Published on December 24, 2018 in Business Tools & Services, Web Design.
In this Web Hosting Hub review, you'll learn about this low-cost, feature-rich web host -- and discover if they're a good fit for you. While Web Hosting Hub offers loads of features, add-ons, and great customer service, there are some downsides and drawbacks you need to be aware of. In this highly detailed and deeply researched article, you'll discover all the ins and outs of this quality web hosting company. Let's dig in!
Review Web Hosting Hub's offer and see if they're a good fit for you!
If getting big value for your money -- keeping your hosting costs as low as possible while getting the best quality service, features, and support -- then Web Hosting Hub just might be a perfect fit for you.
But before we really get rolling, here's a few important points about this Web Hosting Hub review...
First, reviews are always tricky business. Dig around a bit online, and you can easily find both glowing and sour reviews not only for Web Hosting Hub, but for any product or service. Some complaints and negative reviews are no doubt valid, but the vast majority are anecdotal and situation-specific.
On one end of the scale, some reviews shower praise and nothing but positive remarks -- no doubt in an effort to earn a high affiliate commission. On the other end of the scale, nasty and highly critical reviews often only tell half the story.
How can you know who's being fair and objective?
Well, with all my reviews (web hosting or otherwise), I work hard to be as unbiased and evenhanded as I can be. With so much junk on the web, I want to provide clear, objective information. So this Web Hosting Hub review is based entirely off my own experience as a satisfied customer for 5+ years. Is their hosting perfect? No. Do I have some negative things to share about their service? I sure do!
But the goal with this review is to detail out and weigh these pros and cons to help you determine if Web Hosting Hub will fit your needs.
Next, let's talk about how this review is structured. As you no doubt can see, this is a massive, very thorough review for Web Hosting Hub. Here's how this article has been set up: Right away, you'll get the short gist on Web Hosting Hub. We'll briefly review their features, pros, and cons. This is to give you a sort of rapid-fire overview of Web Hosting Hub.
This way, if you just want a short 'n sweet Web Hosting Hub review, you won't have to dig too far.
Then later on, to give you even more detail, we dig deeper and take a much closer look at everything Web Hosting Hub offers -- their hosting plans, their pricing, services, and more.
So while you're more than welcome to read this entire review from top to bottom, I certainly encourage you to scan, skip, and jump around. Use this article's table of contents to navigate to specific sections that interest you most. I'll leave some links here and there to help you get around, too. Or yet another option is to navigate by price or by features.
And in a few spots, you'll see that I might repeat a piece of information or two. This is simply for completeness -- to ensure you have all the information you need.
Really, this isn't an article so much as it is a reference guide to everything Web Hosting Hub offers!
And if you want my overall impression of Web Hosting Hub, you might want to skip down to the section, My Personal Experience With Web Hosting Hub, where I give my final verdict.
Finally, a quick word of warning as you're checking out web hosting reviews and comparing web hosts online. Web Hosting Hub's main competitors are other low-cost web hosts like HostGator, Bluehost, GoDaddy, and others. Without going into detail here, there are growing problems with many of these competitors. Many are riddled with customer service issues, performance problems, and worse.
This is one of the reasons why I've worked so hard to find the best web hosting that's currently available.
And I'm only mentioning this here because I know you're on the lookout for solid, reliable hosting for your website. If you'd like to learn more about low-quality web hosts and some of the shenanigans that go on in the web hosting industry, check out my post, Cheap Web Hosting – Best Recommendations And Who To Avoid. No matter which web hosting company you go with, just make sure to do your research! And that, of course, is what this review is all about!
So now more directly, is Web Hosting Hub right for you? The answer to that question is a solid maybe! The main objective of this Web Hosting Hub review is to help determine if they're gonna be a good fit for you or not.
Maybe they are...but maybe they aren't...
Let's find out!
Alright, let's dive into your Web Hosting Hub review. As mentioned, this first section will give you the gist on what they're all about. Let's get going...
Founded in 2010 by it's larger parent company, InMotion Hosting, Web Hosting Hub is headquartered in Virginia Beach, Virginia, where they maintain a staff of over 200 customer service and technical support experts.
What sets Web Hosting Hub apart from other low-cost hosting companies is that they specialize in offering just one kind of hosting: shared web hosting. Shared hosting is a type of web hosting where groups of websites are stored together on a single web server, where they share resources. This helps keep costs low for Web Hosting Hub's 40,000+ websites and customers they serve.
And for most websites, shared hosting is just fine. This type of hosting usually offers more than enough resources to keep sites running smoothly.
Web Hosting Hub offers three plans to fit your needs.
Web Hosting Hub provides a simplified, easy to use platform which is perfect for those who are new to web design, or for those running smaller to medium-sized web projects. And unlike other companies offering shared hosting, Web Hosting Hub doesn't oversell their plans and cram websites onto just a few web servers. Instead, they're focused on performance, reliability, and customer satisfaction.
This makes Web Hosting Hub a solid choice for smaller and mid-range websites.
However, if you think you might need more resources, or that your website might grow beyond straightforward shared hosting, then consider going with a web host that offers scalability. Take a look at SiteGround, or consider Web Hosting Hub's parent company InMotion Hosting. Another great option is A2 Hosting.
But, if you have modest hosting needs and are just getting your feet wet with web design, online business, and web hosting, Web Hosting Hub is a great place to start. Once you're comfortable with web design and have gained some skills, you can always transfer your site to a more flexible platform like the aforementioned SiteGround or InMotion Hosting.
Now, let me hit you with some rapid-fire details...
Web Hosting Hub is a solid hosting option for beginners and smaller online projects and business websites that don't expect massive growth.
Web Hosting Hub's superior customer service and tech support give customers peace of mind knowing that their website is in good hands. Someone is always available around the clock via telephone or live chat.
If you think Web Hosting Hub is a good fit for you, my recommendation is to go with their second plan, Nitro. This is the plan I use. To me, the Nitro plan provides the best value -- it's a good balance between cost and features. With my Nitro plan, I run multiple websites and online projects from a single hosting account, and can do all the testing and fiddling around that I want. It's a great choice.
The loads of add-ons that Web Hosting Hub includes (SSLs, their visual website builder, etc) are definitely useful, worthwhile, and welcome additions. The paid data backups are a kick in the pants, but again, we'll dig into this issue later on.
Review Web Hosting Hub's offer, and you'll find they pack in loads of features and extras to help you get the most out of your hosting.
And try not to be too turned off by Web Hosting Hub's...let's say less-than-forthright pricing model. This is actually a pretty common practice in the web hosting industry. For example, SiteGround has a similar pricing strategy: They advertise their lowest-cost hosting at just $3.95/mo. But first, just like Web Hosting Hub, the shortest hosting term they offer is one year (so, you'll be asked for $47.40 at checkout). And second, this low monthly price is good only for the first year. After that, SiteGround's pricing jumps up to $11.95/mo or $143.40 per year. Yeeesh!
Compare this to Web Hosing Hub's lowest-cost plan with a one year term coming in at $83.88 per year. There are of course other attributes to weigh beyond price (extras, plan limitations, etc.), but just keep all this in mind.
But for the time being, is this pricing structure honest? I think concealing pricing is never good. But the odd thing is, their prices are actually very competitive -- so there's no need for Web Hosting Hub to be anything less than transparent. Meanwhile, the take-away for you is to watch out for this sorta stuff, because again, it's common in this industry.
Now all that said, if your biggest concerns are solid customer support, security and reliability, and pricing, then Web Hosting Hub is the best host I can recommend. In my experience, Web Hosting Hub is the best low-cost shared hosting company available.
So that's your Web Hosting Hub review from thirty thousand feet. I hope I was able to provide enough information to help you get started. But admittedly, up until this point, this review's been brief.
But at this point, you could have enough to go on to decide if Web Hosting Hub is right for you. However, I'd like to dig even deeper into the specifics of what Web Hosting Hub is offering. Below, we'll take a detailed look at their service.
Are ya up for it? Then let's keep digging!
Get quick answers to the most frequently asked Web Hosting Hub questions!
