Something I see literally every day, between all the Facebook groups I participate in, is at least one person per day asking “how do I leave bluehost?” or “I’m having massive Bluehost problems and I need to find a new host – who do you guys recommend?”. This rash of site owners (read: uncomfortable, irritated, concerned) all report similar issues – their sites go down without warning and without support, they lose their sites and all of their data, their posts… it’s a nightmare come true, because for so many of us, our websites are the beating heart of our businesses (not in the figurative/emotional way, but in the more literal way in that it keeps all of the other parts of our businesses alive).
Yet in those same groups, there are bloggers recommending Bluehost to each other and perpetuating this cycle, and seriously, every time I say to avoid Bluehost and other EIG companies, you’d think I’d called someone’s firstborn unexceptional. Frankly, I’m burned out with the backlash and writing over and over again why bloggers should avoid Bluehost (and Host Gator and A Small Orange). Like I get that they have a great affiliate program, and a lot of bloggers have “a great experience!”. However, there are enough complaints and problems to at the very least give any serious blogger pause before signing up for their services (or renewing them).
The Root of the Problem: EIG
EIG is the parent company of Bluehost, ASO, Host Gator, and a slew of other cut-rate hosting companies. Their apparent core business strategy is acquisition, with Host Gator being their crown jewel.
Why is that a bad thing?
It isn’t always necessarily a bad thing if the product is already excellent, scalable, and bugs are ironed out. It’s also not a bad thing if the focus is on the product itself and bringing more small names into that fold. Alas, this isn’t the case, and that’s resulted in massive growing pains.
Overstuffed Shared Servers
One of the most common complaints about Bluehost is that users sites go down frequently. Like 30 minutes a day for weeks on end frequently. Most recently, I saw a blogger stressing over missed sponsor deadlines because her site had been down for 5 days and Bluehost couldn’t so much as migrate her to a different server.
Now any time a site uses too much of a shared server’s resources, it gets throttled or temporarily blocked. That’s pretty standard practice for most hosts, and if you’re getting traffic spikes that would merit such service interruptions, 1. congratulations! 2. it’s time to consider upgrading.
But with Bluehost, this is such a common occurrence because they cram LOTS of sites into their shared servers. Now, yes, shared servers are going to be home to hundreds of sites for many hosts, but Bluehost is notorious for the downtime associated with overloaded servers with low CPU limits.
The worst consequence I’ve heard of is complete site loss – truly just gone (stay on top of your backups, yo), and this is alarmingly common among hosts that are transitioning to EIG ownership (the most recent victims being sites hosted by Site5).
Outsourced, Non-Specialist Support
I don’t want to get too political here, but outsourcing really gets my goat. I understand trying to keep business costs down – I do, I really do – but it’s also pretty horrible for local economies, not to mention that it undercuts and devalues those of us working (and/or struggling for work) stateside.
However, that’s neither here nor there.
The problem at hand is support management, which EIG companies do so poorly. Maybe I’m spoiled because Liquid Web sets a high bar, but I’d like to think support representatives for a technical service like hosting should.. I dunno, specialize in hosting. Like I personally should not work as a hosting support rep because I know nothing about what happens server side. However, the problem I’ve experienced with Bluehost support is that they’re not specialists – really, they seem like generalized tech support, and when you get into the nitty gritty, their reps are lost.
Part of that could also be credited to language barriers, so nuance is lost. For example, making the distinction between self-hosted WordPress and WordPress.com is… well, nuanced. And it’s led to a number of issues for my own clients.
My favorite example of this was a client who had purchased hosting with Bluehost, and once we tried to take the site live, it was set up as a wordpress.com site. Bluehost was charging her for a FREE wordpress.com site. No joke. The support reps insisted that it was correct, and even after showing them the development stage we’d set up within her hosting account, they insisted that the wordpress.com site was what she’d paid for. Only after I told them I’d recommend migrating her to another host did this issue get a response (and even still, my ultimate recommendation for this client was to leave and forevermore avoid Bluehost).
