Bluehost Review in 2021
Bluehost Review in 2021
Bluehost is a web hosting company founded by Matt Heaton and Danny Ashworth in Provo, Utah. They have a staff of 750 people who work around the clock. Being a recommended web host by Wordpress.org, they have 1-Click installations in all of their plans.
See Also: Which Bluehost Basic Plan Features Should You Choose in 2021: Basic, Choice Plus
Our rating: 5 (Excellent)
If there is one name you know in the world of web hosting, Bluehost is probably at the top, along with Inmotion and GreenGeeks. It started in 1996 which makes it old by web standards, but I like them nonetheless.
In this post, I'll take you behind the scenes and show you functions through my account. I will also be sharing a special offer for Hosting Manual visitors only at the bottom of this page (you can get a price of $ 2.95 instead of the normal $ 3.95 / month).
Here's what the customer dashboard looks like:
By the time you've read this review, you'll know what to expect from Bluehost and (equally importantly) what NOT to expect from them.
No doubt they've built a solid reputation over the decades, especially when it comes to WordPress hosting.
They are listed as one of the officially recommended WordPress blog hosting providers , offering a plethora of great tools, bonuses, and resources to WordPress customers.
Ready to learn more? We'll go into more detail in our Bluehost review. But first, let's start with some quick facts.
Plans may seem cheap at first glance, but not all of them are as cheap as they seem. You can download all for just $ 2.95 per month to work with shared hosting as you deal als tegenkomt this.Otherwise, the starter plan usually costs $ 7.99 per month, which is still reasonable. But WP plans are quite expensive, starting at $ 12.49 a month.
Get unlimited bandwidth with all accounts.
The starter plan comes with 100 email accounts. The Plus and Business Pro plans offer unlimited email accounts.
Get up to $ 200 in bonuses for marketing offers.
Improved cPanel makes it easy to configure and control your sites (see ahere demo).
Shared Hosting Vs. The Others
Bluehost offers five main types of hosting plans:
Shared Hosting
VPS Hosting
Dedicated Hosting
WordPress Hosting
Cloud Sites
For the vast majority of my clients, shared web hosting is more than enough. If you're building a website from scratch, you don't know how much traffic your website will attract. Going for anything other than shared hosting is an exaggeration at this stage.
With dedicated hosting you are in fact renting a physical server. VPS hosting is a middle ground option where you share a physical server with others, but you have your virtual operating system at your disposal so that the server functions as if it were physically yours. WordPress hosting is, of course, what it sounds like: hosting optimized for WordPress customers. Let's take a look at the plan layers for each.
Read: Publish Your Website: Checklist Go-Live
Shared Hosting
Basic: Starting at $ 2.95 a month, this plan jumps to $ 7.99 a month at the regular price.
Plus: This plan regularly costs $ 10.99 per month, now just $ 5.45.
Choice Plus: This plan is $ 14.99 a month, now just $ 5.45.
Pro: Normally $ 23.99, now only $ 13.95.
These prices are all pretty good. But with this deal you can be sure to get the best price! At the basic level, you get one website, 50 GB of space and unlimited bandwidth. You also get one domain, five parked domains and 25 subdomains. Additional features include 5 email accounts with 100MB of storage space each.
With the Plus, Choice Plus, and Pro plans, you get unlimited websites and unlimited space and bandwidth, which is great. You get an unlimited number of domains and subdomains.
Email accounts and storage are unlimited, along with $ 200 in marketing offers. Plus, it includes Global CDN and one SpamExperts (over $ 24 per year in additional benefits).
The top level plan is Pro. It includes up to $ 180 in additional annual benefits, including better performance and a dedicated IP address, which is important for SEO.
VPS Hosting
Standard: $ 18.99 your first month, up to $ 29.99 after that
Enhanced: $ 29.99 your first month, up to $ 59.99 after that
Ultimate: $ 59.99 your first month, up to $ 119.99 afterwards
These prices are in line with the typical costs for the VPS hosting industry-wide. The speed for the first two plans is 2 CPU cores, maximum three and four cores for the top plan. You get 30 GB of SAN storage at the lowest level, up to 120 GB at the highest level. RAM ranges from 2 GB to 8 GB. You get 1 TB of bandwidth at the standard level, up to 3 TB at the ultimate level. Each layer contains one domain. The Standard tier contains one IP address; you get two with the rest. Each plan is backed by 24/7 support and a money back guarantee.
Dedicated Hosting
Standard: $ 79.99 your first month, $ 119.99 per month thereafter.
Improved: $ 99.99 your first month, $ 159.99 per month thereafter.
Premium: $ 119.99 your first month, $ 209.99 per month thereafter.
With the Standard plan or Enhanced plan, you get a 4 x 2.5 GHz CPU. The Premium plan offers you a CPU of 4 x 3.3 GHz. Storage ranges from 500 GB to 1 TB (mirrored), and RAM starts at 4 GB at the standard level, up to 16 GB at the Premium level. You get 5 TB of bandwidth on the Standard level, 10 TB on the Enhanced level, and 15 TB on Premium. One domain is included with each subscription. You get three IP addresses with Standard, four with Enhanced, and five with Premium. All plans are backed by a 24/7 service and a money back guarantee.