Who is Web Hosting Hub a good fit for? Web Hosting Hub is a great fit for beginners and those new to web design and online business. Their hosting solutions are also a perfect for small to medium-sized businesses, blogs, and personal websites.
What kinds of hosting does Web Hosting Hub offer? Web Hosting Hub specializes in offering low-cost, feature-rich shared web hosting. If you're not clear on what shared hosting is, imagine it's like a hotel or an apartment complex. While everyone has their own private space, many people share just a few resources (like the pool, laundry facilities, meeting rooms, etc).
For small and medium-sized websites, shared hosting is just fine. But if your website outgrows your plan, you'll need to think about migrating to a more scalable web host, like InMotion Hosting or SiteGround.
Where is Web Hosting Hub based? Web Hosting Hub is located in Virginia Beach, Virginia, with data centers in Washington, DC and Los Angeles.
What's the cheapest web hosting plan Web Hosting Hub offers? The lowest cost plan on a one-year term that Web Hosting Hub offers is their Spark plan, coming in at $83.88 per year. We review Web Hosting Hub's plans right here.
What's Web Hosting Hub's refund policy? Web Hosting Hub has a 90-day money-back guarantee -- that's the most generous refund policy I've seen from a web hosting company! I go into detail about Web Hosting Hub's refund policy here.
What payment methods does Web Hosting Hub accept? Web Hosting Hub accepts all major credit cards, debit cards, purchase orders, and checks.
What's included for free with Web Hosting Hub's plans? Every Web Hosting Hub plan includes a free domain name for the first year, unlimited storage and bandwidth, a free SSL certificate, unlimited email accounts, access to Web Mail, cPanel control interface, free access to Web Hosting Hub's BoldGrid visual website builder, parked domains, sub domains, up to three free website migrations, free SSH access, and $150 in advertising credits. We go into plenty of detail about each of these later on.
What are Web Hosting Hub's bandwidth and disk space limitations? Web Hosting Hub advertises unlimited bandwidth and storage space on all of its hosting plans. However, Web Hosting Hub has a "fair use" policy when it comes to disk space usage and bandwidth, which I go into detail about right here.
What additional features or services does Web Hosting Hub offer? In addition to shared hosting and the free features the come with each hosting plan, Web Hosting Hub also offers priority website migration, automated website backups, web design services, dedicated SSL certificates, and dedicated IP addresses. Learn more about these extras here.
What customer support options does Web Hosting Hub provide? Web Hosting Hub provides 24/7 customer and technical support from it's US-based staff. Support options include live chat, telephone, Skype, and support ticket submission. Further, their website hosts a searchable Help Center, Web Hosting Guides, a Community Q&A section, and Learning Corner. I review Web Hosting Hub's customer service and technical support right here.
Can I use FTP with Web Hosting Hub? Yes, absolutely. You can use any FTP application of your choice to connect to your Web Hosting Hub website. I have a step-by-step tutorial on this over here.
Do I have to use WordPress with Web Hosting Hub? No. You can run any number of web building platforms in addition to WordPress. For instance, you can also run a Joomla or Moodle website with Web Hosting Hub, or build your site with traditional HTML and CSS.
In fact, I have a hands-on tutorial that shows you how to build a web layout using HTML and CSS on Web Hosting Hub right here.
Can I choose my data center location? Yes. During sign up, you can choose between Web Hosting Hub's Washington, DC or Los Angeles data centers.
Does Web Hosting Hub offer free site migration? Yes. Website migration (transferring an existing website from one web host to Web Hosting Hub's servers) is for up to three sites at no cost. Find out more about Web Hosting Hub's site migration here.
What back-end control panel does Web Hosting Hub provide? Every Web Hosting Hub plan comes with cPanel, an industry-standard, easy to use control interface. We briefly tour through cPanel later on.
Does Web Hosting Hub provide one-click auto-installers? Yes. Each Web Hosting Hub plan includes Softaculous, an application installer. Softaculous offers easy to use auto-installers for hundreds of popular web applications, including WordPress, Drupal, PrestaShop, and many more. Get a tour of Softaculous here.
Is Web Hosting Hub worth the cost? If you're just getting started in web design, want to keep costs low, but also want a range of top-level features and options, then Web Hosting Hub is the best shared hosting option available!
Other low-cost shared web hosting companies are fraught with customer service and tech support problems. I write about this here. Meanwhile, Web Hosting Hub remains independent, offering superior service at a price that's tough to beat.
Let's start by taking a closer look at Web Hosting Hub's hosting plans and pricing. Web Hosting Hub offers three straightforward, easy to understand plans: Spark, Nitro, and Dynamo. And of course, all three are shared web hosting plans.
Let's take a closer look at what Web Hosting Hub's three plans entail. Note that all prices are in US dollars.
Let's start with their first plan, Spark. Targeted towards beginners or those with few needs, the Spark plan comes in at $6.99/month (don't be fooled by their advertised $4.99 price tag -- that only applies if you sign up to a 3-year term. We'll look at Web Hosting Hub's pricing in more detail shortly.)
The Spark plan also comes with a free domain name (although I strongly recommend you register your domain name separately from your web hosting, which we'll discuss later).
The Spark plan allows you to run up to two websites from a single hosting plan, maintain up to ten MySQL databases (most often used to run WordPress websites), have a maximum of five parked domains, and hold up to twenty-five sub-domains.
If your web hosting needs are straightforward and you want to get your website online fast, then Web Hosting Hub's Spark plan could be for you.
Reviewing Web Hosting Hub's Spark plan, it just may be a good fit for you.
So here's the gist on the Spark plan: $4.99-$6.99 per month (depending on the term you select); Maximum number of two websites, ten MySQL databases, five parked domains, and twenty-five sub-domains. Not bad!
The next plan up is Web Hosting Hub's Nitro plan. This plan is targeted towards online business websites and those looking for a little bit more power out of their hosting. Pricing starts at $8.99/month for a one year term (again, watch those terms).
The Nitro plan supports an unlimited number of websites (a big perk!), and an unlimited number of MySQL databases, parked domains, and sub-domains. This plan also advertises a 2x performance boost over the previous Spark plan, and (if you need it) a 20% discount on Web Hosting Hub's web design services.
If you want a little more oomph out of your hosting plan, then Web Hosting Hub's Nitro plan might be a good fit.
Looking for power and flexibility? Web Hosting Hub's Nitro plan might be just right!
Here's the gist on the Nitro plan: $6.99-$8.99 (depending on the term); Unlimited number of websites, MySQL databases, parked domains, and sub-domains. Plus, the Nitro plan boasts a 2x performance boost over the smaller Spark plan. This is the plan I use with Web Hosting Hub -- it's solid!
Finally, let's look at Web Hosting Hub's third and biggest plan, Dynamo. This plan features everything their Nitro plan offers (so, unlimited websites, MySQL databases, parked domains, and sub-domains). But, this plan also boasts 4x the performance of the other two plans, and a 30% discount on web design services.
Now whether this plan's performance is actually four-times faster than the other plans would need to be independently tested. But, if performance is a priority for you, then this plan could fit the bill.
If it's performance you're after, take a look at Web Hosting Hub's Dynamo plan!
Here's the gist on Web Hosting Hub's Dynamo plan: $8.99-$10.99 (depending on your term); Like the Nitro plan, run unlimited number of websites, MySQL databases, parked domains, and sub-domains. Additionally, it boasts a 4x performance boost. Very good!
So that's an overview of Web Hosting Hub's three shared hosting plans. Now let's take a closer look at Web Hosting Hub's pricing and what they're offering...
Alright, we've taken a broad look at Web Hosting Hub's three plans, Spark, Nitro, and Dynamo. Now, let's take a closer look at what they're offering. I'd like to start with the biggest gripe I have with Web Hosting Hub -- how they present their pricing.
If there's one major criticism I have against Web Hosting Hub, it's that they disguise their pricing in order to advertise it as if it's lower than it might actually be. They do this on their website by setting each plan's term to three years by default. This lowers the per-month pricing that's displayed for each plan.
