Bluehost, one of the longest-running web hosting companies established in 1996, has emerged as the leading choice for WordPress hosting.
As an official hosting provider recommended by WordPress, they have earned a reputation for reliability and performance.
With Bluehost, you can rest assured that your website will remain fast and responsive, even during high-traffic periods.
Their dedicated team of experts is available 24/7 to provide support via phone, email, or live chat, ensuring that assistance is readily accessible whenever you need it. Bluehost has consistently ranked as the number one web hosting provider for small businesses.
Moreover, they have an exclusive offer for Digitalnor users, providing a generous 63% discount, along with a complimentary domain, SSL certificate, and a free Site Builder featuring customizable templates.
Checkout this link, If you want step-by-step guide on how to start a blog using Bluehost.
Our experts have conducted a thorough review of Bluehost, analyzing various aspects using industry-standard benchmarking tools. Here’s what we will cover in this comprehensive review:
- Speed: We will test how quickly your website loads and evaluate the server response time provided by Bluehost.
- Performance: We’ll examine how Bluehost handles traffic spikes by subjecting it to stress tests to gauge its performance under high traffic conditions.
- Reliability: We’ll assess whether Bluehost can keep your website online 24/7 without any downtime.
- Customer Support: We’ll evaluate the reliability and responsiveness of Bluehost’s customer support when you require immediate assistance with your website.
- Features: We’ll determine if Bluehost offers all the necessary features for building your website.
- Pricing: We’ll explore the pricing options available and any potential Bluehost deals that can help you save money.
In our complete Bluehost review, we will provide an in-depth analysis of its pros and cons. If you prefer a quick overview, we’ve included a scorecard with our verdict. Stay tuned to find out if Bluehost is the right choice for you.
| Bluehost Review Summary | |
|---|---|
| Performance grade | A+ |
| Average load time | 1.48 ms |
| Average response time | 1.26 ms |
| Free domain | Yes |
| Free SSL | Yes |
| 1-click WordPress | Yes |
| Support | Phone / Live Chat / Knowledge base |
Our comprehensive review of Bluehost reveals them to be a reliable, fast, and affordable web hosting provider with exceptional 24/7 customer support. Based on our findings, we confidently recommend Bluehost as one of the top choices for WordPress hosting.
Now, let’s dive into the detailed review of Bluehost hosting, allowing you to make an informed decision.
About Bluehost
Bluehost, established in 1996, has steadily grown to become one of the world’s largest web hosting companies, catering to over 2 million websites worldwide.
Bluehost has maintained a strong partnership with the WordPress community, earning the distinction of being an official WordPress.org recommended web host since 2006.
They take pride in their round-the-clock customer support, robust hosting infrastructure, and unwavering commitment to supporting free and open-source software like WordPress.
Bluehost Pros and Cons
When it comes to web hosting services, it’s important to consider both the advantages and disadvantages. Here are the pros and cons of Bluehost:
Pros
- Affordable Pricing: Bluehost offers hosting plans that are affordable, especially for beginners or those starting out.
- Reliable Service: They power a large number of websites and strive to minimize downtime
- Transparent Pricing: Bluehost ensures there are no hidden charges when you sign up for an account.
- Free Domain: Upon signing up, you receive a free domain name for the first year.
- Free CDN + SSL: Each website hosted with Bluehost includes a free SSL certificate and Cloudflare CDN, enhancing security and blocking malware.
- Money-Back Guarantee: Bluehost provides a 30-day money-back guarantee on all plans.
Cons
- Higher Domain Renewal Price: The cost of renewing a free domain with Bluehost is higher than the average.
- Upselling Addons: During the signup process, Bluehost may aggressively promote additional addons like SiteLock. However, you can easily deselect them if you don’t require them.
By considering these pros and cons, you can make an informed decision about choosing Bluehost as your hosting provider.
Bluehost Performance Evaluation
One crucial aspect of performance to consider is the speed of your website. It directly impacts user experience and can also influence your WordPress SEO rankings.
Research indicates that even a 1-second decrease in website speed can lead to a 7% decline in conversion rates. Furthermore, a mere 3-second delay can result in a loss of 50% of your traffic.
Given these statistics, it’s essential to examine how quickly your website will load when hosted on Bluehost.
By evaluating the speed performance on Bluehost, we can determine the impact it will have on your website’s overall user experience and SEO ranking.
Bluehost Server Response Time Evaluation
When testing a live website using tools like Pingdom, it involves measuring the loading time of all elements, including images that typically take longer to load than plain text.
To obtain a more precise server response time, we utilized another tool called Bitcatcha. This tool allows us to assess server response time without loading any data.
Result of Bluehost Response Time Test As depicted in the test results, Bluehost’s server in the United States demonstrated an impressively fast response time, measured in fractions of a second. Even in other locations, the response time remained under a second.
