7 Best Web Hosting Services of 2020 (Top Affordable Plans)

Choosing between web hosting providers can be overwhelming. Trust me, I’ve been there many times before. So after building countless sites and trying out a ton of hosting solutions, I put together a list of what I consider to be the best web hosting services for this year. 

How should you determine which web hosting plan is right for your needs?

That depends on the kind of website you’re building. Are you starting a blog? A scalable ecommerce site? A hub for a lot of video content? Your website isn’t necessarily the same as your neighbor’s, so you can’t assume that one particular web hosting service is best for everyone.

There are so many different elements that make up a web hosting platform. Consider speed, features, uptime (the amount of time that the server hosting your website is up and running), customer support, SSL certificate, and price. Think about the type of web hosting that will fulfill your needs, whether it’s shared, VPS, cloud hosting or dedicated hosting.

So with all of that in mind, what is the best web hosting service? There’s a huge amount of options. I’ll help you boil them down and decide which web hosting service is right for you.

DISCLAIMER: Please note that some of these hosting platforms links are affiliate links. So if you click through and end up making a purchase, I’ll get a small commission at no cost to you. That helps to support me and keep this website running. Know that I only recommend providers that I personally stand behind.

Now, without further ado…

1. Bluehost

My top pick for the overall best web hosting service is Bluehost. They launched in 1996 and have been a leader in the hosting space for quite some time. They’re pretty highly regarded for good prices (only $2.95 per month), excellent speed, and solid customer support. They’re also easy to use, which is something that you shouldn’t underestimate. Best of all, they are one of the official WordPress-recommended hosting providers.

Bluehost has a variety of plans available. These include VPS hosting, shared hosting and dedicated servers. It should be enough to fulfill most users’ needs.

Performance:

You obviously want your website to load quickly (which is also a huge ranking factor). Well, Bluehost is known for fast load times. They can vary depending on where you’re located, but they’re highly competitive no matter the geography. I typically saw half-second load times (and less) and 99.99% uptime. If you care about ranking high in Google search results, then you need this kind of speed.

Customer Service:

We all get a little (or very) confused at times, so it’s helpful to have a robust customer support system. Bluehost has 24/7 support, so you’ll never be left hanging. They can be reached via chat, email, or a phone call.

Price and Features:

Bluehost offers four plans, which unlock more features (unlimited websites, domains, email storage, etc.) depending on how much you spend. Here’s the breakdown:

• Basic plan: $2.95/month promo rate ($7.99 when you renew)
• Plus plan: $5.45/month promo rate ($10.99 when you renew)
• Choice Plus plan: $5.45/month promo rate ($14.99 when you renew)
• Pro plan: $13.95/month promo rate ($23.99 when you renew)

I recommend the Choice Plus plan because you’ll get the most bang for your buck. It includes: 

• Unlimited websites
• Unlimited bandwidth
• Free SSL certificate
• 1 included domain
• Unlimited email accounts

Of course, if you’re just getting your feet wet and want to keep costs down while you figure everything out, save a few bucks and go with the Basic plan. No matter what plan you choose, you get a 30-day money back guarantee. Here’s how you sign up:

1. Go to Bluehost.com and click Get Started.
2. Choose your plan (right now the cheapest is $2.95).
3. Set up your domain.
4. Enter your account information and confirm your plan.
5. Click on Submit and you’re all set.

2. DreamHost

DreamHost is another good option for an affordable web hosting service. They’re recommended by some key players in the industry like WordPress, CNET, and PCMag. They also power more than a million websites (including 750,000 WordPress installations). 

DreamHost is no slouch when it comes to web hosting plans. Options include shared hosting, VPS, managed WordPress hosting, cloud hosting and dedicated server hosting.

Performance:

DreamHost puts a lot of thought into speed. They offer a 100% uptime guarantee, plus auto-scaled memory, multiple caching layers, and isolated servers to keep things humming.

They use a custom control panel instead of the more standard cPanel, which could be good or bad depending on how you like it. I personally think it’s fine, but it’s up to you. It’s one reason why their 97-day money-back guarantee is super useful. If you don’t like their panel, get your money back and try another web host.

Customer Service:

Customer support is a mixed bag. While you can get email support 24/7, chat is only available during certain hours (5:30am – 9:30pm PT). But you can count on the “DreamHost Help Bot” any day and time.

Price and Features:

You can pay in a few different ways with DreamHost, based on your choice of a monthly, one year, or three year plan. A Shared Starter plan (which would probably be your best option if you’re just launching a single website) is cheapest if you sign up for the three year plan, coming in at an extremely reasonable $2.59/month. Here’s what you get with that:

• 1 website
• 1 free doman
• Unlimited traffic
• WordPress pre-installed
• Free automated WordPress migrations
• WP Website Builder
• Fast SSD storage
• Free SSL certificate

And don’t forget about that awesome 97-day money-back guarantee.

