If you are a new blogger and has been searching in Google for different hosting Plans and offers from different hosting service providers, you definitely came across the word Managed WordPress Hosting. You must be thinking what is a fully managed WordPress hosting or how it is different from shared or dedicated hosting.
You have also definitely observed that the price of fully Managed WordPress hosting is high as a comparison to shared hosting.
What is Managed WordPress hosting?
Selecting a proper web host is one of the most important steps in starting or creating a new website. There are various types of web hosting already available like free, shared, cloud, VPS and dedicated hosting, but fully managed WordPress hosting is somewhat different from all of that. Managed WordPress host provides specialized web hosting for WordPress sites.
WordPress is the largest and most used CMS in the world and millions of bloggers use WordPress for hosting their sites. Managed WordPress hosting providers just make your blogging experience easier by looking after all technical aspects of the backend. The servers of fully managed WordPress hosting especially optimized to boost your website performance.
Just take a look at various Pros and Cons of a fully Managed WordPress hosting.
Pros:
1. Easy to Manage: A fully Managed WordPress servers especially optimized to host WordPress websites. The hosting providers will look after and manage all the technical aspects of web management like Page Caching, auto back up, automatic WordPress core updates, etc so that you can devote solely on blogging or content creating.
2.Security: All reputed managed WordPress hosting offers robust security to your WordPress site like auto-backup and restores, protection from a DDoS attack. Therefore, you do not have to pay for any extra back up plugins.
3.Auto updates: Managed hosting automatically updates all plugins or themes as soon as they are released. Also, the hosting providers check the compatibility issues before making any changes at the site level. Therefore, you need not have to worry about manually updating any plugins or themes for your site.
4.Technical Support: All reputed managed WordPress hosting providers have an excellent support team which assists you 24/7 for your hosting related problems. You won’t get these kinds of WordPress specific support from any shared hosting providers.
Though you hardly need any technical support, if you host your WordPress site on any highly rated managed hosting services like Siteground or Bluehost.
5.Speed: Speed optimization is one of the best features that you can avail by hosting your site at managed WordPress hosting. If your site loads slowly, visitors can leave your site without opening the full page, which means the bounce rate of your site also increases and you may lose lots of visitors. Slow loading of the site may also impact your SEO or Google page rank.
Cons:
1.Cost: The price of managed hosting is always on the higher side than any regular shared hosting services. The basic price of any good managed hosting starts from as low as $15 per month and goes up to a few hundred dollars. For a new blogger, it really matters a lot. Also, there are so many limitations in the starting plans of all managed WordPress hosting, like you have limited per month visitors, limited features or you can not avail premium customer support.
2. Limitation in the usage of some resource hungry plugins. Some hosting providers will not allow using certain plugins which may contradict the hosting service.
3. You can not build a non-Wordpress site on managed hosting platform.
Factors to be considered before registering any Hosting Plan
Almost all hosting company provides one-click installation of WordPress, but before jumping into any plan, you should consider following
- Resources: Your hosting providers must support the basic WordPress requirement like how much RAM available to you, can it supports PHP version 7 or above, MYSQL version 5.6 or above.
- Domain: How many WordPress installations your hosting service supports. Some of the hosting providers include only one WordPress installation in their Starter Plan.
- Monthly Visitors: Some hosting company allowed a limited number of monthly visitors, you have to pay extra if your visitors exceeds this limit.
- Renewal Cost: Some hosting services offer very cheap introductory price at the time registration, but this price will increase drastically at the time of renewal of service.
- Price: The most important factor for selecting any web host. For any new blog, the site may not generate any income during the starting phase. Therefore, your web host must be affordable for you.
- Support: Prompt and Round the clock technical support is another important factor you must consider. Most of the hosting services provide support via three different modes – email tickets, live chat, or phone. Some of the hosting services charge extra for phone support.
Best Cheap Fully Managed WordPress Hosting for New Blogger
For a new blog, hosting your site in a managed WordPress service is a bit costly affair, because your site has not started generating income yet. You can always start your blog on any shared hosting platform, but once your blog starts getting more hits, your hosting provider will ask you to upgrade your plan to VPS or Dedicated server without any discount and you have to pay more than what you have thought. The only solution, you have to migrate your site to another hosting service or upgrade your plan by paying extra.
