Very good uptime; excellent features and customer service; poor response time and no free domain or website migrations.
Very good uptime; excellent features and customer service; poor response time and no free domain or website migrations.
We performance test the world's biggests hosts on a second-by-second basis. The top 3 performers for July 2018 are listed below.
Host | Uptime | Response time |
---|---|---|
HostGator | 100% | 390 |
Bluehost | 100% | 502 |
Hostinger | 100% | 513 |
We performance test the world's biggests hosts on a second-by-second basis. The top 3 performers for July 2018 are listed below.
Host | Uptime | Response time |
---|---|---|
HostGator | 100% | 390 |
Bluehost | 100% | 502 |
Hostinger | 100% | 513 |
Siteground ranks among our top three web hosts. It’s difficult to say which host is “best,” largely because they’re all strong in different areas, however Siteground excels on customer service, uptime and technical features.
When we compare Siteground to other popular hosts there are upsides and downsides. For example, Bluehost charges for website migrations, is more expensive in the first year (but cheaper in the second year) and lacks the quality of customer support provided by Siteground.
That said, Bluehost offers a free domain, allows customers to host unlimited websites (Siteground only allows customers to host one website per shared hosting account) and is broadly equal to Siteground on uptime but significantly better for server response time.
Overall, we’re impressed with quality of Siteground’s StartUp package, particularly its technical features and customer service.
Month | Uptime | Response time |
---|---|---|
January 2018 | 100% | 1567ms |
February 2018 | 100% | 1499ms |
March 2018 | 99.96% | 1416ms |
April 2018 | 99.99% | 1761ms |
May 2018 | 100% | 1802ms |
June 2018 | 99.99% | 1726ms |
July 2018 | 99.99% | 1603ms |
Click on a metric to compare the performance of all 18 hosts, or learn more.
N/A = Not applicable NS = Not specified RBNS = Restricted but not specified
$11.95
$47.40
$143.40
No
Unmetered
Yes
30 days
99.90%
Yes
1Many web hosts advertise monthly prices but don't allow you to pay monthly. If you can't actually pay monthly we don't display a monthly price.
2This metric lists the annual price for packages paid 12 months in advance. It doesn't calculate the cost of packages paid monthly for 12 months.
3This is what it costs to renew a package paid annually in the second year. Most hosts increase prices for the second and each subsequent year.
4A "free domain" may sound like an enticing offer but keep in mind its costs will often be subtracted from a refund and some web hosts charge significantly more for renewals than registrations.
5Most web hosts display their uptime guarantees to one decimal point e.g. 99.9% is actually 99.90%. While some uptime guarantees look more attractive e.g. 100%, it's the compensation terms - how much they pay you if they fail to honor it - that matter.
Excellent uptime and response time but offers poor customer service and lacks essential features.
$59.88
99.99%
Nothing spectacular, nothing truly terrible. They're expensive relative to other web hosts.
£94.99
99.93%
Solid uptime but limited customer service, excessive legalese and overbearing restrictions.
$11.88
99.97%
Good uptime, features and value for money but no free domain and response time is average to poor;
$24.88
99.94%
Like most web hosts, the price you’re advertised isn’t the price you pay when you proceed through checkout.
The entry-level ‘StartUp’ package is marketed at $3.95 per month but to qualify for this rate you must pay at least 12 months in advance.
If you want to subscribe for 12 months the annual cost is $47.40 payable upfront (which, when compared against its rivals, is cheap considering the features offered).
Unlike a lot of web hosts, it doesn’t vary the monthly rate depending on whether you subscribe for 12 months, 24 months or 36 months – it’s set at $3.95.
Where SiteGround really get you however is with the renewal rate: it’s $143.40 and thus over 200% more expensive than the introductory rate. It appears to have increased its rates recently – the annual renewal price used to be $119.40.
Unfortunately, this process – increasing prices upon annual renewal – is standard across web hosts (with the notable exception of a few hosts, see here); 1&1’s renewal price for its entry-level hosting package is 700% more expensive than its introductory price.
It also offers a one month trial for $3.95 which increases in price to $11.95 per month for each subsequent month. The trial is also accompanied by a $14.95 setup fee.
SiteGround also increased the price of one year .com registrations recently, up from $14.95 to $15.95 per year. This is high relative to some of its competitors and unfortunately, unlike some of its competitors, it doesn’t offer free domain name to new customers.
Hosting with SiteGround is great in the first year and its features, uptime and customer service are excellent; however, expect to pay a premium for these benefits in subsequent years.