Even more recently, I had a client whose Bluehost account renewed and on the same day, her site reverted back to her wordpress.com blog from 6 years prior. We were fortunate not to lose the work we’d done thus far, but it pushed her launch out by an extra day. Bananas.
A lot of these issues can be avoided, though – if a host has dedicated WordPress hosting, you’d expect that the reps would at least have been trained to recognize the difference between .com and self-hosted. I mean, if you’re going to outsource your support, at least train your reps. Alas, poor training is a major factor at play in the horrific support experiences that so many others have run into.
Anecdotes aside, their support has a 2 star rating from WebHostingGeeks.com, averaged from more than 600 reviews. I know experience is pretty hard to quantify for all you data nerds, but I think this is substantial enough to give any person pause.
High Return Affiliate Programs
I know you must be wondering how Bluehost is still so successful if they’re so awful. First and foremost, they offer a low barrier to entry – $7.99/month (and often with a first month of $3.95) is a pretty agreeable price for anyone. On top of that, there are lots of other bloggers recommending them.
But Resa, why would they refer it if it’s so bad?
There are a few factors at play here:
1. They have a high payout affiliate program – like $65 per referral high. That’s pretty darn hard to resist, especially when you get that payout even for the base level, $7.99/month referral.
2. Referrers don’t know any better. Most bloggers have no experience with the technical side of their hosting, so they really don’t understand what they’re dealing with. On top of that, their only experience in dealing with hosting at all is through their own site. If you want strong, well-based referrals, look to designer/developer communities, and especially those that specialize in your platform.
3. The referrers haven’t come into any problems with them. It’s really easy to say “well, I haven’t had any problems, so it’s good.” At least until you experience catastrophic failure.
With so many bad experiences, it’s really hard to ignore all the horror stories at this point. I totally understand speaking from your own experiences, but when there are at least 2 bloggers per week in a single group trying to jump ship, you start to listen and maybe consider making a switch before it’s too late.
So what am I supposed to do? I’m stuck in a contract with them.
BACK. DAT. SITE. UP. If you aren’t doing consistent backups, get started, and this is somewhere that investing an extra $10/month is a complete no-brainer. I HIGHLY highly recommend Blog Vault for backups (hellz yeah, that’s an affiliate link), which starts at $9/month or $89/year and offers secure, remote backups with 30 days of backups made available to you. Additionally, they offer an auto-restore option AND a test restore option (because you’ll want to make sure that what you revert to still works, right?). On top of that, your backups are encrypted and your backup storage space is unlimited for fair usage.
I know there are lots of others out there, but this combination of features for such a low price point is pretty unbeatable. Just remember, if you choose a free backup tool, have your backups sent to you via email at the very least – don’t store them locally. If your server goes down, your locally stored backups will go right down with it. #nolifeboatsforsteerage
Okay, then who should I host with instead?
Based on unofficial polls, lots of research, and my experiences with my own client’s sites, I recommend the following hosts (so much so that I’m sharing them with affiliate links):
Green Geeks
Green Geeks wasn’t included in the initial list because I’d never tried them before, but after several reviews and a chance to try them myself, I’m a big fan – so much so that I’ve made the switch myself. Based out of LA, Green Geeks stands out not only for its price point (accounts start at $3.96/month for WordPress hosting on sale, but it’s usually $9.99/month) but for their dedication to sustainability. They use green energy to power their facilities and each account has a positive energy footprint (I hadn’t even considered the carbon footprint hosting might have, you guys).
On the technical side, they’re super easy to use, have a solid record of consistent uptime, and 24/7 US-based support & monitoring. I especially like that they offer Managed WordPress Hosting, AND you can manage your own php.ini file (which comes up for bloggers who upload high resolution images or bigger graphics). And on the people side, I’ve seriously heard nothing but glowing reviews. You really can’t go wrong.
