The Best Web Hosting for Small Business

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The Best Web Hosting for Small Business

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A high quality web hosting provider needs to have three things:

1. Fast, secure technology that has what your website needs to run well
2. Hosting options that give your business room to grow
3. Fast access to customer support that knows what they’re talking about, and a huge catalog of nuanced self-help content

InMotion and SiteGround, our two top picks, are both excellent options. We think most small businesses will be really happy with what they have to offer.

DreamHost, Bluehost, and HostGator are also very popular and generally well regarded — there are just enough little issues that keep them from being our overwhelming favorites.

We also looked at GoDaddy. We recommend avoiding hosting your small business’s websites on GoDaddy. You can absolutely do better.

	InMotion	SiteGround	DreamHost	Bluehost	HostGator	GoDaddy
	Sign Up Sign Up Sign Up Sign Up Sign Up Sign Up Quicksprout pick Quicksprout pick Honorable mention Popular Popular Don’t recommend Shared hosting plans Start at $6/month Start at $4/month Start at $3/month Start at $4/month Start at $3/month Start at $3/month 24/7 customer support Phone Chat Email Phone Chat Email Email Phone Chat Email Phone Chat Phone Free trial 90 days 30 days 97 days 30 days 45 days 30 days SSD storage Only on some plans Free SSL certificate Only on some plans SSH Access Email hosting Operating system Linux Linux Linux Linux Linux Windows Linux Windows Our top picks for small business web hosting InMotion Hosting Quicksprout pick This host is all-around excellent and great for beginners InMotion is an all-around provider with a solid reputation: the Subaru of web hosts. It has a lot of plans to choose from across the traditional range of hosting options — shared, managed WordPress, VPS, and dedicated servers — and it prioritizes fast loading times with SSD storage, PHP 7, custom server caching, and two US-based servers. We also appreciate its rigorous security protocol: servers have custom firewalls and DDoS protection, it includes malware protection, and SSL certificates are free on all plans. Where InMotion especially stands out is in its customer support, which caters to all levels of users. Its knowledge center is recognized as one of the best in the business, with thousands of help articles, FAQs, forums, training videos, and guides to help even the most entry-level administrator feel in control. You’ll see InMotion support staff respond to specific questions in each article’s comments section, and there’s even a community support subsection, where one-off questions are answered by InMotion super users. The US-based customer service team is available 24/7 across live chat and email and phone, and InMotion offers a whopping 90-day money-back guarantee — one of the longest available. InMotion staff answers user questions in the comments of their support center’s articles. We think most small businesses will be happy on one of InMotion’s Business shared hosting plans, which include a free domain; unlimited storage, bandwidth, and email; and one-click installation of more than 400 apps. When you’re ready to upgrade, InMotion has a straightforward approach. As you move up the food chain, you won’t get upsold on additional features or slicker tools. You’ll just get more power — 2X the performance with each upgrade. What other hosts consider add-ons, InMotion offers even on its lowest-tier plans, including automatic backups and one free restore every four months, plus three free website/database migrations. The only extra perk the highest-tier shared hosting plan offers is an uptime guarantee: for every month InMotion’s server performance dips below an average 99.999% uptime, you’re eligible for a free month of hosting. InMotion is initially slightly more expensive than competing web hosts. Its shared hosting plans start at $6–7/month and managed WordPress hosting starts at $7–8/month. But InMotion is one of the only web hosts that doesn’t offer promo pricing, where a plan jumps up in price after your first contract. Long-term, there’s a good chance InMotion will be more cost efficient. SiteGround Quicksprout pick An outstanding reputation and robust functionality If InMotion is Subaru, SiteGround is Tesla: cutting-edge, powerful, and enormously well-respected. Its accolades are impossible to ignore: it’s one of WordPress’s three recommended web hosts and is the go-to for Reddit users, plus it has twice as many five-star reviews than any other provider on WhoIsHostingThis. SiteGround is widely considered to a technology leader, especially when it comes to shared hosting — it’s often among the first hosts to provide access to developing tech to its customers. At this point, SSD drives, custom caching, CDN technology, NGINX, and PHP 7 are included to maximize speed on all levels of plans. SiteGround’s commitment to security is also no joke, with CHROOT account isolation, custom AI to counter brute-force attacks, and an in-house DevOps team to code proactive patches. InMotion’s customer support is tough to beat, but SiteGround gives it a real run for its money. Customer support is available 24/7 across all channels — phone, chat, and email — and its knowledge base is rich and well-organized. SiteGround is probably the most transparent web host around regarding uptime: it has a 99.9% annual uptime guarantee (or you get a month of hosting free) and posts both its annual average and the previous month’s uptime right on its site. SiteGround’s