An ideal small business web host should be affordable, have strong security mechanisms (usually an SSL certificate), as well as providing the best possible uptime guarantee. The last quality is especially important because the success of your business may depend on customers being able to reach your website at all times. We took the time to analyze the market and came across 10 exceptional hosting offerings that might be suitable for a small business, so read on.
1. Bluehost
Bluehost (opens in new tab) is the hosting provider of choice for around two million websites all over the world and not without reason. It has a bunch of hosting options suitable for various requirements, including those tailored to small businesses. For example, its Pro package doesn’t have any annoying limits, and this means no limits on SSD storage, bandwidth, domains, and website count. It also includes a dedicated IP, Let’s Encrypt SSL certificate, CodeGuard Basic backups, unlimited MySQL databases, as well as domain privacy and protection capabilities. Site management is a piece of cake thanks to the use of the handy cPanel feature. The price is only $13.95 per month ($23.99 usually) if you choose the three-year billing term. For additional payment, you can get your hands on great features like SiteLock security and Bluehost SEO Tools Start. The provider guarantees 99.98% uptime and if any unsolvable issues arise, you can take advantage of the 30-day money-back guarantee.
2. Hostinger
A veteran in the industry, Hostinger (opens in new tab) has an excellent shared hosting solution for businesses. The plan initially costs $3.45 per month (four-year subscription), $7.95 upon renewal and will get you unlimited bandwidth, 1GB RAM, one CPU, and 30GB SSD space for unlimited websites. The package also includes daily and weekly updates, unlimited 3GB databases and email accounts, Cloudflare protection, free lifetime SSL, powerful control panel, free domain for one year, as well as a 99.9% uptime guarantee. It also includes an easy website builder that doesn’t require any technical expertise. Extra features like an SEO toolkit and priority support can be acquired for additional payment. If this hosting solution isn’t enough to meet your business’s needs, you can pick one of the more advanced VPS options, such as the high-end plan at $29.95 per month ($65.56 after the first four-year term). It includes 8GB RAM, 160GB storage, 8000GB bandwidth, and eight CPUs. Every plan is fully refundable during the first 30 days upon payment if you’re not 100% happy with Hostinger.
3. DreamHost
DreamHost (opens in new tab) has a shared hosting plan that is ideal for small business requirements - it includes a free Let’s Encrypt SSL certificate, pre-installed WordPress, and absolutely no restrictions on bandwidth, MySQL databases, and email accounts. Not only that, but it also has the speedy and unlimited SSD disk storage, a free domain name (except for the monthly subscription), privacy protection mechanisms, and the ability to host unlimited domains from a single account. The provider also guarantees 100% uptime, promising compensation if it fails to deliver. The price? Don’t worry about it, it won’t burn a hole in your wallet as it costs only $5.95 per month under the three-year subscription. If you regret your decision after the purchase, don’t sweat - you’ll have more than enough time to change your mind - 97 days, to be specific.
4. HostGator
Thanks to its robust cloud platform, HostGator (opens in new tab) can offer exceptional hosting plans suitable for every small company. For example, its Business Cloud package includes unlimited storage and bandwidth, supports an unlimited number of websites, as well as providing a free private SSL certificate. It doesn’t stop there either. The cloud platform protects your website against unexpected hardware failures by placing its three mirrored copies on multiple hosting servers, so even if one fails, the website is immediately shifted over to another one. You’ll also get a distributed Varnish caching solution, HostGator SEO tools, shared access to six CPU cores and 6GB of RAM, and a 99.9% uptime guarantee. Such a rich package must be ultra-expensive, right? Wrong. It will only cost you $9.95 per month during the first 36-month billing cycle, after which it will increase to $17.95 per month. Additional options are available for purchase, including SiteLock hack protection and CodeGuard backups. If anything goes awry, there’s a 45-day money-back guarantee to put your mind at ease.
5. OVH
French hosting giant OVH (opens in new tab)’s dedicated hosting range has everything a small company needs - superior localized hosting capabilities thanks to over 25 data centers in many countries, advanced configurability with plenty of operating systems, and blazingly fast storage. The prices for the advanced dedicated server hosting start at $77.05 per month (two-year subscription), guaranteeing unlimited 1Gbps traffic, a 100Mbps unmetered private network, anti-DDoS protection, backup storage area (500GB for each dedicated server), 32GB of memory, and the choice between two 2TB HDD SATA Soft RAIDs or two 500GB NVMe Soft RAIDs. For additional payment, you can play around with various other configuration options, like storage or memory. That said, the provider’s website could use some work as it isn’t doing a very good job in detailing its plans. If you read the company’s SLA, you’ll learn that it offers a 99.95% uptime guarantee.