If your target audience primarily resides in the United States, hosting your website on Bluehost can greatly benefit its performance. However, if your user base is dispersed across different regions of the world, you have the option to select a different server location to optimize their experience.
By considering server response time, you can ensure that your website loads quickly and efficiently, regardless of the geographical location of your visitors.
Bluehost Speed Test Results
To ensure a fast website, selecting a hosting company with excellent speed is crucial. With this in mind, we conducted a test on Bluehost to evaluate its speed performance.
For our test, we created a website using WordPress and the default GeneratePress theme. We imported dummy content, including images, for theme development purposes. Using Pingdom, we measured the website’s speed.
Here are the results of our speed test:
Bluehost Speed Test Results Remarkably, our test site loaded in under two seconds, even without utilizing caching plugins or implementing speed optimization techniques.
However, a speed test alone may not provide a comprehensive understanding of performance, as our test site did not experience high traffic.
To assess how Bluehost servers would handle increased traffic, we employed a testing tool called K6 (formerly LoadImpact). This tool allowed us to simulate virtual users (VUs) accessing our test site.
We gradually increased the number of visitors, reaching up to 100, to observe how the server would handle multiple simultaneous requests.
The results showed consistent server load times, even during peak traffic, as indicated by the stable blue line on the graph. The green line represents the number of active virtual users on the site.
Based on these findings, Bluehost proves to be an ideal choice for those seeking a fast website.
Furthermore, it’s worth noting that we did not encounter any downtime during our testing. Although many hosting companies claim a 99.99% uptime guarantee, we monitored Bluehost’s server uptime and did not observe any interruptions.
Here’s a detailed screenshot of the Bluehost server uptime:
With its impressive speed and reliable uptime, Bluehost offers a compelling hosting solution for those aiming to create a fast and consistent website.
Bluehost Hosting Plans and Features
Bluehost offers a wide range of hosting plans tailored to fit various budgets and website sizes. Their comprehensive selection includes shared hosting, VPS, dedicated server, cloud hosting, WooCommerce hosting, managed WordPress hosting, and more.
Let’s explore the different Bluehost hosting plans and their features:
- Shared Hosting: Ideal for starting a new website with low traffic volume. Your website shares server resources with other websites in this environment.
- Cloud Hosting: An upgraded option from shared hosting, cloud hosting provides enhanced reliability. It utilizes multiple cloud servers, enabling your website to automatically switch to a different server in case of hardware failures or high traffic.
- WordPress Hosting: Designed specifically for WordPress-powered websites, Bluehost’s WordPress plans offer optimization and protection against common threats.
- WooCommerce Hosting: For those looking to start an online store using the popular eCommerce plugin, WooCommerce hosting offers essential features to kick-start your eCommerce venture.
- VPS (Virtual Private Server) Hosting: An upgrade from shared WordPress hosting, VPS hosting provides virtual dedicated resources within a shared environment.
- Dedicated Hosting Server: With a dedicated hosting server, you have exclusive access to all the resources of the server for your website. However, it requires self-management of the server.
All Bluehost hosting plans provide a convenient 1-click installation for WordPress.
Additionally, each plan includes an intuitive hosting control panel for easy management of your hosting account and database creation.
Bluehost offers a user-friendly custom control panel, particularly beneficial for beginners. Advanced users can also access a customized version of the cPanel hosting dashboard, offering more advanced options.
With Bluehost’s versatile hosting plans and user-friendly features, you can find the perfect hosting solution for your website’s needs.
Breakdown of Bluehost’s Shared Hosting Plans
Bluehost offers a shared hosting package specifically designed for beginner websites. They have four different levels of shared hosting plans available.
Let’s delve into the details of Bluehost’s pricing and what each plan includes:
- Basic Plan: This plan allows you to host one website and includes one domain, 25 subdomains, 50GB SSD storage, and 5 email accounts with 100MB disk space per account. The initial price for the first term is $2.95 per month. Upon renewal, the price increases to $8.99 per month.
- Plus Plan: The Plus plan offers unlimited websites, unlimited storage space, and unmetered bandwidth. You also receive unlimited email accounts. The introductory price for the first term starts from $5.45 per month. When renewing the account, the price rises to $11.99 per month.
- Choice Plus Plan: The Choice Plus plan includes all the features of the Plus plan. Additionally, you receive free domain privacy and automated daily backups powered by CodeGuard, valued at over $80/year. The initial price for the first term is $5.45 per month. Upon renewal, the price increases to $16.99 per month.
- Pro Plan: The Pro plan starts from $13.95 per month for the first term. After that, the renewal price is $23.99 per month. This plan includes all the features of the above plans, plus a dedicated IP address.
If you are just starting a website, any of these plans will suit your needs. As your website grows, you have the flexibility to easily upgrade your hosting plan.
By choosing one of Bluehost’s shared hosting plans, you can kickstart your website with reliable and affordable hosting services.
