Which HostGator Plan is The Best for You?

HostGator is a powerful web host, whose services includes hosting plans for every type of website from small business to enterprise. HostGator plans are affordable and easy to use, which makes them a great choice for novices and pro users alike. In this review of HostGator’s plans we make a comprehensive analysis of the hosting features, configuration, price and use cases of HostGator’s web hosting services.

Short Company Overview

HostGator has been around since 2002, when it was founded by Brent Oxley in a Florida dorm room. By 2009, HostGator had 200,000 customers and had grown into a hosting company with international offices serving customers worldwide. In 2012, HostGator was acquired by Endurance International Group, the parent company of other budget hosts like BlueHost or iPage.

Although HostGator has marketed itself mainly as a budget host for individuals and small businesses, their hosting plans are suitable for larger, high-traffic websites as well.

Review of HostGator Hosting Plans

HostGator’s web hosting services consist of the following hosting types:

  • Shared hosting;
  • Cloud hosting;
  • WordPress hosting;
  • VPS hosting;
  • Dedicated hosting;
  • Reseller hosting.

Windows and Linux hosting both feature among HostGator’s plans, with cPanel/WHM & WHMCS, and Plesk control panel licenses included for free. Unlike many of their competitors, HostGator does not offer free domain names with any of their packages.

HostGator Shared Hosting Plans

Linux shared hosting plans at HostGator come in three configurations:

  • Hatchling plan starting at $2.78/month;
  • Baby plan starting at $3.98/month;
  • Business plan starting at $5.98/month.

The Hatchling plan is suitable for hosting a single website and comes with unmetered bandwidth, unmetered disk space, unlimited MySQL databases, unlimited email hosting, and cPanel. If you want unlimited website hosting, you should go for either the Baby plan, which comes with unmetered disk space, bandwidth, and unlimited domain hosting, or the Business plan, which comes with all these features plus a free dedicated IP and a free SSL.

All shared hosting plans are backed by a 45-day money-back guarantee and a 99.9% uptime guarantee. Other than this, these plans also include free marketing credits for Google AdWords and Bing, instant backups, 24/7 support, unlimited FTP accounts, they support many programming languages (Ruby on Rails, Python, Perl, etc.), SSH access, audio/video streaming, Spam Assassin, hotlink protection, IP deny manager, and many other features.

HostGator’s Windows shared hosting plans are available in two configurations:

  • Personal plan starting at $4.76/month;
  • Enterprise plan starting at $14.36/month;

The Personal plan will host a single domain, offers unmetered disk space and bandwidth, and a shared SSL certificate, while the Enterprise plan offers hosting for 5 domains, includes unlimited bandwidth and disk space, and a free private SSL and IP.

Both plans feature Plesk as their control panel, and they also include free website building tools, 4,000+ free website templates, 1-click installs of popular scripts, and various other programming tools, database tools, etc.

Besides bandwidth and disk space, other unlimited features included with both plans are unlimited email accounts, subdomains, and FTP accounts.

Like Linux shared hosting plans, Windows shared hosting plans are also backed by a 45-day money-back guarantee and 99.9% uptime guarantee.

HostGator Cloud Hosting

If you need flexible and scalable hosting for your online projects, HostGator’s cloud hosting delivers 2x faster load times thanks to their low-density servers, multiple caching layers and top-notch hardware. Cloud hosting plans are available in three configurations:

  • Hatchling Cloud starting at $3.58/month;
  • Baby Cloud starting at $4.78/month;
  • Business Cloud starting at $7.18/month.

HostGator’s cloud hosting automatically distributes three mirrored copies of your data to ensure redundancy and safety. Moreover, thanks to the failover protection and integrated caching, your site can enjoy increased performance and no downtimes.

The Hatchling Cloud plan is designed for the hosting of a single domain, it includes 2 cores CPU, 2 GB memory, unmetered bandwidth, and unmetered disk space. The Baby Cloud plan can be used to host unlimited domains, it comes with 4 cores CPU, 4 GB memory, unmetered disk space, and unmetered bandwidth.

