Best WordPress Hosting UK 2024
WordPress hosting reviews & comparisons from a web agency’s perspective
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Author: Matthew Rogers
Last Updated on July 26, 2022As a digital agency with a LOT of WordPress hosting accounts (we’ve got a lot of side-projects 
), we’ve got a pretty decent idea of where to find the best UK WordPress hosting services.
We went through all our accounts, analysed which WordPress hosts are working well, and which ones aren’t (and why). Then we decided to build this massive comparison page to share what we found, enjoy!
Best WordPress Hosting UK
- Hostinger UK – Best Value WordPress Hosting
- Kinsta UK – Best Managed WordPress Hosting
- SiteGround UK – Best WordPress Hosting for Small Business
- A2 Hosting – Best WordPress Hosting for Resellers
- GreenGeeks – Best WordPress Hosting for Beginners
- eUKhost – Great WordPress Hosting for Bloggers
- Heart Internet – Great Local WordPress Hosting
- HostGator – Good for WordPress Multisite Hosting
- InMotion Hosting – Best WordPress Hosting for Developers
- Bluehost – Great for WordPress Blog Hosting
- Dreamhost – Great WordPress Hosting for high traffic sites
| WordPress Hosting Company | Overall Rating | Price/mo. | Disk Space | Features | Website | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 | £1.99 (Huge Sale on) | 10 GB |
| Hostinger Review | Grab Your Discount | |
 | $35 | 10 GB |
| Kinsta Review | Visit Site | |
 | £2.99 (down from £11.99) | 10 GB |
| SiteGround Review | Grab Your Discount |
A few of the sites we’ve been featured on:
1. Hostinger – Best UK WordPress Host
Website: www.hostinger.co.uk
Price: £1.99
Disk Space: 10 GB
Support: Live Chat
Hostinger is our absolute favourite WordPress host at the moment, the value you get for only £1.99 is very impressive!
They’re growing like crazy at the moment (over 29 million users), and with good reason! Their WordPress hosting plans offer all the features most of their competitors offer, but Hostinger does it for a fraction of the cost… without compromising on quality.
Super-smooth onboarding
But the thing that really sets Hostinger apart from the rest is their onboarding process for WordPress sites. The user experience of signing up, connecting a domain name, installing WordPress on their hosting platform… it’s seamless.
And control panel too.
The incredible experience doesn’t stop at the onboarding process. Once everything is set up, managing everything is also straightforward because of hPanel. It is Hostinger’s control panel, which is kind of like cPanel but more clutter-free, intuitive, and easy on the eye.
Of course, all the functionalities remain intact. You can manage everything from domain and account to emails and databases from the panel.
Optimised for WordPress
Hostinger is an active contributor to the WordPress codebase, so it’s safe to say they know a thing or two about WordPress. And given that WordPress occupies more than a third of the internet and more than two-thirds of the CMS market, it’s kind of mandatory for a hosting company of such scale to optimise their servers for the program.
When it comes to WordPress web hosting features that boost performance, they have all the bells and whistles, including:
- The latest PHP — PHP7 — that comes with more throughput than the previous versions.
- HTTP/2 that has a faster response time than the popular HTTP.
- State of the art SSD storage for faster read/write speeds. You get 20 gigs of this on the most basic plan, which is more than enough.
- Litespeed Cache, a custom caching plugin for server-level caching for your WordPress site.
- Litespeed servers that improve website performance by a significant margin.
- As for data centre locations, they have not only one in the UK, but also the United States, Netherlands, Lithuania, Singapore, Brazil, and Indonesia. So if your target market is in another country, or overseas, they’ve got you covered.
All in all, Hostinger is an excellent performer for WordPress sites and in general.
Security
Their security choices aren’t that bad either. The features in this regards include:
- Cloudflare-protected Nameservers.
- Imunify360-protected servers. It’s proactive defence software that basically blocks all the suspicious activities & malware (to stop DDoS attacks, data theft, etc.).
- Backups to re-up your site in case of accidents. The basic plan comes with weekly backups, and premium ones offer daily backups.
Other features
Those were the features regarding the security and performance of your WordPress site. We haven’t discussed the fundamental elements yet, so let’s do that.
- You can host up to 100 websites on the base WordPress hosting plan. Remember, though, the total disk space available is 20 GB.
- Free SSL certificates and a free domain name is included in the package.
- You also get a Jetpack (Free) plugin. The more expensive plans offer the Personal and Premium version.
- Also, up to 100 professional email accounts can be created.
- There’s also a 24/7 WordPress customer support and a 99.9% uptime guarantee (out tests measured it to be around 99.99%!).
- And just in case you need it, all plans come with Github integration (for the more techy devs/designers out there).
Hosting plans
Their cheapest WordPress plan, Starter, is only £1.99/month (huge sale on). The other two packs, Premium and Enterprise, are sold for £6.89/month and £13.99/month.
That’s some crazy value for money. Can’t really go wrong with Hostinger!
Pros
- Very affordable
- Servers in the UK
- Expert WordPress Support
- Great user-experience
Cons
- N/A
2. Kinsta – Best Managed WordPress Hosting
Website: kinsta.com
Price: $35
Disk Space: 10 GB
Support: Live Chat, Tickets
Kinsta falls under the fully managed WordPress hosting companies category. This means you have a team of people and custom-built apps, continually monitoring and adjusting settings where needed to maximise the performance of your WordPress site.
Google Cloud Platform
Kinsta doesn’t own any servers. What they use is better; perhaps the best. To host their sites, they use the Google Cloud Platform. It’s a suite of cloud computing services that Google itself uses for its services like the Google search, Gmail, YouTube, etc. — that’s how you know it’s the best, and the premium pricing also gives away a fair bit of “quality” vibes.
Data centres? You ask it; they’ve got it.
Because it’s Google’s servers, you also get access to the vast network of servers Google has built over the years. They definitely have a data centre in the UK, making it an ideal choice for the UK audience.
Generally speaking, you can choose from 24 data centres. Some of the locations are US-central, US-east, US-west, Europe-west, Europe-north, Australia-southeast, Asia-southeast, Asia-south, Asia-north, etc. For best performance in the UK, go with the Europe-north servers.
