What is WordPress Hosting- Learn Everything You Need before Buying A New Plan

Choosing the right hosting provider is a foundational part of building any new website. It improves web security, speed, and SEO. Yet there are many people who are after cheap hosting services just to save some money.

They can’t imagine how much damage cheap hosting providers can do to their websites. Server downtime is one of them.

As per Forbes, one minute of web downtime can cost $423 to small businesses and $50,000+ to giants like Amazon.

This is why you must look for a reliable one. There are different types of WordPress hosting services. And they are different in terms of usage, features, and functionality.

This article will give you a complete overview of what is WordPress hosting, the different types of them, which one to choose, and the best WordPress hosting service providers. Be with us till the end.

What is WordPress Hosting?

WordPress hosting refers to the hosting service pre-configured to run websites powered by WordPress. This includes various additional tools and packages. Such as a dedicated support team, automatic software updates, backup security, and more.

Most newbie users fail to understand the difference between WordPress hosting and web hosting. They find them in the middle of confusion. Before jumping into other sections, let’s clarify this confusion here.

Web Hosting vs WordPress Hosting

Web hosting is an umbrella term. It hosts all kinds of websites built on any content management system. Such as HubSpot, Shopify, Joomla, Drupal, etc. But WordPress hosting limits this service only to the websites built on WordPress.

This means once you subscribe to WordPress hosting, you cannot shift your website to other CMSs. You may be wondering if this is the case, is there any reason to subscribe to WordPress hosting service?

Obviously, web hosting can offer you a bag full of opportunities, possibilities, and flexibility. But if you are a dedicated WordPress user, you will get far better service from WordPress hosting services.

Types of WordPress Hosting Services and Which One to Choose for Your Site

Web hosting is an online service that makes web content available online. When you are subscribing to a hosting plan, you are basically renting a certain space of a physical server to store your files. Hosting companies usually offer five types of web hosting services.

• Shared Hosting
• Virtual Private Hosting
• Dedicated Hosting
• Cloud Hosting
• Managed WordPress Hosting

We’re going to talk about them below. Carefully, examine each of them to make a decision on which one to choose.

1. Shared Hosting (SH)

When multiple people use the same hosting platform together, it’s known as the Shared Hosting Server. How much data space one can use on that server depends on users’ budgets. But the bandwidth limit remains the same for all users.

Suppose, a server has 100 GB of data space and a monthly 10 GB bandwidth limit. Currently, 10 webs (per 5 GB) are using a total of 50 GB of data space. So, the bandwidth limit for all websites will still be 10 GB, though half data space remains unused.

Some days later, 10 new people joined this server buying the remaining data space. From then onward, all 20 users have to depend on the 10 GB bandwidth limit for their web performance.

Now, if two of those websites get a sudden spike in traffic flow, this will affect the performance of other websites. Because most of the bandwidth and server resources will be consumed by those two websites at that time.

2. Virtual Private Hosting (VSH)

Virtual Private Hosting is almost the same as Shared Hosting Hosting. Here too multiple websites use the same severe space to store their files and content. But the only difference is that the Virtual Private Hosting is more powerful than the first one.

For example, you can imagine the difference between Dual Core and Core i5 computer processors.

If you are a beginner, better to start with a shared hosting server. But if you want to have a fast-loading website because of huge traffic each month, Virtual Private Hosting will be a great choice.

3. Dedicated Hosting (DH)

In Dedicated Hosting, one server is exclusively allocated for one website only. It will give you the utmost level of control over the server. You’ll get access to all the development tools you named above and customize everything from security to running your site.

This is why the price of Dedicated Hosting becomes much higher. Your website will be super fast and have no chance of going down.

If you have much technical expertise in managing web servers, and installing software on your own, and expect to have huge traffic, you can select this hosting option for your website.

4. Cloud Hosting

In Cloud Hosting, you pay the amount exactly for the data space you have used. You can compare Cloud Hosting to Shared Hosting. There the bandwidth and resource consumption rate of other users can impact your web performance.

But here things are different. Others’ resource consumption rate never impacts your web performance. Rather hosting providers scale up the web capabilities as per the demands of web owners.

Cloud Hosting servers will provide you with top-notch data security and data recovery facilities. But if there is any bug, plugin conflict, or your website crashes for any reason, you have to solve it by yourself.

5. Managed WordPress Hosting

Today, WordPress is powering up around 43% of all websites online. You can build any type of website on it that you can think of. The Managed WordPress Hosting offers a powerful server that is optimized only to host WordPress websites.

We have already covered a lot about this hosting in the first part of this article. If you are a WordPress developer, selling software and plugins, or running a big eCommerce site, Managed WordPress hosting will be a great solution.

How to Choose The Best WordPress Hosting (6 Things to Consider)

Having a website is a must for the success of any business in this modern era. But how to choose the right hosting service?

Below are the things you must consider when choosing the WordPress hosting service-

• Average Uptime
• Load Time
• Technical Support
• Bandwidth and Storage
• Security Options
• Additional Features

Let’s have the details in short.

