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BolehVPN review
1:43 pm | September 25, 2020

Author: admin | Category: Computers Gadgets | Comments: Off

When you’re protecting your identity and information online, you need the best VPNs to keep activities safe, secure, and secret. 

One popular use is, of course, using a VPN to block geo-restricted content on platforms like Netflix, Hulu, HBO, and BBC iPlayer  - little wonder, then, that we’ve seen a rise in Netflix VPNs and streaming VPNs.  

The privacy tools are also useful for protecting IP addresses when downloading torrents. VPNs for torrenting prevent your ISP monitoring what you’re downloading. 

When looking for a VPN (even a free VPN), we always recommend looking for one that offers everything - letting you stream geo-locked content, while being the fastest VPNs - without any functional gaps. So, how does BolehVPN measure up? 

Despite having a Malaysian base, the tool’s is jurisdiction is in Seychelles. The VPN has over 65 VPN servers across more than 12 countries, including Germany, Japan, Switzerland, UK, and the US. This is a small number of servers compared to leading VPNs in the market offering thousands of servers. The servers are categorized into three groups, each with advantages and disadvantages, based on their intended use: Fully Routed, Proxied, and SurfingStreaming. 

BolehVPN: Pricing & plans 

(Image credit: Future)

BolehVPN has a 1-day free trial that allows you to test the software before deciding to make a payment, but it is extremely limited, with only 3 servers available at your disposal. It also comes with five pretty flexible subscription plans: weekly, monthly, bi-monthly, semi-annually, and annually.

The costs are

$3.70 a week, $9.99 a month, $16.99 every two months, $44.99 for six months, and $79.99 for the whole year.

All plans give you access to the same features and allow up to three simultaneous connections, which is small compared to the industry standard (5–7 simultaneous connections).

Payment options include credit cards, PaymentWall, PayPal, and cryptocurrency. All plans come with a 14-day money-back guarantee, which is manageable, but the standard in the industry is 30 days. Some other VPNs even go so far as to provide 45-day money-back guarantees. Keep in mind that refunds are not available if you pay with cryptocurrencies.

BolehVPN: Privacy and encryption 

Nearly all VPN providers in this market try to win customers by claiming to have a no-log-in policy, but they don't go as far as to support their claims by having their software audited by an outside auditor.

According to BolehVPN's no-logs policy, none of your online activity, IP addresses, or other data are logged, but according to the privacy policy, BolehVPN has the right to briefly enable logs if it notices suspicious behavior or receives a specific complaint of torrenting or spamming. This is inappropriate because it may compromise your privacy by recording your data. Despite the fact that the company claims they do not share the logged data with outside parties and that they delete the logs once the problem has been resolved, this is still a cause for concern.

The Seychelles Islands are home to BolehVPN's corporate headquarters. They have satellite offices in Malaysia and Hong Kong. These nations are not a part of the 14-Eye Alliance and are not governed by laws requiring the retention of intelligence. Therefore, BolehVPN is not required to provide information to law enforcement.

BolehVPN's log policy is transparent. The VPN provider releases a security canary once per month. This disclaimer serves to safeguard BolehVPN users in the event that the company is mandated by law to remain silent about any searches, seizures of data, or requirements to log. This is good, but we need the credibility of an impartial VPN audit report to support its assertions.

Although the platform is built on the OpenVPN security protocol, it also provides alternative ones, such as L2TP/IPsec, in case your device doesn't support OpenVPN. Additionally, it uses SHA-2 hash authentication, 4096-bit DHE-RSA keys, and 256-bit AES encryption for encryption.

There is a VPN kill switch feature, which safeguards your IP address and ensures your data is not exposed or made visible. The VPN also permits P2P torrenting. Remember, it’s unlawful to download copyrighted files. Also, there were no IPv4, IPv6, DNS, or WebRTC leaks over BolehVPN when we checked for them. 

(Image credit: Future)

BolehVPN: Streaming 

Servers on BolehVPN are separated into three categories based on their intended use: Fully Routed, Proxied, and SurfingStreaming. 

We tested the dedicated streaming servers for US Netflix and BBC iPlayer inside the app, and they functioned well without lagging. Disney+, Amazon Prime, Pandora, and Hulu could all be unblocked, although we found that long-distance servers typically had poor streaming quality.

BolehVPN: Speed and experience 

Depending on the location, connection, and internet service provider, speed can differ from person to person. Fast connections are almost as crucial as the security and privacy of a service. 

Running a series of speed tests, we found BolehVPN’s speeds were irregular. Its long-distance servers gave me contrasting results. like Singaporean servers that provided us with a 32.41 Mbps download speed over an 83.59 Mbps connection When connecting to a distant server, a slower connection speed is typical. The US servers closest to us provided us with a speed of 63.65Mbps. 

BolehVPN: Customer Support  

The support section of BolehVPN offers a number of beneficial installation guides, a help desk area with frequently asked questions (FAQs) and troubleshooting instructions, and email support. Regrettably, there is no live chat option or phone number. 

BolehVPN: Apps 

(Image credit: Future)

BolehVPN runs on Windows, macOS, and Linux, iOS, and Android. However, neither iOS or Android has native mobile VPN apps. Sabai Technologies, ASUS, and routers are also compatible with it. Moreover, unlike many other VPNs, there are no browser extensions for top browsers like Firefox, Chrome, Safari, Edge, or Opera.

There is no alternative to configuring the interface of the Windows and macOS apps to connect to a particular server when your computer starts. You must manually choose the best server because the quick connect option that many VPNs provide is not available.

Both the iOS and Android apps for BolehVPN on mobile are very difficult to set up and lack some features, such as the kill switch and split tunneling. All features are available on the Android app, but it has not yet been made mobile-friendly. 

Alternatives to BolehVPN 

CyberGhost

With a user-friendly platform, CyberGhost is one of the best. with a wealth of practical VPN features. The software never causes your computer to run slowly, is easy to use, and is free. In addition, it provides extensive P2P and torrent functionality and gives you access to more than 1200 servers spread across more than 50 nations. Features of the software include web browsing, anonymous browsing, remote access, DNS leak protection, and more. Up to five devices can be used simultaneously under one account. As a result, you can defend your mobile devices and the computers in your home.

Pure VPN 

Aside from unblocking every website we tried, PureVPN has a reasonably large network and offers all of this for some of the cheapest advertised prices available. PureVPN excels at unblocking, has lots of features, and is good value on longer-term plans.

Express VPN

ExpressVPN excels in every area, including speed, security, stable and user-friendly apps, unblocking geo-restricted websites, avoiding censorship, excellent privacy and security credentials, a ton of features, and customer support, so we would suggest it to both new and experienced VPN users.

NordVPN

NordVPN is one of the major players in the virtual private network market. It provides all the security and privacy features that customers should expect from a top-notch VPN. NordVPN is based in a country that values privacy and is incredibly fast and easy to use. 

Verdict

BolehVPN can grant you access to the most well-known streaming services, particularly those that are only available to US citizens. Due to their difficulty in use and navigation, the apps are inappropriate for novice VPN users. 

In addition to having a limited number of servers, they haven't had an independent auditor visit to check their servers for logs, so in comparison to other options, we won't fully recommend this virtual private network. 

VPNLand review
6:24 pm | September 15, 2020

Author: admin | Category: Computers Gadgets | Comments: Off

Most of the best VPNs on the market claim to be able to unblock geo-restricted content on streaming platforms like Netflix and the BBC - and that’s the big boast made by VPNLand, whose website proudly boasts that it’s a “premium stealth VPN with dedicated IPs for BBC and Netflix.” So, we decided to give it a try. 

VPNLand, a virtual private network service in Canada - a country that belongs to the 5 Eyes, 9 Eyes, and 14 Eyes surveillance alliances; a group of nations that gather intelligence data from their various regions of the world and automatically share it. This is a bad location for a VPN, especially one billing itself as a “stealth VPN”. The service claims to have over 700 VPN servers located in 13 countries and 10,000 IP addresses around the world. 

VPNLand: Pricing & plans 

VPNLand website screenshots

(Image credit: VPNLand)

VPNLand's price starts at $100 per year for the annual VPN account. This offers access to all of VPNLand’s servers. The monthly VPN account costs $15 a month for the same features as the annual VPN account. 

There is also the option of customizing plans to meet the needs of individual customers; for example, an account for poker players is available for $75 monthly. 

Unfortunately, there is no free VPN option here. There isn’t even a free trial available, and refunds are only given if the service doesn't work. You must provide valid proof to confirm that fact before receiving a refund.  

VPNLand: Privacy & encryption 

(Image credit: Future)

According to VPNLand's privacy policy, no logs are kept, and it does not keep track of DNS requests, but it may occasionally see its customers' real IP address in diagnostic logs. However, it claims not to collect any device-related data. Keep in mind that these assertions should not be taken at face value as no VPN audit has been undertaken and claims independently verified by an auditor.

Since VPNLand is based in a country that’s part of the "14-Eyes Alliance", if asked, it may disclose your personal information. We advise looking at our suggested alternative to this VPN if you are concerned about your privacy and anonymity online. AES (128–256 bit) encryption and a variety of VPN tunneling protocols, such as OpenVPN, L2TP, PPTP, and SSTP, are employed by VPNLand. 

VPNLand: Streaming 

Despite VPNLand's claims of being a streaming VPN - and specifically name-checking itself as a VPN for Netflix and BBC - when we looked for information on how to do so on the website, it only directed us to the page of another VPN service. 

VPNLand: Speed & experience 

For all its promises of being one of the fastest VPNs out there, the reality is far harsher, and slow. So slow, in fact, that we were unable to fully test it because our account was never activated, despite paying the price. If we’re being generous, we believe this service is no longer fully operational - but, regardless, the practice seems highly questionable. According to existing users, download speeds are average or below-average.

 VPNLand: Apps 

VPNLand website screenshots

(Image credit: VPNLand)

VPNLand has tools for Windows and Mac, as well as mobile VPN apps for Android and iOS. You can even enable it on other platforms like Linux, or VPN routers through third-party applications or the firm’s manual installation guide. 

VPNLand: Customer support 

Email and support tickets are the two support channels that VPNLand customers can use to contact customer service. Customers can also get assistance via live chat and phone during business hours. On the service provider's website, there are useful troubleshooting guidelines, so you shouldn't have any trouble resolving common VPN issues on your own. However, we were unable to reach customer service. 

VPNLand: Alternatives 

You can try any of our alternative VPN services as we are not sure if this VPN is active at the time of this review.

NordVPN

NordVPN has been available for more than ten years. You can access your preferred websites without any restrictions and take advantage of online security that meets military standards. Additionally, it has a 30-day money-back guarantee, doesn't log your data, and supports multiple concurrent device connections.

Read our full NordVPN review


Surfshark 

The service has a user-friendly app, unblocks all streaming services, is lightning-fast and loaded with cutting-edge features that are simple to use.

Read our full Surfshark review


ExpressVPN 

ExpressVPN is based in a privacy-friendly jurisdiction, is quick and safe, unblocks major streaming platforms, supports torrents, doesn't log your data, has thousands of servers dispersed throughout the world, and is simple to use. has a 3-month free trial and allows for five connections at once.

Read our full ExpressVPN review


IVPN

IVPN has a no-logging policy that has been independently audited, provides a unique blend of power and usability, is relatively priced, and has servers in 45 countries.

Read our full IVPN review 

Verdict

VPNLand website screenshots

(Image credit: VPNLand)

In theory, VPN Land has some good qualities to offer - it unblocks Netflix, BBC iPlayer, and other geo-restricted streaming channels, and bills itself as a VPN for torrenting. It even allows up to 10 simultaneous connections. However, this is not the case in practice.

We observed that the provider’s website was very slow and had no security certificate. Our account was never activated. Customer support remained silent. All in all, a poor user experience.  

To avoid all these issues - and at roughly the same price - we strongly recommend checking out superior alternatives.

BlackVPN review
6:16 pm |

Author: admin | Category: Computers Gadgets | Tags: | Comments: Off

BlackVPN promises to keep your data private – but can it deliver? We’ve put their VPN servers to the test to see if they can match up to other products on the market, looking at popular features like VPN torrenting capabilities, quick browsing, streaming capabilities and anonymity.

The service was founded in 2009 and is based in Kowloon, Hong Kong. This is considered a privacy-friendly location, because it is outside of the Five Eyes jurisdiction and therefore other countries cannot legally request your data. There is also no mandatory data retention policy in Hong Kong, which is a positive thing for those using the service

As of the time of this review, BlackVPN only has 31 servers spread across 18 different locations. This makes it quite small compared to most VPNs, with many boasting thousands of servers dispersed across multiple nations.

Pricing & plans 

To use BlackVPN you need to purchase a full year’s worth of service, with three different packages to choose from. There’s no free VPN option but you can select your plan based on the server you want to use and the features you desire. 

There’s a TV option for people who want a streaming VPN to use from the UK or the US, a separate package for unrestricted P2P/Bittorrent services, or a Global Package that bundles all of their services into one package. Subscribing to their plan gets you an unlimited amount of server switches and seven simultaneous device connections.