Peak performance
Kinsta gives every site their private server resources, so you’re completely protected from other potentially problematic sites…as your site is the only one “in the house”. Meaning, whatever is mentioned on the plan details is exactly what you get.
Most other hosting’s WordPress plans are shared hosting plans, so the amount of storage, memory, etc. mentioned is not accurate.
Besides, there are some incredible features as well that ensures the best performance:
- The real-time HTTP/2 and IPv6 powered integrated CDN makes sure that the server response time is not only low in the UK but all over the world. FYI, they have partnered with KeyCDN, one of the leading names in the industry, for this.
- They use Nginx, LXD containers, PHP 7.4, and MariaDB for super-fast loading speeds. This includes things like Nginx FastCGI cache module for page caching.
- There’s also, of course, CDN caching and server-level caching solutions as well.
In short, if you are going with Kinsta (and we highly recommend it), performance should be the least of your concern — in fact, you should be at peace in hosting regards if you choose Kinsta.
Secure, SECURE!
Just like the performance, Kinsta emphasises on the security of your site equally. With any of its plan, you receive:
- Free SSL certificate: Kinsta has partnered with Let’s Encrypt to offer an SSL certificate to their customers. Kinsta is mostly for users needing high-quality resources, which kind of implies the site has business goals- generating leads, selling products, etc. It also means you’ll be collecting some sort of personal information such as email, mobile number, credit card details, etc. And to prevent such data from eavesdroppers, this SSL solution will create an encrypted tunnel between the server and the user.
- Automatic daily backups: A copy of your website will be stored every day automatically. Depending on the plan, the backup will be deleted after a particular time (at least 14 days) to create space on the disks. If the need may arise, you can restore it in one-click.
- DDOS protection, GeoIP blocking, and Google Cloud firewall. These are obviously there to keep you safe from malware and other cyberthreats.
A couple of other features
- They also offer a staging environment to develop your website without making it public or test new WordPress versions, plugins, etc.
- SSH access lets you manage your site using a command line.
Premium quality; Expensive plans.
Kinsta plans start at $30/month, which is expensive for most but well worth it. Besides, there’s a Pro plan for $60/month and business-grade plans ranging between $100/month and $400/month. For enterprises, the plans cost from $600/month to $1500/month!
Overall
All of the above is the reason for the extra cost… We would recommend Kinsta for huge, more resource-heavy sites that cater to a global audience; then the additional cost is totally justified. If you want to host your small to medium-sized business site, or a blog, or anything else that’s not a massive e-commerce store, general super high-traffic site, or forum, SiteGround would give you the best value.
Pros
- Google Cloud Platform
- Super high security
- Very experienced
- Free site migrations
- Super scalable
Cons
- A bit more costly
3. SiteGround – Best WordPress hosting for Small Business
Website: www.siteground.com
Price: £5.99
Disk Space: 10 GB
Support: Phone, Live Chat, Tickets
SiteGround is another great WordPress host. Their WordPress specialised plans are well-optimised and packed with WP specific features. Hence, most of their 2 million+ customers are WordPress users. They have fast data centres all around the world, including in London, and most importantly, the support is top-notch.
WordPress recommended
There’s so much to admire about SiteGround, but the most admirable thing is WordPress.org admires it. SiteGround is one of the only three web hosting providers WordPress officially recommends. On top of this, they are also recommended by Woo and Yoast. A rare accomplishment indeed!
WordPress-specific features
WordPress recommends it, so inevitably there will be some features for WordPress-only.
- There’s, of course, the free WordPress installation.
- Then, there’s free migrator. All you need to do is install their WordPress migration plugin and generate a token to get your website transferred from your previous web hosting provider.
- WordPress Autoupdates make sure you are on the latest & greatest WordPress version that usually fixes bugs, adds security and/or performance.
- You also have WP-CLI and SSH access to run the show with a command line. It’s mostly to appeal to the developers.
- Further, there’s SuperCacher. It’s SiteGround’s advanced website optimisation solution as they like to call it. We’d say it simply- it’s their caching solution.
Fundamental features
Apart from the WordPress-specific features, WordPress is fundamentally strong as well, with features like:
- SSD storage: SiteGround uses high-quality solid-state drives for best performance. You get ten gigs of it on the base WordPress hosting plan, which is more than enough to host one website.
- Free SSL: A SSL certificate is also included in each plan. It keeps the communication between the server and end-user secure.
- Free CDN: Yes, they have a data centre in the UK, which is ideal for the UK audience. However, if your audience has a portion of international audience, do not worry. Because the plan includes a content delivery network (CDN), all the visitors will be served fast.
- Free email: You can create as many professional email accounts as you want, for free.
- 30-days money-back guarantee.
- 100% renewable energy match: To maintain carbon neutrality, their data centre partner, Google cloud, add 100% of the energy consumed back to the grid by using renewable sources.
Top-rated WordPress support
If we were asked, “What’s the USP of SiteGround? (Name only one)”, our answer would undoubtedly be its customer support!
SiteGround’s expert support is available 24/7/365 for your service. For self-service, they have amazing online tutorials. For assistance from one of their experts, you can contact via email, live chat, or phone call. They reply promptly & answer concisely in a way your problem is solved right away.
SiteGround claims 90% resolution at the first contact, and based on our experience, it seems true.
SiteGround WordPress packages
They have 3 WordPress hosting plans. Their most affordable plan starts at only £5.99/mo (50% off the usual price)! It allows only one website and can handle approximately 10,000 monthly visitors.
The other two plans, GrowBig and GoGeek, can handle 25,000 and 100,000 monthly visitors. These plans are priced at £8.99/mo and £12.99/mo respectively.
Beautiful control panel
In our opinion, SiteGround’s control panel looks and feels the best. It’s sleek, it’s minimal, it’s intuitive, and no functionality is left behind. Of course, many are used to the traditional cPanel, but this one will make those people love it too.
Overall
SiteGround is a reliable option with incredible performance, almost ideal uptime, and lots of features. Its control panel is fantastic, and so is their customer support. Great value for money option, to keep it short.
