GoDaddy Web Hosting Review | PCMag

Deciding your online business is prepared for an internet presence is straightforward; selecting the best web hosting service isn’t. GoDaddy is effectively referred to as a vendor of domains, and it is also wonderful for private and business website hosting functions. GoDaddy’s well-rounded packages fall simply shy of these provided by our Editors’ Choice picks, however it has many enticing and helpful parts that many potential clients are positive to seek out worthwhile.

Shared Web Hosting

If you do not need to spend some huge cash on website hosting, shared internet hosting is the way in which to go. This type of cheap web hosting locations your web site on a server with different websites. So, sure, your website actually shares server sources with others, therefore the tier’s identify. This signifies that it’s miles from essentially the most highly effective website hosting sort, nonetheless. The websites sharing the server compete for sources—every thing from throughput to space for storing. You’ll need devoted or digital non-public server (VPS) internet hosting for muscle in the event you anticipate huge visitors, or if you wish to insulate your self from huge visitors spikes.

GoDaddy has a positive vary of Linux- or Windows-based shared web servers. For instance, the Economy primary shared internet hosting bundle (begins at a $1-per-month introductory charge, renews at $7.99 monthly) contains 100GB of storage, the power to host one web site, limitless month-to-month knowledge transfers, and a free 12 months of Office 365 Starter Email. Microsoft’s mail plan comes with only one e mail handle, however you’ll be able to improve to extra accounts for a charge. See the Email Hosting part, beneath, for extra choices.

The Deluxe plan (begins at $7.99 monthly, renews at $10.99 monthly) builds on the Economy bundle by including limitless storage and domains. The Ultimate bundle (begins at a $12.99 monthly, renews at $16.99 monthly) provides double the processing energy and a one-year Secure Socket Layer (SSL) certificates. FYI, GoDaddy tosses in a free area identify in the event you join an annual plan.

Speaking of long-term plans, GoDaddy provides steep reductions to individuals who plan to stay round for the lengthy haul. For instance, in the event you join a 10-year Economy Linux shared internet hosting plan, you pay $718.80, which is 25 p.c off the total worth.

GoDaddy’s Economy plan is introduced as if you’ll be able to’t join a month-to-month cost plan (the bottom worth displayed is for a three-month minimal enroll interval), however when you add the plan to the cart, the one-month plan seems. We’re glad the choice exists, however we do want it have been simpler to seek out. We could not discover it till a GoDaddy pointed it out after we complained that the choice did not exist in a earlier model of this overview.

GoDaddy has wealthy shared internet hosting plans, however HostGator nonetheless reigns because the PCMag Editors’ Choice for shared website hosting providers. Like GoDaddy, HostGator boasts limitless domains and month-to-month knowledge transfers throughout the board, and a alternative of Linux- or Windows-based servers, however it tops its rival by providing a VoIP quantity for your online business and limitless storage with all plans.

VPS Web Hosting

VPS or digital non-public server internet hosting is strictly what it seems like. You’re paying for area on a shared server, however one which does far more to isolate you out of your server mates than plain outdated shared internet hosting does.

Hostwinds will be the PCMag Editors’ Choice for VPS internet hosting, however that does not imply that GoDaddy does not have high quality digital non-public server packages. GoDaddy’s VPS plans (which begin at a $19.99 monthly, renews at $29.99 monthly) provide Linux- or Windows-based servers, in addition to limitless domains and month-to-month knowledge transfers. The specs high out at 8GB of RAM, 240GB of storage, and a free SSL for one 12 months. That’s great things, particularly in the event you join a multi-month plan. The Economy Virtual Private Server plan, for instance, drops to only $9.99 monthly in the event you comply with a two-year deal. That’s 50 p.c off. As with the shared plans, these VPS plans use Office 365 Starter Email.

So why does GoDaddy fall in need of successful our VPS internet hosting Editors’ Choice award? It’s as a result of Hostwinds merely has a wider vary of VPS plans. For instance, the bottom VPS begins at simply $16.99 monthly (for 1GB of RAM, 30GB of disk area, and 1TB of month-to-month knowledge transfers), whereas the higher tier scales as much as $574 monthly (for 96GB of RAM, 750GB of disk area, and 9TB of month-to-month knowledge transfers).

Still, GoDaddy’s VPS providers are a succesful possibility for individuals who need a website hosting answer that is extra highly effective than shared website hosting, however do not need to pay devoted website hosting’s comparatively costly price.

