Based on our own usage and comparison reviews , we bring you the

The top website hosting for March 2018

As a blogger and website builder, I have used many webhosting companies including US and Australia based ones  to create websites and below is collection of some of the best that I would recommend for this year.

I have used over  20 companies to test out reliable providers over time and below are some of them that I would still gladly suggest to anyone in 2018.

Let’s check out our listing of best webhosts for 2017-18 after our analysis, review and comparison from the past few years to make it easier for you to make the right informed choice.

I have written a “recommended” against our tops pick of hosts, but feel free to choose which one suit’s you needs best.

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Choosing a service provider to start your first website, online store or blog can be the most important step you take while building your business and its essential to do the right thing from the start.

Some of the important factors are the obvious – Site speed, Disk space, Ease of use, Flexibility, how many websites can I host on the webhosting-plan.

Australian Hosting or US hosting – what should i choose ?

How important is server location

The  decision is always divided on this one, that is – if the server location should be in Australia or the US for your Australian based site. But I like to think that this decision is really  based of  the traffic that your beginner blog will attract.

If you are going  to get 100 % off all your traffic from Australia ,it makes sense to get an Australian host, but the truth is 90% of the websites always get a lot of traffic from the US, even if they are Australian based  and so  it makes sense to get a cheaper US host.

Keep in mind that most Australian hosting providers are more expensive than their US counterparts so this will definitely make a difference to your budget.

What Plan is good for me ?

Most of the plans listed here  are  suitable for beginner websites as well as established websites. These shared plans while cheap can still easily take upto 2000 to 3,000 hits a day and function  smoothly, so you don’t need to upgrade for a while at least.

Some starter plans allow just one  website, so  choose the correct plan if you think you are going to start more than 1 website. Most shared plans allow you to host multiple websites with  1 hosting account purchase.

Once you are doing big numbers like 3000 + hits a day it is wise  to consider new hosting or then  getting CDN services which are a cheaper upgrade for higher traffic. If you get a CDN  add-on  once you start getting higher traffic you can still use your existing host and still enjoy faster speeds.

Price of wordpress Hosting

There is no  fixed price  for  hosting  as companies run deals all the time,which we update over here, but generally  the price range for  hosting is anywhere  between $3.45 to $5.95 a month, though when there are special deals you can get prices going down as low as $1 month, $1.95 a month  or as high as $7.99 month to $11 a month and this is all for the starter plans  or shared hosting.

As soon as  you talk about VPSs , dedicated, Cloud  and managed  hosting plans  the prices  start from $11 and upwards. There are some premium WP hosts that  charge upto $30,000 a month for high traffic plans  with CDN etc inbuilt.

What is CDN services?

Its just a service that  routes your traffic via the fastest route to your audience or website visitors, keeping your blog or webpage fast.It normally costs between $3 to $4 a month  depending on which provider you go with. CDN’s are Quite popular today  for blogs that have traffic spikes.

Different Kinds of hosting services

There are three main types of hosting:

1. Cheap Shared Hosting
2.  VPS Hosting
3.  Dedicated Hosting & Managed or optimised Hosting

For most of those reading this, you’ll want to go for the cheap web hosting type (shared hosting), as it’s perfect for small to medium sized businesses.

However if  you want to go one step further  and get a little more bang for your buck, then you can choose a VPS or Dedicated plan by clicking a  link and then exploring more plans on the seller website. There are shared plans, then  starter plans , Pro plans  all named differently with every different provider.

There are different plans like Linux hosting plans  and Windows Hosting plans, but they both do a excellent job of  displaying your wordpress website , irrespective of all this technical jargon.

One click Install for WordPress

Setting up your  first website-Or-blog will be something that you will always remember  and its best to hope for it  to be a good experience.  I would definitely suggest a host that makes the process easier  with easy to install automated scripts  to set up your blog yourself.

Bluehost and Godaddy has a customised install process and  they have “1 click install”. With this custom install process – you can  install a new wordpress site in as quick as 10 minutes with just a few clicks.

There is step by step instructions given to you through the install process via the admin dashboard, to make the website installing as easy as possible and that is why my top recommendations are for these two webhosts.

Cpanel the Hosting and  WordPress backend

The backend for the hosting account is the cpanel admin area. This is where you can get a bit technical and adjust things further, like get detailed stats for your blog. Set up FTP access. Peek into your SQL database and php admin area. Change admin passwords  and do heaps of other stuff.

But messing around in this area is not necessary, as you could do easily do most of the basic and important stuff like adding graphics and content from the front end of your website.

WordPress as a website builder

WordPress is a very versatile  website building software. Once you install your  wordpress site you can  change the look/design of your blog in one click  by changing the wordpress theme or template.