Global

€99.00 per year

Privacy

€49.00 per year 

TV

€75.00 per year 

BlackVPN also offers a 14-day cash-back guarantee and a 3-day trial that doesn't require any credit card information. You can purchase their service with credit cards, PayPal, cryptocurrencies, bank transfers, gift cards, or e-wallets via PaymentWall.

(Image credit: Future)

Privacy & encryption 

To protect your traffic, BlackVPN employs the military-grade 256-bit encryption standard as well as 4096-bit RSA certificates, which are unbreakable even by the most effective current computers. It also supports the PPTP, L2TP/IPSec, and OpenVPN protocols.

BlackVPN has a no-logs policy that states it doesn't keep any of your data anywhere. However when we checked the privacy policy for more details, we discovered a worrisome sentence that states the VPN will comply with data requests if forced to do so.

It also states that copyright infringement (torrenting) isn't allowed on the platform, which means the company will monitor the VPN account if it receives infringement notices from copyright owners. Therefore, they do log data. Ideally, you should use a VPN that has undergone an independent VPN audit. For this reason, we advise looking at our suggested alternatives to this VPN if you are worried about your security and anonymity online. 

Streaming 

The majority of market leaders claim to be VPNs for Netflix, giving you access to popular geo-restricted streaming services. When we tested BlackVPN the situation was mixed. It has servers made for VPN streaming and can unblock Netflix US, HBO NOW, Kodi media player, and Disney+. Unfortunately we weren’t able to unblock Amazon Prime Video or Hulu. 

(Image credit: Future)

Speed & experience 

Despite the fact that all VPNs will, in some way, slow down your connection, the best ones have a minimal impact and avoid lags or buffering. Likewise, speed can differ based on your location, connection, and internet service provider.

Our internet speed was 32 Mbps when we ran a speed test with BlackVPN on a server in Spain; after connecting, it dropped to 11.43 Mbps. The Australian servers underwent predictably worse performance, achieving only 3.8 Mbps on a 64 Mbps test connection. Brazil reached 5.4 Mbps, which also wasn't manageable. 

Apps 

The BlackVPN app was simple to download and compatible with Windows, macOS, Linux, and routers. You'll also find mobile VPN apps for Android and iOS. 

Be aware that there are multiple applications with the same name in the Google Play store so double-check that you’re downloading the right one. 

Customer support 

To get support, you can try their live chat option or fill out a support ticket. However, you must exercise patience; it took some time before we received a response.

We also advise looking at their knowledge base, which includes FAQs, installation instructions, troubleshooting articles, and more, before contacting the customer support.

(Image credit: Future)

Black VPN alternatives 

BlackVPN is deeply inferior to many of today’s popular VPN names. If you want a safe VPN, we recommend checking out these alternative options.

NordVPN

The service has more than 5,200 servers spread across 60 different countries, offers live chat support, round-the-clock email support, military-grade internet security, and supports up to six simultaneous device connections. It also has the ability to unblock all popular streaming services.

Read our full NordVPN review

ExpressVPN

Express VPN has servers in over 94 countries with live chat support available 24/7, and excellent security measures. It unblocks all streaming platforms, allows you to stream in HD and also allows for five simultaneous connections on devices. Additionally, it adheres strictly to no-log and privacy policies, giving you peace of mind that your information won't be disclosed.

Read our full ExpressVPN review

CyberGhost

Internet access to streaming websites from all over the globe can be unblocked using the incredibly user-friendly VPN CyberGhost. It has 24/7 live support and safeguards your data with features like an automatic VPN kill switch that cannot be turned off and has military-grade 256-bit encryption. CyberGhost can be trusted to protect your data thanks to independent audits, transparency reports, and a strict privacy policy.

Read our full CyberGhost review 

Verdict

BlackVPN was probably an excellent VPN platform once. However, it is now a barely working shell of a service that only has a nice website to show off and a bunch of unusable apps and servers that occasionally connect. It may unblock Netflix and BBC iPlayer but what’s the point if you can’t even connect to a server in a country where such services are available? 

 Due to its privacy policy, BlackVPN is unable to compete with the best VPNs currently available. To be candid there are better VPNs out there that offer more bang for your buck. 

iPage web hosting review
8:50 pm | September 9, 2020

Author: admin | Category: Computers Gadgets | Comments: Off

iPage is a budget web hosting company with close to 25 years in the business, and more than a million websites on its platform.

iPage is owned and run by Newfold Digital (formerly known as Endurance International Group), the company who also owns big-name hosting competitors like Bluehost and HostGator.

What hosting plans does iPage offer? 

iPage offers simple, low-cost shared hosting, aimed at small, low-traffic personal and business sites.

A website builder range provides an easy way to create a site, then customize its content by dragging and dropping. The top website builder plan also supports creating a web store.

WordPress hosting plans include extra features to optimize WordPress speed and security.

iPage doesn't offer more powerful VPS, dedicated or cloud server products, making it unsuitable for large business sites, or any web projects where speed and reliability are important.

Next, we'll break down the various iPage products, find out what they have to offer, and whether they could work for you.

iPage shared hosting

Shared hosting is a technology where several websites are hosted on the same physical server. This keeps prices low because the cost of the server is spread across many accounts. But the websites also share the same CPU, RAM and network connections, and if the sites get busy, that means everyone takes a big performance hit.

iPage's shared hosting is as simple as it gets, with just one plan. It's seriously cheap at $1.99 a month over three years ($7.99 on renewal), but still has a reasonable feature list. There are no storage or bandwidth limits, for instance. The plan allows you to host unlimited websites (a welcome touch, as most plans at this price only support one). There's a free domain, free SSL, a bundled website builder, 1-click WordPress installation, unlimited email addresses and more.

That's reasonable for $1.99 a month, but there are some issues here. The plan doesn't offer backups, for instance, and it costs from $2.27 a month to add them, more than doubling the price. There's no free migration, and your hosting management tools are below par. iPage uses a horribly basic 1-click WordPress installer, for example, which doesn't begin to match the top-notch Softaculous installer often used elsewhere. And its own control panel, where you'll create email accounts, work with files and more, is short on features and awkward to use.

There are potential setup complications, too. Sign up and the website insists you register a new domain or transfer an existing domain to iPage; unlike almost all the competition, there’s no option to use a domain managed elsewhere. We asked support, they said this was possible but they'd have to manually create the account for us (a hassle, and not an option most users would even realize existed.)

Compare all this with Hostinger. It's a very similar price (from $2.99 a month over four years, $6.99 on renewal), but includes backups, offers a free WordPress migration, has a far better WordPress installer and control panel, and was much faster in our tests (more on that, later). Hostinger is a far better choice for budget shared hosting, but if you need extra power and are happy to pay for it, our Best Shared Web Hosting guide has more ideas.

iPage WordPress hosting homepage

(Image credit: iPage)

iPage WordPress hosting

IPage's WordPress hosting plans improve on its shared hosting by preinstalling WordPress, a collection of themes and plugins, and a custom WordPress control panel. The company says its WordPress platform 'has been designed to increase load speeds by up to 2.5 times', and the premium plan ($6.95 a month initially, $10.49 on renewal) throws in specialist WordPress support, SiteLock-based security and automatic malware removal.

This is fair value - you can sometimes pay more for standard shared hosting - but the feature list is a little short. 

As an alternative, IONOS' 'One' WordPress plan has very basic specs (10GB storage and supports just one website) but it includes staging, daily cloud backups and smart WordPress plugin updates, and it's priced at $18 billed monthly (no long-term contract required.) 

And if you don't really need these more advanced features, after all, IONOS WordPress Essential plan supports one WordPress site, 25GB storage and 10 email accounts, and includes a free domain and wildcard SSL certificate, all for just $3 billed monthly. (Again, that's the standard deal, so you won't see a drastic price hike once the first term is up.)

IPage's VPS hosting plans are relatively ordinary: there are just three, they're Linux only, and even the starter product (1 core, 1GB RAM, 40GB storage and 1TB bandwidth) is priced at a mid-range $19.99 for the first term, renewing at $24.99.

These are managed plans (iPage looks after the technical management of the VPS for you), so the prices aren't bad, but you'll get more options and control elsewhere. Hostwinds has ten main plans, in managed and unmanaged, Windows and Linux flavors, and if you know what you're doing, you can get an unmanaged 2 core, 1GB RAM, 30GB storage and 2TB bandwidth plan from as little as $8.99 a month.

It's a similar story with iPage small range of dedicated servers (just three plans). They're a little underpowered - the $119.99 Startup plan ($149.99 on renewal) gets you a 2 core CPU, 4GB RAM, 500GB disk space and 5TB bandwidth - but they don't really stand out in any way. A company like InterServer has a wider choice of servers, more configuration options, and you can find more powerful setups priced from $80 a month billed monthly.

iPage website builder in use

(Image credit: iPage)

Does iPage have a website builder?

iPage has a simple website builder which aims to make it easy to create a small personal or business website. The company bundles a free version with its shared hosting plans, and we gave it a try.

The builder began by asking us what our site was about (music, food, technology etc) and whether we needed a blog. We chose a name and a free cover photo from the iPage library. There were options to tweak fonts, colors and navigation style, add a logo or contact details, but we skipped all that and our site was ready in seconds.

The free version is limited to six pages, but still created a decent site. It added Home, Menu, About and Contact pages for our restaurant site, and a simple blog. We could add sections such as maps, images, forms, videos and more, then preview and publish the results in a couple of clicks.

The website builder has a couple of paid options, too. 

The Business plan supports unlimited pages, adds tools to analyze your web traffic and offers phone support, and is priced from $6.99 billed monthly.

The Ecommerce plan adds the ability to create an online store, with unlimited products, PayPal and shipping integration, and comes with priority support. It's priced from $12.99 billed monthly.

The free website builder is a worthwhile addition to iPage's free shared hosting plan. It's easy to use and could be enough to create simple, low-traffic personal and business sites. But we wouldn't pay to upgrade. The site designs are relatively basic, the editor isn't as polished or powerful, and the e-commerce plan doesn't have the features to build a quality web store.

If you're looking for a website builder and you're serious about selling online, consider Wix. Templates are top quality, there are loads of pre-built page sections and elements, and it's very easy to use. And if you need to upgrade to a web store, it doesn't compromise on functionality: there's as much power here as in regular stand-alone ecommerce platforms. Prices range from $16 a month for personal sites, to $59 for the top-of-the-range Business VIP.

iPage advanced tools dashboard

(Image credit: iPage)

Is iPage easy to use? 

iPage offers shared hosting, the simplest and most straightforward hosting type, which should give it an immediate usability advantage. Unfortunately, it doesn't work out that way.

One key problem is that iPage uses its own control panel and auto-installer tools. These are limited, with fewer features than the best alternatives, less reliable and more awkward to navigate.

Many hosts use Softaculous as an auto-installer, for instance. This can install WordPress and 150+ apps, has all kinds of options to ensure you get the setup you need, reliably installs apps (often in seconds) and can help you manage your app afterwards.

iPage's installer works with WordPress and its own website builder only. It has no significant setup options, doesn't delete a previous WordPress database by default, has left us looking at a 'Setting up' message for more than an hour, failed to properly install WordPress once, and doesn't have any management options (beyond deleting your installation).

This may not matter much to everyone. If you've a simple site, and once you've created it, you'll spend minimal time adding content or making changes, hosting management tools aren't so important. You might spend 15 minutes finding out how to do something, but that's about it.

But if you're a web hosting newbie, or you've a more complex site to build, maybe a blog where you'll regularly add new content, then iPage's usability issues could become a problem.

iPage uptime performance results

We used Uptime.com to measure the performance of our iPage site (Image credit: Uptime.com)

How fast is iPage? 

We measure hosting performance by installing a template WordPress site on a test account, then using various tools to measure server response times and how quickly the page loads. 

GTMetrix analyzed a test page and calculated how long it took for the main content to load (technically speaking, that's a value called Largest Contentful Paint, or LCP). A low LCP makes your site feel snappy and more responsive, encouraging your users to stick around.

IPage's LCP was slow at 1.6 seconds, the longest wait we've seen in our last 15 hosting reviews. Most providers are somewhere in the 0.6 to 0.8 second range, significantly faster.

iPage K6 performance results

(Image credit: K6)

K6 is a website load testing service which measures how a site responds when it has several users active at the time. IPage coped better here, and our site handled up to 25 requests a second. But again, average response times were lower than average at 1.119 seconds. 

Put it all together and iPage is slower than most of the hosts we've tested. With no high-powered or dedicated hosting, you can't upgrade to improve the situation, either. But although this makes iPage a poor choice for any kind of heavy-duty web project, it's still fast enough for personal or small business sites where you might not see 100 visitors a day.

Support

The support site isn't as detailed as it appears (Image credit: iPage)

What is iPage's support like? 

iPage offers support on the website, via live chat, and telephone (7am to 12am Eastern Time, seven days a week). That's probably enough to get by, but the best hosts do better, with a 24/7 phone line and ticket or email support, too.

