95 per month GoGeek plan offers an additional 10GB storage.
SiteGround Tiered Features
| Price | |||
| Money-back Guarantee | |||
| Domains | |||
| Domain Privacy | |||
| Subdomains | |||
| Websites Hosted | |||
| Storage | |||
| Bandwidth* | |||
| SSL Certificate | |||
| Backups | |||
| Uptime** | |||
| One-click CMS Installations |
* Unmetered means the hosting provider does not monitor how much bandwidth you use. There are, however, usage limitations; check your terms of service for details.
** SiteGround offers a one-month credit should your service fall between 99.9% and 99% uptime, and an additional free month of hosting for every 1% your service uptime dips below 99% due to failure of their network or equipment.
Startup
SiteGround’s Startup plan is $3.95 per month and renews at $11.95 per month after 36 months. It offers a website, 10GB of storage, unmetered bandwidth, an SSL certificate, automatic daily backups, and unlimited email. SiteGround claims this plan can handle up to 10,000 website visitors a month. While other providers on this list only offer data centers in the United States, SiteGround also offers a choice of data centers in London, Amsterdam, and Singapore.
With the capacity to handle up to 10,000 visitors a month and only one website, this plan is best for entrepreneurs just starting a blog and whose goal is to grow into a website that attracts 10,000 monthly visitors. With the choice of global data centers for faster loading times for international visitors, it would be ideal for bloggers who are planning on attracting a global readership, like travel writers.
GrowBig
SiteGround’s GrowBig plan is $5.95 per month for 36 months, then $19.95 per month thereafter. It comes with email, unmetered bandwidth, an SSL certificate, and automatic daily backups. It differs from the Startup plan by offering 20GB of storage and unlimited websites. It also offers your choice of data centers in the United States, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, and Singapore so your global website readers can enjoy fast website loading times.
SiteGround confirms this plan can handle up to 25,000 visitors per month while accommodating unlimited websites. This, coupled with a choice of five data centers across the globe, makes it an ideal plan for small but growing global news sites or travel brands that want to build more than one website to target a couple of international markets.
GoGeek
The GoGeek Plan starts at $11.95 per month and renews at $34.95 per month after 36 months. It also comes with unlimited websites and email accounts, unmetered bandwidth, a choice of five global data centers, an SSL certificate, and automatic daily backups. It further offers 30GB of storage (10GB more than the GrowBig plan). SiteGround estimates it can handle up to 100,000 monthly website visitors.
Given a choice of data centers across the globe, the ability to handle up to 100,000 monthly visitors, and email, this plan is great for businesses that are gaining authority in a couple of global markets and would like to continue expanding globally; this includes food, travel, marketing, and news sites.
Ease of Use
SiteGround offers the industry-popular cPanel, which provides an intuitive experience for users. The homepage of the cPanel is straightforward, offering a scroll-down list of product sections like “Domains,” “Site Improvement Tools,” “Mail,” and “Backups Manager.” Each sub-menu item is represented with buttons that you can click to navigate to more information or to complete a task.
Customer Service
SiteGround’s customer support is available 24/7 via phone, chat, and ticket submissions. They take customer service seriously; they claim to overstaff each shift so no user experiences wait times. When you reach out with a ticket submission, SiteGround’s website says you can expect a first reply within 10 minutes of submission.
What SiteGround Is Missing
Unlike Bluehost, InMotion, and 1&1, SiteGround does not offer a free website domain with their shared hosting plans. They also don’t offer unlimited storage and email like HostGator.
What Users Think About SiteGround
Users like that SiteGround offers helpful, instant, and always-knowledgeable customer support via their live chat option. Representatives are great at guiding new users through any learning curves that come with hosting their first websites. They also appreciate their always-reliable website uptimes and speed. They don’t like that the renewal prices for shared hosting plans are pricey compared to industry competitors like Bluehost and HostGator.
Where to Find SiteGround
To learn more, visit SiteGround’s homepage and click on the “Web Hosting” tile. You can also click the “Help” option in the header of any SiteGround website page, then click “Start a Sales Chat” to instantly connect with a representative who can answer your questions. Each plan comes with a 30-day money-back guarantee so you can try any plan risk-free. Click here to get started with SiteGround.
Best No-frills Provider Starting at $1/month: 1&1 IONOS
1&1 IONOS is a web hosting company that stands out by offering low-priced plans with all the basic features necessary for businesses to host a website and communicate with website visitors. Plans start at $1 per month and include a free website domain, a website, domain privacy, an SSL certificate, email, and one-click content management system (CMS) installations. 1&1 is ideal for entrepreneurs just starting their first website on an extremely limited budget.
1&1 IONOS Pricing
1&1 IONOS’ shared hosting plans start at $1 per month (for 12 months). Their basic plan includes one website, 100GB of storage, one domain, domain privacy, an SSL certificate, daily backups, and email. Their Pro plan offers five websites and 250GB of storage, while their Expert plan offers 50 websites and 500GB of storage.