And if you didn't catch this, you might be in for a surprise during the checkout and signup process.
Not catching the default 3-year term, you might be in for a shock at checkout.
To me, this just feels a bit...sneaky. At a glance, you might be amazed at Web Hosting Hub's rock-bottom prices. It isn't until you get to their checkout page where you realize you're going to get charged a whole lot more than you may have thought.
You might feel like you've been tricked.
And frankly, I don't think this is good business practice. It isn't a good idea to try to pull one over on your customers. I'd wager that Web Hosting Hub's checkout page has a huge exit or abandoned rate -- people see a price that's much bigger than they were expecting, then feel either duped, shocked, or angry (or any combination of these) and abruptly leave.
And, another strike against Web Hosting Hub's pricing model is that the shortest term that's available is one year.
Rather than using these sly pricing tactics, why can't Web Hosting Hub simply be completely upfront about their pricing?
Here's what we offer. Here's the cost. Here's how you benefit.
Simple.
On the other hand (and not to defend Web Hosting Hub's pricing tactic) but these kinds of pricing strategies are widely practiced throughout the web hosting industry. Web Hosting Hub isn't the only company disguising their pricing. It doesn't make it right...but just know that it's common. For instance, another web host I use and recommend, SiteGround, uses the same tactic -- advertising a low monthly hosting fee, but requiring you to sign up for a minimum of one year in order to get it.
If you're brand new to web design and this is the first time you're signing up for web hosting, you might be turned off by these pricing games. And I can completely understand why -- not only is web hosting complex (web servers and techie stuff -- yaakk!) but now they're throwing pricing curve balls too?
I get how you might be feeling.
But for those of us who have been around the web design block many (many) times, this pricing stuff isn't a surprise at all. In fact, it's expected. It's just how the industry works.
With Web Hosting Hub specifically, they're a solid, reputable company whose prices are competitive. They're offering a lot of value with their hosting plans, so in my opinion, there's no need for them to be anything less than fully transparent and up front with their pricing.
In short, their indirect, less-than-transparent pricing model isn't necessary...and only serves to taint an otherwise fantastic company.
Anyway, whether it's Web Hosting Hub or another hosting company you're considering, just pay close attention to their offer and how their terms work.
And there is good news -- there is a silver lining to Web Hosting Hub's pricing model. In fact, it relates to how they offset some of the downsides of their pricing structure...
To minimize the two negatives related to their pricing model (setting the terms to three years in order to advertise low monthly pricing, and making one year their shortest term), Web Hosting Hub offers a very generous 90-day money-back guarantee.
This is the longest, most generous, money-back guarantee I've seen from any web hosting company in all my...geeze...twenty-odd years in this industry. As I say, this helps make up for some of the downsides of their pricing model. We'll take a closer look at the specifics of Web Hosting Hub's money-back guarantee a little later.
For now, let's take a closer look at Web Hosting Hub's pricing...
With Web Hosting Hub's less than transparent pricing out of the way (again, this is the biggest knock I have against them -- and I hope you're not too turned off...they're otherwise a great company), let's now take a closer look at their pricing.
Here's a complete breakdown...
To start, we've already gone over Web Hosting Hub's three plans, Spark, Nitro, and Dynamo. And, we know that the minimum term is one year. But, here's a complete breakdown of their pricing by plan and term (again, all prices are in US dollars):
Spark: 1 year, $6.99/month ($83.88 at checkout); 2 years, $5.99/month ($143.76 at checkout); 3 years, $4.99/month ($179.64 at checkout)
Nitro: 1 year, $8.99/month ($107.88 at checkout); 2 years, $7.99/month ($191.76 at checkout); 3 years, $6.99/month ($251.64 at checkout)
Dynamo: 1 year, $10.99/month ($131.88 at checkout); 2 years, $9.99/month ($239.76 at checkout); 3 years, $8.99/month ($323.64 at checkout)
Of these plans and available terms, you'll have to decide which one best fits your needs and budget. At a few points, I've suggested their Nitro plan as being the best value -- that's the plan I'm on.
Next let's take a look at Web Hosting Hub's pricing for other services and add-ons that they offer...
Let's start with domain names. As mentioned earlier, Web Hosting Hub offers a free domain name for the first year on all of it's plans. After the first year, your domain renewal costs are $15.99 per year.
Here's what Web Hosting Hub's Terms Of Service has to say about this...
"When your web hosting account renews, the applicable then-current pricing will be applied to your account (currently, domain registration is $15.99/year)."
Now for several reasons, I strongly recommend you avoid registering your domain name with Web Hosting Hub (or any web hosting company for that matter). Instead, go with an independent domain name registrar like NameCheap -- even if you're being offered a free domain! We'll go into more detail as to why I'm making this recommendation in just a bit.
Next, what about other web hosting add-ons, like data backups, SSL, and other extras?
Data backups are available on all plans, but will set you back $1 per month. Site backups are a hugely important issue, one that you'll definitely want to spend some time thinking about and sorting out. On the one hand, Web Hosting Hub's offer to back up your site as a paid add-on leaves a bit of a bad taste. After all, many web hosts throw in data backups for free.
So in a way, at just a dollar a month, it feels like we're being nickel and dimed.
In fact, I'd gladly trade Web Hosting Hub's free domain name offer (costing $15 per year after the first year) for free data backups (costing $12 per year) -- I'd make that trade in a heartbeat! It would be nice if, during signup, Web Hosting Hub would give us the option -- either a free domain name or free data backups. Anyway...
So you'll have to decide for yourself if an extra $12 per year is worth the peace of mind of having site back ups -- and you know, maybe it is. After all, it's only $12.
But alternatively, maybe you decide to handle site backups yourself (either manually via FTP or if your site's running WordPress, through a plugin). Then, you could put the $12 per year you would have spent on Web Hosting Hub's data backups into registering your domain name independently.
Whatever you decide to do here, just spend a bit of time figuring out how you'll handle your site's backups. And believe me you'll want to have some kind of website backup system in place! Bad stuff happens all the time. An intern trips over a cable, hackers descend on your site, a family of possums make a nest in your web server -- who knows!
Just remember, the unthinkable is always within the realm of possibility!
What about SSL certificates? Do you know what these are? An SSL certificate simply encrypts the connection between your visitor's web browser and your web server. While not absolutely, critically essential, I strongly recommend you have an SSL certificate installed on your website.
If you're interested, I go into more detail about SSL certificates in another post.
The good news is, every Web Hosting Hub plan comes with a free SSL certificate, which should be adequate for most small and medium-sized websites. However, if you want even tougher security, you can optionally purchase a dedicated SSL certificate for your site for $99.99 per year, plus a one-time installation fee of $25.
You'll have to decide for yourself if you think a dedicated SSL is worth the extra cost for your site. My thoughts on the issue are, if you're running a small to medium-sized site, you're probably fine without a dedicated SSL certificate. But if you're running a larger site or any kind of site where you're accepting payments from customers -- or if you simply want that extra peace of mind -- going with a dedicated SSL certificate is a good idea.
If you'd like your site to run on a dedicated IP address, rather than sharing an IP address with other websites, you can certainly do so. Purchasing a dedicated IP address through Web Hosting Hub runs you $48 per year.
Do you need a dedicated IP address for your site? I'll offer the same advice as I did with SSL certificates: If you're running a small to medium-sized site, you're likely fine without a dedicated IP. If you're running a larger site with more traffic and you want that extra peace of mind, ponying up for a dedicated IP address is probably a good idea.
Switching gears a bit, something else we should discuss is Web Hosting Hub's in-house web design services. If you're interested in making use of these services, you can take advantage of their QuickStarter One Page Website option for a one-time fee of $99.
Unfortunately, I can't speak at all about this service, it's quality, or offer any kind of direction, because I've never used it. But, if you need a jump-start with your website's design, you could certainly consider this option.
Finally, let's take a look at costs for transferring a website to Web Hosting Hub. Web Hosting Hub offers up to three website migration for websites up to 5gb in size. This is offered at no cost on all their hosting plans. This makes it very easy to move your existing site to Web Hosting Hub.
