Top Web Hosting Companies 2020

If you are looking to make money online then you are probably going to need some form of web hosting. Whether you are creating a niche website, building an ecommerce store, creating reviews or just want to build some landing pages then really you will need to invest in some web hosting and domain(s).

Below I give you a rundown of the top web hosting companies 2020. Prices mentioned were from June 2020.

Please note that if you make a purchase following the links below then tepagemi enterprises will receive a small commission in most cases. This helps keep the site free.

Most of the providers below offer very low pricing as an introductory offer but the prices can rise quite a bit after the promotional pricing ends.

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Uptime

This is one of the most important factors when selecting a host for your site. Visitors are unlikely to return if your website is down. Be careful when making comparisons though as percentages can be a little misleading. 99% uptime sounds great but that actually means your site could be down for around 87 hours every year.

By comparison a host promising 99.99% uptime should be down for no more than 52 minutes every year. In addition the ‘guarantee’ is likely to mean you are compensated for any downtime which causes your site to fail to meet their standard rather than being guaranteed that your site will actually be up 99.99% of the time. The top web hosting companies will probably be achieving around 99.99% uptime.

SSL Certificate

This means that your website will show a padlock in the address bar when visitors come to your site, the connection is encrypted, which obviously gives the user peace of mind. A number of the top web hosting companies now provide these as standard although some do charge extra.

Storage Limitations

If you are just starting out then any limits on the amount of storage are likely to be of no concern but do watch out as some providers do have quite small amounts of storage available on their cheaper plans. Some of the top web hosting companies offer unlimited storage while others are a little bit mean.

Domain Email

To make your business look professional you really need your email domain to match your website (the bit after the @ symbol). I personally don’t see why it isn’t included with every host but some are trying to get you to buy Microsoft Office subscriptions in order to get your email accounts! You don’t need to do that just use Thunderbird – it’s free and you should be able to connect that to the mail servers specified by the host easily enough.

Usage Restrictions

Can you host the sort of content you want eg many hosting companies won’t allow gambling so that matched betting blog may end up getting removed!

Rundown of Web Hosts

Update February 2021

I have recently started using Siteground for another project and so far am finding it a lot faster than BlueHost. I would suggest you take a look at Siteground rather than BlueHost.

1. BlueHost

This is my own personal choice (this website and several others are hosted by BlueHost). I’ve found them to be good value for money and I haven’t had any significant issues using their hosting. Unlike some hosts they include domain email and an SSL certificate in the price. Founded in 2003 in Utah, the company currently hosts over 2 million domains. Their cheapest plan for a single website starts at £2.38 per month (on their 36 month plan).

For not much more (£4.40 per month) you can move up to unlimited domains/websites (additional domains still need to be paid for when registered though). If you expect a lot of traffic then you could opt for their Pro package which includes higher performing servers and dedicated IP address. Like a lot of hosts the prices do go up significantly at renewal but of course by then your niche site will be able to pay for itself! Recommended by WordPress and one of the best in terms of pricing makes this one of my top web hosting companies. Sign up for an account with BlueHost

UPDATE: This post was originally written some months ago. I now know how important fast hosting is so if you can afford it try to go for the fastest hosting that you can!

2. SiteGround

Founded in 2004 in Sofia. Another very popular provider with a Trustpilot score of 4.7 from around 5000 reviews they are clearly doing lots of things right. For the more environmentally conscious customer it would appear they use Google Cloud for their data centres and they then match the energy consumed with 100% renewable energy.

They are slightly more expensive than some other providers but include some nice features as standard such as CDN. This in theory speeds up your website since users are directed to a server more local to them rather than the hosting providers main server. Up time and speed statistics are better than most of their competitors.

I currently rate them as my No.2 choice.

To open an account with them click the banners below or here.

3. HostGator

Based in Houston, Texas. Started trading in 2002. Only a middling Trustpilot score of 2.8 from around 700 reviews. They are pretty competitive on price as you can see below. Their hatchling plan includes a domain, an SSL certificate and unmetered bandwith and would likely do the trick for a simple blog.

For just a little more you could go for unlimited domains if you think you are likely to expand your online empire. HostGator offer a 99.9% uptime guarantee and should they fail to meet that then you can claim a months free hosting.

Start your website with hostgator.

4. GoDaddy

I have to admit to signing up to GoDaddy without delving too deep and to my cost found they only seem to offer domain email via paid subscriptions and you also have to pay for an SSL certificate. For those reasons I decided to jump ship. GoDaddy do have a lot of favourable reviews on Trustpilot with a score of 4.1. Overall I just felt they were a little too expensive (at the time I signed up) and didn’t offer something that I would expect every host to provide as part of the plan – domain email.

