Suggest Most Reputable Web Hosting Companies

Suggest Most Reputable Web Hosting Companies

   We asked over 100 readers about their web hosting providers to see which web hosts came out on top to make our list of the top 10 web hosting companies. Criteria we screened for: long-standing company history, large employee base (60+), large customer base, advanced hosting feature set, competitive price, 24 hour US-based phone support, fast server response times, high uptime and reliability ratings, and positive customer feedback. We scanned forums and magazines and combined what we found with our own survey feedback to determine our rankings. We also set a bar of a minimum B+ rating with the Better Business Bureau (BBB). See below our Reader's Choice Awards for the top 10 web hosting providers:

More detailed web hosting provider reviews

Bluehost Inc (details)

Bluehost is one of the biggest hosting companies with over 200 employees focused on providing and delivering web hosting services. Bluehost focuses entirely on shared web hosting accounts and they do not provide higher end services such as dedicated servers and VPS servers. Bluehost has a good reputation with starter clients who are new to building websites - they provide an easy interface to build your website and offer generous credits to get started advertising on Yahoo! and Google. Some clients whose sites have grown larger have reported a lack of higher-end service, while customers with smaller sites and smaller traffic requirements report positive feedback..

Headquarters: Orem, UT

Year founded: 2004

Number of employees: 200

Number of customers: 230,000

Price (basic web hosting): $6.95 / month

Services


Shared web hosting
Notable differences vs. other hosting companies:

Bluehost includes one free domain name when you signup for a hosting account
You get $25 credit for advertising on Yahoo and $50 credit for advertising on Google
Customer comments:

"I have been with Blue Host for years. Always found their staff helpful when it came to fixing errors and coding. I have no complaints."
Bluehost coupon codes:

Click here to get $75 in free Google and Yahoo advertising with your Bluehost hosting account
Note: If you are hosting a larger site or have critical business needs, you may want to look into vps web hosting providers. Do you need a good server admin but can't afford to pay too much? Check out SeeksAdmin.

Hostgator LLC (details)

HostGator is one of the giants in the hosting industry, focusing on smaller low-end hosting customers, but recently introducing competitive products in the higher end dedicated server and VPS server hosting areas. Hostgator is consistently associated with good customer service and high reliability.

Headquarters: Houston, TX

Year founded: 2002

Number of employees: 210

Number of customers: 250,000

Price (basic web hosting): $4.95 / month

Services offered:

Shared hosting
Dedicated servers
VPS servers (virtual private servers)
Reseller hosting
Notable differences vs. other hosting companies:

45-day money-back guarantee
$100 in Google AdWords credit
Industry's best 24/7 technical support staff
Customer comments:

"HostGator is actually one of the more established hosts in the industry and should rank fairly decent for the above mentioned (apart from budget - the prices might be quite costly if you are only running a very small website). However for the cost, you would at least be assured of a certain quality standard so it really boils down to your needs."
coupon codes:

Click to view Hostgator's lowest prices ($4.99 for shared hosting, more)
iPower, Inc (details)

iPower is well known in the hosting industry as one of the major players with a solid business reputation. Inc.com named iPower to their Top 500 Companies list, and the company recently migrated over to a new multimillion dollar hosting facility in Boston which provides very fast and stable servers.

Headquarters: Boston, MA

Year founded: 2001

Number of employees: 230

Number of customers: 700,000

Price (basic web hosting): $7.95

Services offered:

Shared web hosting
Notable differences vs. other hosting companies:

24 x 7 1-800 customer support number with live agents
Unlimited bandwidth and storage
$75 credit on Google advertising
Customer comments:

"iPower was plagued with outages in 2007-2008 but after they launched their new facility I've noticed the web hosting there has gotten much better. Fast fast service. I like the customer service too, they have an 800 number you can call anytime and get a live rep on the phone within a few minutes."
iPower coupon codes:

Limited time offer for iPower web hosting at $4.95 per month (regularly $7.95 per month)
Hostdime.com, Inc (details)

Hostdime is not as well known as some of the very large hosting companies, but with 200 employees focused on web hosting, they are a major player. Hostdime also has a good reputation in the industry - they specialize in dedicated server hosting but also provide entry-level shared web hosting, and are known to provide professional, business-level customer service and fast and stable servers. Hostdime provides hosting services to major Fortune 500 companies including Cisco.

Headquarters: Orlando, FL

Year founded: 2001

Number of employees: 200

Number of customers: 280,000

Price (basic web hosting): $4.25

Services offered:

Web hosting
Reseller hosting
VPS Servers
Dedicated servers
Notable differences vs. other hosting companies:

Business-quality servers with high uptime and reliability
Professional 24 x 7 phone and chat support
Customer comments:

"As you can guess I'm not that experienced with the in's and out's of servers but I've learned quite a lot in 3 years and understand much more now. The server has not been down once in 3 months unless it's had some maintenance done to the network (once which we got notified about). Support is brilliant as I've said before, and all the staff I've had to deal with have been very polite and efficient. Even though we are in the Uk the latency is very low and even people in Eastern Europe say the site is quick. So as far as I'm concerned it's a big up to Hostdime. I'm sure they would help out if we needed to upgrade in the future too."
Hostdime coupon codes:

Hostdime discount link: 10% to 80% off new hosting accounts
GoDaddy.com, Inc (details)

We all know GoDaddy for their eye-catching advertising campaigns, but how do they rate as a web hosting provider? Overall, while GoDaddy has a great reputation for providing domain registration, they have a poor reputation for web hosting. Their hosting service is difficult to navigate, as they use a custom control panel interface instead of using the industry standard, cPanel.

Headquarters: Scottsdale, AZ

Year founded: 1997

Number of employees: 2,000

Number of customers: 20,000 (hosting)

Price (basic web hosting): $4.24 / month

Services:

Shared web hosting
Wordpress hosting
Dedicated servers
Virtual dedicated servers
GoDaddy coupon codes:

Discount link: 5% to 15% off GoDaddy web hosting discounts