Click on a metric to compare the performance of all 18 hosts, or learn more.
N/A = Not applicable NS = Not specified RBNS = Restricted but not specified
$11.95
$47.40
$143.40
No
$15.95
$15.95
$12.00
30 days
We compare 17 web hosts against 56 metrics, including monthly and annual pricing and bandwidth, CPU, read/write, storage and database restrictions.
Siteground provides more details on technical restrictions than any other web host we’ve reviewed.
The most important restrictions Siteground set relate to domains, CPU usage and script executions.
Siteground doesn’t seem to provide data on how it limits entry processes (simultaneous script executions e.g. loading a WordPress file), seemingly preferring instead to limit based on daily rather than simultaneous script executions.
What do their restrictions on script executions translate to? Siteground believes your resource restrictions will capably handle up to 10,000 visits per month.
If you reach 80% of your allotted script executions or CPU seconds Siteground will send you an email detailing what you need to do to reduce them. This could involve anything from blocking resource intensive IP addresses or implementing caching.
The restrictions are reset each month and don’t apply to static content (eg HTML content), they only apply to dynamic script executions.
Importantly, there’s also a restriction on database queries: they can’t take up more than 10% of server resources (all WordPress installations rely on database queries to render page templates).
Providing you’re not a heavy user it’s unlikely these restrictions will affect you, however it’s worth keeping them in mind when evaluating Siteground’s service.
You’ll also see a ‘running processes’ metric in the sidebar of your admin panel when you first login.
This metric refers to the number of active processes on the server-side particularly as it relates to cPanel, email accounts, FTP accounts, multiple login sessions to cPanel from different browsers, etc. It is not affected by HTTP connections made by your visitors.
Bandwidth is advertised as ‘unmetered’ (this means SiteGround doesn’t monitor it). It’s worth noting SiteGround state in its terms of service that this only applies to web pages (eg, HTML page or PHP pages) and not to the upload or storage of video, pictures or music files.
It also states the following in relation to bandwidth:
“While we do not meter traffic, the maximum availability at any time will depend on current traffic usage and the technical specifications of our equipment”.
Click on a metric to compare the performance of all 18 hosts, or learn more.
N/A = Not applicable NS = Not specified RBNS = Restricted but not specified
Yes
20%
NS
Unmetered
10GB
768MB
500MB
Yes
Yes
1
Compare all 18 hosts by what it costs if you pay 12 months in advance.
Host | Annual price |
---|---|
SiteGround | $47.40 |
Bluehost | $59.40 |
Hostinger | $39.00 |
Compare all 18 hosts by whether they offer a free domain with new hosting subscriptions.
Host | Free domain? |
---|---|
FatCow | Yes |
A2 Hosting | No |
HostGator | Yes |
HTTP/2 was the first update to the HTTP protocol in 20 years. See which hosts support it.
Host | Supports HTTP/2? |
---|---|
Just Host | No |
GoDaddy | No |
SiteGround | Yes |
Learn more about, and compare 18 hosts by, limitations placed on entry processes.
Host | Entry processes |
---|---|
InMotion | 20 |
GreenGeeks | 100 |
Namecheap | 20 |
The StartUp package offers a single website backup per day. These backups aren’t available in your admin panel (unless you subscribe to the premium backup and restore option) and you’ll likely have to pay if you require a restore.
The GoGeek package – the most expensive package – includes 30 backups taken over 30 days and unlimited professional restores.
Siteground offers a 30 day money back guarantee. This is standard however a number of hosts, eg Hostgator, Dreamhost and InMotion, offer superior guarantees.
Siteground also offers a 99.90% uptime guarantee (advertised as 99.9%) and the compensation it offers for failing to honor the guarantee is as generous as any other host.
If uptime in any given month is between 99.90% and 99.00% then they’ll give you one month of free hosting (they’ll also give you an additional month of free hosting in increments of 1% downtime).
Finally, Siteground is the best host we’ve reviewed for customer service – they provide both ticketing and live chat support.
They responded to our support ticket in less than eight minutes. Their live chat is equally impressive; all of the questions we had – irrespective how technical – were answered promptly. Ordinarily we’d go into significantly more depth on a host’s customer service however SiteGround just handles customer service the way it’s supposed to be handled.
If customer service is your primary concern then there’s no better host at this price range.
Click on a metric to compare the performance of all 18 hosts, or learn more.
N/A = Not applicable NS = Not specified RBNS = Restricted but not specified
99.90%
Yes
Yes
Yes