We opened a live chat window to see how the service performed. A window prompted us to choose a topic, then select a category from an annoyingly short list which didn't cover our test question. We made a best guess, and entered a description of our fictitious problem in an 'Additional Information' box.

Hitting Next submitted the question, and an agent arrived very quickly, within seconds. What happened next depended very much on the issue.

iPage support had no problems with our simple technical and product queries, providing speedy and accurate replies, with occasional links to relevant help pages. Ask an unfamiliar question, though, and it's a very different story. 

iPage offers a 99.9% uptime guarantee, but we couldn't see any document explaining how this works. And so we opened a text window and asked if the guarantee was described anywhere.

'Are we facing an issue with slowness or the control panel', asked the baffled agent? No, uptime, we explained again. 

He asked for a few minutes to research the problem. Finally, he returned. 'I'd like to inform you about bandwidth', he said, going on to explain what iPage means by unlimited bandwidth. We thanked him, and left.

Our problem here isn't that our agent didn't know the answer (this probably isn't a topic that comes up often), as much as he clearly didn't even understand the question, despite us explaining it twice. Perhaps that's less likely to happen when troubleshooting web hosting issues, but it doesn't give us much confidence.

Final verdict

With no VPS or dedicated server hosting these days, iPage is all about its shared plans. These have rock-bottom prices, but they're also poor performers, awkward to use and missing some key features. IPage might work for the simplest sites, or to learn WordPress or some other web technology, but it doesn't have the power or features to handle anything more serious. 


iPage FAQs

What payment types does iPage support?

iPage accepts payment by card and PayPal. 

Does iPage offer refunds?

iPage has a 30-day money-back guarantee covering 'all basic hosting fees.' 'Domain registration fees, setup fees, or any fees for additional Services' are excluded.

That's a very standard guarantee, but there are a couple of exceptions you need to know about.

The first is the guarantee is valid for PayPal and card only; keep that in mind when you're paying.

The second is only first-time hosting accounts are eligible. If you've had an account before, canceled and signed up again, you won't be able to claim a refund. 

Does iPage have an uptime guarantee?

iPage quotes a '99.9% uptime guarantee' for its shared hosting packages. We found no website documentation to explain what this meant, though, how it was calculated, what counts as downtime, what doesn't, and whether you might receive any compensation if the target isn't achieved.

The end result is that although iPage says it has an uptime guarantee, there's no way to assess whether it meets the 99.9% figure or not, making it essentially meaningless. 

Where are iPage's data centers?

The iPage website says the company uses two data centers, but doesn't give any further details.

We entered our server IP address at iplocation.net to find out more, and the site checked it with eight geolocation services. Every one said our server was in Jacksonville, Florida.

iPage IP address location on the website

(Image credit: iPage)

What is my iPage IP address?

Learning your web server IP address can be helpful when you're first setting up a site, for example in configuring a domain hosted elsewhere to point at your new web space.

To find your iPage server's IP address, first log into its Control Panel.

Click the Hosting Tools icon (nine dots arranged in a square).

Your server IP address is displayed as 'Website IP' in the left-hand System Settings box.

What are IPage's nameservers?

iPage's nameservers are ns1.ipage.com and ns2.ipage.com. 

iPage cancelation process page

(Image credit: iPage)

How do I cancel a product?

Log into the iPage Control Panel. Click the Hosting Tools icon at the top of the screen. Click 'Logged in as ' at the top of the screen, and choose Hosting Renewal.

Choose the option to cancel your account today, or when it expires. These won't necessarily stop all payments; if you've registered a domain with iPage, for instance, that's a separate product and is renewed separately. Read the warnings on the Cancel page carefully for advice on this and other issues.

ScalaHosting review
2:30 pm | September 8, 2020

Author: admin | Category: Computers Gadgets | Comments: Off

ScalaHosting is an experienced Dallas-based provider with 15 years of experience in the web hosting business. 

ScalaHosting's range includes everything from shared hosting for simple sites, and VPS for more demanding business projects, to custom-built managed clusters (a group of servers handling the same site) with the power to manage even the largest websites. 

ScalaHosting shared hosting

ScalaHosting's shared hosting offers lots for your money (Image credit: ScalaHosting)

ScalaHosting shared hosting

ScalaHosting's starter shared hosting plan looks a little basic, with only 20GB storage and support for a single site. But otherwise, it delivers everything we'd expect - free domain, free SSL, free site migration, unlimited bandwidth, a 1-click WordPress installer, live chat and email support (not phone) - and some welcome extras, including remote backups of your sites for the last seven days.

It's reasonably priced, too, at $2.95 a month over three years, $6.95 on renewal.

Upgrading gets you more CPU resources, support for unlimited websites, hacking protection, priority support, and SEO advice to (hopefully) raise your Google ranking. The price jumps to $5.95 a month over three years ($8.95 when you renew), but that's fair for what you're getting.

ScalaHosting only has total of 16 hosting locations, including Amsterdam and Singapore, similar to that of A2 Hosting. Adaxially, all ScalaHosting's shared hosting plans use NVMe storage (which isn't used by many of its competitors). These type of disks are at least ten times faster than a normal SSD.

On the whole, these are quality shared hosting packages, easy to use, with all the key features you'll need, and fairly priced for what you get. A smart choice for hosting newcomers, or for small to medium personal and small business sites where speed isn't critical.

ScalaHosting WordPress hosting

ScalaHosting's WordPress plans look identical to its shared range, with the same features (as we discuss above) for the same price (from $2.95 a month). But that's not necessarily a problem, because there are decent shared plans, and there are some useful WordPress-related features, too.

The company says it will migrate as many sites as you ask for free, for instance. Many providers limit you to one, a few don't offer free migration at all.

ScalaHosting's servers are optimized for WordPress performance, with custom security rules to block '99.9% of the web attacks.'

The support team go beyond the usual server problem-solving to help you with more WordPress-specific issues, such as troubleshooting plugins.

All plans get daily backups covering the last 7 days (something we don't always see with budget WordPress offerings), while malware scans and removal keeps your site and visitors safe.

If you're looking to learn WordPress, or use it to build a small personal or business site, ScalaHosting's range more than covers the basics for a very low price. But if you're more interested in features than rock-bottom prices, WordPress, IONOS and A2 Hosting have powerful specialist plans with more powerful WordPress tools and valuable business and other extras.

ScalaHosting VPS

All of ScalaHosting's VPS plans are fully configurable (Image credit: ScalaHosting)

ScalaHosting VPS hosting

ScalaHosting's VPS (Virtual Private Server) plans give your website more resources than shared hosting, significantly improving load times, and avoiding the slowdowns you'll often see with shared plans.

Prices look relatively high at $29.95 a month for a 2 CPU core, 4GB RAM, 50GB SSD system, but you're getting a lot for your money. Unmetered bandwidth; free migrations, domain and SSL; daily backups; WordPress backup, cloning and staging; malware and hacking protection; and no need to buy a cPanel license, because the cPanel-compatible SPanel is thrown in.

ScalaHosting's SPanel

ScalaHosting's SPanel (Image credit: ScalaHosting)

If the standard four plans don't suit your needs, you can build your own by choosing whatever mix of CPU sores (2-24), RAM (4-128GB) and storage (50GB-2000GB) works best.

There's even the option to host your VPS with Amazon AWS, instead of ScalaHosting. They're more expensive, but have far larger networks and can host your server in data centers around the world.

These aren't plans for casual users or bargain hunters, but if you're working on a heavy-duty project for medium to large or business-critical sites, ScalaHosting almost certainly has a VPS for you.

ScalaHosting GTMetrix speed performance

ScalaHosting GTMetrix speed performance (Image credit: GTMetrix)

 How fast is ScalaHosting? 

We assess website speed by using a tool called GTmetrix to calculate how long it takes to load and display the main content of a page (a figure known technically as Largest Contentful Paint, or LCP). The lower the LCP value is, the faster your site pops up in the browser, and the snappier and more responsive your site feels.

ScalaHosting delivered an LCP of 0.730 seconds. That's fractionally slower than average, but still within reach of big names including GoDaddy (0.667 seconds) and GreenGeeks (0.692 seconds), and much better than budget providers such as Domain.com (1.5 seconds) and iPage (1.6 seconds.) Overall, ScalaHosting's shared hosting delivers decent performance which should cope with small to mid-range personal and business sites.

Reliability is another important element of hosting performance. Your website might download almost instantly, but if it's regularly down, your visitors won't be happy.

ScalaHosting uptime results

ScalaHosting's uptime results (Image credit: Uptime)

We assess reliability by using Uptime.com to check a test website every 5 minutes for 14 days, logging any passes and fails. Scala Hosting's result was easy to calculate because it had no failures, scoring a perfect 100% uptime. That's what we'd expect for a short test, but it's a good start. We've left the Uptime.com test running, too, and will update this review from time to time with longer-term results.

ScalaHosting softaculous installer

ScalaHosting's Softaculous app installer (Image credit: ScalaHosting)

 How easy is ScalaHosting to use? 

ScalaHosting's web dashboard is clear and intuitive. Log in and your hosting plan is displayed up-front. Common tools are easy to find, often just a click or two away. A 'launch cPanel' button gives you speedy access to cPanel's many hosting management tools, and the company uses the excellent Softaculous as its 1-click WordPress installer, another usability plus. We've installed a lot of test WordPress sites, and Softaculous is faster, more configurable and reliable than anything else.

We did notice a surprising security issue. Although the dashboard's 'launch cPanel' button logs you into cPanel, it doesn't establish an encrypted HTTPS connection. It's HTTP-only, which left our browser displaying a 'not secure' error. If we accessed cPanel via unprotected public Wi-Fi, that may allow others to intercept our communications and perhaps steal sensitive information.

This must be some temporary issue relating to our account, we thought, and opened a support ticket to ask. An agent replied in four minutes, but the news wasn't good. The dashboard automatically uses a URL beginning hydra.vivawebhost.com:2082, and he explained we had to use hydra.vivawebhost.com:2083 to get a secure connection, before adding: 'I will report that to our developers and they will check if this can be fixed so you will be redirected to a secure connection from your client profile as well.'

In other words, while you can securely log into cPanel via other URLs, try it from the dashboard and it creates an insecure connection as standard. Your browser should clearly warn you of the problem, so hopefully users will notice and try a different login route, but that really shouldn't be necessary. Web hosts have access to some very sensitive data, and customers have the right to expect more attention to security details than we see here.

 What is ScalaHosting's support like? 

ScalaHosting offers 24/7 support via its website, live chat and ticket/ email.

The web knowledgebase is smaller than average but the company makes up for it with its YouTube knowledge channel. For example, the Hosting section has only 304 articles to cover shared, VPS, and reseller hosting, domains, DNS, security, email and more. There is useful content here, but it's mixed with generic 'how to' advice, and a weak search engine can make it tricky to find what you need.

Fortunately, if the website can't help, accessing the support team is quick and easy. Our live chat sessions generally got a reply within a minute, and the agents gave accurate and helpful responses to our test questions. 

Using tickets can make more sense for complex problems, and ScalaHosting performed well here, too. Replies were helpful and detailed, and arrived in anything from four to just under 40 minutes.

Final verdict

ScalaHosting's shared plans aren't the fastest we've seen, but they give you plenty of power for your cash, and could work for bargain hunters with personal or small business sites. The real highlight here is the company's professional and highly configurable VPS hosting, which has the power to handle serious business-critical sites. 


ScalaHosting FAQs

What payment types does ScalaHosting support?

ScalaHosting accepts payments via card, PayPal and bank transfer. 

Does ScalaHosting offer refunds?

ScalaHosting has a 30-day money-back guarantee for shared, VPS and reseller hosting, along with cloud servers and (something you won't get with all providers) SSL certificates. Dedicated servers and domain names are not included.

While that's a fairly typical guarantee, there is one catch: it's available for new customers only, which seems a little unfair. If you have one package and buy another, you're not covered by the guarantee.

Does ScalaHosting have uptime guarantee?

ScalaHosting has a 99.9% uptime guarantee. If your server has more than 0.1% unscheduled downtime over a month (around 45 minutes), you'll receive 10% credit on your hosting fees for every further 0.1% your site is unavailable. So that's 10% for 1:30, 20% for 2:!5, up to a 100% credit for a total 8:15 downtime. 

ScalaHosting data centers

(Image credit: ScalaHosting)

Where are ScalaHosting's data centers?

ScalaHosting has its own data centers in the USA (New York, Dallas) and Sofia, Bulgaria, but it also uses Digital Ocean’s data centers in Bangalore, London, Singapore, Frankfurt, Amsterdam, San Francisco and Toronto. 

That's good news, as the more data centers a host has, the more likely you can choose one near your audience, improving speeds.

Beware, though, you can't choose all of these data centers with every product. We were offered only four locations for our review shared hosting package: Dallas, New York, Europe and India.

What is my ScalaHosting IP address?

Knowing your web server's IP address can be handy when you're pointing a domain managed elsewhere to your web space.

The easiest way to find the address is with cPanel, if it's available on your account.

Log in to the Scala Hosting client area (https://my.scalahosting.com).

Find your hosting product in the My Services list.

