If you want to venture online to open a store, offer a service, or just create a blog, you’ll need a web hosting service to reach your intended audience. Although all web hosting services operate similarly—they store data on servers accessible to others via the internet—they aren’t the same. When you sign up for a web host, you must consider many variables, and we test all of them when we evaluate hosting services.
Site Building and Uptime
Testing a web hosting service involves doing the obvious: building a website. That means signing up for plans, grabbing URLs, using the services’ tools to create pages, uploading images, and adding text. We note how simple or difficult it is to perform those actions, and compare them with tools from rival web hosts.
But what is a website if it doesn’t have strong uptime? If your site is inaccessible, you’ll lose traffic, customer confidence, and, depending on your site’s purpose, money. You don’t want users looking for alternatives while your site is down—and, maybe, never returning. No matter how reasonable a service’s pricing, specs, and features are, it can’t score well overall if it doesn’t have rock-solid uptime. Accordingly, we compare each web host’s uptime guarantee so you can understand what to expect before signing up.
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Linux and Windows: The Operating System Options
The operating system, like on a desktop or laptop, determines how the server works. And, in the case of web hosting, it also determines which tools you can use to build your site.
One thing you’ll notice while exploring server operating system options is that Linux is ubiquitous. You may see different flavors of Linux, such as CentOS or Ubuntu, but every web host we’ve reviewed offers the OS. It’s the baseline expectation, the bread of your sandwich. The operating system is compatible with the many free, open-source tools in your web host’s app library.
However, we give an extra point to web hosting services offering the Windows Server operating system. Some businesses need that OS’s support for the ASP.NET framework, Microsoft Exchange, SQL Server databases, or SharePoint. For more, visit Linux vs. Windows: How to Pick the Best Server OS for Your Website.
Determining the Value Factor: Hosting Types and Pricing
A robust web hosting service caters to as many potential customers as possible, so PCMag’s highest-scoring web hosting services include most, if not all, of the six major hosting categories: Shared, VPS, Dedicated, WordPress, Cloud, and Reseller. Please follow those links for in-depth category explanations and the top web hosts in each class.
Related to those categories is pricing. In fact, the two go hand in hand. Shared hosting, for example, is typically the lowest-cost hosting available from any particular web hosting service; dedicated hosting, on the other hand, is often the most expensive. Therefore, when we compare web hosting services’ features and pricing, we do apple-to-apple comparisons within hosting categories. We point to an Editors’ Choice winner for each category in our reviews, so you can see which host is our current favorite.
Comparing Specs and Features
Spec comparisons comprise a large chunk of our reviews. They give you an idea of what to expect from competing web hosts regarding storage, RAM, email accounts, and monthly data transfers. Just what do the services provide for the money? Which one delivers the best value? We’ll tell you.
We favor web hosts that provide unlimited email and monthly data transfers and large RAM and storage totals. The expected numbers vary depending on the type of hosting we’re reviewing. For example, it’s not uncommon to see web hosts bundle unlimited monthly data transfers with their shared hosting plans, but 1TB or 2TB of data with their dedicated hosting plans.
Customer Service
The customer service experience is also an essential part of our testing process. During each test period, we contact the web host’s customer service teams at various times during the day with questions requiring specific answers. (We do not identify ourselves as reviewers.) For example, we may ask, “How do I set up WordPress hosting?” or “What’s your money-back guarantee?”
We evaluate the customer service experience based on whether it includes phone support (many hosts simply rely on ticketing or web chats), whether it has a 24/7 squad on duty to field questions around the clock, wait times, and the overall pleasantry and clarity of the responses we receive.
Security Features
The internet poses numerous dangers, so you must ensure your website is armored against potential threats. If you plan to sell a product or service, you need a Secure Socket Layer (SSL) or the newer Transport Layer Security (TLS) certificates to encrypt data as it travels between a customer’s computer and your site’s server. As a result, we greatly value web hosting services that provide SSL/TLS certificates. Most web hosts include them for free for a limited time when you sign up for hosting, or let you outright buy one. This is a good thing. After all, if you need to take extra steps to acquire an SSL/TLS certificate, you may forget to do so or even consider it trivial. It’s very important!
Recommended by Our Editors
Email also exposes people to online-based threats. Thankfully, authentication technologies are available to protect domains from phishing scams, such as Sender Policy Framework (SPF) and DomainKeys Identified Mail (DKIM). In addition, Domain Message Authentication Reporting and Conformance (DMARC) instructs receiving mail servers on handling unauthenticated incoming email. For example, DMARC can block or send them to your email client’s junk folder. Like SSL/TLS, the availability of these technologies factors into a web host’s score, as do general antispam and antimalware tools.
Note that we do not currently test the efficiency of each of these security features. We note what’s offered and score accordingly. In other words, a web host that provides these tools will achieve a better score than one that does not.
Not everyone who signs up for web hosting requires e-commerce and email marketing tools, but it’s nice to see the services available.
E-commerce software consists of shopping carts, such as Shopify and Wix Stores, that let you sell items or services online. Email marketing software, such as Editors’ Choice winners Campaigner and Mailchimp, lets you regularly and automatically communicate with customers.
As with web hosts’ security features, we don’t test e-commerce and email marketing tools during the site-building process (we have separate reviews of those services if you want to learn more). Instead, we reward hosts for including these business-enhancing tools.
Trust the Testing
A lot goes into evaluating web hosting services, so we hope this breakdown helps you understand the process. For more on web hosting, check out how to register a domain name and the best website builders.
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About Our Expert
Jeffrey L. Wilson
Managing Editor, Apps and Gaming
Experience
Since 2004, I’ve penned gadget- and video game-related nerd-copy for many publications, including 1UP, Laptop, Parenting, Sync, Wise Bread, and WWE. I now apply that knowledge and skillset as the Managing Editor of PCMag’s Apps & Gaming team. Although I don’t write nearly as much as I used to, fighting games, streaming music, and web hosting are the categories that typically grab my attention these days.
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