When it comes to technical support, HostGator is on the decline and no longer a customer friendly service.
Why you may need an Alternative to HostGator
First of all, I should make clear why someone may seek a hosting alternative to HostGator. |Generally speaking, it has been the best shared hosting for small business websites and average traffic blogs for many years. Like in all my previous articles, I would stay as impartial and unbiased as possible while penning this article. Indeed there was a time when I was a hard-core fan of HostGator and had never thought that someday I could consider to ditch it. However, things have changed remarkably and you might positively feel cheated and frustrated when you come across its horrible sales and technical support.
Reasons to ditch HostGator
HostGator shared hosting is highly vulnerable to malware
No free automatic backup restore feature
Technical support is the biggest failure of Hostgator
Reasons to still consider HostGator
The Most powerful shared Hosting
Potential reasons that force someone to look for a HostGator alternative
Updated
HostGators shared hosting is highly vulnerable to hackers
HostGator is one of the most unsafe web host and hackers can access and spoil your hosting account very easily. My experience says that my websites get hacked many time when I use HostGator. I am a WordPress professional user and tries to implement best security for my WordPress websites. Despite of that hackers messed my HostGator hosting many times.
On the other hand I use A2 Hosting and DreamHost and I never face any issue regarding hacking.
Facing unexpectedly poor support
I am really disappointed to report that HostGator support is getting poorer day by day. HostGator’s present support is not half as good as it used to be in the past. Live Chat is not, in fact, an instant support. Average wait time would be no less than 30 minutes after you initiate a Live Chat. If you place a support ticket, it would not be resolved within a few hours, but it may take more than 48 hours – even when if you place it during U.S. daytime.
Insufficient support staff to cover a very large customer database
Script installer crowded with advertisements
No Integrated Backup-Restore facility
Why BlueHost is no longer an alternative to HostGator
name in India. In my opinion, it is disinformation sort of. When popular bloggers write such things, they misguide millions of people. As f it was nothing, one day I came across these enlightening lines from Harsh: ‘BlueHost shared hosting can cover up to 20k visitors per day, even in case of a WordPress website’. Don’t you think it is utter nonsense? I have a first-hand experience of almost all shared hosting companies and I dare say that a shared hosting starts faltering with as low as 7-8k visitors per day.
(BlueHost and HostGator share technology and data-centers as well)
Once really there was a time when BlueHost and HostGator were two altogether different hosting providing companies, owned by two different persons too. BlueHost was not just another hosting company, but was a true rival of HostGator in every sense of the word because it gave HostGator a run for its money. A great many hosting experts presented BlueHost as a strong alternative to HostGator.
Later things changed. First Hostgator was acquired by EIG and after some time BlueHost too was assimilated into EIG. EIG is a considerably big company that from to time has been buying other hosting companies. Though the acquired company retains its original name but internally almost everything is readjusted and there are tangible differences. Hosting overselling is very common and that consequently results in awful technical support. The customers don’t get satisfactory support in time. Besides, there are other changes too like resource usage policy, quality of price and data centers.
BlueHost and HostGator are now, for all practical purposes, one company, sharing their technology, policies, plans and even data-centers. Recently I purchased the cloud hosting of BlueHost (for the purpose of checking it out) and I was really surprised to find that the server IP given to me was actually belonged to HostGator data center. A closer look suggests that both companies have same resource limit, plan features and are very much alike . In other words we can say that one company is being run by two different names and Hostgator and BlueHost are same except for their names.
Top Alternative Hosting to HostGator
Now I leave out unnecessary preamble, and I tell you about best available alternatives to HostGator
Update – 10% traffic increase on migrating inrealsense.com on Namecheap
4 Reasons that makes Namecheap Shared Hosting phenomenal
- 4 Times more affordable than other reliable hosts
- 5 Times more power to your websites than other reliable hosts
- Many times faster customer support than most of that of others
- 8 times more affordable when it comes to hosting renewal
See the incredible pricing difference between Namecheap and others*
Note -First year pricing may vary based on discounts offered by hosts time to time
| BlueHost | Namecheap | HostGator | A2Hosting | Siteground | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Basic Plan | $48 | $16 | $76 | $52 | $47 |
| Medium Usage Plan | $72 | $36 | $114 | $65 | $72 |
| Ultimate Plan | $96 | $75 | $114 | $82 | $143 |
See the eye opener difference in renewal pricing
| BlueHost | Namecheap | HostGator | A2Hosting | Siteground | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Basic Plan | $96 | $30 | $107 | $96 | $144 |
| Medium Usage Plan | $131 | $52 | $144 | $120 | $240 |
| Ultimate Plan | $180 | $98 | $204 | $156 | $420 |
Try Namecheap Hosting Risk Free
What’s in a name? Some Shakespearean character said this phrase ages ago and it became one of the most used Shakespearean quotations. But Namecheap shared hosting is at the ready to exclaim that yes there’s a lot in a name. Yes, it is very cheap indeed. No, no, don’t judge. Before you make up your mind to say, ‘if it’s cheap, so what? It definitely will be a bad host’. But it’s not like that. Let me tell you that it is not a bad host at all. In point of fact, it is as much good as it is cheap, or rather cheap and best. Yes, it comes with all the services, which you’d get from other hostings by paying three times more price. Not only that, its technical support is one of the fastest technical supports I have ever come across. When it comes to the best hosting support, Siteground name may occur to you first, but read this article to the end and you’ll find that Namecheap is a match for Siteground.