annual uptime compared to last month’s. As one of WordPress’s recommended web hosts, it might come as no surprise that managed WordPress is built straight into all of SiteGround’s shared hosting plans — it’s not considered an upgrade, like it is with InMotion. If you’re a WordPress user, this is undeniably a perk: core updates are automatic, all plans are WP-CLI enabled for easier management, and security is tailored to counter WordPress-specific vulnerabilities. This isn’t to say that you can’t get those things on a standard shared hosting plan with InMotion — they’re just going to take more manual labor. With SiteGround, upgrading your shared hosting plan gets you access to more: more power, yes, but also more tools and functionality. SiteGround is particularly well-known for its highest-tier shared hosting plan, GoGeek. On GoGeek, premium site caching will increase your site’s speed, you can make site-wide backups on demand (plus free restores), and you have access to pre-installed Git and WordPress staging. Pretty cool stuff, although potentially more than your small business needs. SiteGround is designed to meet the needs of customers who are straddling the line of small business. It leaps from shared hosting straight to an $80/month cloud hosting solution or a $279/month dedicated server, skipping over the more traditional VPS stepping stone. And while SiteGround’s promo pricing is extremely reasonable, starting at $4/month, it triples at the end of your first contract. Yowch. 3 other web hosts for small businesses to consider DreamHost Another WordPress recommended web host, DreamHost also integrates managed WordPress hosting into is core shared hosting packages (as well as its super-speedy, cloud-based WordPress hosting plan called DreamPress). DreamHost stands out for having a completely customized back end instead of the universal cPanel most other Linux-based hosts use. Think of it like Apple versus Android: DreamHost customers love it, but it’s not a compatible solution should you ever switch hosts. DreamHost’s sleek custom control panel menu (left) compared to InMotion’s cPanel (right).  Dreamhost is a sleek web host with a traditional upgrade path: shared hosting to managed WordPress hosting to VPS to cloud hosting or a dedicated server. Customer service is a little less traditional: email support is available 24/7, but live chat is only on during business hours, and you actually have to pay about $10 to get technical support over the phone. That said, the free trial period is the longest in the business — 97 days. Shared hosting plans start at $3/month, and since Dreamhost doesn’t do promo pricing, it won’t jump after your first contract is up. Bluehost The third and final WordPress-recommended host, Bluehost is a hugely popular option that builds in managed WordPress hosting to all its shared hosting plans. Its knowledge base is kind of a disaster — we recommend going straight to the search bar; browsing is pretty much pointless — and even though customer support is available 24/7 across phone, live chat, and email, it’s been under fire in recent years. Poor customer support is one of the biggest reasons Bluehost has only one star on Trustpilot, and less than half of customers rate it five-stars on WhoIsHostingThis. Bluehost’s knowledge base is frustrating to browse or get answers fast. Shared hosting with Bluehost starts at $4/month for your initial contract. Bluehost is a standout for offering five(!)-year contracts, which could lock you into some really low prices. Hostgator Another big name in small business web hosting, and it’s a bit of a mixed bag. We were surprised at how thorough Hostgator’s self-serve knowledge base is (despite a certain mid-90s design aesthetic) but disappointed it doesn’t offer any sort of email support — just phone and live chat. Hostgator tends to rank highly on tech publications like PCMag, but customer reviews are pretty dreadful: it has only one star on Trustpilot. If you’re interested in trying HostGator, we recommend taking full advantage of the 45-day money-back guarantee. HostGator’s support center is surprisingly robust and useful, despite its outdated appearance.  HostGator does offer Windows hosting in addition to Linux, as well as a variety of options to upgrade, including cloud hosting, VPS hosting, managed WordPress, and a dedicated server. Shared hosting plans start at $3/month. A web host to avoid GoDaddy You can do better. Even though it offers Windows operating system and a wide range of plans across shared, managed WordPress, VPS, cloud, and dedicated servers, too many features (SSL certificates, SSD storage, site backups and restores) are only included in higher-tier plans or as add-ons. If that isn’t enough, its customer support is lacking, with no email and limited hours on live chat, plus a poorly organized knowledge base. The user reviews are also telling: two stars on Trustpilot and only 27% of users rate it 5 stars on WhoIsHostingThis.   How to find the best web hosting for small businesses Customer support Small business owners don’t always get the luxury of an IT department (or even a web administrator) on staff. Often, your web host’s customer support — and the self-service help articles, tutorials, and blogs it provides — act as the stand-in. That’s why we make technical support one of the highest priorities for small businesses. It’s like health insurance: it doesn’t matter how robust a plan is if you can’t settle a claim.   InMotion SiteGround DreamHost Bluehost HostGator GoDaddy Money-back guarantee 90 days 30 days 97 days 30 days 45 days 30 days Phone 24/7 24/7 ✘* 24/7