InMotion Hosting Review: Pros & Cons

Are you looking for the best web host? If so, the endless amounts of options can feel overwhelming. You might be inclined to think that newer web hosting providers are better, but what if we told you that one of the best ones is also one of the oldest in the web hosting business?

That’s right–we’re talking about Inmotionhosting. For anyone considering spending their money on this web hosting company, you probably have some questions that need answering before pulling the trigger. To make sure you’re well informed, we’re going to go over all the information you need to know in this InMotion hosting review.

Who Is InMotion Hosting?

Let’s start this review with a little discussion about this web hosting provider.

InMotionHosting has been in the game since 2001, making them one of the more established web hosting companies. Users turn to InMotion for their dedicated hosting and shared web hosting plans, primarily due to the fact that the company has an excellent reputation in business hosting. It’s also a favorite for anyone with a personal website, like a blog.

What attracts their customers is versatility. Whether you’re a beginner, pro, or somewhere in the middle, In motion hosting probably has an option that will work for you. Plus, their streamlined site builder makes it a breeze to get started. And of course, we have to mention that the company has been an accredited member of the Better Business Bureau since 2003, which has given it an A rating.

Here are some quick facts before we dive in:

• The cheapest plan starts at $2.99 a month
• Users get unmetered monthly data transfers for all plans
• Users also get unlimited email accounts and storage with all plans
• Free backups available
• Readily accessible tech support
• Plans include free SSL certificates

Pros of Using InMotion Hosting

So what advantages can you expect with your hosting account? InMotion performs above average in several areas–most notably customer service, performance, uptime, and technical features. Let’s take a closer look at some of the advantages of InMotion-hosting.

Excellent Uptime

Uptime is perhaps one of the most critical areas where web hosts must deliver. If your site is down, your customers or target audience can’t reach you, which is especially problematic for large and small business owners.

Fortunately, Inmotion performs incredibly well in this area. Their uptime guarantee is  99.9 percent, but their actual average uptime is closer to 99.97 percent–pretty impressive, right?

Superior Customer Service

Despite being relatively straightforward and user-friendly, there may come a time when you need tech support. Hostings are notoriously bad at providing adequate customer service, so one vital question is how easy they make it to receive the help you need.

How does Inmotion support stack up in this area? Surprisingly, they perform much better than most of their competitors. You can reach their US-based support team in several ways: via phone, live chat support, and their email ticket system.

If you need help right away, the support channels we recommend are phone calls and live chat. There’s no searching for a phone number if you want to speak to someone, and with the webchat, users can get connected and receive answers to their problems almost instantly. Response time isn’t far behind when it comes to email tickets, where the team is also highly responsive.

And aside from being easy to contact, staff members are knowledgeable, friendly, and get your issue sorted quickly. Overall, we give their customer support a high ranking.

Lengthy 90-Day Money-Back Guarantee

The hosting comes with a generous money-back guarantee for your sites. Business, reseller, and VPS hosting receive 90 days, which is well above the 30-day guarantees that other providers offer.

However, keep in mind that the 90 days only come with the plans we mentioned. If you purchase a shared plan, you only get 30 days, and domain registration users receive no guarantee.

Excellent with Integrations

One of their selling points is that they support a ton of open source projects. Users can find all kinds of integrations, from content management systems (think WordPress and Drupal) to an eCommerce service provider (such as Prestashop and Magento). Pretty much everything you need is right at your fingertips.

Security Plugins for WordPress Users

If you host with WordPress, you have access to the Sucuri Plugin, which is an effective way to scan your WordPress site for any number of risks and security exploits. Additionally, the plugin protects against spam and viruses, as well as offers ongoing backups.

Website Transfers for Free

If you’re already hosting with another site and want to move your domain name, we’ve got good news for you: Inmotion provides site migration for free. They make changing web hosting services a breeze, though we do have to mention one downside: they don’t promise zero downtime, which is an industry standard in the hosting industry.

Fantastic E-Commerce Support

Inmotion includes several e-commerce support features.

We really appreciate how easy the e-commerce side is, given how problematic it can be. For example, it’s easy to set up an eShop on your website using the Premium Web Builder, which turns it into an online store with various payment methods. And in general, it’s simple to integrate with payment processors, which is an area other hosting sites fall short of.

Integration with Google Apps

Many other platforms don’t give users a choice when it comes to your email account, and they force you to pay to use an email client you don’t want.

To eliminate this frustrating issue, InMotion allows you to integrate your website with Google Apps and continue to use your Gmail account. Additionally, this feature is incredibly straightforward to set up on the account management panel amp.

