Cloudways: Fast, Simple, Reliable
“Cloudways stands out with its attractive pricing, feature-rich packages, and high user satisfaction. It's a top-notch choice for reliable hosting with impressive site performance.“
Cloudways: A Quick Overview
Summary: Cloudways is rapidly gaining popularity as a leading global web hosting service provider. It's known for its competitive pricing, top-tier security, and round-the-clock chat support.
Who Should Consider Cloudways? Cloudways is the perfect choice for beginners eager to explore web hosting, entrepreneurs, e-commerce enthusiasts, and new small business owners.
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Digital.com’s Expert Rating
Overall: (4.5) Cloudways stands out with its attractive pricing, feature-rich packages, and high user satisfaction. It's a top-notch choice for reliable hosting with impressive site performance.
- Plans And Pricing: (4.0)
- Features: (4.5)
- Performance And Uptime: (4.5)
- Security: (5.0)
- Support: (4.0)
- Improvements: (5.0)
User Feedback on Cloudways
Cloudways is a managed cloud services provider praised for its speed, exceptional customer service, and cost-effectiveness. However, its setup process may pose some challenges, and it lacks cPanel integration.
Key Cloudways Features
- Performance: Offers fast and stable hosting.
- Average Load Time: Approximately 2 seconds.
- Average Response Time: Around 63 milliseconds.
- SSL: Provides a free built-in SSL certificate.
- One-click WordPress: Includes free with all hosting packages.
- Support: Offers 24/7 assistance through live chat.
Pros and Cons of Cloudways
Advantages of Cloudways
- Easy plan upgrades to a dedicated server or VPS without moving your website.
- 24/7 live chat support.
- Collaboration tools.
- Pay-as-you-go pricing.
- Comprehensive security features, including a free SSL, IPs, and SiteLock protection.
- Solid-state drive (SSD)-based hosting.
- Flexible and customizable hosting plans.
- Built-in caching.
- Auto-healing features.
- Highly stable hosting environment.
Disadvantages of Cloudways
- Email hosting not included.
- Content Delivery Network (CDN) is a $4.99 per month add-on.
- User interface design can be complex.
Who Should Opt for Cloudways?
- New businesses: Ideal for small businesses seeking reliable and affordable web hosting.
- Entrepreneurs: Great for those looking for an easy-to-use web hosting provider at competitive prices.
- E-commerce: Cloudways excels with its stable systems, ensuring your site functions flawlessly, leading to increased revenue and customer satisfaction.
- Personal websites: Whether it's a blog or a personal website, Cloudways offers affordability and impressive security features.
Cloudways Hosting Plans and Pricing
(4.0) Cloudways provides four standard hosting plans using Digital Ocean data centers:
- $10 per month: Suitable for small websites.
- $22 per month: Ideal for startups.
- $42 per month: Designed for small businesses.
- $80 per month: Tailored for midsize businesses.
Each Cloudways plan includes Cloudflare, 24/7/365 support, a free SSL certificate, free migration, dedicated firewalls, automated backups, auto-healing, and more.
Cloudways Hosting Plan Features
(4.5) Cloudways offers a range of hosting plans to cater to diverse business needs. These plans vary in terms of memory, storage space, processing power, and bandwidth. The standard cloud-based hosting plan, for instance, comes with 1 GB of RAM, 25 GB of storage, 1 TB of bandwidth, and one core processor. Additionally, you get a one-click WordPress installation and free built-in site migration.
Cloudways ensures your WordPress site stays fast and user-friendly with the following features:
- Easy-to-use site migration
- Account management dashboard
- Free site builders
- One-click installation
- Two-factor authentication
- Auto-healing feature
- Technology for faster site speeds
- Built-in SSL certificate
- Dedicated firewalls
Easy-to-use site migration: Cloudways handles site migration when you need to change hosts, ensuring zero downtime during the process.
Account management dashboard: Access server management features and add-ons conveniently through the Cloudways console.
Free site builders: Cloudways offers an intuitive site builder, suitable for both novice and experienced web designers.
One-click installation: Easily set up a new site on your server with the option to customize server specifications.
Two-factor authentication: Enhanced security through two-factor authentication for all accounts.
Auto-healing feature: Swiftly addresses site issues, minimizing downtime.
Technology for faster site speeds: Automatic configuration for faster page loading times.
Built-in SSL certificate: Ensures secure communication with your customers.
Dedicated firewalls: Robust firewalls reduce unauthorized traffic, enhancing site security.
Cloudways Performance and Uptime
(4.5) Cloudways offers a reliable hosting environment with continuously running distributed servers, resulting in swift page loading times.
Uptime and reliability: Cloudways users experience a commendable 99% uptime, although there is no official uptime guarantee. Cloudways employs various technologies to enhance reliability, including MariaDB/MySQL, Varnish, Redis, Apache, PHP-FPM, Nginx, Memcached, and SSD storage.
Site response times: Cloudways boasts an average site response time of just 0.063 seconds, demonstrating efficient page loading and rapid responses.
Optimized WordPress tools: Cloudways provides tools to design and configure WordPress sites for blazing-fast loading speeds and optimal functionality.
Cloudways Site Security
(5.0) Cloudways offers SSL certificates, regular malware scans, and continuous server monitoring.
Cloudways takes server and site security seriously. Cloud servers are fortified with firewalls, and advanced “security hardening techniques” shield them from potential hacking attempts. You have the flexibility to customize data backup frequencies, or opt for automated backups.
How SSL certificates work: SSL certificates secure sensitive data on web pages, such as login screens and payment forms, ensuring secure connections.
Cloudways Support
(4.0) While Cloudways provides 24/7 technical support through web chat and a ticketing system, reaching them can sometimes be challenging. They have dedicated pages for technical queries, billing, sales, and other common questions.
Getting in touch with Cloudways for assistance is straightforward via email, phone, or live chat. Live chat typically offers the quickest response, although basic queries can be resolved through the FAQ page.
Recent Enhancements to Cloudways
(5.0) Cloudways continually updates its web hosting services and features to meet user demands.
- Run PHP 8.1: You can easily update your CMS to PHP 8.1 via the Cloudways control panel for enhanced performance.
- Safe updates: Implement safe updates for WordPress to detect, test, and apply updates, reducing the risk of internal errors or error codes.
- Cloudways affiliate program: Cloudways has introduced an affiliate program where business owners and entrepreneurs can earn up to $6,000 per month. This program is ideal for bloggers, performance marketers, and media publishers.
Cloudways regularly delivers valuable improvements, making it a reliable choice for web hosting.
Comparing Cloudways with Alternatives
While Cloudways is a top-tier cloud hosting provider, other alternatives may better suit your specific needs. Here's a comparison with other hosting providers recommended by Etechwhiz:
- Bluehost: Ideal for budget-conscious individuals.
- DreamHost: Known for robust digital security.
- InMotion Hosting: Offers additional storage space for your site.
Each of these hosting providers has its unique strengths, so consider your specific requirements when making a choice.