I was afraid that Namecheap Stellar plan might fail to handle a big eCommerce website that was not running smoothly on Hostgator. Still, I had decided to give Namecheap a shot and finally migrated my client’s website to Namecheap Stellar shared plan that promised to host up to 3 websites and 20GB storage.
I was literally taken aback that a big resource intensive eCommerce website was running and loading smoothly on a low-end shared plan by Namecheap. Website pages were loading faster than it took them on Hostgator.
But I didn’t want to jump any conclusion and anyway it would have been too quick to trust Stellar Plan within 2-3 days. I decided to wait for at least 15 days and kept tabs on website health closely. What I found genuinely changed my mind about the phrase that quality and cost always go hand in hand. Namecheap Stellar Plan was nurturing a big WooCommerce website perfectly well and there were really no issues regarding down time, loading time and CPU usage limit.
Here I’d like to point out that I spent about 22$ a month to host inrealsense.com on DreamHost DreamPress plan and DreamPress doesn’t come with cPanel. We can say that DreamHost is good only for those who can handle FTP, SSH pretty well. Another drawback of using DreamPress is that we can host only one website per plan. (It is worth mentioning that DreamPress comes with hourly automatic backup/restore -VaultPress- and malware protection system)
My experience with Namecheap was so incredible that now I wanted to go one step ahead. Yes, I chose Namecheap Business Plan to host inrealsense.com. Business Plan is three times cheaper than DreamHost DreamPress (about $8/month) and comes with more SSD storage space, cPanel, Private name server and unlimited domain hosting. However “Unlimited” word doesn’t carry much meaning in Web Hosting world and how many websites your hosting plan can handle in effect depends on how much server resources are allocated to your hosting account.
Namecheap offers 5 times more resources than any other shared hosting and A2 Hosting is the runner up
Namecheap Business shared plan, I think, is the best value for money if CPU resources are concerned. They allow you to take up to 60% CPU and 2GB server RAM in their business hosting, which is impressive. Additionally, in case of emergency, they allow you to burst up to 400% CPU during peak intervals to boost website performance.
It has been now ten days since I migrated inrealsense.com to Namecheap Business Plan. Believe it or not, it is now two times faster and healthier. And I can host even more websites with this hosting plan.
Try Namecheap Hosting Risk Free
#2 A2 Hosting (non-EIG)
Better than HostGator
This host offers SSD hosting and it is still rare in shared hosting industry. SSD hosting is 300% faster than regular shared hosting and that means your site will be exceptionally faster regardless of the fact that it is on a shared host. My website inrealsense.com has been running on A2 Hosting for about an year and I am highly satisfied with A2 Hosting server speed and power as well. (UPDATE – Now we are hosted on DreamHost DreamPress, a highly optimized affordable managed VPS to bear large traffic website)
Also read – Why A2 Hosting is one exceptionally good shared hosting provider
Salient features of A2 Hosting
SSD hosting
300% faster than normal shared hosting
Secure Hosting
A2 Hosting is highly concerned for hosting accounts security. In addition to Hosting firewall, ddos protection and many other security systems, they have implemented a realtime malware scanner and healer called patchman. Patchman regularly scans hosting files and notifies account holder if a code vulnerability is detected. Additionally patchman automatically patches the vulnerability.
Server Rewind ( Daily backups that can be restore with one click )
Server rewind is a premium backup feature that comes free with A2 Hosting. A2 Hosting captures multiple copies of your hosting account files and databases and you can browse and restore these previous versions of files and databases if you get your hosting account hacked or if you deleted your files accidentally.
Store unlimited files now (was 3 lac)
Update – From now A2 Hosting has lifted any inode limit or limit on number of files stored in a hosting account.