Click Manage, Log Into cPanel.

Look to the right, and your server IP address is displayed as 'Shared IP Address' in the General Information box.

(There is no 'General Information' box? Find and click the Server Information link.)

What are ScalaHosting's nameservers?

ScalaHosting's nameservers are:

ns1.scalahosting.com
ns2.scalahosting.com

How to cancel a ScalaHosting service

How to cancel a ScalaHosting service (Image credit: ScalaHosting)

How do I cancel a ScalaHosting product?

Access your ScalaHosting client area (https://my.scalahosting.com).

Find the plan you'd like to cancel in the My Services list.

Click Manage, Request cancellation.

Choose a reason, decide whether you'd like to cancel the hosting immediately or at the end of the billing period, and click Request Cancellation.

ScalaHosting warns that 'cancellation requests may take up to 7 days to be completed', so if you're looking to avoid the plan automatically renewing, don't leave this until the last minute.

GoDaddy review
12:37 am | September 5, 2020

Author: admin | Category: Computers Gadgets | Tags: | Comments: Off

GoDaddy is a giant Utah-based domain registrar and web hosting provider.

The company excels in the domain world, where (according to Domainstate) it manages more than 63 million domains. To put that in perspective, not only does that put GoDaddy at number one in the domain registrar top ten, it's also more than the next nine providers have registered put together.

Measuring hosting success is more difficult, but Datanyze gives GoDaddy another first place, with around a 14% share of the hosting market (that's ahead of AWS, IONOS, Google Cloud and HostGator). 

What hosting plans does GoDaddy offer? 

GoDaddy offers a wider-than-average range of plans, covering shared, VPS and dedicated hosting, a capable website builder, managed WordPress, and managed WooCommerce for building powerful web stores.

There's a vast catalog of supporting products, too, including SSL certificates, malware scanning, DDoS and firewall protection, a speed boosting CDN, business email hosting and more.

That's a lot to consider, but we'll explore some of the main hosting types here.

Shared hosting 

There are four shared Linux hosting plans, ranging from $5.99 to $19.99 a month on the three-year plan ($8.99 to $24.99 on renewal). The starter Economy plan supports one site, a free domain, 100GB storage and unlimited bandwidth. Paying to upgrade gets you support for unlimited bandwidth and storage, along with increased processing power and speed. All plans include one-click install for WordPress and other apps via Installatron (not quite as capable as Softaculous, but better than most.)

Unusually, there's also a Windows shared hosting range. Specs and prices are similar, with plans running from $5.99 to $12.99 a month over three years ($8.99 to $16.99 on renewal). Most hosts have no Windows option, or charge a premium, so GoDaddy's plans are a major plus.

Advantages of GoDaddy's shared hosting include fast SSD storage for extra speed. Every plan comes with backups (though beware, the cheapest allows you to restore the previous day only). A choice of data centers allows your site to be hosted in North America, India, Singapore and Europe. And when it's up and running, you can manage your site with the industry-standard cPanel, a major plus. 

Valuable extras include at least 2 Microsoft 365 mailboxes, free for a year. Plan lengths are more flexible than just about anyone else in the business, with the option to sign up for 1, 3, 6, 12, 24, 36, 60 or even 120 months.

The major disadvantage of GoDaddy's shared hosting is that there's no free SSL with the cheapest two plans. GoDaddy's SSL certificates start at $69.99 a year on the two-year plan ($99.99 on renewal), too, a chunky addition to the bill.

You may be able to avoid that by choosing another GoDaddy plan (see WordPress hosting, below.) But if you're only looking for shared hosting, there's plenty of money to be saved elsewhere. Hostinger's Premium Shared Hosting includes free SSL and is priced from only $2.99 a month in year one ($6.99 on renewal), less than the cost of GoDaddy's SSL certificate alone. GreenGeeks and iPage offer similar value.

GoDaddy's plans are capable, though, with valuable speedup technologies, easy management via cPanel, and a very unusual plus in the Windows hosting option. If you can live with the cost, the high-end plans may be worth a look.

GoDaddy WordPress hosting homepage

GoDaddy's website is plain but supremely easy to use (Image credit: GoDaddy)

WordPress hosting

Although GoDaddy's shared hosting range makes it easy to install and use WordPress, the company's managed WordPress range adds several useful features (and a huge plus at the end of this list) for minimal extra cost.

An automated migration tool imports your existing WordPress site with a click, for instance. This should cover most people, although complex sites with a host of plugins may need a little work.

If you're starting from scratch, the plans include thousands of themes, pre-built sites and a drag-and-drop editor. We browsed the themes, and although very few stood out, chances are you'll find several that suit your needs.

Practical benefits include automatic updates for WordPress, plugins, extensions and PHP versions, maximizing performance and ensuring you always have the latest security patches.

A comprehensive backup system saves your website every day, keeps each version for a month, and you can restore any backup with a click. That's a significant improvement on the cheapest shared hosting plan, which only keeps a single backup from the previous day.

The major advantage of GoDaddy's managed WordPress plans, though, is they include a free SSL certificate for as long as you keep your plan. That saves at least $69.99 a year compared to the cheapest shared hosting plans, yet the plans are only a little more expensive at $6.99 a month on the three-year plan ($9.99 a year on renewal.)

There are a couple of potential catches. Managed WordPress plans start with just 30GB storage, compared to 100GB for the baseline shared plan. And while shared hosting plans offer unlimited bandwidth, the cheapest managed WordPress plan is recommended for 'up to 25K monthly visitors', and GoDaddy will recommend an upgrade if you need more. 

Still, 30GB and 800+ visits a day is plenty for many personal and small business sites. If you're looking to host a WordPress website, GoDaddy's managed WordPress plans look much better value than its shared range.

Budget alternatives start with Hostinger's shared range, where you can create multiple WordPress sites, with basic managed WordPress tools, from $2.99 a month over four years ($6.99 on renewal). It's less polished than GoDaddy, but gives you loads of features, and could be a cheap way to learn more about WordPress.

Bluehost is a little more expensive than GoDaddy, but has a wider range of plans, including support for some very professional features (video compression). Some plans also include specialist WordPress support, where you'll get general advice on design and functionality, as well as solving problems. 

Liquid Web's managed WordPress has a higher price tag (even the starter plan is $15.83 a month on the annual plan), but it's super-fast and reliable, with some of the best support around, and could be a great choice for demanding, high-traffic sites. (There's a 14-day free trial available, too.)

VPS hosting 

GoDaddy's VPS (Virtual Private Server) hosting plans deliver better performance and far more configuration options than shared hosting, but can also be more complicated to set up and use.

VPS prices start at only $4.99 a month on the three-year plan. Sounds cheap, but that's for a very basic setup: just 1 CPU core, 1GB RAM and 20GB storage, although you do get unlimited bandwidth and automated weekly backups.

There are effectively eight plans, and most support both Linux and Windows. The top range plan gives you 8 CPU cores, 32GB RAM and 400GB storage for $99.99 a month over three years. 

These prices are for unmanaged VPS, which means you're left to handle server and software updates, detect and solve crashes, and otherwise keep your system running smoothly. Even control panels are an expensive optional extra ($16 a month for cPanel or Plesk.)

If that sounds too much, you can pay for GoDaddy to manage the VPS for you. That bumps up the price by a chunky $95 a month, but it could be worth it if you're running a business-critical site. Opt for managed VPS and GoDaddy looks out for some hosting issues and fixes them itself, for instance: choose unmanaged, and that's left up to you.

GoDaddy's VPS plans stand out for offering unlimited bandwidth on even the cheapest plans. Windows support is a welcome plus, and the choice of data centers in North America, Europe and Asia could be a real performance advantage if your target audience is in a specific country.

The problem is there are competitors who do this better. At the budget end of the market, IONOS 4 core 8GB RAM VPS is only $2 a month for the first six months, $25 a month afterwards, a fraction of GoDaddy's price. And if you're looking for full management, Liquid Web has top-quality support, and is priced from $40 a month over two years ($106 on renewal) for a two core, 2 RAM setup. Choosing a GoDaddy VPS may still make sense if you already have some GoDaddy hosting products, but most people are likely to be better off elsewhere.

Dedicated hosting 

Choosing one of GoDaddy's dedicated plans gets you a full server all to yourself, for the maximum possible performance and configurability. But it's also relatively expensive, as there's no-one else sharing the cost. And just as with VPS hosting, dedicated servers take experience to set up and run yourself, so you might want to spend even more money on a managed plan and leave the support team to do this for you.

GoDaddy offers only four base servers, ranging from 4 to 16 cores, and 32GB to 256GB RAM. They're available with at least 2 x 4 TB HDD drives for capacity, or 2 x 500GB for speed, running Linux or Windows, and in unmanaged and managed flavors.

Prices are reasonable at $129.99 a month over two years for an unmanaged server, rising to $529.98 for a top-of-the-range managed model. All plans offer unlimited bandwidth, unusual in the dedicated server world.

GoDaddy's dedicated range stands out for its decent hardware specs. IONOS looks cheaper, for instance, with prices starting at $45 a month for the first six months, then $65. But that's because it has 8GB RAM, a less powerful CPU and a single 240GB SSD, against 32GB RAM and 2 x 500GB SSDs with even GoDaddy's most basic plan.

The problem is GoDaddy doesn't give you much choice over the hardware you'll actually get. If you like its specs, great; but if you're looking for a bargain and can live with a more basic setup, or you need something far more powerful, you're out of luck.

GoDaddy also sells its '99.9% server uptime' guarantee as though it's a major selling point, but we'd question that. That's a common figure for shared hosting, but Liquid Web offers 100% network and power uptime SLAs.

GoDaddy may still work for you if its default servers suit your needs, but shop around before you decide. Hostwinds has twelve dedicated server plans, all very configurable, giving you plenty of choice. Liquid Web has even more, and although it doesn't offer cheap unmanaged servers, its managed dedicated server plans can be better value than GoDaddy's range.

GoDaddy website builder template

(Image credit: GoDaddy)

Does GoDaddy have a website builder? 

GoDaddy has a capable website builder which makes it easy to build a good-looking, feature-packed online home, from $9.99 a month on the annual plan ($11.99 on renewal). It's more focused on businesses than personal users (even the most basic plan has social media marketing features and payment support), but could work for anyone.

There are plenty of templates covering all kinds of site and business types. A 'filter' system instantly tweaks layouts, fonts and colors to find the best fit for you, then you can start adding your own content (using the built-in image library, if you don't have any images of your own).

Template sites can be extended with a wide range of sections, pre-built blocks covering various types of content: blogs or newsletters, image galleries, contact forms, image galleries, embedded video and audio, downloadable file links, and more.

GoDaddy's high-end website builder plans include e-commerce tools, including an online store, PayPal support, gift cards and various product-promoting options. Custom restaurant sections include a menu and price list and reservation system, and there's a more general Appointments option which allows customers to book services, classes, events or whatever else you might be offering.

This is a powerful range of products, especially for users looking to create their first business site. No need to take our or GoDaddy's word for it: you can build a website for free, with premium features available for the first seven days, plenty of time to find out if it works for you.

Alternatively, Bluehost's website builder has a similar set of features, but a big introductory discount means the most basic plan starts at just $2.95 a month ($10.99 on renewal).

GoDaddy online store homepage screenshot

(Image credit: GoDaddy)

Can I build a web store with GoDaddy? 

GoDaddy offers several ways to help you build and run a web store.

GoDaddy's Website Builder, as we discussed above, is the simplest choice for first timers. Hundreds of mobile-friendly templates ensure you'll have a good-looking site right away. You can add sections like image galleries or price lists with ease, click and drag to reorganize them, then add whatever content you need.

You can try out the service for free, to get an idea of how your site might look. If you're happy, the Ecommerce plan ($16.99 a month on the annual plan, $24.99 on renewal) allows you to create product listings; create special discounts and promotions; take payments via card, PayPal, Apple Pay and Google Pay, and use various shipping options to get your products delivered.

Unusually, there's even optional hardware to take payments in-store or on-the-go. Buy GoDaddy's card reader for $49, plug it into your smartphone, and you can start taking cash right away.

Experienced users might prefer GoDaddy's WooCommerce plans. These WordPress-powered solutions come with premium WooCommerce extensions to add all kinds of useful extras, covering everything from store layout and inventory management, to extra checkout and payment features, and marketing tools to keep your customers coming back.

WooCommerce isn't as straightforward to use as GoDaddy's Website Builder, but it's more capable, and prices are very similar at $20.99 a month on the annual plan, $24.99 on renewal.

If you don't need a web store right now, but might be interested in the future, another option is to buy a standard shared hosting account and use GoDaddy's auto-installer to set up WooCommerce for you. Although this won't get you any of GoDaddy's WooCommerce extensions, it'll give you time to explore WooCommerce and get a feel for how it works (and the shared hosting plans are cheaper, too).

There's plenty of choice here, but it's worth considering other providers. Bluehost also offers Website Builder and feature packed WooCommerce plans, for instance. Its high-end plans are a little more expensive, but it also gives you more choice, including a starter Business plan which supports unlimited products and costs only $9.95 a month on the annual plan ($14.99 on renewal.)

