Best uptime, a real premium web hosting that is affordable.
HostGator Cloud is an "updated" version of their shared hosting option.
According to them, it should be faster and more scalable than their regular hosting.
First, it has delivered an uptime of 100% over the past five months, with an outstanding performance of 16 months. HostGator Cloud also does not compromise on the speed, with average page load times of just 432 ms.
Friendly customer support and free site migrations make this one of the best options we have reviewed.
Take into account the extra costs that may arise when it is time to settle or renew your subscription.
Here is an in-depth analysis of HostGator Cloud's performance over the past 16 months.
General Info & Hosting Overview
OVERALL RANK: Rated #2 out of 32 web hosts
SPEED: 432ms (December 2017 to March 2019 average)
UPTIME: 99.98% (December 2017 to March 2019 average)
SUPPORT: 24/7 Live Chat
APPS: WordPress, Joomla, Drupal and Magento
FEATURES: Unmetered bandwidth and storage, email accounts, free domain 1st year
HOSTING PLANS: Shared, Cloud, WordPress, VPS and Dedicated Servers
SITE TRANSFER: Single Free Site Transfer
PRICING: Starting at $2.99/mo (renews at $14.95/mo)
Benefits of using HostGator Cloud
HostGator Cloud has impressed us from the start with great uptime and page load times.
Their servers are full of extra features that you will not usually find at many of their competitors.
Moreover, they offer an exclusive discount that brings the price of this advanced host to the lowest level in the industry.
Here are some highlights:
1. VERY strong uptime of 99.98% (in the past 16 months)
HostGator Cloud has booked an uptime average of 99.98% in the last 16 months. That sounds impressive because it is: the past five months have seen five consecutive 100% scores across the board.
During our 16-month tracking period, their uptime fell only twice below the 99.9% uptime guarantee threshold. Both January and July 2018 were just below the 99.89% threshold.
This is how the uptime guarantee works:
If your average uptime for the month is lower than 99.9%, you can get a payment credit for the entire month. Scheduled maintenance and another one-off, unintended events are excluded. But it is good to know that they love their service and that their customers will not be penalized if hosting performance is temporarily lost, causing frustration for your visitors and potentially missing out on revenue.
If you use one of their VPS or dedicated servers, you will also be covered by another network guarantee (further specified in their terms and conditions).
Average uptime of the last 16 months for HostGator Cloud:
March 2019 average uptime: 100%
February 2019 average uptime: 100%
January 2019 average uptime: 100%
December 2018 average uptime: 100%
November 2018 average uptime: 100%
October 2018 average uptime: 99.99%
September 2018 average uptime: 100%
August 2018 average uptime: 100%
July 2018 average uptime: 99.89%
June 2018 average uptime: 99.99%
May 2018 average uptime: 100%
April 2018 average uptime: 100%
March 2018 average uptime: 99.99%
February 2018 average uptime: 99.93%
January 2018 average uptime: 99.89%
December 2017 average uptime: 100%
2. Top 5 loading times (only 432ms)
HostGator Cloud offers a few extra benefits over their standard shared servers. The biggest, however, is speed.
They claim "up to 2x faster loading times" due to a variety of additional functions, including "low-density servers, premium hardware and multiple caching layers".
The shared plans of HostGator ended up in this department, with a disappointingly low average loading time of 1007 ms. To be honest, that is too low to recommend - it takes at least a second to load pages (even before adding text or images).
It is understandable that we doubted that HostGator Cloud could really deliver "2x faster loading times". But after 16 months of tracing average loading times we have to say - they have delivered.
The 16-month average of HostGator Cloud of just 432 ms is good enough to place them comfortably in our top five fastest web hosts. Find out for yourself in the monthly breakdown below.
3. Specially reduced prices
The uptime and page speed of HostGator Cloud blew their shared servers out of the water.
So why don't more people just upgrade to the Cloud version? Well, money.
The advertised price for this Cloud option starts at $ 4.95 / month and goes up to $ 9.95 / month. Please note that these prices also apply for a longer period of three years. (More on this below under the "Cons.")
Due to the higher price tag, some users instead stick to shared hosting.
Fortunately, there is good news. HostGator has given an exclusive discount to lower HostGator Cloud prices to just $ 2.99 / month.
That means that you essentially pay the shared hosting rates, but in return, you will get MUCH better service. Please note that this discount only applies to subscriptions of one, three and six months. After that first instalment, the price will rise to the $ 8.95 renewal rate on the lowest plan.
4. Very user-friendly hosting
HostGator Cloud manages to achieve a nice middle position with a beginner-friendly service that performs as an advanced one.
This is what we mean:
Bandwidth and storage are "not measured" on every cloud plan. That is almost unseen with cheaper options. And it essentially means that you will not be punished while your site grows and grows.
Larger sites usually require more resources, giving you a higher, more expensive subscription. But not with HostGator Cloud. Instead, your only major limitation for any plan is the number of sites you want to host.
So if you only plan to host one site, you can use the "cheapest" option and still be good when your startup site becomes a top-1.
The other good news is that you cannot be punished for extra resources.
Compare that with a managed WordPress host such as WP Engine. Of course, they are usually great. But they also have "too high" costs that hit you if your site begins to exceed monthly subscription limits.
And even worse, these costs are often automatic. So if you have a good month and the traffic peaks, you are basically punished.
HostGator Cloud, on the other hand, offers more an all-in price, which is rare with cheaper hosts that only give you a few dollars a month.