Inode limit means number of total files stored on your hosting account. Every unlimited hosting provider company imposes this limit other than A2 Hosting that offers unlimited number of files to be stored.
Best available Script installer
A2 Hosting offers Softaculous script installer that provides facility to install more than 200 scripts and every script can be installed within a minute regardless of it being too large for FTP upload. Softaculous also offers automatic backup and restore feature for all installed scripts.
Other features
- 24/7 technical support via Live Chat, Phone and Support ticket system
- 30 days money back guarantee
- Powered by cPanel
- Support forum
- Detailed documentation on website
Try A2 Hosting Risk Free ( 51% discount coupon – SOFAST!)
#3 DreamHost (non-EIG)
To cap it all, it is difficult to get the hang of SSH. We have created a tutorial that will help you how to zip unzip on DreamHost.
Salient features of DreamHost Hosting
Efficient and high performance shared hosting
We are not sure which kind of hardware they use in their shared servers but regardless of this their shared hosting is found lightning fast and powerful. You can host and nurture your multiple WordPress websites on its shared hosting.
Reliable support
DreamHost support is pretty good and they are available 24/7 via Live Chat, ticket system. They also offer phone support at little cost. you can get up to 3 call backs from DreamHost per month.
Inbuilt caching engine (page speed optimization)
DreamHost offers optional caching system that you can enable in your hosting dashboard. With its caching system you can boost website performance and can reduce the load on a shared server.
Automatic backup restore system for files and database
You can restore your files or database from available backup copies. Backup are taken automatically on a daily basis.
Firewall to block malicious attacks on your account
DreamHost gives an option to add extra layer of security and you can enable or disable it for different hosted domains. This firewall blocks attacks like Brute Force, Remote Execution, SQL Injection etc.
Try DreamHost Risk Free ( $50 discount coupon – WEBCUSP)
#4 SiteGround (non-EIG)
Over the last two years SiteGround has emerged as a very reliable host. The most specific thing about this company that stands it out from the crowd is that it is highly transparent and far more honest about its policies. Each shared hosting plan of this company details in a very clear manner about how many visitors per month it can handle. Another thing that is really compelling is SiteGround’s fast and responsive support. On the one hand, the technical support of the so- called big companies like HostGator is going to the dogs, on the other hand SieGround support is improving day by day.
SiteGround has gone to great lengths to make its shared hosting WordPress and Joomla -optimized. Several tools such as WordPress management tool and Site Stagging tool have been implemented, which are immensely helpful for WordPress and Joomla users and make their work remarkably easier. Besides, SieGround offers a free backup-restore tool which helps you restore your files and database. This tool keeps backup copies of last 30 days.
SSD Hosting – SiteGround provides a fully SSD (Solid State Drives) hosting which means that its all servers are equipped with SSDs and all your files and database are stored on these high speed SSDs.
Softaculous installer – You may know that Softaculous is the best script installer ever that can help you install a lot of PHP software with just one click.
In-built caching engine – SiteGround has its own in-house caching system: SuperCacher. With the help of SuperCacher, you can increase your site’s speed many times.
reliable support – Quite a lot has already been said about the support of SiteGround. Here I would only say that as far as support is concerned, no any other hosting company is anywhere near SiteGround in quality, excellence and in almost everything.
#5 GoDaddy (Pro) (non-EIG)
What we we are going to focus upon in this article is not GoDaddy’s regular hosting which comes with the cPanel. We are here talking about GoDaddy’s managed WordPress hosting. Let me tell you that GoDaddy’s WordPress hosting is altogether different from its regular hosting and after putting it to all kinds of tests we have come to the conclusion that you can bank upon this hosting. We checked GoDaddy’s WordPress Ultimate plan and found that it’s not only well-suited to resource intensive plugins but also it comes packed with many useful features.
GoDaddy Pro hosting is designed exclusively for WordPress users and there’s no denying that WordPress has the status of being the de facto number one website building and blogging platform. As things stand now, no blogger in his right mind would go for any platform other than WordPress.
GoDaddy Pro has fabricated its different plans on the basis of number of visitors. If you run a high traffic website, GoDaddy Ultimate plan has more than enough to offer you and meets every last of your needs. It can stand up to 4 lacs (0.4 million) visitors per month. This plan allows you to host 2 WordPress websites. But if your website attracts up to 8 lacs (0.8 million) visitors per month, the best plan in that case for you would be GoDaddy WordPress Business plan.
Goodaddy Managed Hosting features
- 99.9% Uptime guarentee
- Powerful and blazing fast server
- Scalable resources.If your site gets a huge spike in traffic, you can extend your hosting resources paying a little amount of money.