The Business plan is also suitable for hosting unlimited domains, it comes with 6 cores CPU, 6 GB memory, and a dedicated IP and Private SSL for free. While a dedicated IP is not available for the Hatchling plan, it can be purchased for $2/month for the Baby plan.

With each cloud hosting plan, you can easily monitor and allocate resources. Also, several add-ons are available for purchase with these plans like CodeGuard, which offers daily automatic backups, 1 GB storage, unlimited databases; SiteLock, which scans your site for malwares, bot attacks, and vulnerabilities; G Suite, which integrates popular Google applications; and Domain Privacy, which protects against identity theft and email spam.

HostGator WordPress Hosting

HostGator’s WordPress plans are built on cloud architecture offering the same benefits in terms of speed, performance, and security as HostGator’s cloud hosting plans. In this category too, there are three plans as follows:

  • Starter plan starting at $3.98/month;
  • Standard plan starting at $6.38/month;
  • Business plan starting at $9.18/month.

The Starter plan will host 1 site, handle 100,000 average monthly site traffic, include 1 GB automated daily database backups, automatic malware removal, unlimited email accounts, unmetered storage space, and $100 Google AdWords credit.

With the Standard plan, you can host 2 sites, it can handle 200,000 average monthly site traffic, include 2 GB automated daily database backups, malware removal, unlimited email accounts, unmetered storage, and $100 in Google AdWords credit.

The Business plan can accommodate 3 sites, up to 500,000 average monthly traffic, offers WPPro Developer Help (30-minute one-on-one WordPress consulting session worth $100), 5 GB automated daily database backups, automatic malware removal, unmetered storage space, and $100 in Google AdWords credit.

With each WordPress plan purchase CodeGuard, SiteLock, SSL certificate, and Domain Privacy is included for free.

HostGator’s WordPress plans are optimized for speed and security. You can monitor and allocate additional resources, enjoy blazingly fast speeds without having to configure your caching or CDN.

Free site transfers are included with each plan and expert WordPress support is available around the clock.

HostGator VPS Hosting

HostGator VPS plans offer full root access, so you can enjoy total control over your hosting environment. VPS plans come with an autonomous virtual server dedicated entirely to your site, thus, allowing you to enjoy the benefits of a dedicated server, but without the higher costs associated with it.

HostGator offers three VPS plans:

  • Snappy 2000 starting at $19.95/month;
  • Snappy 4000 starting at $29.95/month;
  • Snappy 8000 starting at $39.95/month.

The Snappy 2000 is configured to include 2 cores CPU, 2 GB RAM, 120 GB disk space, 1.5 TB bandwidth, and 2 IP addresses. The Snappy 4000 comes with 2 cores CPU, 4 GB RAM, 165 GB disk space, 2 TB bandwidth, and 2 IP addresses. The Snappy 8000 includes 4 cores CPU, 8 GB RAM, 240 GB disk space, 3 TB bandwidth, and 2 IP addresses.

cPanel is offered optionally with all Snappy VPS plans, as well as weekly offsite backups are provided to ensure your data remains safe. A full suite of site development tools, thousands of free website templates, a script installer are also included with each package. Support is available through live chat, phone, and email 24/7 to help with any issues you may have.

HostGator Dedicated Servers

If you want the ultimate in performance, control and security, HostGator’s dedicated servers are built for advanced management, maximum performance and instant scalability. You can choose Windows with Plesk or Linux with cPanel servers, as well as managed and semi-managed options. HostGator customers can choose from three dedicated servers:

  • Value Server starting at $119/month;
  • Power Server starting at $139/month;
  • Enterprise Server starting at $149/month.

All dedicated servers include 4 IPv4 IPs, RAID-1 configuration, full root access, DDoS protection, unlimited databases, fully redundant network, and 24/7 live support.