6. Liquid Web
Liquid Web (opens in new tab) specializes in fully managed web hosting and has a wide range of products, including VPS (virtual private server). It might be a fitting solution for small businesses that need more power than the shared plan but aren’t ready to pay as much as is demanded by dedicated hosting platforms. The provider offers four managed VPS hosting plans with SSD, starting at $19.99 per month if you opt for the 24-month subscription. This option will get you 2GB of memory, 40GB of SSD storage, 10TB of bandwidth, two CPUs, a dedicated IP, DDoS attack protection, 100GB of backup storage for unlimited websites, 100% uptime guarantee, and more. You’ll also be able to choose whether you want your hosting package to be equipped with cPanel Pro, Plesk Web Pro, or Interworx. The company’s capable teams will handle maintenance tasks like OS updates for you and even repair all issues before you even realize they happened.
7. GoDaddy
Different types of hosting have different capabilities, but what if you could combine all of them? This is exactly what GoDaddy’s Business Hosting (opens in new tab) plans offer - dedicated system resources combined with VPS-level performance and simple cPanel-like management found in a shared hosting platform. The entry-level option costs $19.99 per month during the first billing cycle, after which it increases to $29.99 per month. It will get you dedicated resources including one CPU, 2GB RAM, 60GB of storage space, as well as unlimited 1GB databases for unlimited websites. Switch up to any of the three more expensive packages (the priciest one will cost you $59.99 per month initially, $99.99 afterward), and you’ll get more dedicated resources. All the plans also include a free domain (if you’ve chosen an annual contract), while a free SSL certificate is available for the full term of your hosting plan. The two most expensive options are also equipped with a free premium DNS. Furthermore, you’ll also get a complimentary Office 365 email for the first year.
8. 1&1 Ionos
1&1 Ionos (opens in new tab) doesn’t make you wander around its website for long. Just navigate to its hosting packages and you’ll immediately see the mid-range Business plan at $8.00 per month (only $1.00 for the first month). This will get you 6GB RAM, unlimited storage, bandwidth, and MySQL databases (1GB each), one SSL Wildcard certificate, free lifetime domain, 50 email accounts, easy one-click installation for 70+ apps, all accompanied by regular site backups, SiteAnalytics, as well as anti-DDoS and anti-spam protection. The website builder facilitates easy access to apps, pictures, and text templates to customize your business website, although the control panel is a bit awkward and unintuitive. If you’re willing to spend some more money to enrich your package with, say SiteLock protection and List Local, you can do so right before checking out. The Business plan seems too basic? Then opting for the luxury Expert package at $14.00 per month may be better as it will get you more CPU and RAM, 100 email accounts, unlimited SSL, SiteScan malware protection, and a Content Delivery Network, on top of everything included in the Basic package. Don’t worry if things don’t work out. The company has a 30-day money-back guarantee for such situations. 1&1 Ionos also has a great 99.98% uptime guarantee, so your business if safe from any website outages.
9. SiteGround
SiteGround (opens in new tab) has “fast, secure and redundant data centers” in the US, UK, Netherlands, and Singapore, as well as a wide CDN network counting 194 servers worldwide, allowing it to offer reliable hosting to any aspiring startup. Its dedicated hosting plans are way too expensive, but a shared option may be a better fit for a small business. Especially so the GrowBig package at $5.95 per month during the initial billing cycle ($19.95 afterward), which covers unlimited traffic, email accounts and MySQL databases, and 20GB of SSD storage space for unlimited websites. You’ll also be getting 99.98% uptime, free SSL security, Cloudflare CDN, WordPress SuperCacher, and automated daily backups, regardless of the plan. Add the handy cPanel dashboard, a simple drag-and-drop website editor, and free and easy installation of shopping carts into the mix, and you got yourself quite a solid hosting solution. An additional $12.00 per year will get you optional Domain Privacy, while you’ll have to allocate $19.80 per year for the SG Site Scanner. As usual, there’s a 30-day period during which you can ask for a refund if you don’t think the provider is delivering upon its promises.
10. InMotion Hosting
Advertising directly as ‘Shared Business Hosting’, it’s clear that InMotion (opens in new tab) has a solid choice of plans. It even suggests the best option for a small business, which is its best-selling Power plan. It delivers a host of features that will help your business strive, such as unlimited SSD storage space, bandwidth, and email accounts for up to six websites. Additionally, you get free SSL, hack and DDoS protection, automatic backups, a free domain, awesomely simple website builder, easy cPanel, e-commerce support, visitor stats, 50 MySQL and PostgreSQL databases, and more. All of this will only cost you $3.99 per month under the two-year billing contract. The most expensive Pro plan (at $13.99 per month billed during the first two-year period, $15.99 afterward) increases the number of supported websites and databases to unlimited, as well as adding pro-level tech support. A dedicated IP is available for an extra $48.00 per year and the provider offers a 99.97% uptime guarantee. Be aware though, if you cancel your contract early, you may be charged a $50.00 cancellation fee.
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