3. HostGator

More than nine million websites use HostGator. I consider it to be the top cheap web hosting provider. They’re reliable, easy to use, and a good option if you need hosting for multiple sites. And while they’re not the absolute fastest option around, the speeds are still better than average. Plus their little alligator logo is absolutely adorable. There, I said it.

HostGator has a good amount of hosting options including shared hosting plans, VPS hosting and dedicated servers. Their HostGator Cloud option is faster and (more importantly) much more scalable. So if you’re looking to scale, HostGator could be the webhost you’re looking for.

Performance:

HostGator promises 99.9% uptime, which beats the industry average. Their speed is under a second. So while it won’t break any world records for peppiness, it’ll get the job done (and at a better than average clip). Plus their drag and drop website building tools perform solidly.

Customer Service:

Running into a roadblock with your website? You can reach out to HostGator’s 24/7 support using live chat, email, or phone. So whatever your preferred method (and whatever time it is), the Gator is ready to help.

Price and Features:

As befits a company with a cute alligator mascot, they also have cute names for their plans. There’s the Hatchling plan ($2.75/month promo rate), Baby plan ($3.95/month promo rate), and the less creatively named Business plan ($5.95/month promo rate). Here’s some of what’s included in the Hatchling plan:

• 1 domain
• 1-click WordPress installation
• Unmetered bandwidth
• Free SSL certificate
• Unmetered disk space
• Unmetered bandwidth

HostGator also offers a 45-day money-back guarantee.

4. A2 Hosting

Speeeeeed! If you’re looking for a fast hosting service, it’s hard not to like A2 Hosting. They’re known for offering some of the fastest speeds in the web hosting game. Why is this important? Having a website with zippy load times can lead to improved bounce rate, time on page, and conversion rate. Plus, perhaps most importantly, it can help you rank better on Google.

If you’ve got a need for more than just speed, A2 Hosting also offers 1-click installs for WordPress, Drupal, Magento, and other popular CMS tools. They also provide free migration services, as well as a mix of hosting options.

Performance:

If you’re looking for reliability, A2 Hosting has got you covered with a 99.9% uptime commitment. And have I talked about speed yet? Okay, I know that I did. But since it’s the key draw for A2 Hosting, it’s worth mentioning again. All of their pricing tiers offer high speeds, but if you’re really looking to smoke the competition, their turbo servers (offered as part of their Turbo plan) can deliver a blazing 20x page load time. 

Customer Service:

Speed is good and all, but what happens if you run into a problem? Thankfully A2 Hosting comes through here too, with great customer service. Hit up support via email, phone, or live chat 24/7. 

Price and Features:

A2 Hosting has four pricing tiers. They’re not the cheapest plans on the block, but they’re still in the ballpark. Here’s how they shake out when it comes to price:

• Startup plan: Starts at $2.99/month
• Drive plan: Starts at $4.99/month
• Turbo Boost plan: Starts at $9.99/month
• Turbo Max plan: Starts at $14.99/month

If you’re looking to utilize those 20x faster Turbo servers, you’ll need to go with either the Turbo Boost or Turbo Max plan. But if you’re okay with starting a bit slower (and cheaper), here’s some of what the Startup plan includes:

• 5 databases
• Unlimited transfer
• Unlimited email addresses
• cPanel control panel
• WordPress pre-installed with A2 optimized
• SSL certificates available
• 1-click install for WordPress, WooCommerce, Joomla, Drupal and more

And all A2 Hosting plans come with a money-back guarantee.

5. Hostinger

Looking to make your mark online without emptying your wallet? If that’s the case, you really need to check out Hostinger. They’re a solid option when it comes to budget website hosting. Sure, they may not be the most well-known company, but they’re fast, reliable, and their lowest plan starts at $0.99 a month. Yes, 99 cents. And while it’s actually a promotional rate, the price is still an awesomely low $2.15/month when you renew later.

Hostinger is also a really nice option for beginners. Their control panel keeps things simple and straightforward, so you can launch your site more quickly. You can get a WordPress site up easily with their 1-click installation. And while Hostinger doesn’t offer dedicated hosting, they do have plans for cloud hosting, VPS and WordPress hosting.

Performance:

Hostinger is cheap AND reliable, with a 99.9% uptime guarantee. Their average load time is less than 0.5 seconds, better than the industry average. So while they lack some of the fancier features of their competitors, they still do a good, respectable job.

Customer Service:

If you want to be able to call customer support when something goes wrong, you’ll need to look elsewhere. But Hostinger does offer 24/7 expert chat support, which is often all you need.

