Web hosting powers the internet. And web hosting companies manage the servers that store all of your website -- more specifically, website files. Web hosting is required for online stores, blogs, forums, and all types of websites, applications, and games on the Internet, which is why it is so important to find a high-quality host. That's why we researched and decided on the absolute best web hosting providers to ensure your website never crashes, speed up your load times and improve your SEO.
The good news is that most reputable web hosts offer an easy, intuitive way to place your website on their servers. Not to mention, our top picks offer affordable prices, top-notch security, and tons of features integrated with your favorite tools.
How we conduct research
To say that the web hosting market is oversaturated is an understatement. Thousands of companies around the world offer server space for a price. A quick search online is bound to provide a seemingly endless list of web hosting options, ranging from small to large, cheap to expensive, simple to complex.
Since the site is a resource for e-commerce platforms, our team has researched and vetted hundreds of web hosting providers over the years to determine which ones have server capabilities, security measures, and the best user experience to support scaling an online store.
To compile this list, we reviewed our previous research and combined it with the latest offerings from the world's top 50 hosting providers. After that, we reduce the list by eliminating those who don't have real-world uptime testing, state-of-the-art security measures, and reasonable pricing.
As a final test, we conducted rigorous user experience testing to see which web hosts provided the ideal modern dashboard experience, along with fast integrations, managed hosting options, and a seamless experience across all user levels.
Best Web Hosting Providers: Our Top Picks
As a result, we ended up with a list of the top web hosting providers on the market. Check out our recommendations below.
1. SiteGround – Our pick for the best web hosting
siteground - best web hosting
SiteGround is our top choice for reliable web hosting because of its easy website management tools, fast and secure hosting, and affordable hosting packages. Standard web hosting from SiteGround is a great starting point for small online stores, blogs, and business websites, but it also offers the opportunity to upgrade to managed WordPress hosting, WooCommerce hosting, and cloud hosting.
Pricing
New users have the opportunity to sign up for SiteGround's frequent promotional pricing, which may lower pricing for previous years depending on the plan you choose. After the promotion, it switched to standard pricing, which still offers better value than most competitors.
Here are the SiteGround shared hosting plans:
StartUp: $14.99 per month for one website ($3.99 per month for promotions), 10 GB web space, 100,000 visits per month, free SSL certificate, daily backups, free CDN, free email, enhanced security, ecommerce tools , managed WordPress options, caching, unlimited databases and collaboration.
GrowBig: $24.99 per month (promo $6.69 per month) for unlimited websites, 20 GB of web space, 1 million monthly visits, everything from previous plans, on-demand backups, faster PHP, and staging parts .
GoGeek: $39.99 per month (promo $10.69 per month), unlimited websites, 40 GB web space, 4 million monthly visits, everything from previous plans, staging + Git, white label client option, priority customer support, and The highest level of resources provided by SiteGround.
Pros👍
SiteGround offers top-notch promotional prices that remain affordable after the deal closes.
All website hosting plans get a free SSL certificate and backup for optimal security.
Web hosting manages WordPress elements and e-commerce-enabled features for quickly building websites and launching online stores.
You can add collaborators to manage your site, share ideas, and grant users access.
SiteGround plans are designed to scale your business, which means you can upgrade at any time as your site grows.
Out-of-the-box caching and a free CDN combine to improve site speed.
Some plans offer staging sites to test plugins, themes and website designs before publishing anything online.
The highest-tier plans offer advanced tools for working with web design clients, such as priority customer support, staging + Git, and white labeling.
SiteGround is optimized for the most popular content management systems like WordPress, Drupal, and Joomla. This provides one-click installation for your favorite website builder.
2D Embossed Stainless Steel Sheet SiteGround Dashboard makes web development and management easy for all users with modules for domain management, site building, email services, and more.
Disadvantage 👎
SiteGround only offers a 12-month promotional period. If you sign up for longer than that, you won't get the discounted price.
The pricing on SiteGround's website is a bit misleading, as they lure you with a promotional price that goes up to the regular price after a year. You must also pay for the full year in advance.
We want to include elements like domain registration, domain privacy, and site scanning in our pricing. These are all add-ons.
Further reading 📚
SiteGround Review (Oct 2022): Is It the Best Hosting Platform?
SiteGround Pricing (Oct 2022) - Which Hosting Plan Should I Choose?
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2. WP Engine – Best Web Hosting Runner Up
wp engine - best web hosting
Close behind SiteGround is WP Engine . While slightly more expensive, we actually feel WP Engine pricing is more transparent with SiteGround, and you're just starting with regular pricing instead of getting a year at a discount. So, pricing WP Engine is more or less the same as the top contenders on this list, even if it looks more expensive. Having said that, WP Engine excels with its managed WordPress hosting, allowing you to launch a fast website, secure your site, and complete upgrades without having to do much for it. Much of the process is automated, and you can choose from WordPress hosting, WooCommerce hosting, or enterprise hosting. They even have a whole email list set of businesses for running an agency or managing your freelancers.