1&1 IONOS Tiered Features
| Price | |||
| Money-back Guarantee | |||
| Websites Hosted | |||
| Storage | |||
| Bandwidth | |||
| Domains | |||
| Domain Privacy | |||
| Subdomains | |||
| SSL Certificate | |||
| Backups | |||
| Uptime* | |||
| One-click CMS Installations |
* 1&1 IONOS does not offer a refund of any service should your service uptime fall under their claimed 99.9% uptime.
Business Plan
1&1’s Business plan is $1 per month for one year, then $8 per month. It offers one website, 100GB of storage, 2.5GB of bandwidth, a Wildcard SSL certificate, domain privacy, automatic daily backups, 25 email accounts, and one-click installations of popular CMS’s like Joomla. The Wildcard SSL certificate means that any subdomains you add are also protected. It exceeds providers like Bluehost by offering 100GB of storage in even its basic plan.
This plan only covers one website and has limited bandwidth, allowing you to only have, on average, 100 website visitors at a time. With only 512MB of memory, it can’t handle a lot of moving parts like pop-ups or real-time personalization. As such, it is best for entrepreneurs who are putting together a portfolio or blog and don’t yet have a well-known brand that will generate lots of traffic or need real-time targeting to appeal to several marketing segments.
Pro Plan
The 1&1 Pro plan is $1 per month for the first six months, then $10 per month. It hosts up to five websites, has 250GB of storage, 6GB of bandwidth, 25 email accounts, daily automatic backups, a Wildcard SSL certificate, domain privacy, a free domain, and one-click CMS installations. It can handle about 200 website visitors per minute.
Because this plan hosts five websites, is secured with an SSL certificate that covers subdomains, and handles 200 website visitors per minute, it is more suitable for an ecommerce store with multiple niche shops or blogs. For example, you can open an outdoor gear shop and then begin a complementary adventure booking site with a blog on survival skills to showcase how products can be used when camping, mountain climbing, or hiking.
Expert Plan
The Expert plan is $1 per month for the first six months, then $14 per month. It is a significant step up from the Pro plan with 50 websites hosted, 500GB of storage, and 9GB of bandwidth. It further offers a free domain, a Wildcard SSL certificate, domain privacy, daily backups, and 25 email accounts. It boasts the ability to handle up to 300 website visitors per minute. Still, if you need unlimited websites or storage, it’s best to go with InMotion or A2 Hosting.
With up to 50 websites hosted under this plan and the ability to handle lots of traffic, this plan is more suitable for a company looking to expand quickly. With 300 website visitors per minute, it can handle large volumes of traffic from the moment the websites go live. This, coupled with 1&1’s one-click installations of ecommerce applications like Magento, means this plan could handle expanding ecommerce stores or franchises quite well.
Ease of Use
The 1&1 IONOS control panel’s home page offers sections for each web hosting product, including domains, email, SSL certificates, and more. Links and drop-down menu options under each section header lead to relevant tasks like “Manage online storage and permissions,” and “Create new email users.” With no images, 1&1 ads on the side, and drop-down menus, it is cluttered and may be a little difficult for new users to navigate.
Customer Support
1&1 IONOS offers customer support through phone, email, and live chat. Especially useful for first-time website owners, a personal consultant is assigned to each customer to offer catered tips and help with technical issues. They also have an extensive knowledge base where users can find how-to guides on solving issues or using plan features.
What 1&1 IONOS Is Missing
1&1 IONOS doesn’t offer a standard control panel like InMotion and HostGator do. Unlike HostGator, they also don’t offer unlimited websites, storage, or email in their most basic small business plans.
What Users Think About 1&1 IONOS
Users like that 1&1 IONOS offers standard features for free, like SSL certificates and email. They say the customer support is friendly but takes a long time to answer (up to two days by email) and are not knowledgeable. Because their website load times are sometimes slow, customers say they wouldn’t host a complicated website with a lot of moving parts using 1&1.
Where to Find 1&1 IONOS
To learn more, visit 1&1’s homepage and scroll down to find the web hosting tile. Click on the accompanying “View Offer” button. Scroll down to find the “See all Linux Hosting Details” button under the pricing tables to view in-depth details about each plan. They offer a 30-day money-back guarantee so you can try 1&1 with no risk. Click here to get started with 1&1 IONOS.
Bottom Line
Shared hosting providers offer businesses a portion of a server to store their website files, then make those files available to website visitors. We believe the top shared web hosting plans should provide all the features small businesses need to host and run a successful website, even as they grow and traffic peaks. These include multiple hosted websites, flexible storage and bandwidth, email, website security, and friendly and knowledgeable customer service.
Based on the criteria above, we consider InMotion to be the best overall shared hosting provider. In their most basic shared hosting plan, they offer unlimited storage, bandwidth, and email, as well as advanced website security features like hack protection, an SSL certificate, and website backup—all for just $3.99 per month. Click here to get started with InMotion.
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