Pros
- Free SSL + CDN
- Servers in London
- Expert WordPress Support
- User-friendly
Cons
- Renewal costs are a bit high
4. A2 Hosting – Best WP host for Resellers
Website: www.a2hosting.com
Price: $3.92
Disk Space: Unlimited
Support: Phone, Live Chat, Tickets
A2 Hosting has both shared hosting that supports WordPress and managed WP hosting plans for that extra peace of mind. Their servers are very well optimised for a range CMSs’ though, including WP, so you don’t need the managed plan unless you want to have the extra WordPress specific features (which you can find below). They also have multiple data centres around the world (Amsterdam for the UK), and have fantastic support.
Managed WordPress features
They have a simple WordPress hosting, which is basically their shared hosting. And then there’s Managed WordPress with these features:
- Pre-installed WordPress: A2 Hosting auto-installs WordPress from the get-go.
- A2 Optimized: It’s an A2 Hosting exclusive plugin that decreases page load time. A2 claims up to 6x faster loading time! Crazy!
- WP-CLI pre-installed: It’s the official command-line tool for WordPress, which you can use to make any changes on your WordPress site.
- Jetpack Personal: It’s a WordPress plugin that’s loaded with functionalities like Daily & Automated backups, Photon Unlimited Image CDN, Lazy Loading Images (to not load images on loading the page & instead wait to load till needed, effectively speeding up the page speed), WordPress templates, etc.
- Website Staging: To clone your WordPress website before you test new code, updates, plugin, etc.
- WordPress LiteSpeed cache: Again a speed booster, it caches your WordPress pages to serve quickly when the request comes.
Basic features
A2 Hosting’s basic features are also quite impressive. Let us just share the Managed WordPress plans’ features here, for the sake of conciseness.
- A2 uses some of the best enterprise-grade RAID-10 SSDs to store website data. The base Managed WP plan comes with 10 GB of such storage. The plan is meant for one website only, so it’s more than adequate.
- On all plans, your site is assigned to their Turbo servers which have fewer users per server, making more resources available for you.
- There’s also a 99.9% availability guarantee.
- Plus, unlimited free emails are included.
- If you are purchasing it for WooCommerce, the plans also include a free SSL certificate. It’s absolutely necessary to have HTTPS for e-commerce sites.
- And. And. You can ask them for a site transfer as well, which they will do at zero cost.
To manage all these, there’s the Plesk control panel.
Anytime money-back guarantee
This is also a basic feature tbh, but this feature features separately because of its uniqueness in the hosting market. Most hosting providers offer a 30-day money-back guarantee; some even go as far as 90-days. However, the confident A2 offers anytime money-back guarantee!
If you claim a refund in the first 30 days, you get a full refund. After that, you’ll be charged for the previous months and be given the rest of the amount. Pretty sweet deal, right?
24/7/365 Guru Crew support
A2’s customer support is available 24/7 via live chat, tickets, and phone. In our experience, the support team turned out to be very professional & knowledgeable. Plus, the response time is also quick. They also have neatly categorised FAQs in their knowledge base.
The WordPress plans
As we mentioned, they have two types of plans for WordPress.
The first is Shared WordPress. These packages start at only $3.92/mo (was originally $7.99/mo) and can go up to $14.99/mo.
On the other hand, the Managed WordPress hosting starts at $11.99. The middle plan costs $18.99/mo, and the most premium plan starts at $36.98/mo. For the higher price, you get more resources. E.g. The shared base plan offers half-a-gig of RAM, whereas the base managed plan comes with 2 GB RAM.
Overall
With some of the best quality storage, turbo servers, foundational features, and WordPress-ready features, A2 Hosting ranks high in our recommended UK WordPress Hosting list.
Pros
- Great performance
- Good for resellers
- Very affordable
Cons
- No official WordPress recommendation (this is why SiteGround is higher in our list)
5. GreenGeeks – Best WordPress hosting for Beginners
Website: www.greengeeks.com
Price: $2.95
Disk Space: Unlimited
Support: Phone, Live Chat, Tickets
GreenGeeks is one of those hosting companies that just know will make it big. While their main hook is how eco-friendly they are (which they really are, putting their energy consumption back three times into the grid). Their WordPress hosting performance is pretty impressive.
The WordPress performance
GreenGeeks is unquestionably serious about your WordPress site performance, and it shows in the choices of features it includes:
- LiteSpeed Web Server: It’s perhaps the fastest server platform for WordPress sites. The speed at which it can access requests per second is miles ahead of its competition.
- LS Cache Plugin: It’s an all-in-one acceleration solution used for sites hosted on LiteSpeed Web Server. It’s basically a cache management tool that reduces page load times.
- SSDs: Your website data is stored on solid-state drives, which is currently the most practical way to server website data fast.
- Latest PHP7 and HTTP/2 ensures the best performance.
Other features
Apart from performance ingredients, they have other fundamentally-needed features as well, including:
- Unlimited web space & bandwidth: It’s obviously not unlimited because it’s practically impossible. However, what they mean by it is there’s no cap to either & you aren’t charged based on the amount of space you need or bandwidth you use.
- Free SSL Certificate: It helps in keeping your visitors’ data secure. If you don’t use an SSL certificate, someone can tap in on the channel between visitors and server and steal private data like mobile number or credit card details.
- Free domain: You can register a domain name while signing up with GreenGeeks. The first-year cost is zero.
- Free Nightly backup: A copy of your website is stored every night to make sure you don’t lose your website even if the live site is hacked or something.
- Free CDN: Even though they have a data centre in the Netherlands, Europe, a CDN can help serve visitors from the UK and any part of the world faster.
- Unlimited emails: You can create as many professional emails as you want. E.g., [email protected] for support [email protected] for yourself, etc.
- WordPress Installer/Updates: It’s for WordPress, so obviously you have a one-click WordPress installer and Auto Updates.
- 30-day money-back guarantee: If you decide to cancel your plan within the first 30 days, you will receive a full refund on the hosting plan. Of course, the setup fee or transfer fee won’t be returned.
Green energy commitment
GreenGeeks has been a supporter of environment-friendliness since day one. In fact, that’s how it gets its name. They provide 300% of the energy used (by their operations & servers) back to the grid.