Smartwell Threat Defense System

The security Inmotion provides is quite good, and you can tell that they take the issue of user security seriously.

One of the areas where we can see this the most is implementing the Smartwell threat defense system (TDS). We’ll spare you the technical details of what it does and instead tell you that TDS detects, mitigates, and eliminates attacks and security risks in real-time.

And aside from robust security features, you can also purchase an additional SSL certificate, which includes a dedicated IP address.

Cons to Using InMotion Host

Like any hosting, InMotion is not without its downsides. Here are some of the disadvantages that we identified when doing our research.

You Have to Sign up for 24 Months to Get Low Advertised Pricing

A lack of monthly options is one of the biggest gripes about using Inmotionhosting. Signing up for the service locks you into a year-long contract at a minimum, and if you want to take advantage of the low pricing that they advertise, you have to sign up for two years.

Neither of these two options may be appropriate for someone who wants to get their feet wet. However, to counter this point, we must mention that having an opportunity for a refund if you’re not satisfied helps mitigate any potential risk.

Subpar Server Speed

Another gripe has to do with server performance, a critical feature for your users and your SEO rankings. Google ranks you on how fast your site loads, and if it isn’t up to par, a lot of your traffic may bounce.

And sure, Inmotion hosting has taken steps to ensure that server speed is fast. One of those is setting up data centers on both the East Coast and the West coast (in Virginia Beach and Los Angeles, respectively). In theory, choosing a data center close to your target audience gives them faster load times. But in reality, the servers’ performance is not as robust as others.

This problem may have to do with the shared server system, but it also seemed an issue even on dedicated servers.

Overzealous Security Verification

We’re always appreciative when a company takes steps to prevent fraud, but the security measures feel a little overzealous in this case. Signing up for hosting is generally a simple matter of entering your credit card info and jumping in. But not with In motion, where account activation requires phone verification to complete the process. In rare instances, you may even have to send in a photo of your ID.

So yes, while the security provided is stringent, at best, these measures can be annoying for someone who just wants to get started as quickly as possible. They may be especially problematic for users who aren’t based in the U.S.

There Are Some Limitations in the Plans

One thing to consider before hosting with Inmotion is that there are no free automated data backups. You have to buy this feature for $2/month, which buys you backups for up to 10GB. If you want an extra 10GB per month, you have to pay another fee of one dollar.

InMotion Hosting Pricing

Now it’s time to look at another critical feature: How much does Inmotion cost, and is their pricing right for you? The answer is probably, as they offer various plans to meet a wide variety of needs and budgets. Let’s take a quick look at the different hosting packages and pricing.

Shared Hosting

Otherwise known as business class hosting, this kind is one of their most popular services. You can choose from a dedicated server, InMotion VPS server, WordPress, reseller hosting, and managed hosting options. There are three tiers:

• Core Plan: pricing starts at $2.99/month, including two websites and free SSL. Some features included are 100 GB SSD storage, unlimited bandwidth and 10 email addresses.
• Launch Plan: hosting cost starts at $5.99/month, including two websites and 25 subdomains. Some of the features include free domain names and unlimited storage and bandwidth, to name a few.
• Power Plan: prices start at $5.99/month. The Power plan is a shared plan and arguably the most popular of the three. It allows you to host up to six websites and fifty databases, and you get unlimited disk space as well.
• Pro Plan: pricing starts at $13.99/month. It gives you hosting features specifically tailored to business, like unlimited websites and unlimited databases. It also includes a priority support feature.

WordPress

A quick note on WordPress hosting, this hosting plan is very similar to the shared hosting plans mentioned above, only tailored for use with WordPress. Essentially, it has extra tools and features that improve performance and security.

There are several plans, and the most basic costs are $6.99/month for two years. It gives you access to a basic website with 50GB of storage and supports 20,000 monthly visitors.

Also, check our suggestions for high-quality Minecraft hosting

To Use InMotion or Not: Our Recommendation

Aside from all the information we’ve provided for you, this review wouldn’t be complete without our opinion on Inmotionhosting. So what’s the bottom line — should you use this web hosting service or go with one of its competitors?

For the most part, we’d recommend this service. With their various hosting types, you get things like fantastic customer support, a wide range of hosting resources (such as an easy-to-use website builder), excellent money-back guarantees, and competitive prices. Despite some of the cons, you can’t go wrong – just ensure you understand the limitations mentioned above.

Ultimately the decision is up to you, but we see no reason not to use Inmotion hosting. They’re a reputable web hosting enterprise with lots of advantages.