In the beginning, there is no fundamental difference between regular hosting and WordPress hosting, but WordPress hosting may provide specialized technical support for sites created by WordPress, and
this support differs in that it specializes in problems with WordPress, its additions, and updating WordPress, and this support ensures that the site is restored to what it was. There is a dedicated backup in addition to providing quick solutions.
WordPress hosting also differs in the ability to give you paid plugins at the company’s expense and the ability to backup, clone and configure the site before launch (for developers).
Therefore, in conclusion, WordPress is considered a content management system, which is installed on good hosting. What is important is that you focus your choice on the quality of the hosting more than whether it is specialized for WordPress or not.
What are the criteria for choosing WordPress hosting?
The criteria for choosing WordPress hosting vary, and in most cases they are the same criteria that apply to regular hosting, but with the addition of other criteria that are specific to WordPress only, including the following required criteria:
Speed:
One of the most important criteria that helps with website speed is server speed. For example, the server uses fast SSD storage, and server response time to send website pages faster, are basic criteria that help you increase the speed of your website.
Support
: They are the company’s legal officials, whom you contact in the event of any problem with the server and hosting, such as the appearance of blank pages on your site , or the slow response of the pages to visitors’ requests, or stoppages and damage to the database, and other problems, in which you need assistance from the hosting team.
Security
: It determines the server’s ability to maintain the protection of customer sites from hacking or from attacks such as DDoS or exposure of your site to any malicious files .
Resources:
It relates to the use of the central processing unit (CPU), RAM, and storage of the server device. The more resources your site has, the faster its response and its ability to handle a greater number of visits at one time.
Number of domains allowed.
It is important to know which hosting plan you will rely on. Will it allow the use of one domain or an unlimited number of subdomains? The same applies to sub domains. And the number of email accounts provided by the hosting.
Scalability
As traffic to your site increases over time, you will need more dedicated resources such as increasing storage to unlimited.
The price of subscription and renewal is one of the most important factors for the success of hosting, as paying the same annual amount upon renewal matters to the customer, and some companies pay high prices upon renewal.
The capabilities of satellite servers
, as major companies rely on a larger number of interconnected servers spread across many countries of the world.
There are other additional criteria such as:
- Add a custom cache, which is a system that speeds up access to your pages
- Make regular backups of your site
- More specialized support for WordPress problems and their solutions
The most important hosting companies and their features
Siteground Hosting
Siteground is one of the hosting companies known for its efficiency and multiple capabilities, and perhaps the best WordPress hosting in 2020. The company has been providing its services since 2004, its support is distinguished, and its prices are appropriate for what it offers.
Advantages:
- Giving a free domain
- Unlimited databases
- Free daily backup and restore at any time
- Free SSL encryption for site reliability
- SSD storage
- Connect to CloudFlare to increase site speed
- Account insurance
- Monitoring the server at all times
- 30 days money back
- Unique artificial intelligence system to combat robots
- Fast support
- The last 30 backups are available for restoration
- Use repositories and the git command to maintain and develop your site (especially for developers)
- Control via CLI and SSH (for advanced users and Linux users)
- Allowing the creation of more than one website with more than one domain and adding users with their own accounts
Standards added to WordPress plans :
- Automatic update of WordPress
- There is a SuperCacher feature to increase the speed of the site
- Using a copy of your site to test it before launching Migration,
as the way the Duplicator plugin works is similar to WordPress. This is similar to copying the site to a special subfolder with all WordPress content and thus it can be tested (for developers) - Unlimited number of databases
Defects :
- Maximum web space is 10GB up to 40GB on shared hosting
- If the site spreads, new hosting features and larger paid plans are required
- Higher renewal costs, in the first plan you pay about $7 per month when purchasing for the first time, then $14 per month when renewing.
See all SiteGround plans and pricing
Hosting: A2hosting
A2hosting has been operating since 2001 and is a strong, fast company that gives you more than one plan to choose from, such as shared and dedicated hosting, WordPress hosting, VPS, and Reseller hosting. It also provides domain selling services and features of WordPress hosting.
