SiteGround Hosting Reviews – Affordable + Fastest Wordpress – Rocket Speed

This is a Review of SiteGround Wordpress and Website Hosting.

If you’re looking to signup right away for Siteground you can go here:

[su_box title=”Pros” style=”default” box_color=”#E8FDF0″ title_color=”#000000″ radius=”3″ class=””]

  • Ludicrous Mode Speed Hosting
  • Cost Effective – The ratio of SPEED and PRICE is pound for pound the best online
  • Insane Server Speed (See Server Speed)
  • Perfect for beginners and Starting a blog
  • Choice of 5 Data Centers in 3 Continents
  • Free SSLs – In Addition to Malware and Brute-Force Protection
  • Free Site migration from GrowBig Plan and Up
  • #1 Host from 1,000s of users.
  • Amazing price for the first 3 years
  • Siteground SuperCacher 😮
  • Support response (Priority Support with GrowBig and up)

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[su_box title=”Cons” style=”default” box_color=”#ffbaba” title_color=”#000000″ radius=”3″ class=””]

  • After a maximum of 3 years, they’ll start charging their “normal” price
  • Uses Cpanel which I’m not a fan of. But most people like it.
  • SiteGround Cloud Hosting might be better for some than their Shared Hosting

[/su_box]

Recommendations

If you want the best bang for your buck in terms of speed for price, get their GrowBig Plan. It is worth the $2 upgrade from Startup for the boost in SPEED.

Because with the GrowBig, you really take advantage of the INSANE speed of ALL 3 Levels of their speech technology called “SuperCacher”

And you also get access to their Priority Support which they respond to you in minutes.

Tips:

Stay away from popular Hosting sites such as Bluehost, Hostgator, iPage, JustHost, and FatCow just to name a few.

They may seem like different companies, but they are NOT.

They operate under a big conglomerate called EIG, and from my experience they have bad quality control.

I talk about it more down below.

Table of Contents

  1. Lite Version
  2. Social Proof - 1,000s of satisfied customers can’t be wrong
  3. Full Review
  4. Speed
    1. Why is SiteGround So Fast?
    2. SuperCacher
    3. How to Enable SuperCacher
    4. SG Optimizer
    5. CloudFlare One Click Activation
    6. Server Speed vs Website Speed
  5. Uptime
  6. Security
  7. Multiple Server Locations
  8. Support
  9. Backend Demo - Cpanel
  10. Site Migration
  11. Ecommerce Support
  12. Automatic Daily Backups
  13. Is My Hosting Slow?
  14. Avoid EIG Companies
  15. Shared Plans: StartUp vs GrowBig vs GoGeek
    1. Quick Story
    2. StartUp
    3. GrowBig
    4. GoGeek
  16. SiteGround Cloud Hosting
  17. SiteGround Dedicated Hosting
  18. Reseller Hosting and Custom Enterprise Hosting
  19. Conclusion - Best Managed WordPress Hosting?
  20. Purchase a Rocket for Your Website

The Lite Review Version:

Summary – Why do I use it?

I ONLY use hosts first and foremost that are BLAZINGLY FAST 🔥

They MUST be able to keep up with the many demands that I ask of the hosts, because I like to use high quality images and fancy designs for my websites.

I want my websites to be both BEAUTIFUL and speedy.

And a good host can help with that.

The hosting provider MUST be there for me when I have questions.

Because I have a LOT of questions when it comes to technical issues.

I’m not a technical expert.
I’m not a wordpress expert.
I’m not a HTML or CSS or JS expert.

I’m not a website expert, but I know a thing or two about hosting my sites  as a customer and USER because I’ve been in the internet website game for 15 years!

And in terms of Customer Support, SiteGround responds within MINUTES.

And solves problems FULLY, without even the need to reply again.

An industry best, ESPECIALLY at the size of their company.

Usually companies as big as SiteGround have some horrible customer support response times.

But SiteGround is pretty amazing.

And the last thing I look for in hosting, and definitely not least is RELIABILITY.

Are they reliable?
Will my site be LIVE even when I sleep?
Will my content get to my visitors in a trustworthy fashion?

Throughout my time with SiteGround they have had a 100% UPTIME reliability.

I would definitely trust them with my blog.

Oh, and they are also 1 of 3 hosting companies that are OFFICIALLY recommended by Wordpress:

siteground_wordpress_hosting_recommend

The other two are BlueHost and DreamHost

IMHO SiteGround is the best one out of those 3.