Creating a website

GoDaddy offers an uptime guarantee of 99.9% on shared hosting and most other products. That's not quite as good as it sounds, and could still allow for 40+ minutes of down time a month. 

Most providers quote the same figure for shared hosting, although a few go further with their high-end products; IONOS quotes 99.99% uptime for its VPS hosting, while Liquid Web has 100% network uptime and power guarantees. 

GoDaddy's uptime performance results

We used Uptime.com, Domain-tools' website speed tests and Bitcatcha to measure the performance of our GoDaddy site (Image credit: Uptime)

We use Uptime.com to monitor a test WordPress-based website during our hosting reviews. GoDaddy's results were a little disappointing, with five brief outages (41 minutes in total) giving an uptime of 99.11%. We can't come to any definite conclusions on this yet, because our testing time was short, and what really matters is how GoDaddy performs over the long term. But Uptime.com's monitoring will continue, and we'll update this review when we have more information.

GoDaddy's server response time was reasonable, starting at an average 520ms from our test sites. That's fractionally slower than Bluehost (433ms) and HostGator (388ms), but it's within the range we'd expect, and far better than budget providers such as iPage (1200ms) and Domain.com (1230ms).

GoDaddy's GTmetrix results

GoDaddy's GTmetrix results (Image credit: GTmetrix)

We also use GTmetrix to load our test site and calculate its Largest Contentful Paint (LCP), a measure of how long it takes to load the main content of a page. Even if the load process hasn't finished, LCP is still an important figure; the lower it is, the faster your site will feel, and the happier your visitors are likely to be.

GoDaddy's LCP for our test site was acceptable at 667ms. As with server response times, it's a little slower than competitors including Hostinger (607ms), Bluehost (603ms) and HostGator (551ms.) But it also outperformed the likes of Hostwinds (774ms), Namecheap (789ms), IONOS (1300ms) and iPage (1600ms), and overall, GoDaddy was within the range we’d expect for a decent shared hosting account.

GoDaddy cPanel

Installatron enables installing WordPress and hundreds of other apps (Image credit: GoDaddy )

How easy is GoDaddy to use? 

While many hosting providers dump new users into a complicated control panel and leave them to figure out what happens next, GoDaddy makes a real effort to point you in the right direction.

For example, our shared hosting control panel opened with a startup wizard to help us through our next steps: building a website from scratch, migrating an existing website or uploading website files.

We chose the Build option, and the wizard prompted us for our domain name and preferred data center should serve the site (North America, India, Singapore or Europe), then created a WordPress account, installed WordPress, and even displayed the DNS records we should add to domains managed elsewhere (that last step can be ignored if you’re buying your domain from GoDaddy).

This is an excellent startup tool which covers a lot of tasks, and should make the setup process far easier for many users.

Once the site is running, GoDaddy’s custom control panel makes it generally easy to manage. Choose a plan from your product list, and you can check your site’s files, databases and backups with a click, while an Action Center offers generally useful advice.

GoDaddy provides Installatron to automatically install WordPress and many other apps. We marginally prefer Softaculous for its features and wider app support, but Installatron is a reliable platform which does everything most users are likely to need.

It’s good to see cPanel is on hand for day-to-day site management tasks. If you’ve used several hosting providers then chances are you’ll already know your way around cPanel. If you’re new, there’s a lot of power here, but common tasks such as setting up emails are simple and straightforward.

GoDaddy help center

(Image credit: GoDaddy)

What is GoDaddy's support like? 

GoDaddy offers 24/7 support via live chat, telephone, a support website and online community (a simple web forum).

There's no ticket support, unfortunately. That's unlikely to be an issue if you've a simple product question, or just need to know how to perform a specific task. But if you've an ongoing issue, you may have to explain it every time you connect support.

The website has a lot of useful content, and a search engine makes it straightforward to find what you need. We tried the keyword DNS, for instance, and it immediately listed the articles most likely to help: What is DNS, Change nameservers for my domains, Manage DNS records and more.

Live chat and telephone support isn't always as speedy as we'd like. We tried a live chat session, and although an agent appeared very quickly, there were lengthy gaps between his replies. It took around seven minutes for him to accept the account support PIN and be ready to answer our question, for instance.

Once we were able to talk, though, the agents did a decent job of identifying our issues, and providing clear and accurate answers.

Final verdict

GoDaddy has a wide choice of products and decent phone and email support, but you may have to spend a lot on plans and add-ons to get the features you need.


GoDaddy FAQs

Does GoDaddy offer refunds?

GoDaddy's standard refund terms give you a 30-day money-back guarantee for many hosting plans of one year and longer, but there are lots of potential complications.

If you've opted for a subscription of less than a year, the refund period drops to only 48 hours.

GoDaddy is more generous with domains. Many hosts offer no refunds on domain purchases at all, but GoDaddy offers a five-day refund period on new registrations, and at least five days on auto-renewals.

Beware: a few products have no refunds at all (cloud servers, some hosting add-ons, domain transfers).

There may be special rules depending on your location. Brazilian customers get a seven-day refund period on all products. UK and EU customers are able to cancel within 14 days of signing up, allowing them to beat the 48-hour limit, but GoDaddy reserves the right to charge for any services provided (so you may not get all your cash back).

We've given you an outline of GoDaddy's refund rules, but if the details are important to you, check out GoDaddy's full Refund Policy for the big picture. 

Where are GoDaddy's data centers?

GoDaddy has data centers in North America, India, Singapore and Europe.

Sign up for a GoDaddy plan and you're able to choose which data center to host your site. 

Choose the location nearest your target audience and any website data has less distance to travel, improving website speeds.

GoDaddy custom control panel

(Image credit: GoDaddy)

What is my GoDaddy IP address?

There are some situations when it's useful to know your GoDaddy server's IP address. If you're using the web hosting plan with a domain managed somewhere else, for instance, you'll probably need to create a DNS 'A record' which connects your domain to your GoDaddy web space.

To find your IP address, log into GoDaddy's account dashboard and choose My Products (account.godaddy.com/products).

Find your web hosting plan, and click Manage.

Click 'cPanel Admin' to launch cPanel.

Your GoDaddy IP address is displayed as 'Shared IP Address' in the General Information panel on the right-hand side. (If you don't see a General Information panel, look for a Server Information link).

What are GoDaddy's nameservers?

You can find the nameservers assigned to your domain in GoDaddy's control panel.

Sign into the GoDaddy Domain Control Center and select your domain.

Select Manage DNS to view the domain's DNS records.

Find the NS (nameserver) records in the list, and make a note of the nameservers displayed in the Data column.

How do I cancel a GoDaddy product?

Log into your GoDaddy account, and click My Account, Manage My Products (or go to account.godaddy.com/products).

Choose the product you no longer need, and click Manage.

Click Account Actions, and choose Cancel from the drop-down list.

Click Cancel Renewal, and GoDaddy will cancel the product at the end of its term, without charging you again.

Canceling a product alone won't automatically get you a refund. If you think you qualify - you're canceling within 30 days of purchasing a one year or longer hosting plan, for instance - then contact support via live chat or telephone to see if you can get your money back.

How can I find my GoDaddy support PIN?

Contact GoDaddy support and the agent will ask for the PIN you chose when creating your account, to verify you're the account owner.

If you don't remember the PIN, you can access it from the GoDaddy account control panel (account.godaddy.com). Just click your first name, displayed at the top right of the screen, then View PIN. You can also edit the PIN from the same screen.

Byethost Free Webhosting review
1:34 am | September 4, 2020

Author: admin | Category: Computers Gadgets | Comments: Off

Opting for free web hosting often means accepting a lengthy list of restrictions, but browse the Byethost website and you might be left thinking it's better than some commercial products.

The company boasts about its unlimited data transfer, MySQL databases, addon and parked domains, for instance. There's 5GB of web space, the excellent Softaculous platform gives you automatic installation of WordPress and hundreds of other popular web applications, and there's a free website builder (with platforms) if you need it. It's ad-free, too.

This isn't quite as good as it looks. Although your site doesn't have a fixed bandwidth limit, it's limited to 50,000 hits a day. A 'hit' is a single file, so if your web pages refer to ten files on average (images, CSS or scripts), that translates to a maximum 5,000-page views a day. That's a lot for a small site, but it's not 'unlimited.'

Is it the best website builder? Don't get your hopes up (more on that later).

There are other limits elsewhere, although they're less of a surprise: you're restricted to one FTP account and five email addresses, and you can't upload files larger than 10MB.

The service does give you free SSL certificates, but they're self-signed, which means visitors will see security warnings until they explicitly trust your site. That might work for a site you'll use with friends and family, but it won't impress anyone else.

Byethost does at least give you access to the key hosting technologies and tools you'd expect: PHP 5.4, 5.5, 5.6, 7.0, and phpMyAdmin; DNS management for CNAME, SFP and MX records; FTP access; email accounts, custom forwarders, web mail, cron jobs, redirects, custom error pages, and more.

By default, your site will be a subdomain of byethost32.com (mysite.byethost32.com), but there are plenty of other domains to choose from: iblogger.org, is-best.net, my-board.org, mydiscussion.net, synergize.co and more.

Paid hosting plans lift the restrictions of the free products, and are available from $4.99 a month.

Setup

Dated setup instructions cover ancient AOL clients (Image credit: Byethost)

Setup

Creating your free Byethost website starts at the official signup page. This advises completing the process with Firefox, saying that 'Internet Explorer' is not recommended - wow, you don't say? - which suggests to us that it's not been changed much for a long, long time. But it's otherwise straightforward: choose your subdomain, password and site type (personal, business), hand over your email address, complete a Captcha and submit the form.

We created a test account, and the site redirected our browser to a URL on an entirely different domain, ifastnet.com, Byethost's parent company. That looks a little odd, especially as the page is plain text, with absolutely no reference to Byethost. The poor impression was confirmed by the outdated instructions on how to whitelist email addresses, as they covered Yahoo, Hotmail, MSN, and AOL 7.0 and 8.0, released way back in October 2002.

Opt In

We had to forcibly opt in to receive email updates from Byethost (Image credit: Byethost)

Whatever our concerns with how the signup process looks, it appeared to work well, presenting us with a 'confirm your email address' link. After clicking, a Welcome email arrived with our control panel, FTP account and MySQL credentials and URLs. But although we successfully used these details to log into our account, we noticed problems elsewhere.

The email gives you a plain HTTP link to the control panel, for instance. Follow that and you send your login details, including your email address, in plain text. Your browser should warn you about that, but we would expect a professional hosting provider to avoid this kind of mistake.

The email pointed us to a working knowledgebase for support issues. This does have some articles, but they're not all up-to-date (many are five or more years old.) It also has an HTTP URL, this time because it apparently doesn't have an SSL certificate (hardly encouraging for a web host).

(We noticed another sign of age in Byethost's Twitter link at the bottom of the page. It pointed us to the page for SecureSignup.net, the previous name for Byethost's parent company, and hasn't been updated since 2014.)

Byethost has at least fixed the video tutorials since our last review, as the links now work and there is some content available. It's very basic, though - topics include how to log in, create or delete a database, update or change your email - and is unlikely to help with most issues.

cPanel

Manage your website from VistaPanel - a mildly customized version of cPanel (Image credit: Byethost)

Creating a website

Byethost users manage their hosting through VistaPanel, which the company says is a 'specially designed control panel.' Sounds good, but the reality is a bit disappointing, and it is little more than regular cPanel with a custom skin and a slightly different selection of tools (it uses Monsta as the file manager, for instance).

If you're familiar with cPanel (and maybe if you're not), uploading a static site to your web space is easy enough. We opened the file manager, followed the prompts to choose our root folder and dragged and dropped our files. They were uploaded within seconds, and the site was instantly active.

Byethost's site also offers a website builder, but this was much less successful. The problems started with an insecure HTTP-only launch page, and continued with a poorly displayed set of templates. These appear in blocks of six, with no option to filter by site type (personal, business, blog and so on), forcing you to keep clicking 'Load more themes' to work through the list.

Each template has a 'Live Demo' button, but clicking this displays an error message 'Oops! Demo configuration is not setup.' Well, thanks.

Clicking Continue prompts for your domain name and FTP credentials, in order to upload the site. That makes sense, but it's insecure, as your login is being sent over an HTTP connection.

We tried to continue, anyway, but received a 'This page isn't working' error message (HTTP error 500.)

Softaculous

Automatically install WordPress and other apps with Softaculous (Image credit: Byethost)

It's not all bad news, though. Byethost free hosting also includes the excellent Softaculous, a powerful platform which automates the setup of WordPress, PrestaShop, Joomla and hundreds of other apps, with the absolute minimum of hassle. 

Performance

We used Uptime.com, Dotcom-tools and Bitcatcha to test the performance of Byethost (Image credit: Uptime.com)

Performance

Good support is a vital element in the best web hosting tool, especially when your service is as flaky as Byethost. But, in our experience, it's not something you'll generally get from a free service.