Advantages:
- Large storage space in the shared plan
- SSL certificate for reliability
- Modern cpanel control panel
- Fast servers in the Turbo plan and many improvements
- Money back guarantee at any time
- Free website transfer by our support team
- Multiple resources
- Unlimited number of databases
- 24 hour support by phone, email and chat
- Complete protection against DDoS attacks and hackers
- CloudFlare connectivity feature
- Two-Factor Authentication for account security
- Constantly updating the system kernel on the CentOS operating system
Regarding the criteria added to WordPress plans :
- A special paid license to add Jetpack with all its features as a gift from the company
- Easy and automatic backup
- Clone the site to test it before launching site staging
- Dedicated hosting for WordPress
- WP-CLI tool is installed
Defects :
- To use Turbo speed you need a more expensive hosting plan
- More fees are paid if you bring more than one site from another hosting
- Sometimes technical support slows down the speed of responding or the speed of solving problems
See all A2hosting plans and prices
Hostinger hosting
Hostinger was founded in 2004 and the number of websites it hosts has reached 29 million in 178 countries. It uses the latest technical systems such as machine learning. It is a distinguished company, and here are the features it offers for custom WordPress hosting.
Advantages:
- Multiple email accounts
- SSD storage space
- The amount of data transfer is unlimited
- Free SSL and domain
- Jetpack premium plan
- LiteSpeed Cache
- WordPress acceleration
- Provided by Cloudflare
- Github integration
- Ensure continuous uptime
- Access Manager
- Unlimited MySQL databases
- Many subdomains
- Unlimited FTP accounts
- SSH access
- Daily backups on most plans
- Cheap price versus capabilities
- Providing technical support in Arabic
- Money back guarantee in the first month
- Having optimized hosting for WordPress
Defects:
- Lack of Arabic technical support around the clock
- hPanel control panel may be different from common cPanel settings
- Chat only takes place when you log in to your account
- It is not suitable for large projects, due to the limited resources it provides
See all Hostinger plans and prices
Inmotion hosting
Inmotionhosting is a company that provides multiple services and is spread across 175 countries around the world and has a support team that communicates with you through chat or by phone with 24-hour support.
Advantages:
- Website building tools
- Customer management tools
- Multiple email
- Free domain
- Free SSL authentication certificate
- Ensuring that the site receives a large number of visitors
- SSD storage
- Protection against hacking, malware and DDoS attacks
- Automatic backup
- Extraordinary site speed due to the use of UltraStack servers
- Unlimited number of email accounts
- Clone the site to test it before staging
- Dedicated IP address (in case of premium plan)
- Support latest PHP version
- Support caching
- Providing free coupons for some advertising platforms
- FTP support
- SSH support
- Large Bandwidth
- Simple control panel
- 90 day money back guarantee
- Automatically update WordPress and its plugins
- Clone the site to test it before staging
- 24 hour support including chat and phone call
- Optimized WordPress hosting
Defects:
- Fixed number of sites allowed per account
- Storage, mail accounts and specific databases
- Backup is not free
See all inmotion plans and prices
Liquid web hosting
Liquidweb began its work more than 22 years ago, providing many services, including website design and support by more than 250 experienced specialists who monitor, manage and support websites.
Advantages:
- The ability to move the website to and from hosting easily
- 24-hour technical support via phone and chat
- Daily automatic backups
- Clone the site to test it before launching (staging) (for developers)
- Free SSL certificate
- The latest PHP is compatible with WordPress updates
- Best developer tools like SSH, CLI, and Git
- iThemes Security Pro and iThemes Sync add-ons for site security and preservation
- An unlimited number of email accounts in the name of the site
- Multiple websites on the same hosting (number according to the paid plan)
- Large storage space (varies depending on paid plan)
- Beaver Builder Lite add-on to build the website using Drag & Drop method
- Possibility of increasing resources as needed
The company in general is a good option that you can rely on, but its drawback is the high cost of the plans it provides, and it may require some advanced expertise in hosting management.