However, you can take advantage of their Priority Website Transfer feature, which will set you back $29.99. This option expedites the website transfer process, speeding up your site's migration. This is helpful if your website transfer is time-sensitive or of an urgent nature.
We'll talk more about Web Hosting Hub's site migration options later on.
But for now, that about wraps up our detailed look at Web Hosting Hub's pricing. Overall, the prices for Web Hosting Hub's hosting plans and additional services are inline with (and in fact in some cases even better than) other web hosts offering shared hosting.
Web Hosting Hub's pricing is competitive, and they're offering a lot of value. The biggest downside overall with their pricing, as we've discussed already, is those less-than-clear pricing tactics.
But don't forget, this pricing issue is offset by Web Hosting Hub's very generous 90-day money-back guarantee -- a guarantee that's unmatched (to my knowledge) in the web hosting industry.
So we have this giant, generous, money-back guarantee from Web Hosting Hub. So despite the issues I have with their pricing, Web Hosting Hub is giving you three months to try them out to see if they're a good fit for you.
That's pretty amazing!
Compare Web Hosting Hub's refund policy to the money-back guarantees from two other web hosts I use and recommend, SiteGround and WP Engine: SiteGround offers a standard 30-day money-back policy (pretty meh), while WP Engine provides a more generous 60-day refund policy.
I've said it a few times already, and I'll say it again: I've never seen a more generous refund policy from a web hosting company.
And during your...let's call it a 90-day trial, you'll have full access to all of your hosting plan's options, features, and add-ons. So you'll have plenty of time to decide if Web Hosting Hub is right for you or not.
So while a minimum one-year sign-up is required with Web Hosting Hub, I think they've more than made up for it with their hefty refund policy.
And if you're still feeling a bit uneasy over Web Hosting Hub's minimum one-year pricing policy, consider this: As I eluded to earlier when I called it a 90-day trial, think of it as a test drive -- you get to use and review Web Hosting Hub and their services for three of those twelve months before deciding to continue with them or not.
That's more than fair!
And to me, you can tell when a company really stands behind their product or service by the refund policy they offer. A bold and prominently advertised refund policy implies a company's confidence in what they're offering. A weak refund policy that's buried somewhere in the fine print implies that they aren't confident at all in what they're selling.
In this instance, Web Hosting Hub is bold and up front about their guarantee. That gives me confidence that I'm in good hands.
Now there are a few minor caveats to Web Hosting Hub's refund policy which I should point out: It's important to note that domain name registration fees and dedicated SSL certificates are non-refundable -- they're not included in Web Hosting Hub's 90-day refund policy. These aren't critical, but I thought it was worth mentioning.
Beyond these minor details, you've got loads of peace of mind with Web Hosting Hub.
Give 'em a spin and see if you like 'em!
Now next, let's take a detailed look at the features, extras, and add-ons that each Web Hosting Hub plan includes...
Okay now, here's a look at what all plans from Web Hosting Hub come with. Certainly feel free to skip to parts that most interest you.
Let's get the big matzah ball out of the way first...
Each plan from Web Hosting Hub boasts unlimited storage and bandwidth. To really understand this, first let's get some definitions cleared up.
Storage means disk space -- how much physical storage space you have available for your website. And Bandwidth refers to the amount of data that can be transferred to your visitors.
So here, Web Hosting Hub is advertising unlimited storage and bandwidth...that's a lot!
But here's what's interesting: If you dig into Web Hosting Hub's Terms Of Service, you discover that when they say unlimited, what they really mean is unlimited within reason.
I'll go into more detail about this in a bit, but in short, despite advertising an unlimited amount of bandwidth and storage, Web Hosting Hub takes a "fair use" approach. Neither storage or bandwidth are really unlimited. That said, Web Hosting Hub provides more than enough disk space and bandwidth for most website owners.
So why do they advertise "unlimited" when they don't really mean unlimited? Marketing, mostly.
But assuming you won't be doing anything too nutty...like serving 3-hour video documentaries shot in 1080p or transmitting weather pattern data to low-orbit satellites or anything...you very likely won't run into any problems.
Again, Web Hosting Hub's fair use policy is more than suitable for most websites.
Next, as mentioned once or twice already, Web Hosting Hub includes a free domain name with all plans for the first year. It's a nice way for them to sweeten their offer.
Many people like keeping their essential web services (specifically, their domain name, web hosting, and their website's email) all under one roof with the same service. While that's nice for convenience and simplicity, I always recommend keeping these three essential services with separate companies.
If there's ever a problem with one service, you can always quickly isolate it and make necessary changes without affecting your other two components.
So with your site's domain name specifically, I suggest going with an independent domain name registrar. I use and recommend NameCheap. I use them for all my domain names. Going with a separate registrar gives you much more control and autonomy. And longer term, it actually costs less (yes, even less than a free domain from Web Hosting Hub).
Later on, we'll take a closer look at this issue, and I'll give you a complete breakdown of domain name costs long-term.
However, if you do decide to take Web Hosting Hub up on their offer of a free domain name, remember that it's only free for the first year. After that, you'll be charged $15.95 each year to renew your domain, plus an additional $9 per year if you want WhoIs privacy protection (which I always recommend).
Truthfully, this is a bit pricey. It's more than you'd pay with NameCheap. But again, we'll do a complete cost breakdown for your domain name in a bit.
Next up, Web Hosting Hub uses solid state drives (SSDs) in all their web servers. Do you know what solid state hard drives are? Essentially, they're hard drives with no moving parts. They're much faster (up to 20x kinda faster) than traditional disk drives (HDDs) that have moving, mechanical parts.
How does Web Hosting Hub's use of SSDs affect you, and why should you care? Because this contributes to your website's overall speed, performance, and loading time. Obviously, you want your site running at it's best, and SSDs help with that.
Low-cost, economy web hosting companies cheap out on hard drives and use traditional, mechanical HDDs in their web servers. So while you might save a few bucks a month on hosting by going with a cheaper host, the performance of your site is gonna suffer.
Next, let's talk about Web Hosting Hub's free SSL certificate. Recall earlier that we discussed SSL -- you learned that an SSL certificate protects information that's being passed between your visitor's web browser and your website.
And again, as a reminder, while SSL isn't absolutely critical, it's a very good idea to have it installed and running on your website. The Chrome web browser is now notifying users of unsecured websites, and SSL can even impact your SEO.
And the good news is that the free SSL certificate you get with Web Hosting Hub is very simple to install. In fact, you can install an SSL certificate yourself with just a few mouse clicks via your Account Management Panel in Web Hosting Hub. This is the control panel you'll have once you sign up with Web Hosting Hub. You'll get a tour of the Account Management Panel a little later on, and you'll see exactly where you can go to install your free SSL.
And of course, if you ever get stuck trying to set up SSL on your website, Web Hosting Hub's tech support is there to happily assist you.
And as mentioned earlier, if you'd like an additional level of security for your website, you can opt for a dedicated SSL certificate. A dedicated SSL costs $99.99 per year, plus a one-time installation fee of $25.
Alright now next, each Web Hosting Hub plan includes email for your website -- so you@yourdomain.com
, info@yourdomain.com
, or any other domain-based email account you'd like to set up. In fact, each plan allows you to create an unlimited number of email accounts for your website.
Further, you'll also have full, secure access to your website's email via Web Mail, or by routing your email through POP3 or IMAP, say, to your Gmail account, desktop email client, or onto your smartphone.
Regarding email storage, Web Hosting Hub provides a very reasonable amount of storage space. However in their Terms Of Service, it states...
"(Web Hosting Hub) provides IMAP mail services to its customers, however we do not directly monitor size. Customers are responsible for making sure their inboxes do not reach unreasonable sizes and that the number of messages stored on their accounts does not exceed 10,000 messages or 2GB in size."
So, just keep that in mind should you want to use Web Hosting Hub's included email service.
But as you might guess, I'm not a fan of using web hosted email, even if it's free. As I've mentioned a few times, I believe it's much more secure to separate your three critical web services (domain name, hosting, and email) from one another.
