Web hosting can be a complicated world (that’s why I’ve been reviewing them for you). Now many of the best web hosts have started to offer managed WordPress web hosting.
Basically, WordPress hosting providers offer UK server locations give you several advantages such as faster response times, better SEO, etc.
These providers are optimized for WordPress sites, meaning fast response times and features such as 1-Click WordPress installation.
When I look at web hosts, I measure their success by the features they offer, their speed and reliability, and the overall customer service. Let’s get stuck into the top picks for WordPress hosting.
Hostinger offer shared WordPress web hosting from only £2.59 per month. This hosting company offers a 99.9% uptime guarantee; they publicly publish their uptime and downtime records across all of their servers.
This for me was a real step in the right direction, giving their customers the reassurance they might need. Their premium plan is only a couple of quid and offers unlimited website hosting, unlimited bandwidth, and weekly backups along with a free domain name.
Hostinger is becoming very popular. They offer all the features that you’d expect to find with a top-rated web host, like 1-click installations, a free domain, and free SSL certificates on all plans.
When I signed up and created a test website, I was pleasantly surprised by the speed and performance. Their control panel was incredibly easy to use and the large icons, simple dashboard, and user-friendly tools were a refreshing change.
If you’re looking for extremely affordable web hosting that suits small websites, blogs, or even online stores, Hostinger is my number 1 recommended choice. If you encounter any issues, their customer service is out of this world, and there’s a 30-day money-back guarantee.
Pros:
• Excellent server response times
• Great customer support
• Free domain and SSL certificate
Cons:
• Pricing is based on a 48-month term
Key Features:
• 1-click WordPress installation, and that’s it.
• AI tools are here to help you generate website content and even the whole website.
• Automatic Website Migration tool is ready to move as many WordPress websites as you want to Hostinger.
• WordPress Automatic updates enhance your website’s security and performance by making sure it has the latest core software, themes, and plugins.
• WordPress Vulnerabilities Scanner keeps potential attacks or breaches away.
• LiteSpeed WordPress Acceleration caches your website’s content, boosting the speed and performance by 2-5 times.
• Object Cache for WordPress makes sure that not only your website’s content, but also databases are cached – and that’s even more speed.
• In-house Content Delivery Network (CDN) is another booster: it makes copies of your website’s content across many different servers, so the traffic is distributed throughout the whole network, and your website loads faster for end-users.
• WordPress Staging Tool is your playground for testing and making changes to your website without affecting it.
• Use an On-Demand Backup tool when enabling changes to your website, and rest assured that a stable and working copy is lurking behind, just in case.
• WordPress Multisite is essential for creating and managing multiple websites from a single WordPress installation.
• Have a WordPress-based online store of your dreams with WooCommerce: sell products and services, manage inventory, process payments, facilitate online transactions, and more.
• WordPress Command Line (WP-CLI) tool helps you manage WordPress manually.
Get an additional 10% for Premium plan by using our code UKWEBHOST.
Cost: £2.59/Month |
Space: 100GB |
Bandwidth: Unlimited |
Average Uptime: 99.94% |
Live Chat Response Time: ~1 minute |
30 Day Money Back Guarantee |
1 Click WordPress Installation |
Visit Hostinger.co.uk(£2.59/Mo) |
READ HOSTINGER REVIEW |
Starting from £2.99 per month, customers can host 1 website with 10GB of storage space. This is recommended for a maximum of around 10,000 site visitors per month.
If you can look past the price, you’ll see why SiteGround is a firm choice for WordPress hosting. Every plan comes with a free and easy WordPress installation. Once you’ve installed WordPress, you can use the WP starter site wizard to get your site up and running straight away.
What sets SiteGround apart in my eyes is the fact that all of their updates are automatically managed. There’s nothing I’d enjoy less than working on my site and making sure my web host’s back end was updated and running the same version as my WordPress site.
To top it all off, SiteGround’s customer service is astounding. Phone calls are answered within seconds meaning no waiting around. Their support is available 24/7 and their live chat service is incredible. Their staff is knowledgeable and helpful, ticking all the boxes for me.