Byethost's free plan doesn't include live chat, but you're able to raise support tickets from the VistaPanel dashboard. We've had helpful responses in under an hour, too, beating the service you'll see from some commercial providers.

Free web hosting is never going to offer the best speeds, but it can deliver better performance than you might expect, and we run our test sites past multiple monitoring and benchmarking tools to see how good they really are.

Uptime.com automatically checked our Byethost server over a period of a week. Uptime was 100%, but average response times were a little slower than most at 325ms (typical shared hosting plans manage 200-400ms.)

Dotcom-tools website speed test simulated loading our site from 16 locations across the US and Europe. Load times were slower than usual at an average 1.2 seconds, close to twice the speed of the top commercial competition, but comparable with other free hosts (Infinity Free averaged 1.3 seconds, Free Hosting No Ads hit 1.5 seconds.)

There was better news with our final test, when Bitcatcha's website speed checker tested our website speed from 10 global locations and rated it A+ for 'exceptionally quick.'

Our own subjective experience wasn't as positive, and we would rank Byethost as a mid-range performer at best. It's good enough for simple tasks, though, and if you're interested in Byethost, it's well worth creating a simple site and trying it out for yourself.

Final verdict

Byethost has an impressive sounding feature list for a free service, but there are lots of catches (the bandwidth and disk space aren't as 'unlimited' as the website claims), and the dated content and various website issues are a concern. This web host might be worth a try if you need its specific features, but beginners should look elsewhere. Just bear in mind that the competition, even in free, is ferocious.

Byethost Free Webhosting review
1:34 am |

Author: admin | Category: Computers Gadgets | Comments: Off

Opting for free web hosting often means accepting a lengthy list of restrictions, but browse the Byethost website and you might be left thinking it's better than some commercial products.

The company boasts about its unlimited data transfer, MySQL databases, addon and parked domains, for instance. There's 5GB of web space, the excellent Softaculous platform gives you automatic installation of WordPress and hundreds of other popular web applications, and there's a free website builder (with platforms) if you need it. It's ad-free, too.

This isn't quite as good as it looks. Although your site doesn't have a fixed bandwidth limit, it's limited to 50,000 hits a day. A 'hit' is a single file, so if your web pages refer to ten files on average (images, CSS or scripts), that translates to a maximum 5,000-page views a day. That's a lot for a small site, but it's not 'unlimited.'

Is it the best website builder? Don't get your hopes up (more on that later).

There are other limits elsewhere, although they're less of a surprise: you're restricted to one FTP account and five email addresses, and you can't upload files larger than 10MB.

The service does give you free SSL certificates, but they're self-signed, which means visitors will see security warnings until they explicitly trust your site. That might work for a site you'll use with friends and family, but it won't impress anyone else.

Byethost does at least give you access to the key hosting technologies and tools you'd expect: PHP 5.4, 5.5, 5.6, 7.0, and phpMyAdmin; DNS management for CNAME, SFP and MX records; FTP access; email accounts, custom forwarders, web mail, cron jobs, redirects, custom error pages, and more.

By default, your site will be a subdomain of byethost32.com (mysite.byethost32.com), but there are plenty of other domains to choose from: iblogger.org, is-best.net, my-board.org, mydiscussion.net, synergize.co and more.

Paid hosting plans lift the restrictions of the free products, and are available from $4.99 a month.

Setup

Dated setup instructions cover ancient AOL clients (Image credit: Byethost)

Setup

Creating your free Byethost website starts at the official signup page. This advises completing the process with Firefox, saying that 'Internet Explorer' is not recommended - wow, you don't say? - which suggests to us that it's not been changed much for a long, long time. But it's otherwise straightforward: choose your subdomain, password and site type (personal, business), hand over your email address, complete a Captcha and submit the form.

We created a test account, and the site redirected our browser to a URL on an entirely different domain, ifastnet.com, Byethost's parent company. That looks a little odd, especially as the page is plain text, with absolutely no reference to Byethost. The poor impression was confirmed by the outdated instructions on how to whitelist email addresses, as they covered Yahoo, Hotmail, MSN, and AOL 7.0 and 8.0, released way back in October 2002.

Opt In

We had to forcibly opt in to receive email updates from Byethost (Image credit: Byethost)

Whatever our concerns with how the signup process looks, it appeared to work well, presenting us with a 'confirm your email address' link. After clicking, a Welcome email arrived with our control panel, FTP account and MySQL credentials and URLs. But although we successfully used these details to log into our account, we noticed problems elsewhere.

The email gives you a plain HTTP link to the control panel, for instance. Follow that and you send your login details, including your email address, in plain text. Your browser should warn you about that, but we would expect a professional hosting provider to avoid this kind of mistake.

The email pointed us to a working knowledgebase for support issues. This does have some articles, but they're not all up-to-date (many are five or more years old.) It also has an HTTP URL, this time because it apparently doesn't have an SSL certificate (hardly encouraging for a web host).

(We noticed another sign of age in Byethost's Twitter link at the bottom of the page. It pointed us to the page for SecureSignup.net, the previous name for Byethost's parent company, and hasn't been updated since 2014.)

Byethost has at least fixed the video tutorials since our last review, as the links now work and there is some content available. It's very basic, though - topics include how to log in, create or delete a database, update or change your email - and is unlikely to help with most issues.

cPanel

Manage your website from VistaPanel - a mildly customized version of cPanel (Image credit: Byethost)

Creating a website

Byethost users manage their hosting through VistaPanel, which the company says is a 'specially designed control panel.' Sounds good, but the reality is a bit disappointing, and it is little more than regular cPanel with a custom skin and a slightly different selection of tools (it uses Monsta as the file manager, for instance).

If you're familiar with cPanel (and maybe if you're not), uploading a static site to your web space is easy enough. We opened the file manager, followed the prompts to choose our root folder and dragged and dropped our files. They were uploaded within seconds, and the site was instantly active.

Byethost's site also offers a website builder, but this was much less successful. The problems started with an insecure HTTP-only launch page, and continued with a poorly displayed set of templates. These appear in blocks of six, with no option to filter by site type (personal, business, blog and so on), forcing you to keep clicking 'Load more themes' to work through the list.

Each template has a 'Live Demo' button, but clicking this displays an error message 'Oops! Demo configuration is not setup.' Well, thanks.

Clicking Continue prompts for your domain name and FTP credentials, in order to upload the site. That makes sense, but it's insecure, as your login is being sent over an HTTP connection.

We tried to continue, anyway, but received a 'This page isn't working' error message (HTTP error 500.)

Softaculous

Automatically install WordPress and other apps with Softaculous (Image credit: Byethost)

It's not all bad news, though. Byethost free hosting also includes the excellent Softaculous, a powerful platform which automates the setup of WordPress, PrestaShop, Joomla and hundreds of other apps, with the absolute minimum of hassle. 

Performance

We used Uptime.com, Dotcom-tools and Bitcatcha to test the performance of Byethost (Image credit: Uptime.com)

Performance

Good support is a vital element in the best web hosting tool, especially when your service is as flaky as Byethost. But, in our experience, it's not something you'll generally get from a free service.

Byethost's free plan doesn't include live chat, but you're able to raise support tickets from the VistaPanel dashboard. We've had helpful responses in under an hour, too, beating the service you'll see from some commercial providers.

Free web hosting is never going to offer the best speeds, but it can deliver better performance than you might expect, and we run our test sites past multiple monitoring and benchmarking tools to see how good they really are.

Uptime.com automatically checked our Byethost server over a period of a week. Uptime was 100%, but average response times were a little slower than most at 325ms (typical shared hosting plans manage 200-400ms.)

Dotcom-tools website speed test simulated loading our site from 16 locations across the US and Europe. Load times were slower than usual at an average 1.2 seconds, close to twice the speed of the top commercial competition, but comparable with other free hosts (Infinity Free averaged 1.3 seconds, Free Hosting No Ads hit 1.5 seconds.)

There was better news with our final test, when Bitcatcha's website speed checker tested our website speed from 10 global locations and rated it A+ for 'exceptionally quick.'

Our own subjective experience wasn't as positive, and we would rank Byethost as a mid-range performer at best. It's good enough for simple tasks, though, and if you're interested in Byethost, it's well worth creating a simple site and trying it out for yourself.

Final verdict

Byethost has an impressive sounding feature list for a free service, but there are lots of catches (the bandwidth and disk space aren't as 'unlimited' as the website claims), and the dated content and various website issues are a concern. This web host might be worth a try if you need its specific features, but beginners should look elsewhere. Just bear in mind that the competition, even in free, is ferocious.

GreenGeeks review
3:52 am | September 3, 2020

Author: admin | Category: Computers Gadgets | Comments: Off

GreenGeeks is an American web hosting provider with 55,000 customers, managing 600,000 websites, and a lengthy 14 years of experience in green hosting.

The company goes well beyond the simple energy-saving tricks of other web hosts. It calculates its energy consumption each year, then pays for three times that in green energy and puts it back into the grid. That's not just carbon neutral, it's carbon reducing.

If that's not enough, GreenGeeks has another simpler and more straightforward way to showcase its economic credentials: for every hosting account set up on the platform, the company plants one tree.

What types of hosting does GreenGeeks offer? 

GreenGeeks offers low cost shared hosting, ideal for personal users and simple business websites.

WordPress and WooCommerce hosting allows you to build anything from a personal blog to a small web store.

VPS (Virtual Private Server) hosting is a powerful technology which gives your site access to more CPU, RAM and other system resources. It's a smart choice for large or high-traffic sites, where top speeds are vital, and downtime could be a disaster.

GreenGeeks also offers dedicated server hosting, where your server gets an entire site all to itself for the maximum performance.

Next, we'll break down GreenGeeks' various hosting types, find out what they have to offer, and which might be the best solution for you. 

GreenGeeks web hosting options

(Image credit: GreenGeeks)

GreenGeeks shared hosting

Opt for shared hosting and your website is stored on a single web server along with several others. The benefit of this scheme is it's easy to use, and because everyone shares the server costs, it can be very cheap ($2 a month or even less.) But the disadvantage is all sites share the server's CPU, RAM, network connection and more, reducing speeds.

GreenGeeks starter shared hosting plan more than covers the basics, with 50GB storage, unmetered bandwidth, free SSL, a free domain, a free migration to import your current  site from another host, nightly backups, and top-quality industry-standard hosting tools including Softaculous to automatically install WordPress and 150+ other apps, and cPanel for all your other hosting management needs.

It's a decent package with enough power for personal users and small websites, and is priced low in the first year at $2.95. But costs jump to $10.95 on renewal, at little more than the best of the competition.

The mid-range plan adds unlimited storage and support for unlimited websites, along with on-demand backups (save a copy of your site whenever you like) and a WordPress repair tool. It's more capable, but at $4.95 a month in year one, $14.95 on renewal, it's still priced above average.

The Premium plan is aimed at small businesses with high traffic sites or web stores. It adds extra resources and high-end business-friendly extras, including premium SSL and smart object caching (a clever technology which uses the Memcached and Redis tools to accelerate website speeds). It's a capable package, worth considering for demanding sites, and looks fairly priced at $8.95 a month in year one, $25.95 on renewal.

GreenGeeks WordPress hosting 

WordPress is one of the most popular website creators around, and it's easy to see why. Its huge range of add-ons can handle the most advanced of business and web store projects, yet it's also accessible enough for home users to build simple family sites.

GreenGeeks' WordPress hosting is essentially the shared hosting plan - same names, same prices - with a little extra focus on some helpful WordPress-related features.

The plans include free migration of your WordPress site from a previous host, for instance. You get daily backups, with automatic updates of WordPress and its plugins. GreenGeeks uses the LiteSpeed server and LS Cache plugin to optimize speed. Unusually, the company doesn't just offer to scan your website for malware: the website says it'll help clean your site if anything malicious shows up.

The malware pledge is unusual for a budget hosting plan, but otherwise there are no real surprises here. If you're happy with GreenGeeks' shared hosting and only need the WordPress basics, these plans have you covered. But if not, take a look at IONOS. It starts from only $0.50 a month in year one ($8 on renewal), but other plans have more advanced features, and the WP Pro range uses VPS hosting to accelerate performance and support business-critical sites.

GreenGeeks VPS hosting 

VPS (Virtual Private Server) hosting is a system which divides one physical server into several smaller private pieces. Each gets its own set of server resources, not shared with other users, making for a far more powerful setup. A good VPS can run a large blog with hundreds of thousands of visitors monthly.

GreenGeeks has only three VPS plans. The cheapest is $39.95 billed monthly for 2GB RAM, 4 CPU cores and 50GB RAM. The top-of-the-range plan has 8GB RAM, 6 CPU cores and 150GB SSD storage for $109.95 billed monthly.

There are a lot of positives here. These are managed plans, which means GreenGeeks maintains the server for you (updating the operating system, installing security patches, monitoring the service for issues.) A strong set of features includes free SSL, a free migration, cPanel server management and the excellent Softaculous to automatically install WordPress or 150+ other apps. All plans have a generous 10TB bandwidth allowance, and prices are low considering what you get.