Again, if these three services are separate, if one goes down, the other two remain functional until you can fix the problem.
By using an independent email service that's completely separate from your web hosting, your primary mode of communication -- your website's email -- is isolated from your website itself. Should something bad ever happen to your website -- a data loss, you get hacked, your website goes down for a period of time, etc. -- you'll still be able to communicate.
This is especially important if you serve a large audience or run an online business.
Alternatively, if your website's email is bundled into your website, and your website goes down (again, for any reason), guess what happens to your website's email? You guessed it, it goes down too. It could be hours, days, or in rare cases, weeks before you might have email access again.
The likelihood of something bad happening is low, but it does happen. My thoughts are to take as many steps as budget (and reason) allow to keep your website safe.
If you'd like some email hosting recommendations, check out either Google G Suite (who I use) or Microsoft Office 365.
But, if you're just running a small website and maybe have a tight budget, bundling your website's email with your hosting could be what's best for you.
We can discuss the best way to set up your website's email in another post.
Moving on, every hosting plan offered by Web Hosting Hub comes with cPanel, an industry-standard control interface that allows you to manage your hosting account, website, and add-ons.
For instance, you can easily set up email accounts, FTP access, access files directly on your web server, and much more, all through an easy to use point-and-click interface.
But the most versatile component of cPanel (and likely most interesting to you) is something called Softaculous. Softaculous is a built-in application auto-installer. Inside Softaculous, you can easily install applications like WordPress, Magento, Moodle, and hundreds of other website builders, platforms, and add-ons.
Forums, shopping carts, advertising platforms...it's all in there! And again, everything is point-and-click. No programming or web development skills needed. It's pretty freakin' cool!
We'll take a much closer look at cPanel and Softaculous later on.
Here's something that isn't common with web hosts at this price-point: When you sign up with Web Hosting Hub, you'll be able to choose your data center. The data center is where your website will be physically stored.
Web Hosting Hub currently has two data centers, one on the East coast, in Washington DC, and another on the West coast, in Los Angeles.
Now truthfully, with the kind of website you'll be running on a shared hosting plan like the ones offered by Web Hosting Hub -- likely smaller to medium-sized sites with modest traffic -- the data center and physical location of your website doesn't really matter a whole lot.
The physical location of your website does have an impact on your website's overall performance -- especially for your overseas visitors. This is why more advanced web hosts like SiteGround have data centers all over the world. But with just two US-based data centers to choose from, it doesn't make a huge difference which one you choose.
But since Web Hosting Hub is giving you the option, it is a nice perk. During sign-up, when asked which data center you'd like to house your website with, I suggest simply choosing the location that's physically closest to you.
And if you live in Shawnee, Oklahoma (the exact halfway point between Washington and LA -- thanks Google Maps!), well then...maybe flip a coin, do eenie-meenie, or throw a dart at a map...
Point is, it's a nice option to have, but don't get too hung up on it!
Now interestingly, on Web Hosting Hub's plans page, they list choice if data center as being unavailable for their smallest plan, Spark. But if I select this plan and begin the checkout process, I'm given the option to choose which data center I'd like -- just as I would on their other two plans.
Maybe this is an oversight on Web Hosting Hub's part...or maybe they just don't care...because again, this isn't anything too critical.
Now of more interest is Web Hosting Hub's proprietary visual website builder, BoldGrid. It's included at no extra cost on all plans.
Truth be told, I've known about BoldGrid for years, but never really bothered looking into it. Yeah, yeah...just another website builder, I'd think, as I busily went about building websites in my preferred way. I never bothered looking further into it or trying it out.
That is, until I began my research for this article. Upon closer inspection, BoldGrid actually looks pretty darn good. Maybe not quite as powerful (and certainly not as popular) as Elementor, but still. And it's completely free, don't forget.
BoldGrid is a drag 'n drop page builder that runs on WordPress, allowing you to easily build beautiful, fully-responsive and mobile-ready layouts with ease. And, it comes loaded with tons of free themes and templates.
This means you can jump in and get building your website right away. And, you have full access to all those themes and templates to speed up the web design process. Pretty awesome!
BoldGrid might just be what you're looking for if you're just getting started in the world of web design. Having it included for free is a very nice touch.
Alright next up in our Web Hosting Hub review we have parked domains and sub domains. Depending on which Web Hosting Hub plan you choose, you'll be able to make use of each of these. But first, let's first get some definitions out of the way...
Parked domains allow you to point more than one domain name to a single website. For example, you could point yourcompany.com
and yourcompany.online
to the same website. That's all a parked domain is.
Sub domains are often used in marketing. They're simply domain name prefixes that can be added to your website's root URL. For example, you might use blog.yourcompany.com
or bonus.yourcompany.com
.
With a little creativity, you can use both parked domains and sub domains to help drive traffic to your website and run promotions.
On Web Hosting Hub's smallest plan, Spark, you can use five parked domains and twenty five sub domains respectively. Web Hosting Hub's other two plans, Nitro and Dynamo, allow for an unlimited number of parked domains and sub domains.
Think about how you might use parked domains and sub domains on your website.
Next, we have website migrations. A website migration is simply moving a website from an existing host to Web Hosting Hub's servers.
Each Web Hosting Hub plan includes up to three website transfers up to 5gb in size, allowing you to migrate an existing website to Web Hosting Hub's servers at no extra cost. This is fantastic if you're switching over from an existing web host. It makes the entire process of moving over to Web Hosting Hub a breeze -- let them do all the heavy lifting and handle all the technical stuff for you!
Typically, website migrations take between one and four business days to complete. And, Web Hosting Hub has a zero downtime guarantee during the migration, meaning your site won't go offline during the transfer process.
Now if you need your site transferred more urgently, you can take advantage of Web Hosting Hub's Priority Website Transfer. More on that in the next section, below.
Next, we have SSH access. From Web Hosting Hub's website...
"SSH access allows for a user to access their server using command line. It allows for an easier workflow and faster management than a graphical user interface is able to provide."
Alright, then...techie-sounding stuff and some tricky grammar! Now, I don't have much use for this kinda thing myself, but who knows, maybe you do. Either way, every Web Hosting Hub comes with free SSH access, so I'm including it here. Who knows, maybe this is of interest to you. But as I say, for my own processes and workflows, I have no need for SSH.
Finally, every hosting plan comes with $150 in bonus advertising credits that you can use with popular ad platforms. Specifically, what's included is $100 in ad credits with Yahoo or Bing, and $50 in credits with Amazon Product Ads. Also included is a free business listing on YP.com (Yellow Pages).
I don't know about you, but I'm not too terribly interested in this. Once again, it might be a nice perk, but if I'm going to run a full-on paid ad campaign, it's going to be through Facebook and Google (at least, as it stands now). So I don't have a whole lot of interest in this. But, maybe you do.
These advertising freebies are found in your Account Management Panel, which we'll discuss later on.
Alright, so there's a review of Web Hosting Hub's features -- everything that comes with each hosting plan, no matter the price tier.
However, Web Hosting Hub also offers extra paid services and add-ons in addition to what's included with each of their hosting plans. Let's take a look...
On top of the features that are included with each web hosting tier from Web Hosting Hub, you can also take advantage of some additional services and add-ons that they offer. Here, we'll review each...
As mentioned in the previous section, every Web Hosing Hub plan comes with up to three free website transfers. This is just fine for most website owners.
However, if your site migration is more urgent and time-sensitive, you can make use of Web Hosting Hub's Priority Website Transfer option. This will give you priority positioning in Web Hosting Hub's website transfer queue. But in order to do so, you'll have to pony up $29.99.
This was brought up earlier, but in case you missed it, let's address it here: Website backups are available on all Web Hosting Hub plans. However, you're gonna get dinged $1 per month to add this option to your hosting.
In many ways, it feels like a kick in the pants -- after all, it's just a buck a month...but this is a service that other competing web hosting companies throw in for free. So you'll have to decide if this is a worthwhile option for you or not.
Alternatively, you could look after your site backups yourself, often for free.