Pros:
• Packed full of free features
• Incredible customer service
• Best response times from a UK server
Cons:
• Slightly expensive
Cost: £2.99/Month |
Unlimited Storage |
Unlimited Bandwidth |
Average Uptime: 99.97% |
Live Chat Response Time: ~5 Seconds |
30 Day Money Back Guarantee |
1 Click WordPress Installation |
Visit SiteGround.com (£2.99/Mo) |
READ SITEGROUND REVIEW |
iPage is one of my favourite cheap WordPress web hosts, and you can see more about why in my review. iPage’s WordPress hosting starts from just £1.50 per month and serves up a whole host of features that you may not expect.
When it comes to creating your first WordPress site and hosting it, you may feel like you’ve been thrown in at the deep end. Not with iPage you won’t! Alongside their fab hosting features, you’ll find SEO friendly tools and options to get you started.
All WordPress hosting customers get a free domain of your choosing registered for 1 year. You’ll also be able to enjoy the wealth of plugins that come with your hosting package. These extra features really take your website from good to awesome in a matter of seconds (and the click of a button).
iPage’s customer support is delivered by WordPress experts. So, if you’re feeling at a loose end, their agents will be able to help you with their professional WordPress knowledge. When I signed up for iPage, I was really happy with my purchase.
Their website performance statistics were impressive, delivering 100% uptime across a 7 day period. They guarantee 99.9% uptime, as well as 2x faster WordPress websites. Simple additions like SiteLock and other features mean your website will have that little extra spice to take it to the next level.
Pros:
• Very easy to use
• Affordable pricing plans
• Customer support provided by WordPress experts
• SiteLock security included for free
Cons:
• Some features are available to U.S. customers only
Cost: £1.50/Month |
Space: Unlimited |
Bandwidth: Unlimited |
Average Uptime: 99.71% |
Live Chat Response Time: ~30 Seconds |
30 Day Money Back Guarantee |
1 Click WordPress Installation |
Visit iPage.com (£1.50/Mo) |
READ IPAGE REVIEW |
Another favourite cheap hosting of mine is BlueHost. Their official WordPress hosting tag has built them a solid reputation over the years. If you’re after a WordPress specialist web host that costs less than a cup of coffee, BlueHost is a wise choice to consider.
When you sign up with BlueHost, you’ll get a free domain, free SSL certificate, 1-click installs, and 24/7 support. If for some reason you don’t like them (although I’m not sure why you wouldn’t), they offer a 30-day money-back guarantee.
One of my favourite things about BlueHost is the amount of choice you get. They really are tailored to almost anyone, whether you’re after a blog or eCommerce site, their WordPress hosting can help you to achieve your goals.
All of their plans include website backups, resource protection, and scalability. They’re the kind of web host that you could stick with for years to come, upgrading your plan as and when you feel it’s necessary.
Features like anti-spam protection and Cloudflare CDN will enhance your website even more. There’s a whole bunch of features that can be taken advantage of in order to successfully market your website and take your SEO to another level.
Pros:
• Plenty of choices
• 24/7 support
• Lots of advanced features
• Suited to a wide range of users
Cons:
• Not the cheapest
Cost: £2.43/Month |
Space: 50GB |
Unlimited Bandwidth |
Average Uptime: 99.96% |
Live Chat Response Time: ~4 Seconds |
30 Day Money Back Guarantee |
1 Click WordPress Installation |
Visit BlueHost.com (£2.43/Mo) |
READ BLUEHOST REVIEW |
GoDaddy is somewhat of an all-round web solution. They offer web hosting, cheap WordPress hosting, domains, easy and simple website builder, and more. They claim to be the world’s number 1 host with a 99.9% uptime guarantee.
Their web hosting plans start from £3.99 per month, allowing you to host 1 website, 100GB storage, unmetered bandwidth, and a free domain if you register for a 1-year contract.
GoDaddy’s web hosting plans aren’t anything to turn your nose up at. They offer a wide range of options at a reasonable price. eCommerce customers are looking at paying a mere £5.99 to get a hosting plan that would be very suitable. It’s hard to complain at that price when you look at what’s included.
All of GoDaddy’s web hosting plans include 1-click installs that cover WordPress installations. You can also upgrade your plan at any time with the click of a button, adding more RAM, CPU, and more. GoDaddy’s web hosting is certainly very easy to use and seems to be catered to a large market.