I’ve tried BlueHost and I hated them.

bluehost vs siteground

I’ve never tried Dreamhost, but I’ve heard many horror stories.

dreamhost vs siteground

SiteGround I have only heard praise 😊

siteground reviews trustpilot

You pick your poison.

You can check Siteground out here if you’re convinced.

If you want to keep reading, I’ll show you down the rabbit hole 😎

Thousands of 100% Satisfied Users

Intro of Full SiteGround Review

SiteGround Reviews

Most reading this are probably looking for a new host to upgrade to.

One that’ll really help them to elevate their website, their blog and their business to new horizons.

A web hosting that’ll ACTUALLY take care of their traffic, that’ll take care of your technical problems, that’ll help you when you’re having issues, that’ll be there in MINUTES for you when an SOS arises..

A reliable host, a trustworthy host, a host that NEVER goes down, but have backup servers upon backup servers just in case of rare moments when it does.

To make sure your SITE, your DREAM, lives on 24 fuckin 7 of every moment of life of your website.

And I know that you ESPECIALLY desire a host that is FAST.

EXTREMELY FAST.

No lag from server to audience.

No friction from browser to screen.

A straight path from click to load.

Lightspeed from your content to the visitors mind.

There was a time in my life, when I first started out in the digital world.

It was such a fascinating thing to me when I was a little kid.

The internet
The way you can connect with people
Email.
Chats.

It was like wandering into a brand new city where everything was novel to you

Throughout all those hosts I have tried, I always wished for this feature..

And this feature..

And although they got the “job done”

I never felt quite satisfied..

Until I was introduced to SiteGround.

At first, I was quite skeptical because I ONLY heard good things about them.

And because I ONLY heard good things is WHY I was skeptical.

I would think:

They can’t be THAT good, could they..?

And boy, was I proven wrong.

Let me give you some technical orgasm:

Let’s look at the following:

⚡️ Website Speed
⚡️ Server Speed
⚡️ Server Location
⚡️ Uptime
⚡️ Security
⚡️ Site Migration
⚡️ Automatic software and wordpress updates
⚡️ Ease of Use – Backend
⚡️ Different Hosting Plans
⚡️ Support
⚡️ Staging and Backups
⚡️ Business Mindset
⚡️ And much more..

Speed: The Fastest Wordpress Hosting Provider

Why is SiteGround so fast?

The company has incredible Speed Technology.

They are obsessed about speed and making sure your site loads as fast as possible. They even include their own plugin for all users.

Underneath the hood of their servers lie these powerful technology:

SSD known as Solid State Drives – provide an increase in input and output operations by a factor of 1000 when compared to normal drives!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solid-state_drive

NGINX server technology – speeds up the static content of the website

They provide Cloudflare CDN – which is a FREE CDN to help your content load faster across the world.

HTTP/2 servers – which means that you get to take advantage of the new SSL certificates that make your sites both faster and more secure.

They use the latest PHP 7.3 – that is supposed to have an increase of 10% in speed from the previous PHP 7.2 version

SuperCacher – their famous Caching tech. They use their SuperCacher in tandem with their SG Optimizer plugin and when you test your sites on website speed tests, you get some remarkable results.

siteground_speed

SiteGround SuperCacher Details:

Let’s talk about SiteGround’s SuperCacher.

Caching is when a hosting server saves information in it’s RAM so that when a user visits a website the next time, it loads super fast from the saved data in it’s memory.

So it loads up MUCH quicker.

Cache is like ram for servers.

If everything is stored on your harddrive, your computer won’t be really fast.

That’s why computers add data to your RAM first, so you get the ultra speed of your computers.

It’s the same idea with Caching.

Siteground Reviews claim that it boosts site speed by up to 4x!

Let’s dissect this roadrunner.

There are 3 Levels of Caching in SiteGround’s Supercacher

Leve 1:
Static Cache

1 – Caches images, CSS files, JS, flash, and others to it’s RAM and not their SSD so that it optimizes delivery to returning users.
2 – Future visitors will be answered to cached content and not from server so it’s a faster, closer, straight line path to your users.
3 – Allows more FREEDOM for your site to handle more visitors.

The cache is automatically flushed every 3 hours, so any changes will be automatically every 3 hours.

