Why our reviews are worth reading
As a web agency, we use/test a LOT of hosting providers to scale both our clients and our many many side-projects (we like to experiment).
Having done this for quite a few years now, we’ve used, analysed, and reviewed a lot of web hosts… these are our findings.
If you’ve been browsing our site for a bit, you’ll quickly notice how much we like (nay LOVE) SiteGround, they are hands-down our all-time favourite web host. In this review, we’ll show you exactly why that is!
We generally look at the following 4 aspects of a web host to determine its overall quality: Ease of use, Speed (on a global level), Support, and Uptime. SiteGround absolutely nails all 4 and I’ll be going over each aspect in detail in just a minute.
Reasons to choose SiteGround
Let’s start with the best features of SiteGround, those that immediately give them the edge over the competition. For most people, the following list alone is enough to convince them SiteGround is the way to go.
- Officially recommended by WordPress: This, for me, is a BIG one. Over 25% of the web is now powered by WordPress, chances are, you’ll be using WP for your own website. There are only a handful of web hosts that get the official approval stamp from WP, and SiteGround is one of them!
- 24/7 support: That’s right, and they are insanely fast at responding to tickets, more on that below in the Support section.
- Free daily backups: Broke your site? No problem, just roll it back to yesterday.
- 30-day money back guarantee: Not happy for any reason? No problem, you have nothing to lose.
- Free SSL: Security is incredibly important and SG knows this, so you can grab an SSL certificate for free!
- Speed: Using a combination of strategic locations (Singapore for Aussies) and superior tech, they blow the Australian competition out of the water. More on that further down the page.
It’s truly a no-brainer. As for costs, they have 3 hosting plans, their most affordable plan starts at only $4.95/mo (which is 67% off the usual price)!
SiteGround Review
Having been around since 2004, this web hosting company has employees in 13 different countries across the globe, and localised websites for customers in the UK, Europe, Spain, the US, Australia, and more. Like most great web hosts, they don’t just offer basic web hosting, there’s something here to meet everyone’s needs.
SiteGround has the following hosting options:
- Shared Hosting: This is what most people need.
- Cloud Hosting: High performance hosting for more demanding high traffic sites.
- Dedicated Servers: Super high performance, managed servers.
- Reseller Hosting: If you’re a web design agency and want to host your clients.
- Enterprise Hosting: If you want something high-end and custom.
Shared hosting is what most people need if you want to host a site for a small/medium sized business, a blog, a hobby, etc. They offer 3 plans for shared hosting.
This is the impressive list of essential features that comes with every plan:
- Free Website Builder
- cPanel & SSH Access
- Free CMS Install
- 24/7 Technical Support
- SSD Storage
- Free Auto Daily Backups
- 30 Days Money Back
- Unlimited Email Accounts & DBs
- HTTP/2 Enabled Servers
- Free Let’s Encrypt SSLs
- Free Cloudflare CDN
Let’s get into the 4 aspects I talked about in the intro!
Ease of Use
If you’re not a web designer by trade, setting up a site might seem daunting, luckily SG knows this, and provides a variety of tools to make setting up a site as easy as possible. From 1-click installers for WordPress and Joomla, to easy SSL activation, cPanel access and even a Weebly site builder.
Everything you need is a few clicks away!
Speed
Your site’s loading times are insanely important as for every second your site is still loading, you can lose 1/10 of your visitors, they’ll just turn back, get distracted, etc. SiteGround has put multiple measures in place to optimise their server speeds as much as possible. They use features like SuperCacher (their in-house caching system), SSDs, and PHP7 to get php code executed faster. Here’s the list of tech they use.
If you’re in Australia, you should use their blazing fast Singapore server (they have servers on 3 continents), it’s amazing! Check the speed of one of my personal side-projects below, pinged from Melbourne, 1<sec loading times!
With a data centre in Singapore, SiteGround is a great web host for most countries around the APAC area, like Indonesia, Malaysia, and Vietnam.
Support
If you’re new to web hosting or having your own website, then you’ll definitely find having 24/7 customer service to be an invaluable resource to cash in on. Even if you’re a veteran webmaster, having access to knowledgeable, friendly, and helpful customer support is key to a smooth operation.
Their support is available through phone, chat, and a ticketing system, with an average ticket response time of 10 minutes!
Up-time
While a lot of Australia web hosting providers promise 99.99% uptime, SG is one of the few that actually delivers! It does this through a combination of a custom in-house server monitoring system that’s lightning fast at detecting issues, redundant electrical systems, and a custom built bot that prevents brute-force attacks.
SiteGround is also the first web hosting service to implement a one-of-a-kind isolation system that aids performance by preventing vulnerable accounts from taking an entire server down. This unique technology helps to make their shared hosting service equally as secure as many dedicated hosting options – which come with a much higher price tag.
By constantly monitoring and detecting threats to the server, keeping software updated, and conducting in-house patches, you can count on SiteGround to be one of the most reliable ways to use shared hosting.
Conclusion
I could go on and start getting into the details of their techy side and all the magic that happens in the background, but I think I’ve made my point. SiteGround deserves the praise as it truly is a one of kind hosting provider that make it very easy to build your own website! Give them a try, you won’t look back!