I’d recommend GoDaddy if you’re looking to keep all your website needs in one place. Whilst their hosting isn’t the cheapest, it will certainly do the job (and more). You’ll get a free domain, SSL certificate, and access to their control panel and 24/7 customer support.
Pros:
• Ideal for eCommerce
• 24/7 support
• Easy to use control panel
Cons:
• The basic plan is expensive
Cost: £3.99/Month |
Space: 100GB |
Bandwidth: Unlimited |
Average Uptime: 99.85%% |
Live Chat Response Time: ~60 Seconds |
30 Day Money Back Guarantee |
1 Click WordPress Installation |
Visit GoDaddy.com (£3.99/Mo) |
READ GODADDY REVIEW |
IONOS (formally 1&1) has been a well-known name in the web hosting market for many years. They’re also very popular for those wanting domain names and other website solutions.
1&1’s WordPress hosting is incredibly affordable, starting from just £2 per month (excluding VAT) for their Essential plan. This plan will give you a managed WordPress website, 25GB SSD storage, 2 MySQL databases, 10 email accounts, and a free domain. I’ve found it hard to beat or even match this value for money with other web hosts.
The way IONOS integrates with WordPress is quite impressive and possibly the easiest to use dashboard I’ve come across. When you first install your WordPress site, you’ll be given the choice of some designs in different categories. It’s basically a mini WordPress wizard to get you started.
Once you’ve set up your website, it’s easy to log in to IONOS and manage your website installs, domain, and simply click through to your WordPress site. You’ll also find some pre-installed plugins courtesy of 1&1 which may be helpful for beginners.
Although 1&1 IONOS offers incredible value for money, their speed and performance statistics are a little lacklustre. They offer a wide variety of services to many customers, but I think their lack of focus entirely on web hosting means that their technology is perhaps not the best it could be.
Pros:
• Great for blogging
• Very cheap plans
• Incredibly easy to use
Cons:
• Speed and performance isn’t great
• Prices exclude VAT
Cost: £2.00/Month |
Space: 25GB SSD |
Bandwidth: Unlimited |
Average Uptime: 99.99% |
Live Chat Response Time: ~60 seconds |
30 Day Money Back Guarantee |
1-Click WordPress Installation |
Visit IONOS.com (£2.00/Mo) |
READ IONOS REVIEW |
HostGator offers lots of features that make it a great web host. If you take a look at my review of HostGator, you’ll see that they always deliver on their uptime guarantee, performance, and website speeds. Resource demanding sites like online stores often don’t encounter many problems with HostGator, allowing their customers to rely on their technology to deliver the best results.
This web host does have a habit of fluctuating it’s pricing plans. Currently, their baby plan is just £2.00 per month, including a free domain, unmetered bandwidth, a free SSL certificate, and 1-click installations for applications like WordPress. HostGator might not be the cheapest WordPress hosting, but it certainly isn’t among the most expensive either, and their most basic plan offers quite a lot in comparison.
In terms of cheap WordPress hosting, HostGator does boast lots of features that make it a host worth considering. Even the most basic plan comes with marketing credits worth £75 each (Google Adwords and Bing), allowing you to start experimenting with marketing your website. What I like about HostGator is that they cater to quite a large market.
Whether you’re starting a blog, a small website, or an online store, they have something for everyone.
HostGator uses the latest control panel so it’s easy to manage your website from one place. My only gripe with it is that their dashboard is a little frustrating to use at times. I think if you’re a beginner you may struggle a little, but if you’re just looking to host a basic WordPress website, you shouldn’t encounter too many difficulties.
Pros:
• Free SSL certificate
• 99.9% uptime guarantee
• No contract on any plans
Cons:
• Not the cheapest
• The dashboard isn’t very user friendly
Cost: £2.00/Month |
Space: 100GB |
Bandwidth: Unlimited Bandwidth |
Average Uptime: 99.78% |
Live Chat Response Time: ~9 Seconds |
30 Day Money Back Guarantee |
1 Click WordPress Installation |
Visit HostGator.com (£2.00/Mo) |
READ HOSTGATOR REVIEW |
InMotion hosting is one of the biggest brand names in the industry. It boasts reliable and stable performance and excellent hosting for businesses and other customers. Their customer support is second to none (although it is U.S. based), and is a user favourite among many.