If you don’t want to wait, you can always manually flush it with a click of a button

supercacher level 1

Level 2:
Dynamic Cache

1 – Best for CMS, Content Management Systems such as Wordpress, Joomla, and Drupal based websites.
2 – Stores copies of your website’s dynamic content on the server’s RAM
3 – Need to download their special SG Optimizer plugin to activate
4 – When Dynamic Cache is enabled, it automatically enables Static Cache

siteground supercacher level 2

Level 3:
Memcached

It is siteground’s version of Memcache system or Memoization.

1 – Boosts speeds in database calls
2 – Reduces number of times a database is queried
3 – Stores data and information in their server’s RAM thus increasing database recalls, page rendering and API requests
4 – Not automatically flushed.

supercacher level 3

When you enable Memcache, it will show up in your Cpanel which you can control from there.

Since there is no auto-flusing for Memcache, you need to remember to flush it when you make changes on the frontend of your website.

HHVM

They also have an ADDITIONAL speed booster called HHVM, but it’s only for siteground cloud hosting users.

HHVM is supposed to be a PHP executing engine that was build by Facebook.

The main purpose of HHVM is to make your Wordpress backend a LOT faster.

Tests show that it makes your backend up to 10 times faster!

How to Enable SuperCacher?

You login to your cpanel:

http://yourdomain.com/cpanel

And under “Site Improvement Tools”

Look for “SuperCacher”

And then you turn on each individual Levels with a click of a button 😀

siteground_wordpress_cpanel

Siteground has a step by step guide on how to do it.


SG Optimizer

SG Optimizer is SiteGround’s own proprietary Wordpress Plugin.

This is a FREE plugin that comes with any of their hosting plans.

It will NOT work with other hosting, so you must get a SiteGround Hosting Plan.

You can download the Plugin here:

SiteGround Optimizer

SG Optimizer is pretty dope.

You are able to reduce your load times and speed even more by turning on their own caching system.

siteground fastest hosting 1

siteground hosting review 2

siteground hosting review 3

siteground fastest wordpress hosting

Try turning these on for some SUPREME website speed!

Just by turning these features on and Level 3 Supercacher Enabled, I was able to achieve an 88% Score on GTMetrix WITHOUT any further optimization!

Just a few button clicks!

siteground gtmetrix

They even provide you with their own Image Optimization service.

You normally have to pay for some of these plugins, but they provide it free!

Also, if you want an awesome Image Optimization Plugin, check out: Imagify.

They are the BEST I’ve tried.

I have done many, many experiments on getting the BEST quality images AND at the smallest size as possible.

They have the best algorithm that gets the right balance IMHO.

You can also check out the SG Optimizer tutorial here.

CloudFlare CDN – Content Delivery Network – One Click

CDN is having your content cached across a network of data centers all over the world so that it reduces the distance the content needs to travel to reach the visitor and thus minimizes latency and website load speed.

And the closest server usually delivers the stored information to the end user, so that they load your website in a speedy manner.

Wordpress also recommends “offloading” by using a CDN so that it reduces load times.

With SiteGround you get Free CDN with CloudFlare and it’s super easy to setup.

siteground_wordpress_hosting cloud

Adjust CloudFlare Caching level to “Aggressive” and turn on “Railgun” and “Minify” for Javascript, CSS, HTML for even FASTER Speed!

wordpress_hosting_cloud

You can also follow Siteground’s tutorial here:

https://www.siteground.com/tutorials/cloudflare/enable/

SG Optimizer

SG Optimizer is SiteGround’s own proprietary Wordpress Plugin.

This is a FREE plugin that comes with any of their hosting plans.

It will NOT work with other hosting, so you must get a SiteGround Hosting Plan.

You can download the Plugin here:

SiteGround Optimizer

Server Speed

Server speed is slightly different from website speed.

Your website might be super speedy.

But that doesn’t necessarily mean your SERVER or web host is super speedy.

Because a website can be extremely lightweight and easy to load with minimal design elements and little to no pictures, so on the front-end it might LOOK like you have the fastest website hosting in history, but that’s not the COMPLETE picture.

You need to access SERVER speed to know if you TRULY have raw, authentic website speed.

You can check server speed from a few sites, but a simple one is:
http://www.bytecheck.com

This is also known as Time to First Byte (TTFB)

Let’s take an example:

When someone goes to your site, the VERY FIRST thing that happens is your internet browser (Chrome, Safari, Firefox, etc) sends a signal to your hosting server.

It asks your server for information about your website so that it can load it.

This is where your hosting server comes in. It HAS to respond quickly to the browser in order for the browser to fire things up.

No matter how fast your plugins are, no matter how optimized your images are, no matter how sleek your wordpress setup is, it’ll be slow if your server response is slow.