Average Uptime

Uptime refers to the average amount of time your website will be available online in a given period of time. Lower uptime can damage you a lot to your website. Because traffic won’t be able to visit your website if it’s not available online.

Even an hour of web downtime can cause you to lose thousands of dollars of sales. This is why you must look for hosting providers that make sure 100%, or at least 99.50% of uptime.

Load Time

Slow websites not only lose many potential visitors, but also frustrate them. As per Google, over 50% of online users move away from a website if it takes more than 2 seconds to load. For eCommerce websites, this time may vary up to 4/5 seconds.

Besides, Google prioritizes those websites that have a fast loading speed. So, never subscribe to those WordPress hosting services that cannot make sure of fast loading speed.

Technical Support

Sometimes due to plugin conflicts, lack of timely updates, malware attacks, and else, your website may stop working. Renowned hosting providers come forward with a helping attitude in such critical situations.

They allow you to connect to them by phone, ticket, or live chat. But the most important thing is how quickly their support team reaches you.

Never choose a WordPress hosting service that is slow in response and doesn’t care about you.

Bandwidth and Storage

Bandwidth refers to the amount of data a website can deliver to its visitors in a period. A sudden spike in traffic means the bandwidth consumption is at a quick rate. Once it reaches the limit, your website will stop delivering data to your visitors.

Better if you look for hosting providers that offer unlimited bandwidth. Storage determines the amount of web content (text, photos, emails, codes) you can store in the host. Usually, it starts from 1 GB.

Security Options

Around 2,200 hacking attempts are made each day. It means every 39 seconds there is happening a cyberattack.

Norton

Today, data security is a prime concern for any digital user. Prominent hosting providers include a number of basic security packages like SSL, DDoS protection, data backup, CodeGuard, SiteLock Fix, etc.

No matter what hosting server you are going to use, make sure they have these security options available. Never let your visitors think your website is unreliable.

Additional Features

Apart from the above issues, there are some other things as well that your hosting provider must have. They are-

• cPanel availability
• One-click WordPress installation
• Free web transfer
• Site builder access
• CND
• Unlimited email accounts

Giving Priority to WordPress Managed Hosting- Let’s Learn Why

If your business isn’t on the internet, then you are out of business.

Bill Gates

And a powerful hosting service works as the backbone of any successful website. Since you are a WordPress user, check out the following reasons, why you should subscribe to WordPress managed hosting service instead of others.

• Premium Support from Experts
• One-Click Staging Environment
• Automatic Backups
• Quick Loading Speed
• High-End Security
• Access to Development Tools
• You Won’t Need Too Many Plugins with Managed Hosting

Let’s check the details.

Premium Support from Experts

The managed WordPress hosting providers maintain a 24/7 dedicated support team for their users only. They don’t deal with other CMSs like Joomla, Drupal, or Shopify. So, they naturally have much expertise in the ecosystem of WordPress CMS.

They can quickly identify which theme, plugin, or bug is causing a problem. They can recommend which WordPress configuration will take your web performance to the top level. Besides, you don’t have to wait with other CMS users in the same queue.

It will give you a feel like owning a personal IT team. The managed WordPress hostings provide support through real-time chat, in-app ticketing, and community forums.

One-Click Staging Environment

It refers to a test site where you can experiment with your plugin updates and other changes before making them public. People due to small mistakes on live sites while experimenting can cause an entire website.

This may cause great havoc to your online business. That’s the reason experts suggest never to experiment on live sites. Managed WordPress hostings offer a staging site where safely experiment changes. If they are okay, you can publicize them on the live site.

Automatic Backups

Data security is one of the prime concerns in the cloud environment. Due to site crashes, unintentional deletions, and virus attacks, you may lose your valuable web data forever. To tackle it, web users spend a big sum of money to ensure data backup.

But if you subscribe to a managed WordPress hosting plan, they’ll give you automatic data backup support. Even without any extra charge. You no longer have to worry about your data security.

Quick Loading Speed

Two seconds is the threshold for eCommerce pages to load. Even online users never like those websites that take more time than this.

Google,

But web owners who use a shared host face difficulty to maintain this threshold. As a result, they install new software for site optimization and caching plugins. But with managed hosting services, you don’t have to worry about the speed issue.

Because they’ll offer you multiple web performance enhancers. For example, server-level caching (full page caching), CDN, and instant-scaling technology.

High-End Security

According to Security Magazine, around 2,200 hacking attempts are made per day. Due to weak passwords, insecure web hosting, incorrect file permission, and unprotected configuration, cybercriminals can hack WordPress sites very easily.

Don’t worry, managed WordPress hosting includes various security features in the same package. Such as enforcing multi-factor authentication, identifying suspicious users, using strong passwords, automatically updating necessary software, and more.

Access to Development Tools

In shared hostings, you won’t get access to all the development tools. Such as SSH, Git, Composer, HeidiSQL, Sequel Pro, etc. Because many other web owners are using the platform too. If the provider gives you access, other users will feel less secure.

