When you’re thinking about building a new site, your mind will predominantly be occupied with the content of your website, its design, and its functionality.
But everything that I’ve just listed is comprised of data, so who is providing that space for all of that data on your site?
About Web Hosting
A web host can provide you with shared or dedicated server space (depending on how much you want to spend and how much traffic you expect your site to have). If you don’t have a host, no one is going to be able to view your site!
Since choosing a great host provider is a critical first step to start your WordPress site, I would like to tell you about the top five providers that I recommend. WordPress is also one of the favorite platforms for hosting providers because of its simple requirements.
Many hosting providers have provided WordPress users with an easy 1-click installation process that can be very inexpensive. But like anything that is too good to be true, some suspiciously low-cost providers add hidden costs, and may take advantage of your website by advertising without your consent or permission.
Of course, you shouldn’t expect support from those kinds of providers either. Make sure you do your research and due diligence!
This is another reason that I’ve made this list of the best WordPress hosting providers. Hopefully this list will help you make an informed decision on who provides quality hosting, easy installation, top support and affordable prices.
WP Engine
If you are a WordPress geek like me, then you may want to go with a hosting provider that really understands WordPress. WP Engine is a hosting provider specialized for hosting only WordPress websites and as a result they include some special features for your site that other hosts won’t provide.
The folks at WP Engine also have some incredible servers, and have been shown to deliver some really high speeds for your website. The support team is comprised of top WordPress engineers, so there really is no problem that these guys can’t handle.
Everything that is important under the hood of your website, from security to how your plug-ins will behave, is easily covered by your support team. One of the coolest features of WP Engine is that they offer you a staging area, where you can test anything you want to publish on your website without the fear of ruining your live site with a snippet of bad code.
One thing that may be a caveat to some is the WP Engine is a little more expensive than some of the hosts on this list. However, if you’re about to publish a high-end WordPress site then WP Engine will definitely be a great match.
Bluehost
Bluehost is one of the more well-known hosting providers, and they even provide a discount for WordPress developers. Since Bluehost is well optimized for WordPress, your site’s performance should be fast and reliable.
They will also offer you a an easy 1-click installation, and provide a cPanel with easy-to-use tools for successful and easy management of your site. You even get one free domain name!
Customer service is also a priority for Bluehost, and their 24/7 support has been really helpful to me for any issues. Maintaining your website should be an easy job when using Bluehost.
InMotion
Being rated as one of the best hosting providers by CNET for 10 years is certainly an encouraging sign of InMotion’s offerings. InMotion is recognized for its reliable performance and great support for WordPress, Drupal, Joomla and many more.
InMotion guarantees 99.9% up-time, and in my experience I haven’t found any ways to contest that claim. InMotion’s technical support includes live chat with real technicians, video tutorials and an active message board. If you choose InMotion, they will help you to adequately determine which hosting plan works best for your site.
Synthesis
Synthesis uses an entirely different architecture for its servers – NGINX architecture as opposed to Apache. By migrating your website to Synthesis, NGINX will allow your site to maintain more traffic than it once did, while using fewer resources.
They also offer content marketing services along with hosting, so their platform can even help you research keywords and identify topics that are most interesting for your visitors. You’ll also get great tips for optimization of your pages, which will help you improve your site’s rankings.
Just like the other hosting companies on the list, they offer great customer support. They have additional backup plans, including personal programs that give you full control of daily backups.
HostGator
HostGator is one of the world’s largest hosting services, offering great 1-click WordPress installation, 99.9% up-time and round the clock customer support. And you might as well give these guys a shot since they offer a 45 day money-back guarantee!
They’re also one of the more affordable hosting providers on this list. I’ve been using this hosting service for a lot of my projects and have had a great experience.
One interesting tidbit about HostGator is that it is eco-friendly. By using HostGator you are sort of helping to save the planet, because HostGator uses wind-produced electricity to power its servers. And who can argue with that?
At The End Of The Day…
The hosting provider that is going to work best for you is going to based off of your needs. A lot of hosts offer the same core set of features, but some may cater to your needs in a specific way. Let me know if you have a favorite hosting provider that I haven’t listed that you would like to recommend!