This is what makes your site truly fast.

fastest_wordpress_hosting_speed

Uptime

Uptime is pretty much the life of your server.

What percentage of time is your website LIVE for?

Just because you have hosting, doesn’t always mean that your website is always live.

Some hosting providers have horrible uptimes.

Most promise an uptime of usually 99% and up.

Why don’t hosts promise 100% uptime?

They can’t guarantee 100% because sometimes unforeseen accidents happen, such as outages, natural disasters, heating problems on the servers, and even having your site moved to another server, for better or for worse.

Because of this, most providers state a 99% uptime.

But, with my experience at SiteGround, they have a strong 100% uptime, and continue to do so.

They even have backups if the current server has an outage.

You can check your uptime and server speed with a Free Wordpress Plugin called WPDone.

siteground hosting reviews server

siteground consistent

You can also check the status of your website here:

best_wordpress_hosting_status

Security

Account Isolation

One of the BIGGEST things that differentiate SiteGround (besides speed 😊) is Account Isolation

No single hosting account can affect the others.

EVEN on SHARED hosting.

It was one of the 1st innovations they introduced way back in 2008.

Other hosts and hosting companies thought this wasn’t possible, but SiteGround has managed to come up with a GENIUS solution to use CHROOT account isolation of accounts on shared hosting.

Meaning if something goes wrong with one of the accounts on their shared hosting, YOURS won’t be affected at all!

Brute-Force Prevention

Brute-Force is a technical terminology for hacking.

It’s the attempt of hackers trying to login to your website.

SiteGround has an advanced anti-bot AI that prevents invaders from entering their servers even BEFORE it reaches their users’ sites.

fastest wordpress bruteforce

Linux Containers (LXC)

SiteGround uses Linux Container technology because of their super efficiency and because of it’s extreme flexibility and elasticity especially in times of traffic spikes.

Our platform is built on top of the cutting edge LXC (Linux containers) technology.

We have chosen to use LXC, because it is extremely resource efficient, highly elastic and provides great stability in times of unexpected traffic spikes.

While building our own implementation of the LXC, our talented DevOps have written multiple Linux Kernel patches, which we are proud to see now incorporated in the official Linux Kernel code itself.

BUT..

Not only are you protect from online and software type of security, they also provide extra security for their PHYSICAL servers as well

best wordpress hosting server security

Automatic Software Updates, Including Wordpress

Server updates are done automatically so that it guarantees compatibility and stability for the end user and increases the efficient of the server even more, giving you even more speed and power.

Siteground’s system automatically applies the latest versions of their core software without interrupting server flow and keeps your site extremely current and super optimized ALL the TIME.

And all of this is done behind the scenes, so you don’t have to do a thing!

You also have the option to have the latest, greatest and MOST stablest version of Wordpress AUTOMATICALLY updated for you if you choose to do so:

Best hosting backups

Multiple Server Locations

When you sign up for SiteGround you get to choose your server location from 1 of 5 data centers from all around the world across 3 different continents:

Chicago, USA
Amsterdam, Netherlands
Singapore
London, United Kingdom
Iowa, USA

fastest website host datacenters

Choose the one that makes the most sense to you and your users.
It’s usually where you have the most visitors for your small business or blog.

You want to reduce the geographical distance as much as possible.

You are also protected by their “Redundant electrical systems” that utilizes multiple power feeds and generators using Enterprise level technology 😮

redundant electrical systems hosting

Support

Support is INCREDIBLE.

Most hosting companies I have been with in the past..

Actually ALL hosting companies I have been with in the past..

Made sure I received a response in under 48 hours.

But 48 hours these days is the equivalent of 7 days in today’s “time.”

Funny how even “time” has an inflation in today’s digital world 🙂

So I would usually get a response from them within a day or two.

Here’s where SiteGround and other great businesses such as WPX Hosting leave everyone else in the dust:

Not only are they the Fastest Wordpress Hosting companies, but also have the Fastest Support RESPONSE times.

SiteGround boasts response time in MINUTES not hours!

And if you’re on their GrowBig and GoGeek plan, you get PRIORITY, first-class support.

They will also migrate your site for you hassle-free if you’re on one of these plans (##check site migration section)

Their tech support all attend multiple WordCamp events all over the world!

Wordcamp is a gathering for the Wordpress community to get together and exchange ideas.

They offer a 24/7 Live Chat service which is my go to solution when I have a question.