- They offer malware protection and free malware removal for infected websites.
- Daily backups that can be restored automatically
- Multi-WordPress management tool
- Site stagging facility
A Quick Survey of GoDaddy WordPress Pro.
WordPress Migration Tool
GoDaddy WordPress Pro offers the site migration tool. You just have to provide your WordPress login details (of the old server) and FTP details of your old hosting and you can leave the rest to GoDaddy’s migration tool. This migration tool will migrate your WordPress website to a temporary address, which is called the staging address. After the migration is finished, you can point the site to your main domain at your leisure.
GoDaddy WordPress Pro is equipped with an automatic backup restore tool. This tool keeps the automatic backup on a daily basis and you can restore any of your previous databases and files with just one click. However, only the backup en bloc (files, database or files and database both) can be restored and you are not able to restore an individual file (Unlike A2 Hosting server rewind).
SiteLock comes free
SiteLock is a powerful and trustworthy tool. With GoDaddy Pro you get this tool fully free, which is really a big deal as this tool usually is not available for free and in most of the cases you have to purchase the tool. Everybody knows the prowling evil eyes of hackers who are always in search of vulnerable WordPress websites . Seeing this, it becomes all the more important that you should get a potent malware protection service and if it is SiteLock and for free, that’s what is called the icing on the cake.
Site Staging for development
Whether you are a web designer or a developer or simply just a blogger or whatever, you have to make changes to your WordPress website from time to time such as a change in site’s design, plugin experiments and much more. Are you really ready to make any of these changes while your website is live. I don’t think so, right? GoDaddy Pro’s ‘site staging’ tool is a big help in that case. How? Just click once and a staging site for your live website is ready. Now you can throw caution to the wind and experiment on this staging site whichever you like. When you get to make the desired change, transfer these changes from your staging site to your live site. This way the user experience remains unaffected.
GoDaddy Caching system
GoDaddy adds its own caching to your WordPress website. There is no plugin installed by GoDaddy for caching yet you find a GoDaddy caching control menu in admin menu bar. You can flush cache using that option.
Some points to ponder about its drawbacks:
- File manager is not available. You need to depend on FTP to change, upload or download files
- You can’t create email accounts on your hosted domains
- Limited options in control panel
GoDaddy Pro hosting is suited best for
A serious blogger or an online marketer.
A large online portal that ropes in more than 10000 visitors per day.
An eCommerce website
Advanced users
Whoever values performance
You should not go for GoDaddy Pro hosting if
You are a beginner and your website attracts only up to a few hundred visitors. (If so, you should go for some cheap alternatives given above.)
You value the file manager more than FTP because GoDaddy Pro does not have a file manager.
You want to install a CMS other than WordPress such as Joomla or Mgento.
Alternative Popular Hosts that are not recommended
Inmotion ( Not recommended )
It is a web host that is just like a pain in ass. They suspend web hosting account when a hosting account starts getting a little load on its WordPress or Joomla websites. Very low CPU per account.
Other not recommended hosts
- HostDim – Host with strictly low RAM per process and which is insufficient for many WordPress plugins like Gravity Forms
- Site5 –Low limit CPU / Insufficient CPU
- Web Hosting Hub – Low limit CPU
- FatCow – Poor EIG Host with very slow server
- iPower – Other name of FatCow
- iPage – Just like FatCow
- Greengeeks – Low CPU and RAM
Over 90% Web Hosting companies are not reliable. When you buy a shared hosting everything runs smoothly until your website swells a bit. They apply a lot CPU / RAM / IO restrictions per account hosted on shared server. They suspend your website and ask you to upgrade to VPS. But in reality your website does not require VPS.
Most of the beginners fall prey to this kind of unlimited offers
For example I bought Inmotion hosting in the days when I started blogging. Everything ran smoothly until I started getting some visitors to my website. This hosting company started showing its true colors. They sent me a warning message that your Hosting account was consuming high CPU and thus affecting whole server. I was surprised because my blog was attracting only 500-600 visitors per day. Ultimately they suspended my account and suggested to me that I upgrade my account to VPS. I switched to HostGator and my website got no issue even after the numbers of visitors per day crossed 3k.
Literally it is a trick to earn more money by Web Hosting companies. They suspend clients accounts and ask them to upgrade. There are many people who never mind upgrading their plan and thus Hosting company is benefited and the client is cheated in a way.
Conclusion
Honestly speaking, in terms of server resources like RAM, CPU and I/O ( in / out data transfer speed per account), support, server speed and overall features, there seems to be only one host that is really a match for HostGator and that is A2Hosting.