The trick with website backups is that you have to remember to do them (!) and it's best to store them on in a location that's separate from your website. If you're running a WordPress site, you can tackle both of these challenges with a plugin that automates your website backups and saves them to Amazon S3, Google Drive, DropBox, or some other location.
Alternatively, you could handle your website backups manually, say via FTP. But the problem here is that it's labour-intensive...and you have to remember to actually do them.
So again, you'll have to decide what's best for you. At just $12 per year, maybe it's worth the extra piece of mind for you to know that your site's being backed up. Or, maybe you could go with both options -- go for Web Hosting Hub's paid backup option and set up automated backups for your site as a failsafe. After all, you can never have too many backups!
Whatever you decide, spend a bit of time thinking about how you'll handle your website backups. As a recommendation, I'd suggest daily backups if you can. That way, you're covered in the event of a site crash, getting hacked, a misbehaving plugin...asteroid strikes, plagues of locusts...you know, the usual stuff!
These events are rare, but having a recent backup makes an otherwise catastrophic event painless.
Next, you can take advantage of Web Hosting Hub's optional in-house custom website design service. A web hosting company offering design services strikes me as a bit odd, but this could be just what you're looking for -- a company that can handle everything from your domain name to your hosting, from your site's email to website design.
If you'd like to use this service, Web Hosting Hub's QuickStarter One Page Website option has a one-time fee of $99.
As mentioned earlier in our Web Hosting Hub review, every hosting plan being offered comes with a free basic SSL certificate. And this is just fine for most websites. However, if you want an even greater amount of security, you can purchase a dedicated SSL certificate for your website. This locks down and secures data to and from your website even further.
The cost for a dedicated SSL certificate through Web Hosting Hub is $99.99 per year, plus there's a one-time set up fee of $25.
Rather than running your website through a shared IP address, you can optionally purchase a dedicated IP. This is completely optional, though, so you'll have to decide if this is a good choice for you or not. A dedicated IP address costs $48 per year with Web Hosting Hub.
Now that we've taken a look at some of the additional services and options you can purchase through Web Hosting Hub, I'd like to take a few minutes to discuss this whole idea of "unlimited" as it's applied to bandwidth and your website's available disk space.
This is important stuff to know, so let's dig in...
Earlier on, we briefly discussed how all Web Hosting Hub plans include unlimited disk space and bandwidth...and how "unlimited" didn't exactly mean unlimited.
In our Web Hosting Hub review, I think it's important to take a moment to dissect all this.
Highlighting unlimited storage space, visitors, email addresses and so on is a fairly common practice in the web hosting industry. And truth be told, it's a marketing gimmick. I mean, after all, there are technical constraints and limitations on these kinda things.
Would Web Hosting Hub let you upload your entire movie collection to their servers and stream it to everyone in your city? Nope!
So while they advertise unlimited what they really mean is within reason.
In fact, the limitations on disk space and bandwidth is detailed in Web Hosting Hub's terms of service. There, they outline their "fair use" policy, which is more than adequate for most website owners. Specifically, Web Hosting Hub's Terms Of Service states...
"...providing CPU time, bandwidth and disk space that fits the profile of the average website running our systems" and "(Web Hosting Hub's) shared systems allow for significant bursts in activity, but resources must be shared among all clients."
And that makes sense, because as we know, Web Hosting Hub specializes in offering shared hosting, where hardware resources are shared (and therefore limited) across multiple websites. Offering more detail, Web Hosting Hub's Terms Of Service goes on to state...
"Web Hosting Hub's "Unlimited" Policy is designed for the typical needs of a personal, micro, or small business. For example, it is not intended for computationally intensive software, large file repositories, as a backup system, as a free file download system, as a data warehouse, as a video archiving site, or other uses suitable for a dedicated server."
So there it is...setting up a streaming audio service for your Boyz II Men collection is a non-option! Total bummer, I know! Now as it relates to unlimited disk space here's what Web Hosting Hub's Terms Of Service says...
"(Web Hosting Hub) will attempt to provide the disk space needed to power its customer's websites as far as is commercially reasonable. There is no arbitrary limit on the amount of data stored on an account, however the delivery of capacity is determined by availability, commercial viability, and the affect on the shared platform as a whole."
And as for unlimited bandwidth, they state...
"(Web Hosting Hub) will attempt to provide sufficient bandwidth for its customer's sites as far as is commercially viable. Excessive bandwidth usage from national media traffic or DOS attacks may result in the account being disabled without warning."
So, if you get featured on HuffPo or are hit with a DOS attack, your site may likely crash. Fair enough. But so long as you aren't doing anything too crazy, you should be just fine.
And as I'm sure you agree, slogging through Terms Of Service agreements isn't exactly fun. But I want you to be clear about exactly what Web Hosting Hub is offering, and how they handle their "fair use" policy.
So hopefully all of this has helped you to further determine if Web Hosting Hub is a good fit for you.
It's important to cover "free" domain names in this Web Hosting Hub review. As an additional bonus, when you sign up with Web Hosting Hub, they offer to include free domain name registration for the first year. But should you take them up on their offer? Or are there alternative ways to register your domain name that are even lower-cost than "free?"
Maintain complete control over your website's domain name by using an independent registrar like NameCheap.
Many web hosting companies, including Web Hosting Hub, offer to register your website's domain name as a convenience. And this makes sense -- after all, domain names and websites are closely related.
And for non-technical users, it's a welcome service. This makes setting up your website super-easy. Both your domain name and your web hosting are going to be set up simultaneously -- with all the techie stuff looked after for you.
And going forward, your domain name and your web hosting will be bundled under a single account, on one recurring bill.
So, registering your domain name with your web hosting company is definitely convenient.
And while all that might sound great (and who knows, maybe this'll be a perfect fit for you), it's important to know exactly how all this all really works -- how registering your domain name through a web hosting company gives you less control and actually costs you more money long term...even if it's advertised for free.
In order to fully understand all this -- and specifically how Web Hosting Hub is handling domain name registration, let's once again take a trip into Web Hosting Hub's Terms Of Service.
Stick with me here.
Regarding domain names, Web Hosting Hub's TOS first states...
"Qualifying web hosting purchases may include a free domain registration or transfer for the first year of service. When your web hosting account renews, the applicable then-current pricing will be applied to your account (currently, domain registration is $15.99/year)."
Alright, that's pretty clear. You get a domain name for free for the first year. And then when your account renews, you'll be charged $15.99 for each following year.
Next, Web Hosting Hub's TOS states...
"This registration agreement is between Tucows Domains Inc. ("Tucows") and you."
Wait, Tucows Domains Inc? Who the heck is Tucows?!
Why, an independent domain name registrar, that's who!
So, Web Hosting Hub is simply reselling domain name registration services on behalf of Tucows. And this is no slam against Web Hosting Hub -- many web hosting companies do exactly the same thing. It's a way to provide convenience and service to their customers.
So if you decide to register your domain name with Web Hosting Hub, you're actually registering it with an entirely different company, Tucows. Again, from a convenience standpoint, maybe you're okay with this.
But, what about the cost?
Now that we know that Tucows, not Web Hosting Hub, will be handling your domain name, let's break down the math -- the true cost -- of going with a "free" domain name from Web Hosting Hub.
What we'll do is compare costs between Web Hosting Hub (really, Tucows) and my independent domain name registrar of choice, NameCheap.
It's important to point out here (because I know you're probably wondering) that Web Hosting Hub allows you to point any domain name you've registered elsewhere to their servers.
So in my example, I'm using a .com domain name. And as always, prices are in US dollars. Here's how the cookie crumbles...
NameCheap: NameCheap costs a very simple $8.88 per year for your domain name. WhoIs privacy protection is included with all domain name registrations for free. And with NameCheap, you own and control your domain name. This means you can point your domain to any web hosting company you want, at any time you want.
So, with NameCheap, the first year costs $8.88, the second year costs $8.88, the third year costs $8,88, and on and on...
Web Hosting Hub (Tucows): With Web Hosting Hub, we know that your domain name is gonna be free for the first year. But WhoIs privacy protection costs $9. But here, do you really own and control your domain? Can you take control of it and point it to any other web host you want?