Below I am showing the pricing for their WordPress hosting. At the moment it would appear the UK is getting a very competitive deal! When I used the support line it seemed pretty good although the wait times were a little longer than I would have liked (this was during the covid-19 crisis though so they may have had reduced staff).

5. DreamHost

Dreamhost offer a very competitive package for wordpress hosting starting from $2.59 per month on their 3 year plan. Although you should note that domain email would be an extra cost. You do get SSL as standard though. If you go for the shared unlimited plan then you can host as many sites as you like and you get unlimited domain email thrown in so, to be honest, that would appear a better bet even if you weren’t looking to host multiple sites.

With a Trustpilot score of 4.6 from over 1100 reviews its clearly doing a lot right. They also have good performance stats when it comes to load times and uptime. If you are used to using other providers then you may find that Dreamhost is a little different as they dont use the usual cPanel for configuration.

DreamHost don’t appear to list their prices in GBP so I have done a quick conversion for you.

Shared Starter will be £2.10

Shared Unlimited will be £3.20

I assume you will be charged VAT on top (unless you are registered for VAT)

6. Hostinger

With hosting starting from an incredible $0.99 per month on their 4 year plan, Hostinger is definitely a company to investigate further. Their cheapest plan only allows 1 email address but you do get SSL included. They currently have an excellent Trustpilot score of 4.5 from over 1500 reviews although there have been a couple of critical reviews lately based around changing from live chat to email support (presumably due to the covid-19 crisis).

Their performance stats are some of the best. If you can move up one level to their $2.89 per month plan then you can host unlimited sites and get unlimited email accounts so again that would be worth thinking about.

Hostinger don’t appear to list their prices in GBP so I have done a quick conversion for you.

Single will be £0.80

Premium will be £2.34

Business will be £3.23

I assume you will be charged VAT on top (unless you are registered for VAT)

UK Based Hosts

7. Ionos

With plans starting from £2 per month including a domain they are certainly up there in the value for money stakes. Up to 10 email accounts are included which should be plenty if you are only interested in 1 website and SSL is included. Their Trustpilot score of 3.8 isn’t great but interestingly the .com version of their domain actually comes in with a score of 4.0! It’s been in business now for over 30 years and has over 12 million domains under its wing.

I have recently started using them for a site that I couldn’t host with BlueHost (it involves gambling). I’ll see how it goes over the next few months.

They also offer a complete website design and build service, which while not cheap might prove to be a useful option if you aren’t confident on the technical aspects of building websites. Some example pricing is shown below right.

Start your website with IONOS.

8. HeartInternet

An award winning company but also a little more expensive than many of the others mentioned here. In order to get SSL you would need to go for their Ultimate package (no doubt you could pay to upgrade one of the lower packages but its probably more cost effective to go for the Ultimate). So that’s £8.99 plus VAT (assuming you aren’t registered for VAT).

It does sound a lot more expensive but don’t forget most of the other companies here are offering large discounts for new customers and come renewal £8.99 a month won’t look that expensive by comparison.

A quick look at Trustpilot shows a very healthy score of 4.4 out of 5 from almost 2000 reviews.

Depending on your content (eg gambling) you may find that some of the cheaper US based hosts won’t host your site so a UK based provider might be just the ticket.

9. UK2

Based in trendy Shoreditch, UK2 has two decades of hosting experience. Looking at their WordPress hosting plans they are quite cheap at first glance and all include email as standard and have the bonus of CDN included too.

However there is no mention of SSL which to be honest you really need these days. Moving up to the higher priced plans mainly seems to increase the amount of visitors you are allowed – not extra sites. Their Trustpilot rating is only 3.8 so needs improvement really.

If you would rather deal with a UK company then UK2 could merit a little further investigation.

10. EUKHOST

With an office base in Leeds and 15 years in the business eukhost appear to be a solid hosting choice.

Their Trustpilot rating is excellent.

You can host up to 5 sites and have a reasonable number of email accounts included. SSL comes as part of the package and daily backups are done for you too! With 24/7 support and WordPress migration included this looks like quite an attractive option.

Unfortunately the only discount at the moment is 50% off your first month.

Despite that I think this would be a good option for those wanting a UK based host.

I would rate this my favourite UK host from the Top Web Hosting Companies.

Conclusion

That’s a round up of 10 Top Web Hosting Companies 2020.

From the UK hosts eukhost might be the one to plump for given its excellent rating on Trustpilot. It’s not the cheapest but then almost all of the cheaper hosts prices go up significantly once the initial deal ends anyway.

Bluehost is my first choice at the moment as I think it offers the right combination of price, functionality and performance.

You could also try IONOS.

James