But managed WordPress hosting services will give you access to all the development tools mentioned above. Also, you can enjoy the staging environment to check the progress of your development and changes.

You Won’t Need Too Many Plugins with Managed Hosting

Indeed, managed WordPress hostings cost a little more than shared hostings. But don’t you may need numerous plugins for the security and smooth functioning of your website. In turn, your costs will go high again. You have no escape from this.

Besides, the more plugins you use, the more it affects your site speed. But once you subscribe to managed WordPress hosting, you won’t need to take the hassle of installing too many plugins. This will save you time, money, and labor at the same time.

5 Best WordPress Hosting Providers to Host Your Site

There are numerous hosting providers in the world. But not all of them are equally reliable and fast in service providing. Here, we are going to talk about five WordPress hosting providers. You can choose any of their plans according to your budget.

1. Bluehost Features and Pricing

Since 2005, Bluehost has been an officially recommended hosting provider by WordPress. They never limit your bandwidth. So, your site will never experience a slowdown even if it gets a sudden spike in traffic flow.

Top Features of Bluehost

• Allow you to run unlimited websites from the same account
• Offer free domain for 1 year, free CDN, free SSL for 1 year, and more.
• Has website builder available including drag and drop functionality
• Powers up your website with custom themes
• Provides 24/7 customer services

Bluehost Pricing

Bluehost has four different pricing plans. The basic plan starts from $4.95/month.

2. Kinsta Hosting Features and Pricing

With Kinsta you never have to worry about your web speed, downtime, and technical hassles. It saves you a lot of time and lets your focus on your business. They have all the resources ready for your WordPress-specific tools and extensions.

Top Features of Kinsta

• Kinsta offers free CDN with every plan
• A free SSL certificate with every plan
• 24/7 dedicated support
• Unlimited data storage
• Unlimited bandwidth

Kinsta Pricing

Kinsta has ten different pricing plans. The Starter package starts from $35/month with a 30-day money-back guarantee.

2. Cloudways Cloud Hosting Features and Pricing

Cloudways is not only a host but also provides you with performance plugins and marketing tools to grow your online presence. It ensures your web security is in safe hands. You can enjoy a 1-click installer, a user-friendly control panel, and automatic updates.

Top Features of Cloudways

• Offers free SSL, free migration, regular backups, and DDoS protection.
• Enables geolocation-specific hosting with seven data centers
• Combines LiteSpeed Cache plugin that makes your site 4x faster
• Ensures 99.9% of uptime guarantee
• Gives you WP-CLI and SSH access

Cloudways Pricing

Cloudways has four different pricing plans. If you are a beginner, you can start with the Single WordPress plan and it starts from $12/month.

3. WPEngine Features and Pricing

WPEngine offers you a broad list of services alongside top-notch security. Some of their special services are website migration, SEO, and custom web design. They have a 24/7 active customer care team to help you out with any sort of problem.

Top Features of WPEngine

• Faster load times for WordPress websites
• Enhanced security features
• Automatic updates for WordPress and plugins
• Staging environments for testing changes
• 24/7 customer support

WPEngine Pricing

WPEngine has three different pricing plans. The Starter package starts from $23/month with a 45-day money-back guarantee.

4. Ithemes Hosting Features and Pricing

Ithemes Hosting is another WordPress-recommended hosting provider. It makes sure your website is always fast, secured, and up. They have a friendly user interface that caters to any beginner’s needs.

Top Features of Ithemes Hosting

• Automatic updates and backups
• Free Migration
• Malware scanning and removal
• One-click staging
• 24/7 expert support

Ithemes Hosting Pricing

Ithemes Hosting has three different pricing packages. The Ithemes Hosting plan starts from $15/month with a 30-day money-back guarantee.

FAQs on WordPress Hosting

Here, we are going to cover some frequently asked questions on WordPress hosting.

Over to You: Which WordPress Web Hosting Will You Choose?

WordPress is a dynamic content management system, whose user base is growing every single day. The reason behind its extreme popularity is that even non-coding people can use this CMS like a pro.

But to seamlessly run a website, everyone must have some sort of technical knowledge. Because site crashing, conflicts, downtime, etc. are nothing new in this industry. How come the non-coding people can handle them as they aren’t experts in this field?

Subscribing to a managed WordPress hosting server will be the ultimate solution. It won’t just give you a feel like hiring a space but also owning a robust IT team. You’ll get experts always ready to help you out in case of any hassle or crisis.

Here are the top 5 managed hosting providers for WordPress-

• Bluehost
• Kinsta
• Cloudways
• WPEngine
• Ithemes Hosting

Looking for a very budget-friendly hosting provider at your beginning time? You can go for Namecheap which starts only at $2.88/month. Check their services carefully before buying.

Namecheap

Hopefully, this article has catered to your quests to the fullest. Subscribe to us if you love this piece of writing. And don’t forget to let us know through the comment section which hosting provider you’ll choose to host your WordPress website.