Of course, they aren’t into the energy business, and building turbines & windmills would be unwise from a business perspective. Therefore, they match the 3x in the form of RECs or Renewable Energy Certificates, which are market-based instruments. Meaning, they pay to the entity generating renewable energy to create on their behalf, that simple.
24/7 support
Firstly, they have a well-rounded & well-categorised knowledge base. You can find guides and articles for topics ranging from setting up, managing, and billing to server questions, cPanel, website builders, and more.
Besides, they have an expert team available 24/7 at your service. You can get to them via phone call, live chat, and support ticket.
Developers will love it.
Everyone has access to SSH access, WP-CLI, SFTP, Git, and multiple versions of PHP. There’s also a phpMyAdmin & staging environment. If you know your way around these things or are keen to learn WordPress development, GreenGeeks is an affordable option.
How affordable?
Well, GreenGeeks’ WordPress plans start at $2.95/mo. They have two other plans — Pro and Premium — costing $5.95/mo and $11.95/mo, respectively. Both can manage multiple websites, and the servers are comparatively less densely filled, unlike the Lite plan that allows only one website.
Pros
- Affordable
- Super green
- Good security
Cons
- Competition has more robust WP features (but they’re higher priced as well)
6. eUKhost – Great WordPress host for Bloggers
Website: www.eukhost.com
Price: £3.99
Disk Space: 5 GB
Support: Phone, Live Chat, Tickets
15-year-old Robert King founded eUKhost in 2001, and today, it’s among the best local WordPress web hosts. If you are from the UK, want to support a local business, and get great services at a fair price, eUKhost is an excellent option.
4 data centres in the UK
As you can assume from the name, eUKhost has its data centre in the UK. And they don’t have only one server centre but four located in Leeds, Nottingham, Reading and Maidenhead.
You can choose any of the servers for good performance in the UK. Plus, if you are a local business, say in Leeds, choosing Leeds data centre will give the best server response time.
Optimised for WordPress
No surprises here; a WordPress web hosting is supposed to be optimised for WP. Here’s how eUKhost does it:
- WordPress Toolkit: It’s an easy to use interface for installing, updating, and managing your WordPress sites. You can also clone or sync a site from here.
- 1-click WordPress: You can install WordPress on your site with a click of a mouse.
- WordPress Application Firewall: Well, it prevents you from bots and hackers.
- Free WordPress Migration: They have a migration tool you can use to migrate an existing WordPress site free of charge.
- Optimised Servers: Their plans come with PHP7 + OPcache, NGINX cache, HTTP/2, and more, essentially providing some excellent WordPress speeds.
Other features
Foundationally, too, eUKhost is decent. You get…
- SSD storage: On the base plan, you receive 5 GB storage, which is perfectly alright for beginners. For more storage & multiple websites, they do have other plans.
- Unmetered Data Transfer: There’s no cap to the monthly bandwidth you can use. However, you will be told to upgrade to other plans if you use too much of it.
- Multiple WordPress sites: Most companies only allow a single site on their base plan. eUKhost lets you host 5 WordPress sites on their base plan and even more on the premium ones.
- Free domain: On their annual plans, you can avail a free .com, .net, or.uk domain.
- Mailboxes: You can create up to 25 free business email accounts on their base plan, and even more on the other two.
- SSL certificate: All WordPress plans include Let’s Encrypt, a free SSL service. They also offer premium SSL from Globalsign for those who want extra verification. Either way, you’ll have your HTTPS site.
VPS server WordPress hosting
Their WordPress Pro Server plan uses VPS servers, unlike the other two plans’ shared servers.
The plan comes with 50 GB enterprise-grade SSD storage, 4 GB dedicated memory, and four vCPU cores. If you are a UK-only business with lots of potential customers or you are a WordPress professional, this is the plan for you!
24×7 support
Their customer support team is ready to help you 24/7 via phone support or live chat. You can also generate a ticket if the matter isn’t urgent or is too complex. There’s also a knowledge base with categorised articles.
In our experience, the support agents were adequately knowledgeable and professional. It’s not some SiteGround-level WordPress support, but a good enough one.
Secure
WP plans come with automated malware scans that scan your files for malware, script injections, cross-site scripting (XSS) attacks, and more. They also have DDOS protection and a great firewall. Not to forget the free SSL certificate included in all the plans.
eUKhost plans
As already discussed, they have a WordPress Pro Server plan, which costs £29.99/mo. The other two plans are:
- WordPress starter costing £3.99/mo (5 websites, 5 GB SSD).
- And WordPress Standard priced at £9.99/mo (20 websites, 20 GB SSD).
Overall
As said, if you are a local business, eUKhost is a good choice, especially if you want to host multiple small sites.
Pros
- Affordable
- Local UK host
- Good security
Cons
- 5 GB is not that much disk space
7. Heart Internet – Great Local WordPress Hosting
Website: www.heartinternet.uk
Price: £9.49
Disk Space: Unlimited
Support: Phone, Live Chat, Tickets
Heart Internet is known for giving back to the community, as they sponsor various events and conferences such as WordCamp, Pixel Pioneers, Hack24, etc. As a WordPress hosting provider, they’re also pretty solid. With in-house WP specialised support, unlimited bandwidth and disk space, free migration and super quick setup, they’re a good choice.
That being said, the price is a bit higher than the competition, and keep in mind they don’t have any data centres outside of the UK… so you’d need a CDN to reach a US audience for example.
Worry-free site migration
Heart Internet offers seamless WordPress site transfer for free, so you don’t have to worry about it. Your posts, pages, files, folders, images, scripts, plugins…everything will be transferred in no time at all. Plus, your site will experience no downtime, and the transfer will be successful within 48 hours of asking.
However, the number of sites you can migrate depends on the plan you choose. For instance, the Economy package will give one basic migration.
One-click WordPress install
You can get your website up and running within a jiffy. One-click is all it takes to install WordPress on Heart Internet servers.
Free domain name
If you are creating the website for the first time or are going to build a new one, you will most definitely need a domain. All of Heart Internet’s WordPress plans come with a free domain name, so you’re sorted there!
You can choose from a number of options, including UK-specific domains ending with .uk, .co.uk, .org.uk, etc. and more international ones like .com, .org, .net, etc.