Dedicated Web Hosting

Dedicated internet hosting is the tier you want whenever you function a website that calls for a lot of system sources. With devoted internet hosting, your website exists on a server all by itself, thus leveraging the entire server’s energy. This is the {hardware} it’s essential to energy a website designed to deal with hundreds of thousands of holiday makers per 12 months.

GoDaddy’s dedicated servers are available in many Linux or Windows configurations. Economy (begins at $89.99 monthly, renews at $169 monthly) comes with 4 CPU cores, 4GB of RAM, 1TB of storage, limitless month-to-month knowledge transfers, three IP addresses, Office 365 Starter Email, and a free SSL certificates. Value (begins at $104 monthly, renews at $199 monthly) ups the RAM and storage to 8GB and 1.5TB, respectively. Deluxe (begins at $129 monthly, renews at $249 monthly) boasts 16GB of RAM and 2TB of storage. Ultimate (begins at $179 monthly, renews at $349 monthly) has a sizeable 32GB of RAM. Naturally, a long-term dedication nets you huge financial savings. For instance, in the event you join 24 months of the Economy plan, you pay simply $79.99 monthly).

GoDaddy’s devoted servers are extraordinarily enticing, however AccuWeb takes the Editors’ Choice crown. AccuWeb’s servers will be outfitted with as much as 512GB of RAM, 2TB of storage, and 50TB of month-to-month knowledge transfers. You may also choose both the Linux or Windows working system.

WordPress Web Hosting

GoDaddy has a number of tiers of unmanaged and managed WordPress hosting. The unmanaged plans have the identical costs and specs as GoDaddy’s shared plans.

The managed selection the white-glove remedy with 4 tiers of Linux-based WordPress internet hosting. Signing up has its benefits. GoDaddy has 1000’s of WordPress themes and plug-ins, and it provides nightly backups and automated WordPress software program updates. Like different managed WordPress hosts, GoDaddy does not require you to put in the CMS, because it comes preinstalled. Once you are logged into WordPress, you’ll be able to create posts, pages, and galleries as you’d with some other self-hosted WordPress website.

The Pro 5 plan (begins at $24.99 monthly) comes with 5 domains, 50GB of storage, 5 staging areas, website backup (for as much as 90 days), and a free SSL certificates. Pro 10 (begins at $49.99 monthly) ups the domains to 10, storage to 80GB, and staging areas to 10. Pro 25 (begins at $89.99 monthly) builds on Pro 10 by providing 25 domains, 25 staging areas, and 100GB of storage. Pro 50 (begins at $169 monthly) serves up 50 domains, 200GB of storage, and 50 staging areas. Please observe that the renewal costs are the identical because the beginning costs.

That’s an excellent providing, however A2 reigns because the Editors’ Choice for WordPress internet hosting. A2 has plans beginning as little as $7.99 monthly (for limitless storage, limitless month-to-month knowledge transfers, and free SSL certificates) and as excessive as $24.46 monthly (which provides limitless websites and limitless databases).

No Cloud Web Hosting

GoDaddy lacks cloud internet hosting, a substitute for conventional internet hosting that attracts sources from a number of servers. If you need to get into cloud internet hosting, which helps you to develop server sources with ease, we recommend looking at DreamHost, our co-Editors’ Choice in that class.

DreamHost’s small business-friendly packages begin at $4.50 monthly (for 512MB of RAM, 100GB of storage, and limitless month-to-month knowledge transfers) and high out at $48 monthly (for 4 CPU cores, 8GB of RAM, 100GB of storage, and limitless month-to-month knowledge transfers). If you are simply dabbling in cloud internet hosting, DreamHost is a positive place to start out.

Heavily trafficked websites will favor 1&1 Ionos . The co-Editors’ Choice has the specs (16-core CPUs, 48GB of RAM) and prorated plans that huge companies crave. In addition, 1&1 Ionos provides customizable servers that you would be able to construct from the bottom up. Those, after all, price huge bucks. You ought to attain out to one of many firm’s customer support reps for pricing data.

Reseller Web Hosting

If you are seeking to get into the website hosting enterprise, however you do not need to cope with infrastructure issues, take a look at GoDaddy’s reseller hosting packages. The firm’s two plans—the $8.99 monthly Basic and the $14.99 monthly Pro—provide gross sales and fee reviews and bank card processing. The servers have the identical RAM and storage quantities as people who Hostwinds provides straight, which isn’t all the time the case.