If you're looking for a lower to mid-range VPS, or new to this type of hosting and unsure exactly what you need, GreenGeeks is well worth considering. But with only three plans, and no configuration options, there's not a lot of choice, and many users will be better off elsewhere.

Hostwinds has a far wider range of plans, including budget $4.99 a month unmanaged setups ranging up to far more powerful 16 CPU core, 96GB RAM system. There's a choice of operating systems (including Windows), and a speedy 1Gbps network connection. If you're a seasoned VPS user with a demanding website, or you'd like more of an upgrade path if the site outgrows your first VPS, Hostwinds may be the better choice.

GreenGeeks dedicated hosting

Opt for dedicated hosting and you get a web server for your site alone. That means no more sharing resources with others, no unexpected slowdowns because a neighboring site is suddenly busy: you just get the best speeds your hardware can manage, all the time.

GreenGeeks has only four dedicated plans. They start with a budget 2GB RAM, Intel Atom 330 Dual Core CPU system for $169 a month. At the top of the range, a 16GB RAM, 6-core Xeon E5-2620 2.0Ghz, 2x 500 GB SSD is $439, again billed monthly.

These prices are higher than most, a surprise considering how GreenGeeks offers such great deals everywhere else. We found we could save $100-$150 a month or more on some plans by choosing comparable servers at Hostwinds.

As with GreenGeeks' VPS products, its dedicated hosting range is a little small. It covers the lower middle range of the market, but there's plenty of gaps elsewhere. IONOS has some value unmanaged deals for experienced users, for instance, with prices starting at under $50. Or if it's power you're after, Liquid Web has dedicated servers for enterprise users, with as much as 32 cores and 128GB RAM.

GreenGeeks website builder templates

Automatically install WordPress or use GreenGeeks' graphical site builder (Image credit: GreenGeeks)

Does GreenGeeks have a website builder? 

GreenGeeks' shared hosting packages include a free version of Weebly Site Builder. At least, that's the idea. It's not installed by default, and we didn't see it mentioned in the dashboard, so many users may never even realize it's available. But if you raise a support ticket, GreenGeeks will activate the free version for you.

Weebly works much like many other website builders. Choose a starting website design from a selection of around 100. Then customize basics like colors and fonts, if you like. Or just drag and drop blocks of content onto the page - text, photos, forms, maps, more - and then add your own text and photos, just as you would in any other editor.

This is easy to use, and has a few more features than we'd expect for a free tool. There's no limit on the number of pages your site can have, for instance. You can even create a tiny web store for up to five products. 

Weebly Free is a fun app, and could be perfect for, say, allowing your kids to build their own personal sites. But the basic templates, limited features and Weebly ad on each page footer mean this isn't something we'd recommend for serious use. And although you could pay to upgrade, Weebly isn't the best website builder around, and we'd recommend you consider some alternatives.

HostGator's Gator website builder is priced from just $3.84 a month for the first two years, for instance ($7.68 afterwards), but it's easy to use, with a gorgeous stock image library, and also supports a simple web store with a maximum of three products.

Wix is a power-packed alternative with far better templates, vastly more features, a well-designed editor and the ability to create truly professional business sites. It's also way more expensive, but a free plan gives you plenty of time to try before you buy.

Web store WooCommerce

(Image credit: WooCommerce)

Can I build a web store with GreenGeeks? 

GreenGeeks has a WooCommerce hosting range which is very capable of building a top-quality web store (WooCommerce is one of the best ecommerce platforms around).

As with GreenGeeks' WordPress range, though, this is really just the shared hosting range underneath, with the same names, features and prices.

This isn't necessarily a problem. The plans can automatically install WooCommerce for you within seconds, and it really does have the power to handle even the largest and most demanding stores. But because these are general-purpose shared hosting plans, GreenGeeks doesn't offer you any helpful ecommerce extras or specialist WooCommerce support. That makes these more suitable for experienced users with some ecommerce experience, who are happy to set up and learn WooCommerce largely on their own.

If that's not you at all, there are other options. As we discussed above, website builders are not only the easiest way to create a site, but many also support adding a web store. Most builders have only a fraction of the power of WooCommerce, but they're enough for many stores. HostGator's Gator website builder and Hostinger's website builder can build basic stores from a few dollars a month, while GoDaddy and Wix cost more but include many extra features.

GreenGeeks web control panel

(Image credit: GreenGeeks)

How easy is GreenGeeks to use? 

The GreenGeeks control panel launches with a simple startup wizard, giving you useful advice on migrating or building your site, then getting it up and running.

Elsewhere, the control panel is refreshingly simple. Technical language is kept to a minimum, and sensibly-named options in a left-hand sidebar (Hosting, Domains, Security, Support) make it easy to find what you need.

Even when you drill down to more complicated areas, GreenGeeks does its best to keep life straightforward. Create an email account at DreamHost, for instance, and it prompts you with 12 options, including some you may never know existed (do you want to get daily warnings if your Inbox is nearly full?) GreenGeeks just asks you to enter an email address and password. You can still tweak more advanced settings, they're just not displayed up-front.

GreenGeeks Softaculous application installer

(Image credit: GreenGeeks)

Best of all, GreenGeeks provides users with top-quality, industry-standard tools to manage all the most complex tasks, including Softaculous to automatically install WordPress and other apps, and cPanel to keep it running smoothly.

Hosting can still be tricky at times, and you'll have the occasional complicated challenge to overcome. But that's the same with every provider, and GreenGeeks does a better job of simplifying the process than most.

GreenGeeks uptime score

(Image credit: Uptime.com)

How fast is GreenGeeks? 

Web host performance matters, even for simple and low traffic projects. If your site is slow or regularly down then you'll annoy your visitors, and some may leave and never come back.

To find out how a provider performs, we sign up for a shared hosting package, set up a simple WordPress site using a standard template, then run various tests and compare the results with others. (Although this gives us useful information, keep in mind that we're comparing basic shared hosting plans; our results can't tell us anything about a provider's VPS, dedicated or other plans).

We measure a host's uptime by using Uptime.com to check our test website every five minutes over 14 days. GreenGeeks scored a perfect 100%, which means Uptime.com was able to access our test page every time it tried (that's zero fails out of 3,744 tries).

Uptime.com also logs how long it waits for the server to respond to a request. GreenGeeks was speedy at 0.302 seconds (some providers took a second or more), and even better, response times were very consistent, varying by only 0.032 seconds across all 3,744 tests (only GoDaddy and SiteGround scored better in our last 15 tests). That's good news, as it suggests GreenGeeks' shared servers aren't overloaded, and they have enough resources to cope with the websites they're hosting.

GreenGeeks GTMetrix performance result

(Image credit: GTMetrix)

We check website performance by using GTmetrix to load a test WordPress site and calculate how long it takes to load the main page content (in technical speak, it's called Largest Contentful Paint, or LCP). The lower your LCP, the snappier and more responsive your site feels, and the more likely it is that your visitors will stick around.

GreenGeeks' LCP was a decent 0.691 seconds, similar to top names like Bluehost (0.603) and GoDaddy (0.667), and far ahead of budget providers such as Domain.com (1.5 seconds) and iPage (1.6 seconds).

GreenGeeks performance result

(Image credit: K6)

Finally, we use the online service k6 to measure how our test WordPress site handles many visitors at the same time. GreenGeeks fractionally underperformed here, with our site able to cope with a peak 19 requests per second and an average of 15 (most providers managed a peak 20 and an average of 15). But that's not a difference you're likely to notice in real life, and overall GreenGeeks performed very well.

GreenGeeks support page

(Image credit: GreenGeeks)

What is GreenGeeks support like? 

GreenGeeks offers 24/7 support via live chat, ticket, telephone and a website knowledgebase.

The support site isn't very well organized, and it can be difficult to find the content you need. Fortunately, there are some useful all-in-one tutorials. 

For example, the Getting Started with GreenGeeks guide links to articles on registering and setting up domains and DNS, creating email accounts, building your website, and managing your bills and accounts. That's good to know and will point you in the right direction, but these articles are often short, and may not include all the information you need.

If the knowledgebase leaves you confused, then you can always contact the support team. We raised some test questions to see how it performed, and the results were excellent. 

Live chat responses were quick and helpful, and even opting for ticket support (often more appropriate with complex problems) didn't leave us waiting for long. GreenGeeks' free Weebly version isn't enabled by default, for instance, and you must raise a support ticket to 'activate' it. 

We did, and GreenGeeks read our request, activated Weebly and replied to let us know, all in just a fraction under 50 minutes. That's a very acceptable response time, and suggests to us that GreenGeeks has plenty of support staff available to deal with questions as they arrive.

Final verdict

GreenGeeks' has excellent shared hosting, with the features and speed to handle most personal and many SMB sites. It's weaker on WordPress and ecommerce, and the VPS and dedicated hosting plans don't have the power for the most demanding sites, but there's still plenty to like here (and of course helping to save the planet is pretty important, too). 


GreenGeeks FAQs

What payment types does GreenGeeks support?

GreenGeeks accepts payment via card only.

Does GreenGeeks offer refunds?

GreenGeeks has a simple 30-day money-back guarantee for all its main hosting products, regardless of the length of subscription. Unlike some providers, there's no 30 days for this hosting product range, 15 days for that, something else again for monthly plans (GoDaddy only gives you 48 hours for subscriptions of less than a year). It's 30 days and that's that.

There are some restrictions for add-on products. You won't get your domain registration or SSL certificate fees back, for instance, but that's common to most hosts. (Although, as a plus this time, GoDaddy does offer refunds on some domain purchases.)

More significantly, renewal fees aren't included. At SiteGround, you can cancel 15 days after renewing, and the company will give you all but your first month's fees back. At GreenGeeks, the small print warns you must cancel your account at least five days before the renewal date 'to ensure the billing date can stop any renewal charges', and if you forget, and you're charged, you've no right to a refund.

Does GreenGeeks have an uptime guarantee?

GreenGeeks claims to offer a '99.9% uptime guarantee', but that's no more than a hope, or a goal. If your site is down for more than 0.1% (or 43.83 minutes a month), you won't get any form of compensation.

Some hosts do significantly better. SiteGround also has a 99.9% network uptime guarantee, for instance, but if your downtime is actually 99%, you'll get a month of free hosting, and there's another free month for every further 1%.

GreenGeeks data centers

(Image credit: GreenGeeks)

Where are GreenGeeks’ data centers?

Sign up with GreenGeeks and you can choose whether your site will be hosted in its US, Canadian or Netherlands data centers.

That's better than many providers, and good news for performance. If your website has a mainly European audience, for instance, hosting your site in the Netherlands means visitors are closer to your server, automatically giving you a little extra speed.

GreenGeeks IP address

(Image credit: GreenGeeks)

What is my GreenGeeks IP address?

Log into the GreenGeeks control panel.

Click Hosting, find your hosting account in the list and click Manage.

Your website server's IP address is displayed as 'IP' in the Server Information panel.

What are GreenGeeks' nameservers?

GreenGeeks shared hosting nameservers are chi-ns1.websitehostserver.net, chi-ns2.websitehostserver.net and ams-ns1.websitehostserver.net. 

How do I cancel a GreenGeeks product?

You can cancel a GreenGeeks hosting plan from the website cancellation request form.

Choose the service you'd like to cancel, complete and submit the form. You'll receive an email from GreenGeeks, click the Confirmation link, and your request is processed within seven days.

Although this sounds simple enough, there are a couple of potential gotchas.

First, the company automatically renews your package 24 hours before the hosting date, so don't leave this until the last minute.

And second, when you're prompted to enter your email address in the cancellation form, you must enter the same address linked to your GreenGeeks account. If you don't, the cancellation won't be accepted, and if the renewal date is close, there's a chance you'll be billed again before you realize there's a problem.

InMotion Hosting review
12:44 am | September 2, 2020

Author: admin | Category: Computers Gadgets | Comments: Off

Founded in 2001, InMotion Hosting is up there with some of the very best web hosting providers, and has over 570,000 customers around the world. 

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What types of hosting does InMotion Hosting offer?

InMotion Hosting has low-cost and easy-to-use shared hosting plans, ideal for low-traffic personal and small business sites.

Its managed WordPress hosting supports running anything from simple family blogs to heavy-duty business sites, while hosted WooCommerce and Prestashop plans can help you build a professional web store.

If it's raw server power you're after, VPS (Virtual Private Server), dedicated and cloud hosting plans cover everyone from expert personal users to international corporations.

There's a lot to consider, but next we'll look at some of these hosting types, find out what they offer, what they don't, and whether they could be a good choice for you.

Shared hosting 

Shared hosting is a system where your website and many others are stored on the same web server. Sharing both resources and costs means shared hosting can be slow, but it's also very cheap, and can be a good choice for smaller sites.

InMotion Hosting's shared hosting starts with its Core plan (from $2.29 a month over three years.) This doesn't include a free domain or backups, and only supports 10 email addresses (most accounts have no limit). But it allows you to host two websites, where other starter plans often allow only one, and elsewhere there's free SSL, a free domain, unlimited bandwidth, malware protection and 1-click WordPress installation, while the excellent cPanel has everything you'll need to manage your site.