InMotion’s WordPress hosting is certainly not the cheapest, but it is extremely well optimised and allows a lot of growth. When you sign up, you’ll get a free domain and a free SSL certificate, which is very much welcomed for any type of user.
As I said, prices are quite steep. WordPress hosting starts from £5.61 per month but does boast a lot of features you may not find with other web hosts. Their basic WordPress hosting plan is suitable for roughly 20,000 visitors per month, includes hosting for 1 website, 40GB SSD storage, and unlimited bandwidth.
WordPress comes pre-installed with InMotion’s web hosting, which saves a job for you! Their servers are super fast and allow for any plugin to be installed. If you sign up for the WP-2000s plan and higher, you’ll get free access to thousands of premium themes and plugins for your WordPress site. All plans include backups if your website, managed by InMotion hosting, and include a copy of Jetpack.
Pros:
• Lots of free features
• Free domain and SSL certificate on all plans
Cons:
• Very expensive compared to other web hosts
Cost: £5.61/Month |
Space: 40GB SSD |
Bandwidth: 20,000 visits/mo |
Average Uptime: 99.93% |
Live Chat Response Time: ~90 Seconds |
90 Day Money Back Guarantee |
1 Click WordPress Installation |
Visit InMotionHosting.com (£5.61/Mo) |
READ INMOTION HOSTING REVIEW |
DreamHost offers scalable web hosting for a multitude of website needs. Whether you’re looking for WordPress hosting, shared hosting, VPS, cloud, or dedicated hosting, DreamHost is more than likely able to cater for your you.
This host offers a lot of interesting features, however, lots are available at an extra cost. Those who are just starting out might not want to pay the extra in order to enhance performance or optimisation when these options are often available for free from other hosts. But, if you do decide to host your website with DreamHost, many users have reported that they really do take care of you.
When I signed up for DreamHost, I challenged their customer support to see if they were helpful. Not only were they helpful, but they also knew what they were talking about. Their support team is available 24/7 and offers WordPress solutions, a user-friendly control panel, and speedy servers. Their WordPress plans start from £2.05 per month for their basic shared plan.
But, if you want to upgrade your servers, the next plan comes in at a whopping £13.44 per month. Granted, there are more features and the services are all managed, but I feel this is a bit of a steep jump when you look at other web hosts. The basic plan will probably do to get you started, and DreamHost throws in a free domain, unlimited bandwidth, and SSD storage.
Pros:
• Great customer support 24/7
• Nice control panel
• Scalable hosting options
Cons:
• A little pricey for the ‘mid’ plan
Cost: £2.05/Month |
Space: 50GB |
Bandwidth: Unlimited |
Average Uptime: 100% |
Live Chat Response Time: ~60 Seconds |
97 Day Money Back Guarantee |
1 Click WordPress Installation |
Visit DreamHost.com (£2.05/Mo) |
READ DREAMHOST REVIEW |
A2 Hosting provide their customers with fast servers, great support, and top-notch security. These are all staple elements (or should be) of any web hosting package. When they first launched, A2 Hosting focused most of their attention on developers, but over time they’ve shifted to providing a whole range of customers with fast performing servers.
A2 Hosting was actually among the first web hosts to offer SSD storage, which is now commonly seen across the web hosting market. This host offers lots of hosting plans, including its Turbo hosting platform, offering servers to fewer users, more caching options, and more allocated memory per server.
From £2.39 per month, A2 Hosting’s basic plan offers WordPress hosting for 1 website, 5 databases, unlimited storage and bandwidth, a free SSL certificate, and free site transfers.
Although the optimisation and performance are pretty awesome with A2 Hosting, I wouldn’t consider it very cheap WordPress hosting. The features are great, and the service is worth paying for, however, I’d say that they’re still tailored a little more towards advanced users.