Therefore, in my view, it is always better to purchase a good fully managed WordPress hosting service at the beginning so you don’t have to face these kinds of the situation at the latter phase of your blogging career.
There is a number of cheap and affordable fully managed WordPress hosting providers, you can choose from to host your blog. I recommend you register your hosting for more than one year to avail of the benefits initial discounted price.
Top 5 affordable fully Managed WordPress Hosting
1.SiteGround
Siteground is one of the most trusted and highly rated managed WordPress hosting services and also officially recommended by WordPress.org. Their plans are greatly fitted for non-technical blogger and also very cheap too. They have an excellent support system with almost no waiting period. Siteground is a great solution for cheap managed WordPress hosting for new bloggers.
Price: $5.95 and $11.95
Key Features:
- One click installer of WordPress.
- Supercacher for excellent site performance with three levels caching.
- WordPress staging area for testing your site functionality before going into online. (GoGeek Plan).
- Automatic WordPress core updates
- Git integration
- Multiple Website
- CDN with Cloudflare
- Free SSL with LetsEncrypt
- 24/7 support
- Robust Security
- Free PCI compliance for e-Commerce
- WP-CLI comes pre-installed to managed multisite
Cons: Price gets almost tripled after the initial offer period.
2.Bluehost
One of the oldest web hosts started its operation back in 1996 and the name is almost identical with WordPress. Bluehost is also officially recommended by WordPress.org. Though they have a basic shared hosting plan which starts from $3.95, is sufficient for a new blogger, but if you want to create a WordPress site with all the features of a Managed WordPress hosting, then Bluehost is an excellent choice. Bluehost is no#1 brand in the market of WordPress specific hosting.
Price: Starts from 19.99 per months
Key Features:
- One click WordPress installation
- Unlimited visitors
- Manage single to multiple websites hosting from a single account
- WordPress specific technical support team
- Highly rated security features like sitelock, advanced CDN
- Most trusted WordPress hosting providers
- Staging Site to test changes before you make it online
Cons:
Costly for new bloggers.
3.DreamHost:
Dreamhost is also officially recommended hosting service provider by WordPress.org. WordPress has been in the market for more than 18 years and provides hosting for more than 600000 websites. Dreamhost is one of the most reputed brands.
Price: Starts from $16.95 per month
Key Features:
- One click WordPress installation
- WordPress specific technical support team
- Cloud server technology for page load optimization and scale when traffic spikes
- Unlimited automated backups
- Real-time malware scanning and site repair for hacked sites
- Woocommerce integration
- Pre-installed Jetpack plugin and premium themes for the higher plans
Cons: only 10000 monthly visitors for the basic plan, you can install only one WordPress. For hosting multiple sites, you need the Advanced Plan which costs $35.95 per month.
4.Godday
Godaddy.com is a well-known name in the field of Domain registration, but they are expanding very rapidly in the field of hosting service too. They offer very affordable WordPress specific managed to host service with lots of add-on features.
Price: Price starts from $3.99 per month, recommended $7.99, $13.99
Key Features:
- Very Affordable to new Bloggers
- One click Staging site
- Multisite management tool
- Malware detection and removal tool with sitelock.
- One year free SSL certificate
- Can handle up to 400000 monthly visitors($7.99 plan)
- Automatic Plugin updates
- Free domain
Cons: Negative feedback on technical support
5.InMotion Hosting
InMostion Hosting is a well known US-based brand that provides a hosting solution for millions of web developers and bloggers. They are recognized for excellent technical support. Inmotion Hosting also provides a well-optimized fully managed WordPress Hosting for active bloggers.
Price: Starts from $7.26 per month
Key Features:
- One-click WordPress Hosting
- No restriction on Plugins or themes unlike other Managed hosting
- Advanced server-level caching for blazing fast loading time
- Free domain and SSL
- Automatic plugin, theme and core updates
- Staging site to test changes and updates
- Hack and Malware Protection
Cons: Limited monthly visitors for the basic plan