Three more powerful shared hosting plans support hosting unlimited websites, handle as many email addresses as you need, and have some unusual speedup features (ultra-fast NVMe storage, for instance, something we rarely see with shared hosting.) Still no backups, though. They're priced from $4.99 to $12.99 over three years.

Billing isn't as flexible as we'd like. The top Pro plan has a monthly payment option, but everything else is only available in one, two or three year terms. (There are similar issues with other ranges.)

Unsure about signing up for long-term contracts? Us too, but InMotion Hosting offers more protection than most with a 90-day money-back guarantee (three times the industry standard 30 days), plenty of time to be sure if this is the right package for you.

These aren't the cheapest shared hosting plans around, especially if you must have backups (add from another $2 a month.) But it’s also very easy to see why. The company hasn't taken shortcuts to hit a low headline price: this is solid and reliable shared hosting with top quality features, and all the power you need to handle small to medium personal and business sites. 

If price is top of your priority list, though, take a look at Hostinger. Its $2.99 a month plan supports unlimited websites, includes at least weekly backups, and although it doesn't have InMotion Hosting's extra speedup technologies, our shared hosting tests show Hostinger is still a good performer.

WordPress hosting with In InMotion Hosting

WordPress hosting with In InMotion Hosting (Image credit: InMotion Hosting)

WordPress hosting

WordPress is the world's favorite website creator, a one-stop tool which can build anything from simple personal sites to busy web stores and the most heavy-duty business-critical projects.

InMotion Hosting's shared plans have an automatic WordPress installer, good news if you're just looking to learn the basics. But its specialist WordPress hosting range goes further, with server-level speed optimisations, extra security to keep hackers at bay, automatic WordPress updates and more.

Prices start at only $3.99 a month over two years ($11.99 on renewal) for the WP Core plan. It's limited to two websites and ten email addresses, and there are no backups, but InMotion Hosting suggests a WP Core site could handle 20k visitors a month, more than enough for many users.

The $7.99 a month WP Launch plan adds offsite backups, and support for unlimited websites and email addresses, and enough resources to support 50k visitors a month, making it our budget pick. 

If you need more, a WP-VPS range gives you extra system resources, and the power to handle very demanding sites (or lots of smaller ones.) Prices start at $19.99 a month over three years ($59.99 on renewal.)

These are capable plans, fairly priced, with the power to handle (at the top of the VPS range) perhaps a million visitors a month. But the WordPress-specific features are much the same as you'll find with other providers. If you're after real WordPress power, WP Engine offers genuinely Premium themes, intelligent updating, smart performance optimizations, page speed testing and more.

InMotion Hosting shared hosting screenshot

InMotion's plans have lots of features as standard (Image credit: InMotion Hosting)

VPS hosting 

Virtual Private Server (VPS) hosting is a mid-range option which gives your website more server power, for a little extra cost. You're likely to see better and more consistent speeds, with fewer of the slowdowns that often happen with shared hosting.

InMotion Hosting has four VPS plans. These start at $19.99 a month over three years for a 4GB RAM, 90GB SSD storage and 2 CPU core server, and range up to $59.99 for 16GB RAM, 360GB storage and eight core system.

Although these prices are more expensive than some, that's because they're stuffed with valuable features. Every plan gets a free domain, free migration, at least two dedicated IPs, five cPanel and one WHM license. They're fully managed (InMotion Hosting keeps the VPS updated and running for you), and all plans come with Launch Assist, two hours with a VPS expert to help you set up and optimize the server, migrate a previous site, whatever else you need.

These are powerful products which could work for many levels of user. The Starter plan is ideal for mid-range sites which have outgrown shared hosting, or demanding projects which need more resources (a busy photography site where users can explore many image galleries, for instance.) Upgrading to a more powerful VPS may help with sites where consistent performance is critical - a web store where just a brief slowdown might drive customers away - or if you need to host multiple sites on the same server.

If you don't need InMotion Hosting's level of VPS power, take a look at IONOS. Its plans are more basic, but then they start at just $2 a month, and that could work for experienced users who know exactly what they need.

Consider Hostwinds, too. Its VPS plans have more configuration options, there are more powerful servers at the top end of the range, and there's Windows VPS hosting on offer if you need it.

Dedicated hosting 

Opt for dedicated server hosting and your site gets the full power of a server all to itself. No more unexpected slowdowns because a neighboring site is suddenly really busy, because there are no neighboring sites: the server is entirely yours. If you're running a large business-critical site, where speed matters, even when you're really busy, dedicated hosting is a must-see.

InMotion Hosting has five dedicated hosting plans. These begin at an affordable $139.99 a month (billed annually, $169 on renewal) for an managed 4 core, 16GB RAM and 1TB SSD system, and range up to a hugely powerful $539.99 ($619.99 on renewal) Dual Intel CPU, 192GB RAM and 2x2TB NVMe SSD monster. That'll cover most sites and requirements, but if you're unhappy, a 'Build your own' plan allows you to choose whatever CPU, RAM, storage and other features work for you.

These aren't the lowest prices around, but as with other InMotion Hosting products, that's because the company isn't skimping on the server specs. There's a 1Gbps network connection, for instance; unmetered bandwidth; at least 50GB free backup space; free cPanel and WHM licenses, free SSL, free website migrations, and more.

The closest we can get to a disappointment is you can only buy servers in US data centers. Many providers can host your server in other continents, important if your main audience is elsewhere in the world.

If location isn't an issue, InMotion Hosting's dedicated products offer a capable full-featured service which can handle some of the most demanding business and speed-critical tasks.

If you're more interested in the budget end of the market, check out IONOS, where very basic dedicated plans start at $47 a month. But if it's power you're after, Liquid Web is more expensive, but has more plans and add-ons, and data centers in USA and Europe.

InMotion Hosting's website builder

InMotion Hosting's website builder solution (Image credit: InMotion Hosting)

Does InMotion Hosting have a website builder?

InMotion Hosting includes the BoldGrid WordPress Website Builder for free with all its WordPress plans. Choose a prebuilt starter site from 200+ industry-specific designs, drag-and-drop blocks (text, pictures, videos, forms, more) onto the page, and you can customize them with your own text and photos just like any other editor.

BoldGrid is easy to use, and a handy site-creating alternative if regular WordPress feels a little too intimidating. But it doesn't have a lot of features, and is really only suitable for creating small-scale sites.

HostGator's Gator website builder is also simple and seriously cheap (from $3.84 a month), but even the most basic plan supports a tiny web store and email campaigns. At the top of the market, Wix has great templates, stacks of features, an intuitive editor, and the power to handle almost any web task.

Surplus control panel options

Surplus control panel options (Image credit: InMotion Hosting)

How easy is InMotion Hosting to use? 

InMotion Hosting's customer account panel looks more appealing than most, with the usual text links replaced by 30+ colorful cPanel-like icons. Unfortunately, many of these are for functions you'd use rarely, if ever. Add another credit card; buy or transfer in a new domain; buy a Sucuri website security package; read InMotion's GDPR statement. These should be tucked away in a menu, not permanently taking up valuable screen real estate as though you might need them every day.

There's a separate set of icons for each hosting package you have, but they share a similar problem. There are some useful shortcuts, for example to launch cPanel, or Softaculous to install WordPress or hundreds of other apps. But many of the others are less helpful. How often do you think you'd use functions like 'Request Email Limit Exemption' or 'Simple CSR Request for 3rd party SSL', for instance?

Fortunately, you don't have to spend long in the account panel. One click launches Softaculous, you can have WordPress ready to go within a minute or two, and the excellent cPanel has all the email, file, database and other management tools you need to get your site running smoothly.

InMotion Hosting GTMetrix performance

InMotion Hosting GTMetrix performance (Image credit: GTMetrix)

How fast is InMotion Hosting? 

We began our performance tests by signing up for an InMotion Hosting shared plan, then setting up a simple WordPress website based on a standard template.

Next, we measured our server's uptime by using monitoring service Uptime.com to check the site every five minutes over 14 days. InMotion Hosting managed a perfect 100% uptime, with a speedy server response time of 0.340 seconds (that's third fastest in our last 15 tests.)

We measure website speed by using GTMetrix to access a test page, and calculate how long it takes to load the main content (a figure technically known as Largest Contentful Paint, or LCP.) The lower the LCP, the more snappy and responsive your site feels.

InMotion Hosting scored an LCP of 0.610 seconds, fourth fastest in our recent tests, and less than half the time of budget shared plans from Domain.com (1.5 seconds) and iPage (1.6 seconds).

Results of InMotion Hosting's load time of a single page

Results of InMotion Hosting's load time of a single page (Image credit: K61)

Measuring the load time of a single page is useful, but we also use k6 https://k6.io to discover how a site performs when it has 20 visitors accessing a page at the same time.

Our server did a good job, handling a peak of 20 requests per second without difficulty, and averaging a mid-range but very acceptable 15 requests per second.

These are positive results, but keep in mind our site was hosted on a shared plan. Our figures can't tell you how InMotion Hosting's VPS, dedicated or other plans might compare to the competition.

What is InMotion Hosting's support like?

InMotion Hosting offers 24/7 US-based support via phone, email and live chat, a web Support Center and community forums.

The website has a 5,000+ articles, guides and tutorials on the full range of hosting topics, way more than you'll see with most providers. The search engine doesn't do a good job of sorting its results by relevance, so it might take some scrolling to find what you need, but there is a lot of detailed and helpful content to explore.

Ticket support wasn't the fastest we've seen, with replies to even relatively basic product queries taking around four hours. These typically pointed us in the right direction, though sometimes didn't have all the details we'd expect.

Fortunately, live chat gave the best results. We found responses were speedy and helpful, and the agents were able to give us useful answers to any extra questions we asked.

Final verdict

Whether you're a total website newbie or a big business running a huge and high-traffic web store, InMotion Hosting has a fast and feature-packed product which can help. A must for your web hosting shortlist.


InMotion Hosting FAQs

What payment types does InMotion Hosting support?

InMotion Hosting accepts payment via card and PayPal.

Does InMotion Hosting offer refunds?

InMotion Hosting has a '100% satisfaction guarantee' which promises your money back if you ask for it within a very generous 90 days.

There are some exceptions. There's 90 days of protection for all shared hosting, 6 month and longer VPS and reseller hosting packages. But dedicated servers and monthly-billed VPS and reseller plans get 30 days. 

Most hosts only give 30 days across the range, though, so even taking the small print into account, InMotion Hosting tramples over the rest.

InMotion Hosting uptime performance

InMotion Hosting uptime performance (Image credit: InMotion Hosting)

Does InMotion Hosting have an uptime guarantee?

InMotion Hosting's website doesn't quote an uptime guarantee for shared hosting. Most hosts do a little more, typically claiming 99.9%, and with some explanation of how this is calculated and the compensation you might get if this isn't met.

The company looks to do better with VPS hosting, claiming each VPS is on a server 'with 99.99% uptime.' It doesn't use the word 'guarantee', though, and there's nothing in the small print to explain how this 99.99% is calculated or guaranteed.

Confusingly, the website quotes two figures for dedicated servers. At the top of the page it says servers are on a '99.99% uptime Tier 1 network'; at the bottom, it says current network uptime is 99.999%. Again, there's no mention of a guarantee.

We prefer hosts to offer more clarity, and offer compensation if expected uptime isn't met. For example, Scala Hosting's Uptime Guarantee says customers get all their monthly fees back if unscheduled downtime is greater than 1% (that's more than around 7 hours 18 minutes).

Where are InMotion Hosting's data centers?

InMotion Hosting has two US-based data centers in Washington, D.C. and Los Angeles. Even shared hosting users can choose which data center should host their website.

cpanel is included

cPanel is included (Image credit: InMotion Hosting)

What is my InMotion Hosting IP address?

If you need to connect your InMotion Hosting site to a domain managed elsewhere, it can help to find your web server's IP address.

To locate it, first log into the InMotion Hosting account management panel.

Scroll down and find your hosting plan in the list (it'll appear under your domain name).

Find and click your plan's cPanel icon (probably top left in the list.)

Your server IP address appears in the General Information panel on the left, in the 'Shared IP Address' box.

If you can't see a General Information panel, click the Server Information link, and look for the 'Shared IP Address'.

What are InMotion Hosting's nameservers?

InMotion Hosting's nameservers are ns1.InMotionhosting.com and ns2.InMotionhosting.com.

Cancel Plans From The Account Panel Subscriptions Area

Cancel plans from the account panel subscriptions area (Image credit: InMotion Hosting)

How do I cancel an InMotion Hosting product?

Point your browser at www.InMotionhosting.com, click Login top-right of the page, and log in using your regular InMotion Hosting credentials.

Click Billing, My Subscriptions.

If you see a red cross to the right of the subscription you'd like to cancel, click it and fill in the cancellation form. Your plan will remain active, but it won't renew and you won't be willed again.

If the Cancel column includes the text 'Set to Manual Renewal', the plan already has its 'auto-renew' setting turned off. You'll still receive email reminders just before the subscription is due to end, but if you're not interested, you can just ignore these and leave the account to expire.