Siteground
Siteground is reliable, offers dedicated WordPress support and hosting (WORDPRESS SPECIALISTS, YOU GUYS!), and awesome features like free CDN (this makes your site run faster), dynamic caching (also makes your site run faster), and 24/7 support.
The biggest upside to Siteground is their prices – their single site WordPress hosting starts at $9.95/mo (and right now it’s $3.95 for the first month). As your blog grows, they also offer incredibly reasonable cloud hosting plans starting at $60/mo. What’s more is they don’t try to nickel & dime you with a constant barrage of upsells (I’m looking at you, GoDaddy). As far as shared hosting in this price range is concerned, Siteground runs circles around its competition.
WP Engine
WP Engine is a top-tier host with plans starting at $29/month for sites that get up to 25K visits per month. This is certainly not a budget host, but at a certain level, you’re not going to want one. They offer incredibly responsive AND proactive support, plus they’re dedicated to optimizing the WordPress experience. The experience is fully managed, highly secured (like your site’s security is included in the cost of your hosting), and incredible scalability.
What I love most about WP Engine is their staging, which allows users to test out new themes and plugins without having to take down your site to do it. This is an EXCELLENT option for developers and DIYers alike to tool around.
Flywheel
I edited this post to add Flywheel, because at the time of publication, I thought they largely outsourced their work. WRONG WRONG WRONG, girl. Based out of Omaha, Flywheel is another managed WordPress solution, and it’s pricing sits between Siteground and WP Engine at a base of $15/mo for smaller sites. They boast excellent customer support, free migrations, automatic backups, and one-click restores, all big wins in my book.
The reason I’m probably going to end up switching to them myself, though, is that they allow users to set up development stages and transfer billing. This means that for designers, you can set up the site as a preview for the client, then once they’re ready to launch, there’s no backup, install, reconfigure song & dance – it’s really simple and saves a lot of time and the client doesn’t have to pay for a hosting account until their site is live and running. NICE.
LiquidWeb
I used LiquidWeb for basically the first 10 years of my online career – they own and manage all of their own data centers, rather than renting out servers remotely, their 24/7 support team comprises incredible specialists, and they’re incredibly kind, helpful, and responsive. I have never felt like their reps were talking down to me, and they always work to speak at your level without condescension.
The sole drawback to LiquidWeb is they’ve stopped offering their more affordable shared server plans that started at $15/month. If you’re a growing blog, though, they offer stellar VPS (virtual private server – it’s basically like having your own dedicated section of a server, so in case someone else’s site is having problems, yours won’t suffer for it) plans starting at $50/month.
In summary…
Bluehost is not a solution for serious bloggers. It just isn’t. Unless you’re 100% on top of your backup, security, and optimization game (and I don’t just mean SEO, but minification, caching, the whole shebang), hosting with an EIG company is a risk that just does not behoove your business. My final advice? Avoid Bluehost. You can do so much better.
Just signed up for the free trial. I have Bluehost now and every time my traffic surges my site goes down. It sucks and it’s ridiculous. They never have any explanation for it, either. Of course they won’t admit they’re “cramming too many sites into their shared servers.” Thanks for the tip here!
Another part, and this part is wholly dependent on the plan you purchase, is their CPU limits are SUPER low, so traffic spikes mean massive throttling. Bad news bears, boo. I hope you find a host you love instead, though!
I’m using bluehost shared hosting almost for an year (Business Pro plan) to host my sites & blogs. But only one time I faced downtime that’s also for few minutes (4-6mins).. And some of my sites are getting 8k-10k views per day. The only problem I face on a daily basis is Server Response Time They are not good at that.. Planning to migrate my sites to Digital Ocean aka DO… 🙂
That’s awesome that you’ve had the experience you have, but yeah. If it isn’t downtime, it’s site speed. I’ve heard great things about Digital Ocean, and I’ll be interested to hear about your experience with them, too!
