Website Hosting Services Comparison Chart

Our overall ratings are based on the average score of all ratings combined.

Our scores give you an at-a-glance overview of which service offers you the best features, value, and more.

To calculate the Types of Hosting score, we looked at how many different services are offered by the provider e.g. shared/VPS/dedicated hosting. Shown are the five most popular types, but more were taken into consideration.

Firstly, it’s important to know if the type of hosting you’re after is provided. Secondly, it’s nice to know what the other options are, should you ever want to switch or upgrade.

Shared hosting is where your website sits on a server with other websites. It’s generally the cheapest type of hosting but you share your resource limits with the other sites.

Virtual Private Server (VPS) hosting is where multiple sites use the same server, but have their own set resource limits. You can also ‘borrow’ resources from another site if it doesn’t need them and you’re maxed out.  

WordPress hosting is a service specifically designed for WordPress websites. It usually comes with set features like a one-click WordPress install and automated WordPress updates to make life easier for you.

Cloud hosting is where you’re not tied to one specific server. In fact, your site is hosted across several servers, pulling a flexible amount of resources from each. It’s a modern type of hosting that’s growing in popularity.

Dedicated hosting is where your site gets a server all to itself. You’re not reliant on anyone else, and get huge resource limits. Naturally, this is reflected in the price.

Covers all the key features you get with that provider, regardless of the type of hosting you choose. We compared every possible feature, but these are the five we believe to be most interesting and important to you.

It’s important to know what’s included when you sign up with each provider. After all, after your actual hosting performance, features will be one of the biggest factors in your final decision.  

Short for control panel, cPanel is an industry-standard dashboard used by most hosting providers. You can manage your site’s hosting through this dashboard. It’s very intuitive and easy to use.

The flow of data between your website and its server. Every time someone lands on your site, your server has to send the information to them. Unmetered essentially means this data transfer is unlimited and can’t run out.

A domain is what you see in the URL of your site e.g. ‘www. websitebuildingguide.com’. We looked at whether the provider offers you your domain free of charge for the first year.

Most providers will back up your website every 24 hours. This feature looks at whether it’s free to restore your site to the last saved backup, should something go wrong.

Storage is to do with how much content your website needs to hold.

Sites with lots of media (images, videos etc.) will need more storage space. If you have unlimited storage, you can host as much content as you like.

Relates to the average amount of time your website is ‘live’ online. It’s impossible to achieve 100% uptime, but the aim is for providers to guarantee an uptime as close to that as possible.

Obviously, the purpose of a website is to share your information with the rest of the world, and that’s only possible when it’s live. Generally speaking, any uptime above 99.95% is pretty darn good.

Scored on the number of ways you can receive support from the provider. Does the provider offer a help center, ticket system, phone service, and live chat? And is the phone/live chat support available 24/7.

No one likes getting stuck, so it’s reassuring to know there’s help on hand, should you need it. The 24/7 service is particularly important, as it adds a personal touch and means there’s always someone around to help you.  

Two things are taken into consideration here: the average cost of the provider’s plans for shared, VPS, and dedicated hosting, and if it offers a money-back guarantee.

Everyone loves a bargain. It’s good to understand if the prices offered by a provider are cheap, expensive, or average compared to the rest of the market.  

The cost of each service’s cheapest pricing plan. Please note, these are the regular prices – most providers will offer further discounted rates for new customers, but these will only be applicable to your initial sign-up term. Check out each host’s own site for further details.