WordPress is one of the leading web design scripts being used to build websites, with estimates that as many as one in five websites is powered by this versatile platform. The reason for its popularity is its intuitive, user-friendly design capabilities that make it easy for anyone with even a minimal amount of computer skill to quickly create almost any sort of website you could possibly want to use. Because it is an Open Source web design script, there is an almost endless variety of new style and functionality that is being added to the platform. To get the most out of your WordPress website, it is best to choose a webhost that has experience with hosting them and has a service that is tailored to be used with this script. The three top performers in this area are Bluehost, iPage, and Hostgator, and while they all provide a similar, one-click installation for WordPress, the differences in the service they provide makes it important to compare them, to determine which one has the right service for your specific needs. After a comparison of the services that are most used by WordPress webmasters, the three services come out with Bluehost as the leader, flowed closely by iPage and then Hostgator.
1. BlueHost WordPress Hosting
Of the three webhosts, Bluehost has the most reliable and experienced service for hosting WordPress websites. It combines the flat rate monthly fee of $6.99 with the popular cPanel and a completely unlimited service, to make it the leading company when it comes to hosting your WordPress website. New accounts get $100 in Google AdWords credits, a year’s free domain registration on any new domain that is purchased through Bluehost and comes with over 70 single click installation scripts. Bluehost also provide a single-click WordPress installer directly in cPanel, to make it quick and easy to get your new website or blog started. The webhosting service from Bluehost provides unlimited disc storage and data transfer, so that you can be sure that you will always have enough room to grow and you can rely on good download speeds, regardless of how heavy your traffic gets.
Apart from users that only need a very limited webhosting service, Bluehost offers the best value for money service in the long term. The flat rate of $6.99 per month for their all-inclusive service is much cheaper than Hostgator’s full service plan and less expensive than iPage long term prices, as well. This already reasonable cost can be reduced to as little as $3.95 per month on new accounts to help you to keep the set up costs for your new WordPress site as low as possible. The advantage of having cPanel also makes Bluehost more useable than iPage with a greater range of features that most webmasters will use, while many of the free inclusions from iPage will appeal to people that are setting up a retail specific website.
While there is very little to differentiate the quality of service and technical support, Bluehost’s live chat feature that allows you to connect to technical support via your Bluehost account dashboard, and their long history of reliable, state of the art service, make them the industry leader when it comes to hosting WordPress websites. With their reliability, quality service and long term cost effectiveness it is hard to find a better host for a new WordPress website than Bluehost.
2. iPage
The WordPress web hosting service from iPage is also accessed via a one click installer that is simple to use. Unlike Hostgator, iPage has a single, flat rate webhosting service that is offered at only $1.99 per month for the first year but increases to $8.49 per month after that. The service from iPage is unlimited and it allows you to set up as many websites as you want to, park domains and use as many subdomains as you need. It also comes with an impressive range of free inclusions, with over $500 of extras. Even though you may need to purchase some of the services like Google AdWords advertising to claim your credits, they can be useful for reducing your start up costs.
The control panel that is used for managing your webhosting account at iPage is vDeck, which, while similar to cPanel, doesn’t have quite as much functionality and is less intuitive to use. Every new iPage account comes with Install Central included as a part of vDeck which allows users to install a new WordPress website with a single click. There is very little to differentiate the two installers but the all-inclusive service from iPage offers greater flexibility than the limited hosting from Hostgator.
3. HostGator
Hostgator has a good reputation as a webhost and provide three levels of service that allow you to keep the costs of running your website to a minimum. If you are only going to keep a single website that uses only one domain then the Hatchling Plan from Hostgator may be perfect for your needs. This allows you enough space for any sized website that you want to use but because it is limited to a single domain and its subdomains it has very low fees, starting at only $3.96 per month. This does not come with some of the features like SSL that you may want if you intend to conduct transactions via your website and it doesn’t allow you to park domains either. The graduated range of webhosting service from Hostgator increases the cost as you add these sorts of functions and for the full service, the cost of $10.36 per month is more than the shared hosting from either Bluehost or iPage.
Another advantage of webhosting from Hostgator is that every account comes with the popular cPanel webhost dashboard that makes managing your account easy. The WordPress installer is available through the QuickTime Installer that is included with Hostgator’s version of cPanel, and the set up process is easy enough for anyone to do without having to understand any complicated code or web design jargon.