Does Dreamhost too belong to EIG company? And what is your take on Dreamhost?
As far as I can tell, Dreamhost is independent. I feel pretty neutral about them – like they get the job done, but I’d also say they’re not offering anything extraordinary. It’s solid, mid-level hosting.
I commented on your FB share, but wanted to pop over here too. I mentioned on FB, but I am with bluehost until 2017. All this information makes me so nervous. I personally haven’t had any issues with them since I have had them for a few years. I renewed my contract this past year strictly on the basis that they were always so great with their customer service when I called in. I use updraft plus for my backup which syncs to my dropbox and email. Do you think that is sufficient enough? I have always backed up my website just to be safe, but I want to make sure I am totally protected. Thanks for this post!!!
If both your files and database are being backed up externally (especially to Dropbox), I think that’s pretty darn sufficient. Just stay on top of it, be vigilant, all that good stuff.
I’ve had great success with Web Hosting Hub. They helped me connect with a free CDN. Their mid-tier pricing is still a really great price for someone like me not making much money from my blog yet, who still needs space to grow. Plus their backup service is only $1/month.
Oh man oh man do I love me a free CDN! I haven’t heard of WHH but I’ll be sure to look them up.
Perfect timing! My hosting is getting ready to expire on Bluehost and I was just starting to research for a new host. Thank you so much for all the great info and the recommendations.
Awesome! I’m SO happy to have helped 🙂
Oh my! I totally agree with you about Bluehost. A client of mine had a recurring problem with them whereby whenever Bluehost does an update on that server, my client’s index.php file gets updated, the custom codes are lost and her site goes down! Now, I’ve been developing websites for years and I’ve never seen that happening. And Bluehost couldn’t offer a solution apart from telling my client to re-instate index.php every single time. Arghhh!
My two favourites are SiteGround and Flywheel. Both are extremely reliable. SiteGround’s online chat is manned by people who actually know what they are talking about 🙂 Contrast this to when I contacted Hostgator and was asked “Is WordPress a plugin?”
UGH, what a mess! But that’s sadly unsurprising. Were you able to convince your client to move?
AND YES! HOSTGATOR ASKED ME THE SAME THING! How do you run a hosting company and NOT train your support reps to know what WordPress is?!
This is a useful article, thanks for sharing. I find it ridiculous how all the big name bloggers and influencers recommend Blue Host when it’s so bad. I almost did the switch to Blue Host but I won’t now after reading this article.
My best guess is 1. affiliate program and 2. they have someone who does the tech side of things for them, so they really just have NO IDEA how terrible bluehost is. Some lessons just have to be hard learned, I guess?
hey bro, what do you think about inter-server ?
Huh, I’ve not heard of them, much less tested them out myself – I couldn’t say either way.
Amen! Not long ago I decided to give Bluehost another go but after just a few days in problems started to appear (mainly sporadic outages and slow loading issues) luckily their money refund policy came to the rescue (cancelled within the first 30 days)
You lucked out! Most people aren’t so fortunate, but I’m glad to hear you were. 🙂
OMG, so glad I stumbled upon this article. Was reading something else and saw this. I absolutely love this “BACK. DAT. SITE. UP.” Bluehost has been on my last nerve in recent months. They actually tried to upsell me for their server delays. I am definitely making a change when my term is up and appreciate your recommendations. Thanks!
It’s a really great ploy, isn’t it? (Get your tinfoil hats on, kids) Provide irresistibly cheap service. Force the client’s hand at upgrading because irresistibly cheap service only works for hobby sites that get less than 5000 hits/month. Profit. I hope you find a host you LOVE once you get to move off, though!
Not the least bit surprised to read this! I’ve done a lot of research on Bluehost myself and I wish more people knew about this and the headache of dealing with them. Thanks for the article!