Titan premium email hosting
All of Heart Internet’s WordPress hosting plans come with Titan’s premium email solution. It’s an easy to use solution to create & manage professional accounts. For example, you can create [email protected] to answer support queries, [email protected] for sales emails, etc.
The solution includes meeting functionality, contact storage, spam protection, virus protection, and much more.
Sadly, no essential freebies.
A CDN is kind of crucial if you are serving a global audience, and Heart Internet doesn’t include it in any of the packages. So, unless your core audience is UK-based, that’s sad news.
Another disappointing fact is that on the Economy and Deluxe plans, there’s no SSL certificate included. Of course, those aren’t meant for WooCommerce stores, but adding it to the mix would’ve been appreciated.
You need to worry about taking backups as well, which is something many hosting companies do for free.
Overall, there’s not much in terms of value-added features.
Developer friendly
Heart Internet is developer-friendly, though. You have features like SSH access, protected directories, cronjobs, mod_rewrite, and .htaccess.
Meh customer support
Heart Internet does have WordPress support handled by experts, and in our opinion, the quality of the support is decent. However, what we don’t like is the timing. While most web hosting companies offer 24/7 support, Heart Internet’s phone support is available from 9:00 to 19:00 only and the live chat from 9:00 to 17:00.
A bit disappointing, we must say.
WordPress hosting packages
They have four WordPress packages, namely Economy, Deluxe, Ultimate, and Maximum. Economy plan costs £2.99/mo, and you can host only one website here. Deluxe, costing £3.99/month, allows up to 5 websites. Ultimate & Maximum are priced at £5.99/mo and £9.99/mo and can host many, many websites.
Overall
Heart Internet is a decent hosting option if your core demographic is UK-based. The lack of freebies is a disappointment, and hence it’s this low on the list.
Pros
- Local hosting service
- Unlimited disk space
Cons
- Expensive
8. HostGator – Good for WordPress Multisite Hosting
Website: www.hostgator.com
Price: $5.95
Disk Space: Unlimited
Support: Phone, Live Chat, Tickets
While HostGator is a veteran in the hosting industry (similar to GoDaddy), their WordPress plans are actually quite new and perform a lot better compared to their super cheap shared web hosting plans. Their WP hosting uses cloud architecture which allows for 1-click scaling capabilities. They also offer auto-backups and one-click restores, free migrations, email accounts, and advanced security again WP specific attacks.
Faster load times
Apparently, HostGator’s WordPress hosting plan increases the page loading speed by up to 2.5x. The number is in comparison to their HDD-based slower shared hosting plans.
The primary reason behind the apparently fast loading time is, HostGator uses robust cloud architecture for serving websites. Plus, the servers are low-density, the CDN distributes the static data to all its nodes, and they use multiple-layer caching solutions.
Talking about CDN, HostGator doesn’t have a data centre in the UK, so the CDN is a crucial element to get good loading speeds there.
Free SSL certificate
Want your site to show HTTPS with a padlock icon in the address bar? HostGator’s WordPress plans have a free SSL certificate included. It encrypts the users’ data when they are communicating with the server so that eavesdroppers do not steal any data. For encryption, they use a 256-bit system with 2048-bit communication key. In layman terms, even a supercomputer can’t decrypt it by brute-force.
Free domain
Just like free CDN and free SSL, they also add a free domain to the mix. You can register one free domain on any of its annual or above plans. This deal is for first-year only. After that, a non-refundable $17.99 will be charged.
Other freebies
They have a few more value-added features, so let’s just compile them here:
- Free migration: You can contact their customer support and ask them to migrate your WordPress website from another host to HostGator. They’ll transfer it free of cost.
- Daily backups: There’s ‘Automated Daily Database Backups Including File-Level Restore’.
- Google Adwords credits: You get $100 in Google Adwords credits. You can use it for advertising your new site across the Google Network!
- SiteLock: SiteLock removes malware and defends against malicious attacks (like DDoS). HostGator plans come with it. While we are at the topic of security, they also have custom firewalls, network-level flood protection, and a few security rules.
The “Green” factor
HostGator is no GreenGeeks, but it does add more power to the grid than consumed. It buys renewable energy credits worth 130% of total consumed power, which essentially means not only does it use green energy to power its operations, but also adds extra renewable-generated energy for others to use.
24/7 Customer support
Unlike Heart Internet, HostGator does have 24/7/365 expert support. You can call them, communicate via live chat, fax them (!!), or share your screen and find a solution quickly.
There’s also a knowledge base for commonly asked queries. Furthermore, they provide a library of video tutorials.
The three plans
HostGator has three WordPress hosting plans- Starter, Standard, and Business. Their base plan starts at $5.95/mo. The middle one costs $7.95/mo. And the most premium option is $9.95/mo. The plans allow hosting one, two, and three websites respectively, and hence have equivalent resources to offer as well.
Overall
Because of the free SSL, cloud hosting, expert support, domain privacy, automatic malware removal, and much more, HostGator at the introductory price is an excellent value proposition and well worth considering.
Pros
- WP expert support
- Scalable
- Affordable
Cons
- No free CDN
9. InMotion Hosting – Best WordPress website host for Developers
Website: www.inmotionhosting.com
Price: $7.26
Disk space: 40 GB
Support: Phone, Live Chat, Tickets
InMotion Hosting is known for its business solutions and their very high-quality web hosting services. But what most people don’t know is that they also offer WordPress solutions. They’re a bit more expensive, but provide outstanding performance!
Security
Let’s start with security, as it’s a pretty important topic. InMotion offers DDOS protection, hack protection, and a custom firewall, which is enough for even the most aggressive attacks.
A free SSL certificate is also included with each plan. It makes sure that the communication and data transfer between the user and the server is secure. It’s essential in cases where the customer is providing private information like emails for a newsletter, phone number for registration, credit card details for online purchase, etc.
They also give a 90-day money-back guarantee, which is a “money security” of sorts. No?! Ok.
Incredible WordPress performance
The WordPress range of plans come with pre-installed WordPress, auto-updates on WP as well as themes & plugins. Even more importantly, it comes with all the performance tweaks InMotion has done.