You can also call them or issue a support ticket.

30 Day Priority Support on the GrowBig Plan in which your Tickets will get replied in UNDER 10 minutes as opposed to a few hours (which is still much better than the industry standard).

fastest wordpress hosting technical

They answer some difficult technical questions in record time!

You even have the option to select “Site Slow” so they can have a look at it.

siteground wordpress hosting support

Dimitar answered my question in 20 minutes.

AND, it was a difficult one. He also went into ARTICULATE detail on how he solved it by writing 2 paragraphs about it.

He didn’t need to go that far, but he went above and beyond 😀

The case was solved, so I didn’t even need to post a reply.

Some other extremely satisfied customers:

How does the Backend look like?

You can see their CPANEL DEMO!

If you haven’t signed up with Siteground hosting yet (you can do so here, if you’re convinced 😊), you can go here to have a first-hand experience with how their backend Cpanel looks like.

siteground reviews cpanel

It’ll help you make up your decision and you can also check out their many, many OFFERINGS, such as free email, automatic updates, CloudFlare CDN, SuperCacher, Wordpress Installer, Your Website Stats, Backups, Staging, and many others.

It’ll really be able to see if Siteground is right for you or not.

And I love how they give you this demo, because I’ve never seen any other hosting company giving a demo of their backend before.

It really shows true confidence in their hosting and their business :0

And if you’re not familiar with cPanel, they also have excellent tutorials:
https://www.siteground.com/tutorials/cpanel/

Site migration

Siteground comes with one FREE site transfer when you buy blog hosting for a new account (Only for Siteground GrowBig, GoGeek and higher plans).

Note:
SiteGround’s Free Migration Only comes with Siteground growbig and higher plans.
GrowBig is only $5.95 a month (when paid for yearly) and comes with super fast 20GB SSD storage, can accommodate 25,000 visitors, can host UNLIMITED websites and comes with the uber fast SuperCacher. You can buy wordpress hosting here.

The website transfer should be absolutely seamless without any downtime.

I transferred a site of one of my clients and it was a flawless move.

No downtimes, and no hassles.

All I did was fill out a site migration request ticket, sent them credentials for my old hosting and bam site migration complete.

There was a minor complication during the process, but it was completely my fault because I provided the wrong database credentials.

After it was resolved, the site was live on the siteground growbig hosting in about a day.

siteground support ticket

The priority support they provided was amazing as well.

Their support team answered within a few minutes to a few hours (when I responded at odd times like 3:00 AM in the morning :0)

How to migrate your website?

Siteground has very simple instructions if you want to get started on site migration:
https://www.siteground.com/kb/how_do_i_apply_for_the_free_website_transfer_advertised/

Ecommerce Support

Not only does siteground’s afforadable web hosting package support personal website hosting but they also support small businesses, such as eCommerce businesses.

siteground ecommerce 2

Shopping Cart Support

They provide free and simple installation of popular and secure shopping carts such as:
Magento, osCommerce, PrestaShop along with many others.

Free Let’s Encrypt SSL Certificates

Comes with all siteground web hosting plans and is based on the certificate authority Let’s Encrypt

PCI Compliant Servers

PCI DSS is called Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard.
It’s a security procedures provided by SG to make sure there is a unified method of online payment processing. It is aimed at protecting credit card holder info, credit card fraud prevention and various security threats and other vulnerabilities.

PCI DSS is only available on the siteground gogeek plan.

siteground plans ecommerce

They also provide you with some eCommerce tutorials here:
https://www.siteground.com/ecommerce_hosting_pack.htm

Automatic Daily Backups

SG automatically makes 30 copies of your website, so in case of emergencies you can revert back to a previous version.

wordpress_hosting_backup

They make the 30 copies of backups for FREE, BUT RESTORING the backups are paid on the Startup plan, while they are free on the GrowBig and Go Geek plans.

Note:
Backups are Free on All Plans, but Restoring Backups are Only Free on GrowBig Plans and Up.

wordpress daily backups

On their GoGeek plan, you also have the power to MANUALLY create up to 5 instant copies of your website. And you’re also able to restore them back at any time as well.

siteground hosting review backups

If you’re on the Startup and GoBig plans, you can always use Updraft Plus to backup your website (Free).

You can go here to check out all their backup options:
https://www.siteground.com/go/backup-options

Is My Hosting Slow?