LiquidWeb sounds like a pretty great alternative and I’ve also heard good things about WP Engine, thanks for the tip. When I’ve been researching WP Engine though, I noticed that they are a bit too expensive for what they offer – I found WPX Hosting to offer more than even WP Engine and for a lower cost. Have you heard of them? Would you consider looking into them and comparing them to somewhere like WP Engine?
Thanks again and great article!
Interesting – I actually haven’t heard of WPX, so I’ll certainly look into it. These hosting recommendations are based on first-hand experience, but I’m interested in finding out more about them. Thanks for the recommendation!
What do you think about iPage? I am about to open my blog and I was looking around for other sites instead of Bluehost because that is all I see.
Sorry I’m seeing this so late! I’m actually not terribly familiar with iPage, at least not first-hand so I can’t really say.
Thanks to you I went with Green Geeks! Appreciate the thorough and honest review 🙂
Ahh wish I had found this post earlier!! Arggg I’ve been wondering about the slow loading times, poor customer service and page timeouts when I’m trying to write a post!! I’m so new to this world and didn’t think to put the blame on BlueHost straight away – after all, these massive successful bloggers were bigging it up!! So gutted, looking to leave straight away. Thank you so much for shining the light on this, I’ll definitely be more careful next time – hope I can migrate painlessly…
Oh my GOODNESS. I am having Bluehost struggles and absolutely relate to this! My site has gone down (it says ‘account suspended’) and I haven’t had proper help for over a week, I am going mad! 5 years of solid work potentially lost, it is ridiculous. 🙁 Immy x
http://www.immymay.com
NOOOOOO! Do you have any backups? Can you get into your cPanel or account itself?
I wish I had read this article before subscribing to BlueHost,
I’m in a process of trying to be refund before the 30 days… it is a battle for a foreign company (outside the US).
If you are interested by the use case i’ll keep you updated on how it has gone.
regards
Moved my site (www.funneltribes.com) and all my other sites to WPEngine 18 months ago. Bluehost is the registrar for my domains (I bought them there) and today my site goes down. I contact Bluehost and they tell me that “I” (as in “Me”) changed my name servers 8 months ago and because I don’t have a hosting plan with them … they won’t let me change the name servers back to WPEngine!
Can you believe that? The call with them was recorded so I have proof. My site (and my business) is down … but “They Understand”, right? That’s what I’m told. They understand that they’ve essentially created a no-win situation for me.
After eight years and thousands of dollars spent with Bluehost … and after referring hundreds of my followers and clients to Bluehost I left … and yet they can still do their best to destroy my business.
And again … they blamed me for changing my name servers. The site has worked beautifully at WPEngine for 18 months … but as of today … Bluehost has screwed me royally by killing my site.
I can’t access the name servers on my Bluehost Dashboard to make changes back to WPEngine. Why (according to Bluehost?) Because I don’t have a “PAID” hosting plan …. so I can’t access the name servers.
Sound criminal to you? Sound like something the FTC might want to know about?
If you’re considering using Bluehost … don’t. Save yourself the headaches … the anger … the lost money … the damaged reputation (for not having a site that remains up — even though you’re paying for the service) …
Bluehost is the most dishonest, lame online company I’ve ever had to deal with.
They should be ashamed for how they accuse customers and blame them … while they’re they real problem. Shoddy technology and even shoddier management.
Hi Resa! Thank you so much for this article! I’m in the research stages of starting a blog and was getting really bad vibes with how much EVERY blogger recommended BlueHost without discussing other options or even potential downsides. Of course, everyone had a “really great” affiliate link. I know affiliate sales will be a part of my blogging income, but I want to be 100% transparent about a product and only put my name behind something I use myself or completely trust.
It looks like this post is a few years old. Do you still recommend these options in 2020?
Hi! I do still recommend these options – I’ve to this day never experienced problems or downtime with GreenGeeks in particular and my clients have all been happy with others as well.