- Latest PHP 7 is used, which can handle more requests per second than the previous PHP versions.
- A free CDN is included for faster delivery across the world. Essentially, your site is cached on multiple servers (of the content delivery network) around the globe, and when requested by someone, they will get a response from the nearby node.
- NGINX servers, which is quicker compared to the traditionally used Apache web servers. Plus, the server caching increases the page speed by a significant margin.
- SSD storage helps achieve maximum read & write speed. Its usage is especially visible when multiple people are downloading large files. InMotion’s WP-1000 plan has 50 gigs of it; for more disk space, you can upgrade, of course.
- More PHP workers are assigned to process the PHP code, which is at the base of any WordPress site.
Other features
Foundationally, too, InMotion is super solid. Each plan comes with the following:
- Free domain: You can register one domain of your choice for free.
- Free SSL: Free SSL ensures the data the visitors share with you (email, address, CC details, etc.) remains encrypted & away from hackers.
- Unlimited email accounts: Professional email account adds to the credibility factor when someone receives an email from you. You can create as many of such accounts as you want, for free.
- Staging: InMotion provides you with a staging environment to test our new code, script, upgrades, and more before applying them directly to the live site and potentially crashing it.
- Jetpack plugin: Except for the base plan, you receive a Jetpack Personal or Jetpack Professional with the package. It’s a many-things-in-one plugin to better your WordPress experience.
BoldGrid builder
BoldGrid is a known WordPress website builder. It’s a DIY (do it yourself), WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) page builder used to create beautiful sites hassle-free. There’s no learning curve as such, so anyone can use it.
Moreover, you have 200+ themes across categories like consulting, marketing, design, photography, fitness, etc. to get started quickly. It’s also WooCommerce-ready, meaning you can sell unlimited products and accept all the currencies via your website.
On top of that, it is SEO-friendly & mobile-friendly.
24/7 U.S. support
Their friendly support staff is available on phone, live chat, and emails 24/7. Plus, you can schedule a Skype call as well for even more convenience.
If you have a common query, you can be confident you’ll find its answer on their knowledge base tutorials.
WordPress hosting plans
InMotion has four WordPress hosting packages starting at $6.99/mo for its WP-1000S plan. This base plan is suitable for one site only. For multiple websites & more resources, you have options- WP-2000S at $9.99/mo, WP-3000S at $12.99/mo, and WP-4000S at $19.99/mo.
Overall
With managed updates, advanced security, staging environment, WordPress pre-installed, free domain, drag and drop page builder, and more, InMotion has managed to offer a great hosting deal for businesses.
Pros
- Free domain name
- Reliable
- 90-day money-back guarantee
- Good security
Cons
- US servers so could slow down performance
10. Bluehost – Great WordPress Host for Bloggers
Website: www.bluehost.com
Price: $19.99
Disk space: 30 GB
Support: Phone, Live Chat, Tickets
Bluehost is mostly known for its cheap $3.95 shared hosting package, but they also offer WordPress hosting on their VPS servers. The price is a bit higher, but the performance increase is noticeable. Their WP plans include free SSL, SiteLock Security, Advanced CDN, and SiteLock WAF.
For the UK, it’s probably not a great choice as they don’t have any servers in the country. Also, their reputation has been a bit meh the last few years as they got bought by EIG and support/general quality went downhill… they’re recovering now, but it’s going to take some time before they can get back to their former glory. Still…
Recommended by WordPress
Us ranking them #11 in a list of top 12 shows our experience with them. Still, they are one of the only three web hosting recommended by WordPress.org. That’s something they boast about all over their website, but in reality, it’s a mediocre option as far as value for money goes.
Everything unlimited
It may not be the top-tier WordPress hosting, but it undoubtedly is among the best-unlimited hosts. You can host unlimited websites with unlimited subdomains on any of the WP Pro plans. Plus, you have unlimited storage to store all websites’ data and unlimited bandwidth for data transfer.
Features
Apart from being an unlimited web hosting, they also have some value-added features like:
- Free SSL to encrypt the connection between your visitors and the server, essentially safeguarding any sort of sensitive data involved in the communication.
- Spam protection: Akismet is a powerful spam protection tool for WordPress that is used to filter out unwanted content, especially spam comments.
- Free CDN: CDN, combined with their multi-level caching, give excellent page load speed.
- WP Features: As it’s WordPress hosting, they have features like one-click WordPress install, WordPress auto-updates, etc.
- Backups: The person whose site broke due to some error or hack attempt knows the value of backups. BlueHost’s WP Pro plan includes daily scheduled backups so that you can restore from the copy in case you lose your site data.
- Staging environment: If you want to play around with WordPress and test the functionality/update before pushing it to the live site, BlueHost’s staging environment is the best place. This way, your site is safe for any possible side-effects of the update.
- 30-day money-back guarantee: In our tests, BlueHost stood mediocre, but it can be better when you purchase it. So, if you want to try it, go for it because you can ask for a refund within the first month if you aren’t satisfied.
- 24/7 support: Their experts are available around the clock to tackle any of your queries. Just hit them up via phone call, live chat, or support tickets. If you opt for the expensive plans, you have access to “Blue Sky” support, which essentially is faster in replying.
All-in-one marketing centre
The WP Pro plan targets businesses, unlike their popular shared packs. Therefore, adding a marketing centre makes sense for both BlueHost and one purchasing it.
From a single dashboard, you can manage and view many of your marketing activities, including SEO (it helps you in keyword selection, content optimisation) & social media (it can auto-share content on Facebook & Twitter). You can also see your traffic analytics from the dashboard.
Granted, it isn’t something impressive from their side, but it’s better to have access to one than none at all.
WP Pro packages
They have three managed WordPress hosting packages- Build ($19.95/mo), Grow($29.95.mo), and Scale($49.95/mo). As the plan gets expensive, you get better support, lower-density servers, and extra features that can boost your website experience. E.g. The most premium package comes with “Elastic Search,” which is a blazing-fast website search function.
Overall
BlueHost isn’t the best of hosts, and we wouldn’t recommend it over the other hosts we discussed earlier. However, if you want to try it, it isn’t that bad either.