You can check if you have slow hosting by checking the “Server Response Time” and the “Time to First Byte

You can test your TTFB on 3 different sites:
Google Page Insights
Bytecheck
GTmetrix

First, go to Google Page Insights and type in your website.

If you get something like:

“Reduce server response time”

Then it means you have slow hosting.

Google recommends the following audits to make your site load faster:
https://developers.google.com/web/tools/lighthouse/audits/ttfb

siteground_reviews_audit

“This audit fails when the browser waits more than 600ms for the server to respond to the main document request.

This audit is also referred to as “Time To First Byte”, which represents the time that it takes for a user’s browser to receive the first byte of page content.”

If you go down to the area where it says “Passed Audits” and you find “TTFB” in this section, congratulations, it means you have fast hosting 😊

best_wordpress_hosting_audits

You can also go to bytecheck to double check your “Time to First Byte”

The ideal TTFB time should be under 1 second, or if you’re aiming for perfection then aim for under 600ms.

Bytecheck, is a little more strict in my opinion, so anything under 800ms should be sufficient 😀

fastest_wordpress_hosting_speed1

One last check can be done by going to the TTFB section on GTmetrix

siteground_reviews_gtmetrix

If you have done the following and are getting slow site speed, then it’s time to buy wordpress hosting with ludicrous speed like Siteground GrowBig 😄

If you want the ULTIMATE guide to making your website insanely fast, check out Tom Dupuis guide here.

Why You Should Avoid EIG Companies

EIG stands for Endurance International Group and they are a BIG hosting conglomerate that maintains it’s growth by acquiring smaller hosting companies.

It is actually really bad for the smaller companies that get acquired by this giant.

They acquire smaller brands, keep the same name, but fires many employees, downgrade their servers, move their IT infrastructure to India and they try to maximize their profits by allocating as many customers as possible on the same shared server.

do not use eig wordpress hosting

To me it feels like they are ONLY after short term profits and not really looking out for the long term, which is looking out for the customer.

Instead of having customer obsession, they are more focused on growth and profit obsession.

You probably recognize some of these companies:

Bluehost, Hostgator, Dotster, JustHost, iPage, Typepad, FatCow, Domain.com, just to name a few.

Quick story:

I have used MANY of the hosting companies listed above.

I have been in the hosting game for a good 15 years 😎

For example, I remember about 10 or so years ago, I signed up with BlueHost.

It started out really well: it was fast, everything ran smoothly, customer support was great, and my site was live.

But slowly over time, I felt my site getting slower, customer support took many days to answer and it just felt like a business that was going downhill..

So I jumped ship and transferred my site to HostGator.

HostGator was great!

At first..

In fact, they were so good at first, that I bought several of their packages, including a reseller package and also recommended them to everybody!

Everything was great for awhile, but then I started to see the same pattern..

Everything just seemed to get worse and worse..

And eventually it got so bad, that I had to jump ship again..

Later on, I found out that both of these companies were acquired by EIG.

bluehost wordpress eig
One by one their quality started to suffer.

Now I understand and have learned my lesson.

So now I ONLY recommend Non-Eig hosts:

Siteground Wordpress Hosting

Unless they sellout to EIG too, I’m sticking with them, because they have CUSTOMER obsession vs Profit obsession.

You can check out third party, TrustPilot Reviews to catch a glimpse of EIG companies:

https://www.trustpilot.com/review/www.ipage.com

siteground wordpress hosting ipage

https://www.trustpilot.com/review/www.justhost.com

siteground wordpress hosting justhost

https://www.trustpilot.com/review/www.siteground.com

siteground reviews trustpilot

siteground reviews

SiteGround Hosting Plans Comparison: StartUp vs GrowBig vs GoGeek

siteground wordpress plans

If you are REALLY on a budget and want the cheapest web hosting possible, but still all the benefits of speed from siteground hosting, then the Startup plan is your best choice.

But with the Startup you are only allowed ONE website and also limited resources.

You also don’t get the perks of their special SuperCacher (only 1 level), which I think is worthy every penny.

You do get 30 copies of backups for the last 30 days, BUT in order to RESTORE your backup, you have to pay for it, which costs $19.95.

siteground hosting reviews backups

So unless you’re on a SUPER TIGHT BUDGET, then my recommendation is to go for GrowBig.

With GrowBig, you get ALL the benefits of the speed technology of Siteground, with FREE backups, FREE backup restores, PRIORITY support, UNLIMITED sites to host, and most importantly ALL 3 Levels of their ultra fast Supercacher.

supercacher

And if you can afford it, then absolutely go for GoGeek.