Honestly, I don't know. I doubt a reputable company like Web Hosting Hub would give you a hard time if you demanded control of your domain, but it certainly wouldn't be as simple and hassle-free as it would be with a domain registered with NameCheap.
So with Web Hosting Hub, the first year costs $9 (just WhoIs privacy protection), the second year's gonna cost $24.99 ($15.99 domain renewal fee + $9 WhoIs protection), the third year's another $24.99, and so on...
As you can see, going with a free domain name through Web Hosting Hub is actually almost three times more expensive than registering your domain name with an independent company like NameCheap. And, you have much more control over your domain and the freedom to use it as you wish.
The downside to using NameCheap is convenience. Now you have to manage two accounts and two annual bills rather than one. And, there's the technical issue of actually pointing your domain name to your web hosting account. But, as I show you in this step-by-step tutorial, it's very easy. It's simply a matter of copying and pasting.
One other thing that comes to mind is, with Web Hosting Hub, you can only register .com, .net, .org, .us, .biz, or .info domains, and WhoIs domain privacy isn't available on .us domains. With NameCheap you can register thousands of different types of domains, from .com and .net to .online, .club, and many more.
Ultimately, as I said at the beginning of this section, the choice is yours. In this Web Hosting Hub review, I'm simply trying to provide you with as much information as I can. Ultimately, you'll have to decide which is most important for you, convenience or full control.
Now, let's shift our focus to Web Hosting Hub's customer service and technical support...
Let's now discuss technical and customer support for Web Hosting Hub.
To give you an early impression, I only have positive things to say about their technical support, customer service, and the support documentation that's available on their website. They're really great.
Web Hosting Hub maintains a staff of over 200 helpful technical support agents and technicians, all based in the United States.
Web Hosting Hub offers 24/7 technical support and customer service, which is available in a variety of formats. At any time, you can open a live chat with support, hop on a live phone call, or even reach Web Hosting Hub via Skype. They also of course have a support ticket system in place as well.
What's more, loads of documentation and helpful content spread across their searchable Help Center, Community Q&A, Learning Corner, and Web Hosting Guides. All of this content is conveniently located throughout their website.
In all my years as a Web Hosting Hub customer, I've never had any problems with their customer service. The rare few times where I've had to contact them, they've been fast, professional, friendly, and very helpful. What more could you ask for?
And my experiences parallel what I've read and heard in other Web Hosting Hub reviews -- that is, glowing remarks about their customer service!
Interestingly, during your initial signup with Web Hosting Hub, you may receive a phone call from Web Hosting Hub -- as in, a real, actual human being on the other end of the phone, who's in the United States. Web Hosting Hub does this for extra security for your site, but also to help answer any questions you might have while you get yourself set up.
That, to me, is top-notch customer service!
Whether it's migrating a site, setting up web hosting for the first time, or handling a technical issue that you're unsure of, Web Hosting Hub's helpful staff is just a live chat or phone call away.
Again, I've never had any problems, issues, or negative experiences with Web Hosting Hub's support. They're what other companies should aspire to in the 21st century!
Next up, let's talk about speed, performance, and security...
Regarding Web Hosting Hub's speed and performance, let's maybe start here: If you haven't read my post, Cheap Web Hosting – Best Recommendations And Who To Avoid, be sure to check it out. As it relates to performance, what frequently winds up happening is that low-cost shared hosting companies reduce their operating expenses by overcrowding their shared resources, jamming more websites onto fewer web servers.
More websites crammed into fewer web servers means less overhead and more profit for them...and slower-performing websites for customers like you and I.
Thankfully, I've never heard or experienced Web Hosting Hub overcrowding or over-taxing their web servers. They run a solid, reliable service that keeps their customers happy.
I have heard a few complaints about slow page load times with Web Hosting Hub. And in fact, I've experienced it myself first hand. But there are a few things to keep in mind...
First, it's important to remember that these are shared web servers, not dedicated servers or servers that are highly configured and optimized for speed (like WP Engine does). Web Hosting Hub pushes performance as far as they can, given the limitations of shared resources.
Second, the web server and hardware architecture is only one component of a website's performance. With a few slower running sites I'd hosted with Web Hosting Hub, as soon as I investigated the problems that were on the sites and began optimizing them on my side, they ran just fine.
Specifically, I'm talking about image file size, page optimization, getting rid of bloated code and unused plugins, and so on.
So keep these points in mind as you evaluate Web Hosting Hub. In my experience, for shared hosting and at this price point, Web Hosting Hub's performance is very good.
Another performance-related issue that I should mention is the use of solid state drives (SSD's). As mentioned at a few points earlier on, Web Hosting Hub uses SSDs on all their hosting plans exclusively.
If you're not sure what solid state drives are, the gist is that SSD storage has no moving mechanical parts. This makes them run much faster than traditional, clanky, mechanical hard drives.
Poor quality web hosting companies cheap out and use older, mechanical drives rather than upgrading to more modern SSDs. Utilizing these drives in all their plans, Web Hosting Hub claims they perform twenty times faster than traditional drives -- and many experts agree. But practically speaking, it's impossible to test Web Hosting Hub's claims.
Does Web Hosting Hub seem faster than other shared web hosting companies I've used in the past? Yes, definitely. But is that due to Web Hosting Hub's SSDs, memory allocation, server configurations, website optimization...or a combination of factors? It's obviously a combination of factors, so it's very hard to pin it all on SSDs.
Suffice it to say, the fastest, most modern hard drive technology is being used by Web Hosting Hub...and that's a good thing for you and I.
There are a number of free tools you can use to test your website's speed and performance.
One (very rough) gauge you can use to measure a website's speed is something called Time To First Byte (TTFB). TTFB measures how quickly a web server sends the first byte of data to a web browser.
You can review your Web Hosting Hub server stats to ensure youre site's running fast.
Generally speaking, a TTFB under 100ms is amazing, while an average TTFB is around 200 to 500ms. A TTFB between 500ms to 1 second isn't the greatest, and a measurement of over 1 second should be looked into.
To give you an idea, I recently ran a speed test for Ten Ton Online (hosted with WP Engine) and my TTFB was 235ms. Not bad, but you can bet I'll be working hard to improve that score. For example, I scored low on image optimization -- something that's totally within my control and has nothing to do with the web host.
Now oddly, I've run tests on different websites that run on the same web server and gotten different TTFB results. This tells us that TTFB isn't entirely dependent on the web server, but also on the contents and load times of the website itself.
If you're interested in TTFB, I'd suggest using it as a rough gauge, as I do. Some people in this industry live and die by TTFB, while others claim it's unnecessary. But to me, just use it as a guide to help steer you in the right direction to keep your site running smoothly and loading fast. In my mind, overall page load time is a much more important metric.
After all, what's more important, how long it takes for the first byte of information to hit the visitor's browser, or how long it takes for your web page to load into the their browser?
And this is where image optimization, use of a CDN, and caching options can play a role in speeding up your site's performance.
Now we should review Web Hosting Hub's TTFB -- how does it stand up? Overall, it's solid. They do a decent job of handling server performance and allocating memory as needed. And because they're offering shared hosting, it can't be easy on their end to balance everything from a technical standpoint.
I think they're doing a great job.
You can use a tool like webpagetest.org to test the performance of your website
You can run your own TTFB test using bytecheck.com but I prefer using webpagetest.org. This second tool gives you a lot of info, including overall page load times, suggestions to speed up your site's performance, and of course a TTFB measurement.
And lastly, if you're running a WordPress website, there are plugins available to test your site speed and web server performance. Check out WP Hosting Performance Check. That's the one I use.
Finally, as for server up-time, I can't remember the last time any of my Web Hosting Hub hosted websites went down. Maybe they have for a split second or two and I simply wasn't on the site when the outage occurred.
Needless to say, server uptime with Web Hosting Hub is very good. Digging around, I found they have an average uptime of about 99.95%, which is really good.
Now that we've reviewed Web Hosting Hub's performance, let's now take a look at what's inside once you sign up with their hosting...