Pros
- Decent security
- CDN included
Cons
- Rocky reputation
11. Dreamhost – Great WP hosting for high-traffic sites
Website: www.dreamhost.com
Price: $7.95
Disk space: Unlimited
Support: Phone, Live Chat, Tickets
DreamHost is known for its high-quality hosting solutions, especially for WordPress sites. Their WordPress range of plans includes WordPress Basic, which is essentially their shared hosting plan with a couple of WordPress tweaks. And the other one is DreamPress, which is their managed WordPress hosting for high-performing websites.
No servers in the UK
One of the primary reasons why DreamHost ranks this low on the list is their data centres are only in the US. No data centre in the UK means comparatively lower server response time for the UK audience.
Plus, they do not offer free CDN on their base DreamPress plans! Meaning, unless you buy the expensive package, you don’t get a CDN and hence it’s a bad choice for the UK.
Everything unlimited
It may not be the top-tier WordPress hosting, but it undoubtedly is among the best-unlimited hosts. You can host unlimited websites with unlimited subdomains on any of the WP Pro plans. Plus, you have unlimited storage to store all websites’ data and unlimited bandwidth for data transfer.
Features
Apart from being an unlimited web hosting, they also have some value-added features like:
- Free SSL to encrypt the connection between your visitors and the server, essentially safeguarding any sort of sensitive data involved in the communication.
- Spam protection: Akismet is a powerful spam protection tool for WordPress that is used to filter out unwanted content, especially spam comments.
- Free CDN: CDN, combined with their multi-level caching, give excellent page load speed.
- WP Features: As it’s WordPress hosting, they have features like one-click WordPress install, WordPress auto-updates, etc.
- Backups: The person whose site broke due to some error or hack attempt knows the value of backups. BlueHost’s WP Pro plan includes daily scheduled backups so that you can restore from the copy in case you lose your site data.
- Staging environment: If you want to play around with WordPress and test the functionality/update before pushing it to the live site, BlueHost’s staging environment is the best place. This way, your site is safe for any possible side-effects of the update.
- 30-day money-back guarantee: In our tests, BlueHost stood mediocre, but it can be better when you purchase it. So, if you want to try it, go for it because you can ask for a refund within the first month if you aren’t satisfied.
- 24/7 support: Their experts are available around the clock to tackle any of your queries. Just hit them up via phone call, live chat, or support tickets. If you opt for the expensive plans, you have access to “Blue Sky” support, which essentially is faster in replying.
Dreamhost website builder
Just like one of the previous web hosts we discussed, DreamHost uses BoldGrid website builder. You have access to 200+ pre-build mobile-responsive sites for almost all purposes. Plus, it’s a drag-and-drop builder, which makes it easier to edit & add blocks (they have 100+ of these) on the page.
Moreover, the builder has an SEO functionality as well, which recommends you to make changes for better search engine rankings.
DreamPress plans
There are three Dreampress: Managed WordPress plans, namely DreamPress, DreamPress Plus, and DreamPress Pro.
The DreamPress plan costs $16.95/mo and can handle nearly 100k monthly visitors. The Plus plan’s suitable for about 300k visitors and costs $24.95/mo. If, and we hope you have it, your site gets about a million hits, Pro plan priced at $71.95/mo is an excellent choice.
The Pro & Plus plans have unlimited CDN included, so it’s a good choice for the UK. Both also come with a Jetpack Professional plan, which supercharges your WordPress site.
Overall
DreamPress plans are an excellent choice for managed WordPress hosting. We can recommend them with our eyes closed if your audience is in the UK. However, for the UK demographic, we have mixed feelings.
Pros
- Free SSL
- 97-day money-back guarantee
Cons
- No UK servers
Researching the best UK WordPress hosting companies
Individuals and businesses alike have discovered the ease and beauty of using WordPress for their websites and blogs. Its versatility and quality have made it ideal, whether for individuals who just want to keep their own blog and improve their personal brand or for even medium-sized businesses doing e-commerce.
If you are an individual or business looking to create your own website, you might currently be overwhelmed by all of the options out there and may not understand the difference between a content management system (or CMS) and a website host for the UK. It’s important to understand the difference and know what to look for in a good host, since poor web hosting can nullify the snappiest of websites.
We’ve also done these WordPress comparisons for other countries, like WordPress hosting Australia, and WordPress hosting Canada.
Free VS Paid WordPress Hosting
First, what we don’t mean by WordPress Hosting: WordPress.com offers users free WordPress hosting to host extremely simplistic WordPress websites. This is not recommended, as it does not provide the features or expertise you need to have a professional website that provides excellent service and strong web presence. So, unless you are just blogging for kicks and giggles, do not use wordpress.com for hosting.
What we do mean by WordPress hosting is rather simple: it means finding your own hosting service and having them host your WordPress site for you. Really, all hosting services are capable of hosting a WordPress website, so you won’t necessarily find hosting services saying that they only host WordPress, or services saying they don’t have the capabilities for WordPress.
However, while all services can pretty much host a WordPress site, some are most certainly better at it than others. When looking for a hosting service, it is certainly worth your time and effort to find one of these, as they will have WordPress specific assistance that can truly make a difference. They can offer anything from super easy installation to WordPress specific tech support, tools, etc. But more on that later.
A final note about what WordPress hosting is: while you can get hosting for WordPress on shared, dedicated, and/or VPS servers (also don’t forget about the more expensive managed WordPress hosting), for our current purposes, we will stick to discussing the ins and outs of the best shared hosting services for WordPress.
Shared hosting is by and large the most common for people using WordPress, and something as complex and costly as a dedicated server or even VPS servers are most relevant to those with large corporations. Shared hosting simply means that you are sharing a server with other websites, which will cut down on the cost.
A good hosting service will know how to limit the number of sites on one server so that you should not experience any negative consequences for using a shared server.
Pros & Cons of Shared WordPress Hosting
When weighing your options for the type of hosting to use, you, of course, want to know what the pros and cons are. So, what are the pros and cons specifically for shared WordPress hosting?