See all Liquid Web plans and prices
Bluehost
Bluehost is a company that provides services at good prices and reasonable features. It was established in 2003 and the number of websites has reached more than 2 million.
Advantages:
- Free domain for one year
- Provide some tools to market your site
- Unlimited SSD storage (depending on plan)
- Free SSL certificate
- Run WordPress in just a few clicks
- 24/7 support by phone and chat
- CodeGard backup to the cloud
- Easy to use control panel
Defects:
- Increase the renewal price
- To bring your site from another hosting, other amounts are paid
- Its price is not commensurate with the capabilities it provides to website owners
- Some complained about the lack of guarantee for the number of backup copies and the slow loading of the site.
See all Bluehost plans and services
Amazon AWS services
Amazon AWS is one of the companies that cannot be overlooked, if not the number one company, although the installation of WordPress is done manually, but its importance and the reliable hosting services it provides will eliminate this issue.
To create your website on Amazon, you need some technical skills and also deal with installing WordPress and linking it to its database that you will also create. Among the features of this hosting are the following:
Advantages:
- The first year is free, but you must have a credit card to create an account
- Strong and fast technical support that responds to any questions
- Databases of all kinds
- It supports Machine Learning, which makes it easier to avoid many problems
- Supports site security
- Large storage space
- Backup your site
- Special tools for developers
- Continuous monitoring of resources and sites
- Tools to convert video to other formats
- Tools to monitor and analyze what is happening to your site
- Great speed and high stability for hosting
- It is possible to account for resource consumption in cloud services
Defects:
- Technical support with three paid plans
- Not ideal for beginners as it is complex
Google cloud hosting
Google Cloud is one of the major companies in all fields and its expertise is required, but WordPress installation is done manually, but its support and capabilities make it one of the most important priorities for any website builder.
To create your site on Google, you need some technical skills, as well as installing WordPress and experience in creating MySQL databases.
Advantages:
- Better prices than competitors
- Reliable cloud services
- RAID backups
- Extraordinary security for websites and servers
- Unlimited storage
- Technical support around the clock
- Provides powerful analysis
- Scalability and pay for consumption
- Get a free trial period
- It is based on artificial intelligence and machine learning
Defects:
- Paid technical support paid plans
- Not ideal for beginners as it is complex
Discover google cloud services
The most famous sites to test the efficiency of your site and determine its rank
There are many sites that provide you with detailed reports on your site’s defects and how to fix them, some of which are free, some are paid, and others show your site’s global rank. Among these sites are the following:
- Google testing site for developers is free
- The gtmetrix testing site is free with many capabilities and special paid features
- Paid pingdom testing site
- A site to know the Alexa rank and efficiency of the site is free for rank only, but efficiency is paid
common questions
Is hosting responsible for the speed and efficiency of the website?
Hosting has a big factor in the speed and efficiency of the site, but templates and plugins can negatively affect the speed of the site, if they are poorly developed.
What is the difference between WordPress hosting and regular hosting?
The difference is in technical support, where the support team specializes in WordPress problems and solving them, in addition to their ability to solve regular hosting problems, in addition to having continuous backups for the site.
What is the difference between shared hosting and dedicated hosting?
Shared hosting is where the server space is shared between several sites, and all of those sites benefit from the server’s capabilities and resources in a shared way. As for dedicated hosting, a dedicated server is rented that provides a fixed amount of memory, a fixed amount of storage space, and a large bandwidth.
You can also get a virtual server (VPS) that you can fully manage, which is less expensive than a dedicated server and has fewer resources.
Are there any free WordPress hosting providers?
Yes, we talked about them in the following article: The 8 best free WordPress hosting – advantages and disadvantages
How much does it cost to create a WordPress website?
The cost varies based on the resources and tools you use and the features of your site. For example, the cost of building a blog differs greatly from the cost of building an online store.
Can I move my WordPress site from one host to another?
Most hosts probably support this service, but some of them charge a fee to transfer the site, but you can certainly move your site from one host to another, whether manually (transferring files and databases) or using one of the add-ons, because it is yours in the end.
