We track published pricing, the renewal rate you pay in year two, and the specs that actually differ between hosts. Rankings are editorial judgements from that research plus aggregated public customer feedback — not from a lab we do not run.
The sweet spot between shared hosting and running your own server. You pay per hour on real cloud VMs and Cloudways handles the stack. No renewal trap, because the price never was…
| Included | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cloudways Best overall | 8.5 | $11 | $11 flat | $396 | 8.4 | trial | Cloudways Platform | DigitalOcean, Vultr, Linode, AWS, GCP — global regions | –Domain ✓SSL ✓Migration |
| Hostinger Best value | 8.1 | $2.99 | $8.99 ×3.0 | $252 | 7.5 | 30d | hPanel (custom) | India, Singapore, Indonesia, US, NL, UK, LT, BR | ✓Domain ✓SSL ✓Migration |
| SiteGround Best support | 8.4 | $2.99 | $17.99 ×6.0 | $468 | 9.1 | 30d | Site Tools (custom) | US, UK, NL, DE, ES, SG, AU | –Domain ✓SSL ✓Migration |
| ChemiCloud Best small host | 8.1 | $2.49 | $11.95 ×4.8 | $317 | 8.6 | 45d | cPanel | US, UK, NL, DE, IN, SG, AU, CA | ✓Domain ✓SSL ✓Migration |
| FastComet Best for Indian traffic | 8.0 | $2.95 | $8.95 ×3.0 | $250 | 8.4 | 45d | cPanel | US, UK, NL, DE, IN (Mumbai), SG, JP, AU, CA | ✓Domain ✓SSL ✓Migration |
| Kinsta Best performance, at a price | 8.7 | $35 | $35 flat | $1,260 | 9.2 | 30d | MyKinsta | Google Cloud — 37 regions | –Domain ✓SSL ✓Migration |
| WP Engine Best for agencies | 8.5 | $25 | $30 ×1.2 | $1,020 | 8.6 | 60d | WP Engine User Portal | Google Cloud + AWS — global | –Domain ✓SSL ✓Migration |
| Hosting.com Best for developers | 8.0 | $2.99 | $10.99 ×3.7 | $300 | 7.9 | 30d | cPanel | US (MI, AZ), NL, SG | –Domain ✓SSL ✓Migration |
| MilesWeb Best for Indian sites on a budget | 7.6 | $0.72 | $2.28 ×3.2 | $63.36 | 7.8 | 30d | cPanel | IN (Mumbai), US, UK, SG, DE, CA, AU | –Domain ✓SSL ✓Migration |
| Namecheap Hosting Cheapest renewal | 7.4 | $2.28 | $3.88 ×1.7 | $120 | 6.9 | 30d | cPanel | US (Phoenix), EU, Singapore | ✓Domain ✓SSL –Migration |
| GreenGeeks Best eco option | 8.0 | $2.95 | $13.95 ×4.7 | $370 | 8.0 | 30d | cPanel | Chicago US, Montreal CA, Amsterdam NL, Singapore SG | ✓Domain ✓SSL ✓Migration |
| DreamHost Longest refund window | 7.6 | $2.89 | $10.99 ×3.8 | $298 | 7.4 | 97d | DreamHost panel (custom) | US (Ashburn, Hillsboro) | ✓Domain ✓SSL ✓Migration |
| Bluehost Easiest for beginners | 7.4 | $2.95 | $8.99 ×3.0 | $251 | 7.0 | 30d | Bluehost panel (cPanel-based) | US, IN (via bluehost.in), UK, CN | ✓Domain ✓SSL –Migration |
| HostGator Best unmetered plans | 7.1 | $3.75 | $10.99 ×2.9 | $309 | 6.6 | 45d | cPanel | US, IN (via hostgator.in) | ✓Domain ✓SSL ✓Migration |
| IONOS Cheapest first year, steepest cliff | 7.1 | $1 | $8 ×8.0 | $204 | 6.4 | 30d | IONOS panel (custom) | DE, UK, ES, FR, US | ✓Domain ✓SSL –Migration |
| BigRock Heavily advertised — read the renewal | 6.3 | $1.73 | $9.29 ×5.4 | $244 | 6.0 | 30d | cPanel | IN, US | –Domain ✓SSL –Migration |
Shared means your site sits on a server with a few hundred others and the host manages everything. VPS gives you guaranteed CPU and memory plus root access, and usually a flat price. Managed WordPress is infrastructure tuned for one application, with staging and caching configured for you. Which one you actually need.
Very little. Bandwidth is the cheapest thing a host buys, so it is the easiest to give away — meanwhile CPU, memory and process counts are all capped, and those are what actually run out. Look for the CPU limits in the knowledge base rather than the bandwidth figure on the pricing page.
Less than the numbers suggest. A large WordPress site with hundreds of posts and images is often under 5 GB, so a 10 GB plan is usually plenty. It becomes the binding limit only if you host video, large downloads, or keep many backups on the same disk.
Because the advertised price is an introductory rate for your first term only. Across the hosts on this site the renewal price averages about 3.5 times the intro rate, and reaches 8 times at IONOS. It is disclosed in the provider's terms, just rarely next to the number in the large font. Full explanation here.
For a small site, $3 to $6 a month is normal once the introductory period ends — not the $1 to $3 you see advertised. Over three years the hosts we track range from about $29 to $1,260 depending on the tier and how long the intro rate is locked. Use the true cost calculator to price your own term rather than guessing from a monthly figure.
Often yes, for the first term. The question is what happens after it. A host at $2.89 that holds the rate for 36 months is genuinely cheap; one at $2.99 that holds it for 12 and renews at $17.99 is not. Cheap is a property of the whole term, not the first month.
The intro rate applies for the whole first term, so a longer term is real value — but it is billed in full up front, and refunds after the money-back window are usually pro-rata at best. Buy the longest term you are genuinely confident the site will still exist for, and no longer.
Yes, and most hosts will migrate it for you free to win your business, so the cost is your time rather than money. The three things that go wrong are DNS, email and cancelling the old account too early — this guide covers the order to do it in.