Unfortunately, GoDaddy’s reseller packages do not include e mail; you’d want to enroll in separate e mail plans for electronic message. On the upside, GoDaddy permits you to apply your individual branding to the servers you hire, and it additionally provides 24/7 tech help.

Still, Hostwinds goes the additional mile with extra beneficiant specs in quite a lot of server classes. As a end result, Hostwinds is the Editors’ Choice for reseller internet hosting.

Setting Up a GoDaddy-Hosted Site

GoDaddy’s free website builder is named GoCentral. It’s a totally responsive-design instrument, which suggests you get a handsome and practical cellular web site alongside the desktop web site you construct. The drag-and-drop performance makes web page constructing a breeze. For $29.99 monthly, you’ll be able to add a succesful internet retailer.

Email Hosting

One of the higher elements of GoDaddy is that it’s progressively abandoning its outdated cPanel email hosting service for accounts bundled with Microsoft Office 365 Business Premium, the Editors’ Choice for e mail internet hosting.

If you need to buy e mail, this is the breakdown: Email Essentials (beginning at $4.99 monthly or $3.99 monthly with a two- or three-year dedication) offers you 5GB of e mail storage. Online Essentials (beginning at $9.99 monthly or $7.99 monthly with a two- or three-year dedication) ups the e-mail capability to 50GB and provides 1TB of cloud storage. Business Premium (beginning at $14.99 monthly or $9.99 monthly with a two- or three-year dedication) raises the e-mail storage capability to 50GB and provides limitless internet conferencing and entry to on-line Microsoft Word and Excel. Premium Security (beginning at $24.97 monthly or $14.99 monthly with a two- or three-year dedication) tosses in encryption and Microsoft Office cellular purposes.

We discovered it a easy endeavor to arrange our GoDaddy e mail, as the net host prompted us to create one through the sign-up course of. We merely chosen the area to which the e-mail handle could be related, after which entered an e mail deal with and a password. In common, Microsoft Office 365 is pretty simple to configure, however GoDaddy has actually taken the guesswork out.

Since GoDaddy has primarily repackaged Microsoft Office 365, you get loads of bang in your buck when it comes to e mail options, each on the consumer facet and from an administrator’s perspective. Assuming you go together with the Business Premium function set as we did, you may get the total Microsoft Office Suite together with its enterprise collaboration instruments. This means the standard productiveness apps, akin to Microsoft Access, Excel, Outlook, and Word, however it additionally offers you extra crew collaboration, on-line conferencing, and even VoIP telephone calling through Microsoft Skype for Business and Microsoft Teams. However, we’re just a little upset within the pricing construction, as a few of what GoDaddy sells as extra-cost add-ons, akin to encryption, is already current in the event you go together with a plan straight from Microsoft.

Along with the slew of desktop apps, you additionally get entry to Microsoft Outlook Web Access (OWA), a glossy and fashionable internet adaptation of the Outlook e mail consumer. It provides a well-recognized format for calendars, contacts, and duties, and a brand new “centered inbox”—all out there in your browser. What Microsoft means by a “centered inbox” is that, somewhat than simply being a dumping floor for all incoming e mail, it defaults to a dynamic view that is consistently being up to date. This tech relies on a machine studying (ML) algorithm that makes an attempt to determine which e mail is most vital to you; every thing else goes to the common inbox. As you type emails between the centered inbox and the common inbox, the algorithm progressively will get higher, serving to you to focus on e mail that issues most. You’ll additionally have the ability to use mentions. When creating a brand new e mail, in the event you prepend somebody’s identify with the @ signal, then it should robotically Cc that particular person. You may also apply a filter that may present you emails wherein you have been straight talked about.

We are pleasantly stunned to seek out that GoDaddy defaults to the identical e mail administration portal that admins would get by buying Office 365 straight from Microsoft. The one caveat is that among the panes have been changed with hyperlinks again to the GoDaddy web site. This applies notably to consumer and license administration. Many of the superior configuration choices stay intact, nonetheless. Because of this, you can make the most of Exchange Online Protection for spam filtering, although you may need to dig just a little extra to get to the Security and Compliance panel.