GoGeek is what is known as a “Semi-Dedicated” Host.

Considering the price, it is very affordable and you get all the benefits of an almost dedicated server.

Plus, it’s supposed to be 4x faster than their shared hosting!

And another BIG plus about GoGeek is probably their “staging”

1 Click Staging

Staging is only included in their GoGeek plans and higher.

siteground staging

But it’s an incredible feature because it provides you with a COPY of your live site in a separate “staging” or “test” area so that you can test any changes made BEFORE you actually make it live on your site.

Progressing from staging to making it live on your site takes ONE click at the same time automatically creating a backup, just in case you need to revert back to the old version.

They have a tutorial on how to use it here.

On ALL the SiteGround Pricing Plans, you have the choice of 5 different servers (they upgraded from 4!) from around the world:

siteground centers signup


SiteGround Startup Review

Low cost wordpress hosting that’s perfect for 1 site and beginner friendly. This is probably way better than most other hosts, especially EIG companies and if you have a choice between choosing this and another host, then definitely go with Startup.

  • $3.95 a month (if paid yearly for 12 months comes out to $47.40)
  • If you want to try it out for the first month it’ll be $3.95 + $14.95 setup fee, which comes out to $18.90.
  • 1 Website
  • 10 GB of SSD
  • 10,000 monthly visits
  • Essential Wordpress Features:

essential best web hosting

  • Lacks Level 2 and Level 3 Supercacher
  • Have to pay to Restore Backups
  • No priority support (but still good)
  • Choice of 5 server locations from across the globe

SiteGround GrowBig Review

This is probably Goldilocks hosting for most users. The Perfect Balance.

Only $2 more than their entry level hosting, but comes with it LOTS of gravy. Like ALL 3 Levels of their SuperCacher and FREE backup restores.

  • $5.95 a month (if paid for 12 months, it comes out to $71.40)
  • 1 month trial will cost you $5.95 + $24.95 setup fee, totaling $30.90
  • Host UNLIMITED websites
  • 20 GB of SSD
  • 25,000 Monthly Visits
  • Everything from Startup PLUS Premium Wordpress Hosting Features:

premium wordpress hosting

  • All 3 Levels of SuperCacher
  • Free to Restore as many backups as you want
  • Priority Support (expect a response in MINUTES)
  • Choice of 5 server locations from across the globe

SiteGround GoGeek Review

This is for those who want that EXTRA speed without spending too much more.

You get 4x the speed, but you only pay $6 more. Plus you get their dope Staging feature.

  • $11.95 a month (if paid for 12 months, it comes out to $143.40)
  • 1 month trial will cost you $11.95 + $24.95 setup fee, totaling $36.90
  • Host UNLIMITED websites
  • 30 GB of SSD
  • 100,000 Monthly Visits
  • Everything from Startup and GrowBig PLUS Geeky Wordpress Features:

affordable web hosting package

  • All 3 Levels of SuperCacher, PLUS Semi-Dedicated Server Speed (up to 4x faster)
  • Free to Restore as many backups as you want PLUS Instant On-Demand Backups
  • Wordpress Staging for Testing before Going Live
  • Priority Support (expect a response in MINUTES)
  • Choice of 5 server locations from across the globe

Some Polls of Siteground Hosting

SiteGround Cloud Hosting

What is Cloudhosting?

Most people don’t need cloud hosting. I’d say only about 10% of users need the resources of cloud hosting. GrowBig and GoGeek will serve about 90% of users AND with INSANE speed as good as cloud hosting.

But cloud hosting will provide just a small edge over shared hosting.

Cloud Hosting has gotten really popular the last few years.

That’s because cloud hosting lies right between a dedicated server and shared hosting.

Not too expensive, and comes with scalable resources.

A big advantage of cloud hosting is that when you’re website gets a surge of traffic, it automatically scales the resources for you so that your website doesn’t run slow or shuts down during big spikes.

You also get the benefits of ISOLATED resources, just like you would with a dedicated server without costing too much.

Isolated Resources

With regular shared hosting, your website gets located on a single server from a single location.

With cloud hosting, your website is practically hosted on unlimited machines. Which means if one server goes down, it won’t affect your site, because your site is hosted in the “cloud.”

So no matter how much resource another site is using, your site will be COMPLETELY isolated and will ALWAYS stay fast!

Cloud hosting mimics a dedicated server because it allocates a set number of resources (dependent on the plan you choose) and thus makes it load a lot faster.

