Recommended Hosts of Year 2017

Blogging
If you are a blogger, chances are you will use the immensely popular CMS, WordPress. If so, look for a hosting plan that caters specifically to WordPress sites, such as WP Engine or iPage. All of these website hosts offer plans optimized for WordPress and include a one-click installation of the latest version of WordPress, pre-installed plugins/templates and automatic updates. (If you are looking for managed hosting, do check out the best 9 Managed WordPress hosting)

 

eCommerce
For an ecommerce website, Magento is a very popular online store and shopping cart software. Magento is an open source CMS, so the base software is free with add-ons and plug-ins available for a price. Hosting plans that are optimized for Magento are offered by Nexcess and MageMojo.

Datacenter Location
Another consideration when shopping for website hosting is the location of the company’s datacenter(s).

 

Let’s say you are an Irish citizen who is developing a website mainly for local users but also traffic throughout the continent. Then your best bet is to find a hosting service with a datacenter somewhere in the UK. Same goes to Nigerian websites and South East Asia websites.

 

Although the vast majority of web hosting companies are based in the USA, plenty of them use multiple datacenter locations. For instance, InMotion and SiteGround all employ datacenters scattered throughout the world. And many hosting services today offer plan features such as global CDN, Smart Routing and the ability to choose the datacenter where your server resides, all of which can help increase server response speed.

 

What’s Your Page Loading Speed?
Not sure how fast your pages load right now? Just use our handy Server Speed Checker tool to find out how quickly users across the world can access your site’s content. Try it out now by putting your URL in the search box. The tool then provides the results of page loading time tested from various servers around the globe. This will help you determine if you need to make a website hosting change.

Shared Hosting
Shared hosting refers to a plan where you are allotted a certain amount of space and bandwidth on a server that is shared by many customers. This type of plan is just fine if you are a blogger, don’t expect a lot of traffic or only have a simple site. There are plenty of reliable shared hosting plans available from hosts such as FatCow.

 

VPS Hosting
VPS (virtual private server) plans provide a physical machine located in a datacenter owned by the hosting company. The server where your VPS resides is usually divided between several clients and you get to install the software of your choice and customize your plan. InMotion Hosting is our favorite for VPS plans – this is the company used to host the Bitcatcha website. DreamHost is also good options for VPS hosting, while A2 offers managed VPS and flex accounts, as well.

 

Dedicated Servers
Dedicated servers refer to actual, physical machines that a customer “leases” and the hosting company maintains. You have the most control in terms of server type, features and software because you don’t share it with anyone else. Codero and Liquid Web are two good hosting companies to try.

 

Cloud Hosting
Cloud servers are also virtual machines using shared software that is accessed exclusively via the internet. Cloud hosting plans are dedicated to a single user account. When it comes to cloud hosting, HostGator Cloud is a great choice but so is Steadfast, which specializes in cloud plans.