The Value Servers boasts 4 Core / 8 Thread Intel Xeon-D CPU, 8 GB RAM, 1 TB HDD, unmetered bandwidth, Linux or Windows OS. The Power Server has 8 Core / 16 Thread Intel Xeon-D CPU, 16 GB RAM, 2 TB HDD or 512 GB SSD, unmetered bandwidth, and choice of Linux or Windows OS. The Enterprise Server features 8 Core / 16 Thread Intel Xeon-D CPU, 32 GB RAM, 1 TB SSD, unmetered bandwidth, Linux or Windows OS.

HostGator Reseller Plans

If you want to start your own small web hosting business or add hosting as an ancillary service to your web design services, HostGator has three reseller levels:

  • Aluminum starting at $19.95/month;
  • Copper starting at $24.95/month;
  • Silver starting at $24.95/month.

All plans feature unlimited domain hosting, unlimited Subdomains, Email Accounts, MySQL Databases, FTP Accounts. The Aluminum plan features 60 GB disk space, 600 GB bandwidth. The Copper plan features 90 GB disk space, and 900 GB bandwidth. The Silver plan boasts 140 GB disk space, and 1400 GB bandwidth.

Other reseller hosting features include:

  • Flexible, easy to use cPanel;
  • Private nameservers based on your domain;
  • 99.9% uptime guarantee;
  • 45-day money-back guarantee;
  • Free website transfers for up to 30 websites;
  • Free reseller club account;
  • Automatic weekly off-site backups;
  • WHM & WHMCS;
  • SSH access;
  • Spam prevention, and more.

HostGator’s reseller plans give you the flexibility to run your hosting business any way you want from resource allocations to customizing the cPanel and offering additional services (domain name, SSL certificates, etc.).

Which HostGator Plan to Choose?

If you’re launching your first website or personal project it’s unlikely that you would get so much traffic that you would need the resources of an entire server dedicated to your project. Usually, when starting out, a shared hosting plan is sufficient. You can always upgrade when and if your hosting requirements change.

Starting out with HostGator’s Baby plan will allow you to host more than one domain, and get comfortable with cPanel, HostGator’s site building tool, and QuickInstaller tool. You can create virtually any type of website (blog, forum, photo gallery, etc.), and access a wide selection of themes and templates.

HostGator’s plans are scalable, you can easily add more resources or switch to a higher tier hosting plans should it become necessary.

If you’re a professional launching a web project and you need complete control over your hosting environment along with the possibility to install custom software or run custom applications, HostGator’s VPS plans offer you the freedom to do so.

Only if your site’s performance degrades on a VPS, should you consider switching to a dedicated server. Usually, the need for a dedicated server is more common for high traffic eCommerce sites, businesses that process payments and store sensitive information, etc.

If you own a WordPress site, you may want to consider a managed WordPress hosting account before upgrading to a VPS. These plans optimized for WordPress come with more resources than shared hosting plans, and take into account the particularities of WordPress sites such as performance, security, and updates.

HostGator offers monthly billing on most of their hosting plans, but to benefit from their promotional prices, you may need to sign up for at least 12 months. For example, the Baby plan costs $11.95/month if you sign up for only a month, but if you decide to commit for a year, the monthly price drops with 60% to just $4.78/month.

The 45-day money-back offered by HostGator guarantees that you can back out from any long-term plan if you’re dissatisfied with their services. This is a generous money-back guarantee that is above the industry standard.

Conclusion

HostGator is a popular choice in a competitive hosting industry. They are a reliable hosting partner whether you need Linux or Windows hosting, cloud or VPS, or whether you’re looking to become a hosting reseller. This web host can meet the needs of individuals, IT professionals, small and medium businesses, and their selection of dedicated severs can even meet enterprise hosting requirements.

We hope that our review of HostGator’s plans has helped you decide whether HostGator can be a good match for you, and which HostGator hosting plans should you choose for your website.

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David Cross

David is the chief editor at WebHostingMedia right from the beginning. He has a great passion for building and managing websites and creating helpful content. He is also interested in programming - currently learning python.