WordPress Hosting
Basic: Starts at $ 2.95 with a 36-month plan
Plus: Starts at $ 5.45 / month with a 36-month plan
Choice Plus: Starts at $ 5.45 / month with a 36-month plan
These plans look the same as their shared hosting plans, and they cost the same.
However, at the end of 2018, Bluehost introduced a new category: WordPress Pro.
WordPress Pro
These plans are quite expensive compared to their basic WordPress hosting and what some competitors offer (many hosts sell WordPress hosting plans at the same prices as general purpose shared hosting plans).
However, WordPress Pro at Bluehost is a big deal and one of the company's most popular services (with over a million sites hosted by the company).
The Pro plans run on powerful VPS and offer improved site speed.
Build-level features include Basic Jetpack Site Analytics, Marketing Center, 100 free premium themes, daily backups, and malware detection and removal for added security.
The grow plan is a step up with Jetpack Pro. The Business Review tools allow your visitors to leave positive Yelp, Google, Yahoo, or Bing reviews for your business right from your site. The SEO tools give you real-time optimization tips to improve your search engine rankings. It is integrated into the Marketing Center, where you can see statistics on how you are doing in the major search engines.
The top-level scaling plan gives you Paypal integration and ElasticSearch.
It's worth noting that you get live support with Grow and Scale. It gives you 24/7 hands-on help with design, functionality or common questions from real WordPress experts.
All plans come with Positive Wildcard SSLand 24/7 service and a money back guarantee. These plans also include automatic plugin updates and regular backups and a staging environment that allows you to build and test your WordPress website before publishing it.
One feature that probably not many people use is the unlimited video compression. You can upload your videos without optimizing them for the web. Bluehost takes care of it. I haven't used Bluehost for streaming nor could I find a review on it, but the support told me they have no restrictions on how many videos you can stream.
These are all excellent features, yet you may be wondering, "Why should I pay so much for WordPress hosting?" Bluehost plays a very active role in the WordPress community and has a core staff of developers. That means Bluehost can provide top-notch customer support and solve even complex problems unique to WP.
This is not to say that Bluehost is your only or best option. Hosts like Siteground can compete easily, and at a lower cost.
Free Expert WordPress Migration
Sometimes the only hurdle in moving your website to a better host is the hassle of the migration. I've done it so many times. Still, I wouldn't say I like it very much. Fortunately, Bluehost can arrange that for you if you have a WordPress website. Once you sign up for one of their plans, this service is available to you for free.
Here's a more detailed description with everything you need to know about the FREE migration service.
First, search for site migration in the Bluehost Marketplace and fill out the site migration form.
Bluehost has developed a WordPress plugin that will walk you through the final steps. When done, you should see a screen like this:
you will be given a link to your new site to make sure everything is working correctly. If everything is fine, you need to update your DNS settings with your registrar and you are done.
Blue Flash Launch Support
New to both Bluehost and WordPress? Bluehost makes it a breeze to get started with a special feature called Blue Flash Launch Support. This service is included in your hosting package completely free of charge. It takes the form of a professional telephone consultation with a WordPress expert.
With Blue Flash Launch Support, you can enjoy a tour of the dashboard, so you can see at a glance all the functions and options you can use for posting. During this orientation phase you will have the opportunity to get answers to your questions. Since WordPress can be daunting for new users, this saves a lot of time and makes the process of getting off the ground a lot more accessible.
During your conversation, you will quickly get your account and have the chance to choose a theme that suits the style and purpose of your site. The options that are shown to you are pre-screened based on your wishes.
The specialists with Blue Flash Launch Support will even suggest suitable plug-ins. That way, you can take advantage of everything WordPress has to offer for your needs.
The Blue Flash team is available around the clock every day of the week. That means that wherever you are, you can WordPress and get started quickly with start working on your website right away.
If you need more help with WordPress after you are done using this free service, you can sign up for WP Live support for $ 99 per month.
Domain Name Email Address
When it comes to building brand awareness and building trust and relationships in the business world, a domain name email address can go a long way. When you purchase a hosting plan from Bluehost, you have the option to sign up for your own domain name email address.
The simplest plan, Email Essentials, including emails and calendars, Outlook Web Access and 15 GB email storage. If you get the Business Plus plan, it includes the same features along with Microsoft Teams and Microsoft Office Online and 1 TB OneDrive.
The Business Pro plan adds Microsoft Office for Desktop, Access + Publisher for Desktop, Outlook Customer Manager, and booking and billing tools.
All plans automatically update your software and take advantage of the security and recovery services offered through Microsoft Office 365. A simple, easy-to-use interface makes it easy to manage your account with a single login. There is a 99.9% uptime guarantee and your plan is backed by 24/7 customer support.
In addition, you may use multiple devices to access these programs and tools. This means that wherever you are you can log in to manage your account and work on your projects.