Pros
- Very affordable/cheap
- Perfect for small to medium-sized businesses
- Perfect for those new to creating and managing a website
- A shared host is not limited to only WordPress
- Super easy installation and customization with cPanel or other control panels
Cons
- A shared server does mean sharing resources with other websites on that server
- If other websites on the server hog all the resources, it could make your site slow
- You may have less specialized tech support (however, as hinted at above, if you search right, this shouldn’t be a problem)
That being said, if you know how to search for and identify a quality host, then even a shared hosting plan can be free of some of the cons listed above.
So, how do you identify the best WordPress hosting in the UK? Well…
How to choose a top UK WordPress hosting service?
If you insist on waiting to find a hosting service with the following key features, then you should be well on your way to a very satisfactory experience with a shared hosting service for WordPress.
While it should be remembered that you will get what you pay for, we also want to encourage you that you can still find quality hosting with these features without breaking the bank. On that note, here are the features you absolutely need to look into to find the right host:
Single-click or Pre-install WordPress option
The best WordPress hosting services will absolutely have either single-click installation of WordPress available through the cPanel or will offer pre-installation of WordPress when you purchase their services, some even have an existing library of themes.
There are too many great hosting services out there that offer this option, so you should absolutely not settle for anything less than single-click install. It will make the process much easier for you, and mean you are pretty much ready to start making your website immediately upon purchasing the service.
A responsive support team that knows WordPress!
Often too easy to overlook, but vitally important is customer support. Especially if this is your first time making a website, you will need the support. Even if it is not your first time, because errors and downtime could mean customers (and thus revenue) lost, you don’t want to be left to figure out kinks yourself.
Good hosting services will offer 24/7 support, often through multiple avenues such as online chat as well as phone support. Don’t settle for anything less. You will also want to, of course, find a hosting service that mentions it offers WordPress specific expertise. Check out reviews of the services you are considering to make sure their customers can attest to their quality of customer support.
A server or data centre that is close to your target market
It is important to the speed and quality of your website that your host server is located somewhere near your location. We don’t mean in the same city or even in the UK, necessarily, but it does need to be on this side of the world, and the nearer, the better your WordPress site will work. So avoid hosting services that are across the ocean, such as the United States, for example.
One caveat to this, though, is that you could find a hosting service who has multiple data centres across the country and/or globe. If that is the case, check to make sure you can choose the data centre closest to you.
Loading times matter more than you think
The speed (or lack of it) will play a huge role in your users’ satisfaction with the site and can impact how well your site does and thus revenue you make. So speed is obviously important. Many hosting services offer things like SSDs (solid state disks) and/or a CDN (content delivery network), which can significantly improve loading speed, for free. It is worth looking for a service that offers these.
Look for their uptime guarantee!
There is no reason to settle for a hosting service with a server uptime record of less than 99.9%. All of the best ones can offer that while still being incredibly economical. The best way to really check their track record is going through Google to look up the stats on companies; don’t just take their word for it.
Do you need unlimited bandwidth?
Many hosting services will claim to offer unlimited bandwidth or storage. While this is attractive, it could mean that they are overloading their servers, so the quality and speed may be poor. Really, 2Gb should be sufficient for most, and most servers will be able to provide more than you could want. Again, this would be a good thing to focus on when reading customer reviews. Additionally, if you plan to have a lot of site downloads for your site visitors (mp3, pdfs, etc), it is important for you to keep an eye on data transfer limits as well.
Free Domain registrations + Add-on domains
All good hosting services will provide you with a domain for free as part of your package, so definitely do not settle for less. Furthermore, though you will not likely need it as you begin your online business or website, in the future you may want multiple domains and sites. It is good to check to see if you are allowed to have more than one WordPress site per account. Many offer multiple and even unlimited domains.
Backups are essential!
Backups are extremely important and will save you a lot of heartache (no one wants to lose hours’ worth of effort). Check to see if the service offers automatic backups and how frequently (daily, weekly, monthly, etc).
What security measures are in place?
Finally, whether blogging or running an online shop, you want a secure WordPress site. To ensure this, look for services that promise frequent software updates and who may even offer 24/7 security monitoring. Some hosts include intense levels of security while others allow you to choose varying levels.
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Frequently Asked Questions
Which hosting is best for WordPress, Linux or Windows?
We recommend Linux hosting to run WordPress, for the vast majority of cases. While you can run WordPress on Windows hosting, Windows hosting is more expensive generally.
Can I use WordPress without hosting?
Technically no, WordPress needs to be hosted somewhere, but if you don’t want to set up your own hosting, or sign up with a hosting provider, you can go to wordpress.com and get started with a free account. That way you can use WordPress for free without having to worry about hosting it, they do everything for you.
Does WordPress have free hosting?
Yes, WordPress does have free hosting if you use WordPress.com (not to be confused with the wordpress.org version for which you need to find your own host and install it). If you sign up for a free account with wordpress.com, you can use a limited version of WordPress on a subdomain.
What is the difference between WordPress.com and WordPress.org?
The major difference between WordPress.com and WordPress.org is who is hosting the website. If you use wordpress.org, you need to download and install WordPress on the wordpress host of your choice. If you use wordpress.com, they host the installation for you, and you can even do it all for free, though the version of WP you’re working with is limited when it comes to design and features.
How much does WordPress hosting cost in the UK?
WordPress hosting costs in the UK can be as cheap as £1.99/month. You can always upgrade to a more expensive plan if you want more features and power.
For example, Hostinger’s Premium and Enterprise packs are £6.89/month and £13.99/month, respectively. Premium has unlimited websites and bandwidth, while Enterprise gives you more CPU and memory resources to speed up your high-traffic sites. For larger companies with global reach, Kinsta’s more expensive plans, ranging from about £25/month to upwards of £1,250/month, may be the best options.
What is the fastest WordPress hosting in the UK?
Kinsta is a leading WordPress hosting provider that offers the speed you need. They utilize LXD containers, Nginx, MariaDB, and PHP 7.4 to deliver the fastest WordPress hosting experience. This includes features like Nginx “FastCGI” cache module for page caching requests and dynamic content, auto-scaling, and more.
Hostinger is another excellent option for fast WordPress hosting. They use Cloudflare’s CDN, LiteSpeed servers, and LSCache to deliver a smooth web experience.