5. FREE extras: management of server resources, monitoring and site migrations
HostGator Cloud is fast because they do not depend on your standard servers.
Every data centre is supported with integrated caching, cloud resource management and data mirroring. All these functions work together to optimize the loading speed, to manage the resource allocation and to guarantee availability. In English, this means that servers can interact with a visitor's browser to limit the number of resources that must be sent back and forth.
HostGator Cloud also adds server monitoring and automated "failover" to ensure that if hardware problems occur, you know as soon as possible and there is a Plan B to save your site.
Each subscription includes cPanel access, along with new e-mail accounts. You will also receive a free site or cPanel migration from your existing web host.
All HostGator Cloud hosting options include one free site migration. Some other hosting providers will return extra migrations for free, while many others will charge you for migrations. So HostGator Cloud falls somewhere in the middle.
If you want to move more sites, they do so for an estimated cost of ~ $ 25 / site. Although, it can depend a bit on the size or number of files.
Unfortunately, there are a number of sites that HostGator cannot move for you. These usually include sites without FTP and/or databases. The shortlist contains everything from VistaPrint, Intuit, Wix, Google Sites, Microsoft Office or MobileMe.
6. Good, friendly support
HostGator offers 24/7/365 support via a knowledge base and numerous video tutorials, telephone support and live chat.
We have tested their live chat, entered our name and first search query. We only had to wait about five minutes for Puneeth to connect and help us.
Puneeth was generally very friendly and answered most of our questions.
HostGator Cloud Live Chat Customer service
Until the answer came to a few questions about site migrations.
Most web hosts that we have reviewed offer at least one free site migration. HostGator Cloud follows that trend.
However, if other hosts no longer move sites for free, there are usually simple costs to move sites for you.
Puneeth could not really give us a clear answer to the costs for multiple migrations. He claimed that it usually comes down to the size or number of files and a few other details.
We have renewed the live chat session and tried again. This time we finally received an answer to migrations: an estimated ~ $ 25 / site.
So overall the live chat support was a bit bumpy, but it was able to answer all our questions.
There is one last good news. When we first assessed HostGator, they did not offer support through social media.
But we are happy to let you know that they are now very responsive to social media and answer individual problems several times a day:
Now you have many different options to get a quick response from HostGator.
Disadvantages of using HostGator Cloud
HostGator Cloud's performance was usually impressive. However, there are two spots on their plate.
The first is higher prices for short-term plans and high renewal rates when your first term ends. The second major problem is that it seems as if they have taken away a few extra services and are now paying you.
Here is an overview:
7. Introduction price increases and high renewal rates
You can save a lot on hosting if you know how to navigate through the usual pricing that ravages the industry.
The first is the original introductory rate that you see on a host's site. It is usually a fairly low monthly price. However, the catch is that you usually have to pay a minimum of two or three years in advance to profit.
A shorter monthly option, if they even offer it, can sometimes be two or three times as expensive.
For example, HostGator Cloud costs $ 4.95 / month for 36 months (or $ 2.99 / month with our shorter-term discount). But the real price of one month is $ 12.95 / month.
HostGator Cloud Hosting Pricing in the long term
But once you've found a host that you like, you can probably block the three-year rate for as long as possible. This is why.
The second most common competition issue in the hosting industry is the high extension rate. In this case, when your initial term ends, your subscription is automatically extended for $ 8.95 / month for the exact same service. You do not necessarily receive anything extra or better service. They count on you not to change host again at that time.
So make sure you like the host that you are with. And then pay for the longest possible term to keep your monthly rate low.
8. HostGator Cloud Prices, hosting plans and quick facts
Here is a brief overview of the HostGator Cloud subscriptions offered:
Hatchling Cloud:
This subscription starts at $ 2.99 a month with our discount (not $ 4.95). It supports 1 site, 2 GB of memory, 2 core CPUs, a free SSL certificate, unlimited storage and bandwidth. <- We used this plan for our test site.
Baby Cloud:
This subscription starts at $ 6.57 a month. It supports an unlimited number of sites, 4FB memory, 4 core CPUs, free SSL certificate, unlimited storage and bandwidth.
Business Cloud:
This subscription starts at $ 9.95 per month. It supports an unlimited number of domains, 6 GB of memory, 5 core CPUs, free SSL certificate (positive), free special IP, free SEO tools, non-measured storage and bandwidth.
Ease of Registration:
The registration process is a piece of cake!
Payment Methods:
You can pay with a credit card or PayPal.
Hidden Costs and Clauses:
Despite unmeasured bandwidth and storage, you cannot use more than 25% of their system for longer than 90 seconds. Renewal rates are higher than normal rates. And certain types of sites without FTP cannot be migrated by their team.
Upsells:
There are a few upsells on the way.
Activate Account:
In some cases, it can take up to 24-48 hours for accounts to be activated.
Control panel and dashboard experience: cPanel.
Installation of Apps and CMSs (WordPress, Joomla, etc.):
The very simple installation process with one click of the most popular apps available.
9. Do we recommend HostGator Cloud?
Yes, we do.
HostGator Cloud manages to do a few things really well. They are extremely user-friendly and inexpensive for a discount. At the same time, you get some of the best uptime and page loading performance we've seen after reviewing more than 30 other hosts.
Customer service was also solid.
So despite the fact that the renewal rates are a bit higher and some potential additional costs, the fact that this plan is discounted at about the same price as their shared options makes it a no brainer.
Visit: HostGator
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