You get thousands of free templates via the wordpress admin area. If you want a robust  and well supported professional looking template design – you can also buy premium template designs from online sellers.

WordPress uses a system called plugins to add functionality to your website. You can easily add many functionalities by adding free WP plugins available in the free word-press marketplace or then again you can just buy some premium plugins for  adding further functionality.

The flexibility is there, to use either free or paid wp themes with your site and any plugins you choose to enhance  your wp site functionality is a bonus with these wordpress hosting-plans listed above.

No software is easier that WP software for building a website quickly and easily  and that is why this software has become one of the topmost used software for website building. Popular websites like  CNN,  SONY, MTV and BBC America also use them.

Most of them providers I have listed above do cover most of these features that are needed for your webpage/site.

Not many people  focus on ease of use and flexibility when choosing a service provider – but these are very important factors to consider while signing up for a new hosting plan to set up your new blog or site/shop.

Bluehost and Godaddy have millions of user’s setting up their first online-website by themselves and have made it the easiest process to do it yourself.  They can also be considered “cheap web hosting providers”  when their deals are on.

Saying that tho, the rest are not far behind in pricing and most providers will provide you a quick click and install process to get started with a professional WordPress(WP) website.

Is wordpress free to use ?

Yes  word press is free software by itself  and can be used by anybody, the problem is that  if you want  to get it working  from your own pc as a server, you will have to go through a lot of technical settings  like DNS adjustments,  routing domain names   which will be through your pc .

Most providers  already have their custom built installers for  wp  and so provide provide wp as a 1 click install With hosting for the easy building of your WP blog/website.

Most of the above providers allow you to build your website with wordpress and also have many other website platforms like joomla, Drupal and many more.

Our Featured 2017 Hosting Providers

Bluehost.com

Bluehost’s fast and reliable website hosting gives you everything you need to get your website online quickly. Bluehost is a web hosting company owned by Endurance International Group

Key people in bluehost –  Matt Heaton (Founder, CEO 2003-2011) Dan Handy (CEO 2011-2015) Mike Olson (CEO 2015-present)

They have servers in Provo, Utah, USA. Bluehost’s uptime is just about perfect (99.98%), well over industry standard which is around 99.90%.  Prior to last 6 months.

Hostgator.com

HostGator recently launched their new, premium hosting called HostGator WordPress Cloud.

Founded in a dorm room at Florida Atlantic University by Brent Oxley, HostGator has grown into a leading provider of Shared, Reseller, VPS, and Dedicated web hosting. HostGator is headquartered in Houston and Austin, Texas, with several international offices throughout the globe.

HostGator has been around since 2002, originally founded by Brent Oxley before being acquired a decade later by Endurance International Group (EIG).

HostGator Shared Plans

1. HostGator Hatching Plan: Well suited for Hosting single domain
2. HostGator Baby Plan: Most recommended if you are interested in hosting multiple domains
3. HostGator Business Plan: Most features will be that of HostGator Baby Plan. Additional features that you will get will be dedicated IP Address, Private SSL and Toll Free Number

Godaddy.com

Bob Parsons the founder of godaddy is a serial entrepreneur. He sold his first company to Intuit, Inc. in 1994. Three years later Parsons started Jomax Technologies, renaming the company GoDaddy in 1999. In 2000, GoDaddy became an ICANN-accredited domain name registrar. Designated CEO Now: Scott Wagner (Jan 1, 2018).

They have many different kind of plans. While Deluxe and Unlimited WebHosting Plans support and host unlimited Web Sites, owners of single plans may experience periodic decreases in performance once they more than 400 Web Sites.

Crucial.com

The Sydney-based company has focused on delivering a better experience for customers, with the roll-out of an industry first concept; Managed Google Apps.

Crucial’s roots trace back to a student bedroom in Bondi in 2003 where the company was first formed, and its headcount currently sits at 20 employees before the AVS buy.

Wpengine.com

Hosts like WP Engine actually guarantee the security of your site so if you’re hacked, the hosting company will cover the clean-up costs, which can be thousands of dollars, depending on the size of the site.

JASON COHEN

FOUNDER

I started WP Engine because I wanted to work on interesting, real problems experienced by interesting, real customers, and come to the office every day thrilled to be working with the people around me. Somehow, we’ve been lucky enough to make that dream a reality.

The company was founded in 2010 and is based in Austin, Texas. It has additional offices in San Francisco, California – San Antonio, Texas, Brisbane, Australia, and London, England.

I will be adding more content and updates  to this post as we progress through  2017, so do let me know how you go  with your  new venture and leave me a comment if you have any queries, I will do my best to reply to you  as soon as i can.