Pros:
• Turbo server options
• Anytime money-back guarantee
• Average pricing
Cons:
• Turbo option not available on all plans
• More tailored towards advanced users
Cost: £2.39/Month |
Space: 100GB SSD |
Bandwidth: Unlimited |
Average Uptime: 99.96% |
Live Chat Response Time: ~10 Seconds |
Anytime Money Back Guarantee |
1 Click WordPress Installation |
Visit A2Hosting.com (£2.39/Mo) |
READ A2 HOSTING REVIEW |
WordPress Hosting is similar to shared hosting in that you’ll be renting a portion of a server, shared with other customers. However, I like to think of it more as a VIP service to those who specifically use WordPress for their website. Often, WordPress Hosting comes in two forms: managed and unmanaged.
If a web host isn’t specific about whether their WordPress hosting is managed or unmanaged, assume for now it’s unmanaged. Unmanaged WordPress hosting simply means that you’ll have control over your WordPress installation. You will be responsible for installing, uninstalling or updating your website. This includes security updates, maintenance and any optimisation you may want to include. Although it sounds like a negative thing, unmanaged hosting is very common and often customers like the control it offers.
Managed hosting differs between web hosts, but it generally means that the web host will worry about things for you. For example, if your WordPress website needs updating, it will do this for you. You’ll often have access to WordPress experts who can help you with any questions you may have.
Managed WordPress hosting can be more expensive than unmanaged WordPress hosting, because it’s a luxury service. Let’s take a look at the pros and cons of managed vs unmanaged WordPress hosting.
Often cheaper than managed
Offers more control
Usually comes with a control panel like cPanel
More time and effort spent on maintaining website
Not ideal for complete beginners
Less maintenance tasks to worry about
Offers more time to create content
WordPress experts on hand
Can be more expensive
Often no full-root access given
I often get asked if there’s much of a difference in website performance when choosing a data center for your web hosting. I can 100% say for sure that there is a difference, and there’s plenty of advantages to choosing U.K. WordPress hosting if this is where your website is based, or where most of your website visitors are based.
When you visit a website it can take a certain amount of seconds to load. The loading speed of a web page consists of multiple factors, one of these is your server’s location. If your web hosting is based in the U.K. and the majority of your WordPress website visitors are also based in the U.K., you’ll have the perfect recipe for offering better website performance.
You can use a CDN like CloudFlare to assist with website performance if your web host doesn’t offer a choice in data center. However, I would recommend that you find a WordPress web host that does offer multiple server locations, or at least one that suits your needs.
Data centers offer stringent security
Offers faster speeds for your website
Provides a better user experience for your visitors
U.K. based data centers meet EU General Data Protection Regulation
Can improve SEO as loading times are a rating factor
If you’re creating a WordPress website, you don’t specifically need WordPress hosting, but it can help. WordPress hosting often comes with features that can help optimise your website for better security and faster speeds. Often the difference in price between shared and WordPress hosting is either non-existent, or very slim, so I do recommend it.
However, most shared web hosting comes with 1-click installations. These make it easy for you to log in to your control panel and install WordPress with the click of a button. If you’re finding your WordPress website is struggling a little, it may be worth taking a visit over to SiteGround where you can get WordPress hosting from £2.75 per month.
Yes, they most certainly can. If you’ve already purchased a domain name and are now looking for web hosting (or vice versa), you don’t have to choose the same provider. Most WordPress hosting providers will be able to offer domain hosting, or in most cases include one for FREE with their hosting.
It’s worth checking out your web hosting before you purchase a domain name, in my opinion. As I said, there are plenty of companies who will offer you a free domain name during the first year of your web hosting account. This is a bonus because the same provider can manage both, saving you time and money.
Like all web hosting, you can change your WordPress hosting provider at any time. Some web hosts may place restrictions on your account, for example, if you’ve paid for 1 year and cancel mid-term, they might not offer a refund. However, most web hosts will offer you a refund on a pro-rata basis.
Many of the web hosts that I recommend include FREE website migration. This means you can transfer your existing WordPress hosted website from one provider to another, without paying for them to move your files. Your files will be securely transferred as quickly as possible, ensuring you incur minimal (or sometimes zero) downtime.
This is entirely up to you, however, I recommend finding a great WordPress web host and signing up for their long-term plan. The reason for this is that most of the best WordPress web hosts will give you a cheaper price if you sign up for a year or 2 years. You’ll be able to see this when you look at their pricing plans.