Price and Features:

I touched on this before, but good luck finding a more cost effective hosting platform than Hostinger. Their promotional rates start at $0.99/month for Single Shared Hosting, $2.89/month for Premium Shared Hosting, $3.99/month for Business Shared Hosting and $7.45/month for Cloud Hosting.

If you’re just looking for Single Shared Hosting, their pricing structure can be a little complicated. Basically, the longer you commit to, the lower your costs will be. If you want that stellar $0.99/month rate, you’ll need to commit to 48 months. It gets a little pricier if you don’t want to lock yourself in for so long. For example, it’s $1.59/month if you commit to 24 months, which is still a good deal.

So what do you get with the Single Shared Hosting Plan?

• 1 website
• 1 email address
• 1 MySQL database
• Free SSL certificate
• LiteSpeed cache
• DNS management
• Access Manager

Hostinger also offers a 30-day money-back guarantee.

6. Siteground

We could all use a little help sometimes. Siteground prides themselves on this idea, offering superior customer support. You can reach the company 24/7 via live chat, phone or their ticketing system. So if you’re having problems with their web hosting, you know they’ve got your back. That’s how they earned the highest level of client satisfaction.

Siteground offers WordPress hosting, WooCommerce hosting, cloud hosting and enterprise hosting. They’re also one of three hosting sites (along with Bluehost and DreamHost) recommended by WordPress. If you need more proof of their quality, they have a ton of positive recommendations and reviews. Siteground earned 4.7 stars out of 5 on TrustPilot (based on 5,000 reviews) and 4.9 out of 5 on Shopper Approved (based on 6,000 reviews). Not too shabby at all.

Performance:

Siteground is an industry leader when it comes to uptime, averaging 99.99%. And they are Fast (with a capital F). Think under 0.2 seconds. 

Customer Service:

It’s worth repeating that Siteground has some of the best customer service around. They’re ready and willing to help whether you reach out via phone, live chat or ticket.

Price and Features:

Nobody’s perfect. Siteground doesn’t fare well when you compare their price with some of the other hosting companies on this list. Here’s what their three main plans look like (please note, it’s really the renewal costs that will get you):

• StartUp plan: $6.99/month special price ($14.99/month regular price)
• GrowBig plan: $9.99/month special price ($24.99/month regular price)
• GoGeek plan: $14.99/month special price ($39.99/month regular price)

So yeah, Siteground isn’t the cheapest service around. But it’s still a reliable, speedy hosting company with excellent customer service. Here’s what you get with the StartUp plan:

• Unlimited databases
• 10 GB web space
• 10,000 monthly visits
• Unmetered traffic
• Free SSL
• Daily backup
• Free CDN
• Managed WordPress

There’s also a 30-day money-back guarantee.

7. GoDaddy

Is GoDaddy a good website host? While it’s not my favorite hosting provider, it works. (I know it doesn’t sound like I offer much confidence here, which is why I always recommend Bluehost over GoDaddy.) GoDaddy is one of the biggest names in the hosting industry, and they got there for a reason. Because they provide a lot of services. 

I, for one, am a fan of their easy, 1-click install for 150 free apps including WordPress and Joomla. And their wide array of products can make them your one-stop shop for all your website needs. They also assist with security patches, software updates and more odds and ends to help keep your site running smoothly. So if you like simplicity and not having to utilize a bunch of different services, GoDaddy may be right for you.

Performance:

You can expect good performance with GoDaddy. That means a 99.9% service uptime guarantee and load times that are typically under 0.55 seconds.

Customer Service:

24/7 expert support is available using phone and chat. And while they can be helpful, sometimes they just point you toward their online articles.

Price and Features:

Be careful here. You can save a little money up front with GoDaddy’s initial discounted prices. But once you renew, the price will go up for each plan.

• Economy plan: $5.99/month ($8.99/month after renewal)
• Deluxe plan: $7.99/month ($11.99/month after renewal)
• Ultimate plan: $12.99/month ($16.99 after renewal)
• Maximum plan: $19.99/month ($24.99 after renewal)

GoDaddy recommends the Ultimate plan for WordPress. But since that one’s a little pricey, let’s see what what that cheapest plan (Economy) has to offer:

• 1 website
• 100 GB storage
• Free domain
• Unmetered bandwidth
• Free 1-click WordPress install
• Free Office 365 email (1st year)
• Control panel

Web Hosting Ranked (Summary)

When it comes to choosing the best web hosting platform, the key elements to keep in mind are: performance/reliability, customer service, and price. Figure out which item is most important to you and find a host that meets those needs. Bluehost is my number one pick, because it fits the bill. It’s reliable, fast, and affordable (at only $2.95 per month).

Hopefully you found this guide helpful.

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