In this Web Hosting Hub review, we've discussed in great detail plans, pricing, features, performance, and service. But what do things look like when you sign up with Web Hosting Hub?
Once you sign up, you'll be given access to an Account Management Panel (AMP). This is the main screen for your Web Hosting Hub account. You'll also be given access to your hosting account's cPanel.
I mentioned both earlier, but now let's explore both...
When you log into your Web Hosting Hub account, you'll be taken into your Account Management Panel.
This screen is divided into three primary sections: Manage My Account, an area for the main domain you're running on your Web Hosting Hub account (here, mine's displayed as tentontesting.com), and a Recommended For You section.
Web Hosting Hub's Account Management Panel (AMP) provides settings and options for your hosting account.
In the Manage My Account section, you'll have options to adjust the settings and management for your account. For instance, you can update your credit card info, set your contact information, add additional hosting to your account, submit a support ticket, and more.
Each of the icons in this section leads to a sub-page for that option. For example, clicking Transfer Domain brings you to a screen that provides additional information about domain transfers, and allows you to begin the transfer process.
But to me, the interesting stuff is found in the next section -- the section for your account's main domain name. Here, you can see my domain name (again, tentontesting.com), and you can see that I'm on Web Hosting Hub's Nitro plan. And it's in this section where you can access your account's cPanel. More on that in a moment.
You can also manage your site's SSL certificates, change your hosting plan, and manage your email, among many other options. And just like you saw above in the Manage My Account section, each of these icons will bring you into a sub-screen related to that specific option.
Web Hosting Hub's AMP makes it easy to manage your account, including adding SSL certificates
One option I want to point out is Account Technical Details. Clicking on this reveals some important information about your account. For instance, you'll see your cPanel Username listed, your webmail URL (for accessing your account's email), and nameserver info, which is what you'll need to point your domain name from, say NameCheap, to your Web Hosting Hub account (I show you exactly how to do this in my tutorial, How To Point Your Domain Name To Your Web Hosting Hub Account).
The third and final section of your Account Management Panel, Recommended For You, lists out helpful hyperlinks that point to resources to help along. You'll see links there for getting your optional email set up, how to get technical support if you run into problems, how to use Web Hosting Hub's BoldGrid visual website builder, and more.
I should also mention briefly that across the top of your Account Management Panel, along the main navigation menu, you'll have items to handle your billing, add on additional services, manage your domain names, and so on. It's inside Specials where you can access your bonus $150 in advertising credits that come free with your account.
Now next, let's take a look at the cPanel control screen that comes with every Web Hosting Hub plan. You can access your cPanel screen either via your Account Management Panel (second section, first row, first icon), or by navigating to yourdomain.com/cpanel
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Once you're inside cPanel, you'll find all kinds of icons, settings, and information for your web hosting account. If you've never seen cPanel before, it can be a little overwhelming. So maybe what I'll do is give you a brief overview of what's available.
Web Hosting Hub's cPanel gives you access to loads of additional options and features.
Running vertically down the right-hand sidebar, you'll see all sorts of technical information -- your shared IP address, disk and bandwidth usage, add-on domains, sub-domains, email accounts, and a whole heck of a lot more.
Occupying the majority of your screen, however, will be large sections divided into categories -- Preferences, Email, Domains, Top Applications, and more. There are some important spots I'd like to point out that I think you'll find useful.
The Email section, of course, will let you set up and manage all things email-related, including setting up email accounts, auto-responders, forwarders, and so on. But don't forget, I always recommend that you use dedicated email hosting rather than your web host's email. Let's talk more about this over here.
Next, the Domains section is important to know about. Here, you can set up add-on domains, redirects, and sub-domains. Then, there's the Files section. Here you can access cPanel's file manager (I've had to use this frequently over the years) and set up FTP accounts. There are a few other goodies in there too.
Now if there's something specific you'd like to find, use the search field at the very top of the cPanel interface -- just start typing in "FTP," "WordPress," or anything else you're looking for, and you'll get real-time results below.
Now I've saved the best for last -- and that is, both the Top Applications and Software sections. In fact, these two sections are a little redundant, because you can access all the different software, builders, platforms and more via an option in the Software section called Softaculous Apps Installer.
Launching Softaculous Apps Installer brings you into a screen that displays a list of software categories down the left-hand side. There, you'll see categories for blogs, forums, e-commerce, video, and a bazillion others.
Clicking on one of these categories will reveal a list of all the software that's available under that category. For example, clicking on the Blogs category reveals WordPress, Pubcana, Serendipity, Dotclear, and a bunch of others.
And here's what's so cool: These are all what's referred to as one-click auto-installers. In other words, with just a mouse click or two, you can have these software applications installed and running live on your hosting account. How awesome is that?!
So, with your Web Hosting Hub account, you have access to...geeze I dunno (I've never done an official count!)...maybe a few hundred or so popular web applications like WordPress, osCommerce, Joomla, and more. And each has an easy to use auto-installer.
Amazing!
To begin winding down our Web Hosting Hub review, what's my personal take on them? Well, if you've made it all the way through this entire Web Hosting Hub review, you know that I've been with them for over five years, and that I use them for running a few smaller, low-traffic sites. And, because I'm on their Nitro plan, that means I can run an unlimited number of websites.
I hope this Web Hosting Hub review has given you more than enough to go on!
This allows me to run my handful of sites and also use my account for testing, experiments, and other web-related monkeying around.
To me, for the number of features they're offering -- including the aforementioned unlimited number of websites, free SSL certificate, cPanel, and even their BoldGrid website builder -- is tough to beat, especially at this price point.
In my opinion, at this level, there isn't a better shared hosting company.
As mentioned in the customer service section, I only have positive things to say about their technical support and customer reps. I've never had a negative experience, or had a technical problem that dragged on for longer than it needed to. All my encounters with Web Hosting Hub's customer and technical support has been friendly, knowledgeable, and fast. I only have good things to say here.
Performance-wise, as discussed earlier, sites might seem to run a bit slow, but that can be subjective. Is it their servers that are running slow, or is it something to do with the website itself? The only way to know would be to run tests and optimize everything you can on your site.
And don't forget: For a shared hosting environment, Web Hosting Hub's performance is really good.
Despite Web Hosting Hub's tricky pricing structure, overall their pricing is very fair. They're priced better than many of their competitors, and offer much more in terms of features and overall value.
Considering the level of service and quality Web Hosting Hub is offering, plus all their features and available extras, I think you'd be hard pressed to find a better shared web hosting option.
Is Web Hosting Hub perfect? No. I don't believe there's such thing as a perfect hosting company. But, weighing the huge number of pros with just a small handful of cons means they're worth serious consideration.
And as I hope you can tell, I worked hard to provide as much information for you in this Web Hosting Hub review as I could, all in the name of helping you to determine if they'll be a good fit or not.
Web Hosting Hub just might be a great fit for you.
To date, this is easily my most detailed, most thoroughly researched article. And the big question on my mind is the question we asked way, way back at the beginning...
Is Web Hosting Hub a good fit for you?
By now, you should know. And I hope I was able to provide you with enough detail and information to help answer that question.
In summary, if cost is a concern, but you still want reliability and great customer service, Web Hosting Hub is (in my experience) the best low-cost shared hosting company available. If you're just getting your feet wet, want to keep things simple, and have a few small to medium-sized websites, they're a great fit.
But they're not perfect. My biggest gripe, as discussed, is the way they present their pricing. More transparency here, I think, would go a long way. Paid backups are also a drag, but as we covered, it may very well be worth the extra peace of mind for you.
And if you think you might need more flexibility from your web host, with the ability to scale your hosting as your site grows, then SiteGround or InMotion Hosting may be better options. Or, if you need a ton of horsepower and want to take a hands-off approach with your website, then it doesn't get better than managed WordPress hosting from WP Engine.
Meanwhile, I hope you enjoyed this Web Hosting Hub review.
After all that, now I need a nap!
Give me just 63 minutes, and I'll show you exactly what you need to do to launch your successful business!