In summary, when compared to shared hosting, cloud hosting has an advantage in:

  • Performance
  • Security
  • Fully Managed Servers
  • Autoscaling Resources
  • Reliability
  • Isolation

SiteGround Cloud Hosting Review:

  • $80 a month with no yearly commitments! Free Setup
  • Auto-Scalable Resources so that your site NEVER slows down!
  • 24/7 VIP support. Less than 10 minute response time!
  • Choose from 4 datacenters across the world
  • Daily backups from 7 consecutive days so no data will ever be lost!
  • Your site is in the “cloud” so no single server will affect your site
  • Get the benefits of Dedicated servers without the cost of one!

BUT, most people won’t need anything ABOVE GoGeek. I’m guessing about 90% only need shared hosting.

So, if this confuses you, just stick to the Shared Hosting Plans such as Startup, GrowBig and GoGeek.

With Siteground’s cloud hosting there is no yearly commitment like their shared hosting.

They have the option to pay for 1, 3, 6, and 12 months of hosting all with Free setup fees.

siteground cloud hosting

You can also customize the plan to your needs.

You can have up to 32 cores, 128 GB of memory and 1 TB of SSD if you want!

afforadable wordpress hosting
Only if…


Insane! But will also be insane on your wallet! 😍

SiteGround Dedicated Hosting

95% of website owners probably don’t need or want to fork out $269 a month for a dedicated server.

Their ENTRY level server STARTS at $269 a month.

siteground dedicated hosting

A super power server will set you back $729 a month!

I’ve never used a dedicated server before, and probably won’t need one anytime soon (maybe in the future..one day 😄)

You can go here if you want a dedicated server.

But Cloud hosting should be plenty for most people’s needs.

Reseller Hosting and Custom Enterprise Hosting

They also offer Reseller Hosting for web developers to maintain their clients websites in the long term.

And if you are a Well-Seasoned Business, they also offer Custom Enterprise Hosting which is completely customized to the clients needs.

But this is probably out of the scope of 99.9% of users.

In fact, they don’t even list the price. I’m guessing it’s SUPER expensive 🙃

Conclusion - Best Managed Wordpress Hosting?

siteground hosting for small business

Business Mindset

You know, if someone told me back in 2010 that SiteGround was the best hosting hosting site, or would become the best wordpress hosting company I would NOT have believed you!

Because of my bad experiences with LOTS of hosting companies I get really skeptical when I hear rumors around the hosting community.

But what I love is when a business gets better every year..

When a business that LISTENS to the customers..

When they can take FEEDBACK and apply changes..

Then it catches my attention.

At first, I wasn’t quite on board with Siteground…

Until I kept seeing changes.

ESPECIALLY, when a company that GROWS big, BUT does NOT sacrifice on quality.

Over the years I have seen the changes, first-hand:

They have DRASTICALLY improved their speed.
They have become MORE competitive in pricing.
They have added a TON of features.
They have maintained EXCELLENT customer service.

They have what’s known as “Customer Obsession”

Here’s a great article on Jeff Bezos’ business mindset (worth a read).

This is a concept that Jeff Bezos has adopted for Amazon.com

He ranks customer satisfaction and customer happiness as his #1 priority.

One of his core principles is his Day 1 Philosophy.

He keeps his mindset that EVERY SINGLE DAY at Amazon is Day 1.

It keeps the company humble and always makes them strive for relentless excellence.

I see the same pattern for Siteground.

Others see the same as well:

siteground cheap web hosting 1

siteground cheap web hosting 2

best web hosting for wordpress 3

I don’t know about you, but for me I don’t want my art to be presented on a stage of mediocrity.

It has to be the BEST.

It MUST be the best.
It has to be provide an unforgettable experience to the user, the visitor, the reader and the fan.

It is VITAL for my hosting to be impeccable.

I REALLY treasure my sites.

And hosting is the bread and butter for my content.
The foundations for my creations.
The bricks that hold everything together

And after a decade of hunting for the perfect web host for my craft..

For the RIGHT price, nothing beats this one:

SiteGround.

My Recommendation:

Get StartUp if you’re just starting a blog.
Get GrowBig if you’re coming from another host, and want a HUGE increase in speed.
Get GoGeek if you want a step up in SPEED.

And if you want to live on another dimension of ROCKET speed, then get Cloud Hosting.

Give them a shot and let me know how it goes for you.

I have a feeling..

That you won’t go back 😎

Thanks for reading.

-David

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