Bluehost Customer Support and Service
When it comes to web hosting, having reliable support and assistance is crucial. You want a hosting company that is there for you when you need help.
Bluehost understands this, and they offer a range of customer support options to assist you.
Their extensive knowledge base is filled with a vast library of articles, step-by-step guides, and video tutorials. This valuable resource is especially beneficial for beginners, as many common issues can be quickly resolved with a simple search.
In addition to their knowledge base, Bluehost provides 24/7 support through live chat and phone. This means you can easily connect with their support team representatives whenever you require immediate assistance. Whether you have technical questions or need guidance, they are just a click or call away.
While Bluehost offers live chat and phone support, they have discontinued their ticket-based support system. They made this decision to prioritize a more personalized approach with live chat and phone support.
Although the ticket-based support system is no longer available, it’s worth noting that some users may have preferred this method, especially for complex issues that require ongoing communication beyond a single chat or phone session.
Overall, Bluehost offers responsive customer support and services to ensure you have the assistance you need throughout your hosting journey.
Is Bluehost the Right Choice for You?
If you’re considering Bluehost as your web hosting provider, you may be wondering if it’s the right fit for your website. Let’s summarize the key points to help you make an informed decision.
Bluehost consistently receives top rankings as a web hosting provider, and for good reason. They offer a wide range of hosting options and impressive features that make building your website a breeze.
One of the standout features is their expert 24/7 customer support. Their knowledgeable staff is always available to assist you, ensuring that any questions or issues you have will be promptly addressed.
Affordability is another advantage of Bluehost. They offer starter plans that are budget-friendly, making it an ideal choice for those who are just starting out. You’ll have access to all the necessary tools to create and manage your website without breaking the bank. And as your site grows, you can easily upgrade your hosting plan to accommodate your needs.
If you’re ready to get started with Bluehost, simply click here to select the Bluehost plan that suits you best.
In conclusion, Bluehost is a highly regarded web hosting provider that offers a wide range of hosting options, excellent customer support, and affordable plans. It’s definitely worth considering for your website hosting needs.
FAQs
In this comprehensive Bluehost review, we’ve covered various aspects of their hosting services. Here are some of the frequently asked questions we receive about Bluehost:
- Can I create an online store using WooCommerce on Bluehost?
Absolutely! Bluehost is a top-notch WooCommerce hosting service provider. Their starter plan is ideal for launching an online store. As your store grows and attracts more traffic, you can upgrade your plan accordingly.
- Is Bluehost suitable for beginners?
Yes, Bluehost is exceptionally beginner-friendly when it comes to WordPress hosting. They automatically install WordPress for you upon sign-up and provide an easy-to-use control panel for managing your hosting account. In addition, they offer ample help resources, including detailed guides, video tutorials, and articles. Plus, their expert support team is available 24/7 via live chat and phone.
- Can Bluehost handle high traffic?
Bluehost’s shared hosting plans are well-suited for starter websites and small businesses. In our stress test, the shared hosting plan successfully handled 100 virtual users without any performance issues. While these plans can handle reasonable traffic spikes, if you anticipate high traffic on a regular basis, you may need to upgrade your hosting plan.
- Why should I choose Bluehost for WordPress?
Bluehost is not only one of the largest hosting companies globally but also an officially recommended WordPress hosting provider. With their extensive experience and expertise in supporting the WordPress community, they offer highly optimized hosting specifically designed for WordPress websites. Additionally, their team includes dedicated WordPress engineers, ensuring the security and performance of your site.
- Do I need a credit card to sign up with Bluehost?
While Bluehost does accept credit cards, they also provide the option to choose other payment methods during checkout, including PayPal.
- Is Bluehost better than GoDaddy?
Based on our assessment, Bluehost is preferred over GoDaddy due to its superior customer support and beginner-friendly features. Bluehost’s My Sites dashboard and onboarding experience are designed to cater to beginners. Additionally, their pricing is more favorable for small businesses.
- How does Bluehost compare to SiteGround and HostGator?
When comparing Bluehost with SiteGround and HostGator, it’s important to consider their respective pros and cons. Bluehost offers better value for the price compared to SiteGround, with plans starting at $2.75 per month and including a free domain. SiteGround, on the other hand, excels in speed and security features. For a detailed comparison, you can refer to our Bluehost vs SiteGround vs WP Engine article. Regarding HostGator, Bluehost and HostGator are quite similar in terms of hosting resources, functionality, pricing, and site migration tools. Bluehost also provides a better user experience, particularly with their WordPress website builder platform.
- Where are Bluehost servers located?
Bluehost operates its own state-of-the-art data center situated in Utah, USA. This extensive 50,000 square feet facility serves as their primary data center.
- Which Bluehost plan should I choose?
For beginners starting a new website, blog, or online store, we recommend their basic plan. It offers sufficient features for a starter website, and you always have the option to upgrade as your needs grow.
Ready to get started with Bluehost? Click here to select your preferred Bluehost plan.