Pricing
WP Engine offers transparent pricing based on whether you pay monthly or annually. You can also contact the WP Engine team for more advanced enterprise hosting solutions.
Managed WordPress plans include:
Startup: $25 per month (annual) or $30 per month (monthly) for a website with 25 monthly visits, 10 GB storage and 50 GB bandwidth. This also includes customizable themes, one-click staging, backups, automatic PHP and WordPress updates, proactive threat blocking, and maximum speed. You can upgrade this plan for more WordPress sites, visitors, and storage. There are also additional security upgrades, automated plugin updates and bandwidth.
Professional: Everything on the previous plan, starting at $49/month, 3 sites, 75k monthly visits, 15 GB storage and 125 GB bandwidth.
Grow: Everything in previous plans, starting at $96/month, 10 sites, 1M visits/month, 20 GB storage and 200 GB/month bandwidth.
Scale: Everything in previous plans, starting at $242 per month, 30+ sites, 4 million monthly visits, 50 GB storage and 500 GB bandwidth.
Dedicated Hosting: Custom pricing for any need with over 300 sites, 4 million visits, and 50 GB of storage.
Ecommerce hosting plans include:
Startup: Platform built for WooCommerce starting at $30 per month, automated plugin updates, premium WooCommerce theme, one website, 25 visits per month, 10 GB storage, 50 GB bandwidth, and the option to upgrade all of these.
Professional: Everything in the previous plan, starting at $63 per month, 3 sites, 75 visits per month, 15 GB storage and 125 GB bandwidth.
Grow: Everything in previous plans, starting at $117/month, 10 sites, 1 million monthly visits, 20 GB storage and 200 GB monthly bandwidth.
Scale: Everything in previous plans, starting at $292 per month, 30+ sites, 4 million monthly visits, 50 GB of storage and 500 GB of bandwidth per month.
Dedicated Servers: Custom pricing for everything you need across 30+ sites, 4 million monthly visits, and 50 GB of storage.
Pros👍
WP Engine offers options for managed WordPress hosting or eCommerce solutions.
We know that WP engine loads much faster than the competition.
You can protect your website with daily backups, hosting upgrades, and continuous website monitoring.
Customer support is available 24/7/365.
You can use one of the white label programs to run an entire agency or a freelance web design platform.
Everything is managed, allowing you to launch your WordPress store in minutes without having to worry about PHP or WordPress updates.
WP Engine offers a modern, sleek dashboard that is miles ahead of the competition in ease of use.
They provide a quick migration tool for migrating websites from other hosts.
You receive a free SSL certificate to protect all transactions through your store.
WP Engine provides workflow tools such as GIT and SSH access via MySQL and WP-CLI.
Staging websites with one-click staging tools.
You have access to several premium WordPress themes and frameworks.
All backups are automatically performed on a regular basis.
Disadvantage 👎
While very transparent, pricing WP Engine is definitely higher than budget providers like Siteground.
We'd love to see free automated plugin updates, considering they're selling "managed WordPress hosting". We assume that automating plugin updates is essential to consider it managed.
You don't get an extra level of security (including firewall, DDOS mitigation, and CDN) unless you pay extra.
Ecommerce solutions are nice, but they are essentially for convenience without installing the WooCommerce plugin - which is very easy to do yourself.
Further reading 📚
WP Engine Review: Managed WordPress Hosting for Serious Online Stores
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3. GreenGeeks – Best Green Choice
Green Geek - Best Web Hosting
GreenGeeks is a must-see during your web hosting research if you're interested in hosting that cares about eco-friendly solutions. We recommend dual projects for companies and care about the environment at divi to see how GreenGeeks is emphasizing 3x the use of electricity for renewable energy. Not only that, but GreenGeeks offers reasonable pricing, high-speed technology, and best-in-class storage hardware to ensure your website stays fast, secure, and ready for expansion.
Pricing
GreenGeeks sells standard web hosting as well as WordPress, VPS (Virtual Private Server hosting) and reseller hosting. In this section, we'll outline pricing for standard web hosting, which you can then upgrade based on the size of your small business. GreenGeeks will also plant a tree for each plan you sign up for.
Plans include:
Lite: $10.95 per month for one website (promo price $2.95 per month), standard performance, nightly backups, multi-user access, green energy matching, unlimited databases, caching, CDN, one year free domain, free SSL, multiple e-mails Mail account, 50 GB of web space, etc.
Pro: $15.95 per month (promo price $5.95 per month) for unlimited websites, improved performance, unlimited web space, unlimited email, everything from previous plans, on-demand backups, and WordPress repair tools.
Premium: $25.95 per month (promo price $10.95 per month), unlimited websites, best performance from GreenGeeks, everything from previous plans, free dedicated IP, object caching, and free AlphaSSL.