Domain name email plans start at just a few dollars a month. This is an impressively low cost and adds significant value to your hosting plan.
eCommerce Features
It's easy to set up an online store with Bluehost, which offers many different shopping carts: Zen, Cube, Agora, and OSCommerce. You get SSL security for your transactions, a free generated certificate and Open PGP / GPG encryption.
The fact that you get unlimited storage from the Plus tier with shared hosting means you're ready to add as many products to your store as you want. Unlimited bandwidth means that your costs are stable and predictable, even if you have months when you get a lot of traffic (maybe during the holidays or while your business is growing).
The $ 200 in free marketing credits is also a great help if you're a store owner. You can use these to promote your business through Google, Facebook, Bing and Twitter.
Having said all that, Bluehost isn't exactly known for ecommerce, and some sites make it easier and faster to set up a store. But Bluehost is an economical choice, and you get access to a ton of great features to help you sell online.
Security Features
Security is one area in which Bluehost excels. You get three layers of anti-spam protection in the form of Spam Experts, Spam Hammer and Apache Spam Assassin. You also get protection for your inbox; it is easy to set filters. Your folders are all password protected.
If you need to block access to your site, you have the option to blacklist IP addresses. Another first-class feature is secure shell (SSH) access. This gives you individual and secure access to configuration files.
Bluehost also offers one-click integration with CloudFlare, which provides even more excellent security features and speeds up your site! CloudFlare is especially good at thwarting DDOS attacks. Pretty much every review I've seen on this has been positive.
You also get many options for upgrading:
Refund
Policy Bluehost covers its plans with a 30-day money-back guarantee. That means if you cancel within the first 30 days, you will get a full refund. If you choose to cancel afterwards, you will not receive a pro rata refund for the period of your hosting period that you have not used. Domain fees are non-refundable. I haven't tried to get a refund from them yet so can't say how easy it is.
Ease of use
Bluehost makes it a piece of cake to set up and manage your website. The enhanced cPanel interface is as easy to use as it gets - just click the icons to go to the desired destination.
You arrange everything with your websites and email addresses in one central place. You can change the layout of the control panel to suit your needs. That way you can quickly access your favorite functions.
Customer Service
Here's one area where Bluehost is getting mixed reviews. Many customers report positive experiences with fast, helpful and friendly customer service agents. Unfortunately, there are also many customers who say that even with countless phone calls, they couldn't get the help they needed.
Another problem with Bluehost is excessive upselling. This is a company that will happily try to sell you add-ons and upgrades, and there are many areas where you absolutely need add-ons for full functionality. That's a problem if you have a limited budget.
Who is Bluehost best suited for?
Customers looking for a reliable web host with a strong reputation. Bluehost is one of the oldest names in the business and has established trust.
WordPress customers who can pay extra to access more features and a dedicated support team of WP experts.
Owners of both large and small businesses. Bluehost is fine if you're on a budget and only want general purpose shared hosting. Beware of the upselling.
Websites Hosted by Bluehost
While Bluehost is best known for its shared hosting services, it hosts a number of highly visited websites. Here are a few examples:
https://cmsdetect.com - An excellent tool to identify the CMS of websites
https://www.velvetjobs.com - A job search website
https://pod.io - A social network with 5 million users
There are tons of others, I just picked a few that most people can relate to.
A review cannot be complete without a list of pros and cons. Here they are:
Bluehost benefits:
Most plans include unlimited disk storage, domain hosting, email addresses, and bandwidth.
You get a free domain name for one year included with your purchase.
The improved cPanel is very easy to use and provides quick access to functions.
The security features on Bluehost are nothing short of excellent.
Numerous databases are available, including MySQL, PostgreSQL, CGI-BIN, PHP, Python, Perl, Ruby on Rails and many more.
There are tons of free website scripts available, including social networking scripts, mailing lists, message forums, Joomla and Drupal, and blog support Tiki wiki.
ecommerce features are good with multiple shopping carts available and SSL security.
Most customers report that Bluehost is fast. Integrate with CloudFlare and you get even better performance.
If you can afford it, the WordPress hosting on Bluehost is considered top-notch.
Disadvantages of Bluehost:
While there are many useful add-ons available, you unfortunately have to install many to get the full functionality you need.
The customer service team receives mixed reviews.
Bluehost likes to try to up-sell its customers, which can be annoying if you're on a tight budget.
The WordPress plans, while very nice in terms of features, are also very expensive compared to plans offered by many competitors. Inmotion For example,has an excellent plan starting at just $ 2.95 per month. That's less than half the starting price for the lowest WP plan offered by Bluehost.
Conclusion
There are tons of exciting features and extras included for every price, and the diversity of plans offers a lot of flexibility for every budget. Whatever your needs, Bluehost delivers on its packages.
Despite some negative feedback, the majority of customers are quite satisfied with Bluehost's services. This company has such a strong reputation for 20 years of doing business online for a reason!
In short, Bluehost is literally one of the few that I would recommend to anyone. If you're looking for a web host with a rock-solid reputation, look no further than Bluehost. Low-cost and scalable plans let you customize your solution and be up and running in just a few moments.
Bluehost is an absolute knockout of a web hosting provider - if you can grab the occasional sale (now 50% off), that's an absolute no-brainer!
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