E-Commerce

GoDaddy has ditched its outdated Quick Shopping Cart e-commerce software program in favor of the free GoDaddy Online Store. The new providing boasts many options, together with safe checkout, search engine optimization instruments, retailer themes, and limitless product listings.

Setting up store with the brand new instrument is easy and simple. You choose a theme, add merchandise, pricing, and pictures, and decide your most popular cost and transport strategies. If you intend on utilizing your web site to promote merchandise, GoDaddy Online Store is a superb alternative.

Security Features

GoDaddy provides its personal Website Security, a product that features automated malware scanning, steady safety monitoring, Web Application Firewall (WAF), and Content Delivery Network (CDN). Website Security proactively blocks malware and malicious visitors from reaching your website. It additionally safeguards in opposition to Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) and Zero Day assaults.

You may also buy Secure Sockets Layer certificates (beginning at $69.99 per 12 months), the software program that is represented by a inexperienced padlock in your internet browser whenever you go to, say, a monetary establishment’s web site. If you intend to promote merchandise through your web site, contemplate an SSL certificates a necessary buy, because it safeguards the information trade between a buyer and your servers.

In phrases of safety for its hosted e mail providers, you may discover that is all hosted in Microsoft’s knowledge facilities. That means you may have all the identical safety advantages as these offered to different Microsoft Office 365 customers. Your e mail knowledge can be encrypted in transit and at relaxation utilizing SSL and Bitlocker expertise. Per Microsoft’s publicly out there phrases of service, Microsoft staff solely have extremely restricted entry to your knowledge and solely underneath particular, audited circumstances.

But keep in mind that whereas these specs are good, they solely apply to knowledge residing on GoDaddy’s servers. In the case of e mail internet hosting, for instance, customers studying their e mail utilizing an area e mail consumer, like Microsoft Outlook, will nonetheless be storing all that knowledge on their on-premises units the place it will not be robotically encrypted. That means for full safety, it’s best to nonetheless spend money on native knowledge encryption software program. And for these staff who entry knowledge from the street and distant areas, maintain their data-in-transit secure through the use of a virtual private network (VPN) consumer.

GoDaddy hasn’t historically had an uptime coverage for its older CPanel e mail. But because the firm has transitioned to Microsoft Office 365 for its e mail providers, it is now in a position to get pleasure from Microsoft’s 99.9% uptime assure. However, remember that GoDaddy has changed the Office 365 well being providers dashboard with its personal internally branded model. It exhibits the identical sorts of knowledge together with when the final problem was, and whether or not or not it has been resolved.

Strong Uptime

Website uptime is among the most vital elements of a internet hosting service. If your website is down, purchasers or clients can be unable to seek out you or entry your services or products. You don’t want that. Fortunately, GoDaddy was moderately reliable in our assessments.

We use a website monitoring instrument to trace our take a look at websites’ uptime over a two-week interval. Every quarter-hour, the instrument pings our web sites and sends an e mail whether it is unable to contact any websites for no less than one minute. The knowledge revealed that our take a look at website did not go down as soon as through the commentary interval. You can depend on GoDaddy to behave as a rock-solid internet hosting basis.

Decent Customer Service

GoDaddy has 24/7 phone help and stay internet chat help. We positioned a name on a weekday morning and spoke to a customer support rep lower than two minutes later. We requested concerning the completely different e mail tiers, and as soon as once more skilled the most effective buyer help of any of the website hosting providers we have examined to date. The rep was pleasant and educated.

A couple of hours later, we tried to fireside up GoDaddy’s customer support internet chat to ask an vital query: How will we import our current WordPress.com weblog? Unfortunately, the net chat button was grayed out as a result of reps being too busy. We had zero points after we tried to speak once more later that day.

GoDaddy provides a 45-day money-back assure. That’s lengthier than the usual 30-day refund window, however does not compete with DreamHost’s beneficiant 97-day money-back assure.

Who’s Your (Go) Daddy?

GoDaddy has many business- and consumer-friendly choices, a dependable Microsoft-based hosted e mail service, and high quality 24/7 customer support. Note, nonetheless, that GoDaddy lacks cloud internet hosting plans, and has a skimpy variety of default e mail accounts. Still, in the event you’re seeking to shortly arrange an internet site, GoDaddy has the instruments you may want for a profitable launch.

For extra on getting began on-line, learn our recommendations on how to create a website. You may also need to take a look at our story on how to register a domain name for your website.