WestHost Reviews 2022 – Is This Web Host Worth The Money?
Every business starts with an idea, and WestHost’s primary goal is to help you turn that idea into reality. Founded back in 1998, WestHost has ever since been enabling small and large businesses to find their place in the digital world.
There are many web hosting reviews of WestHost available online, both positive and negative. That’s why we decided to see and try for ourselves what the hosting company can offer us. We wrote this WestHost review after analyzing each of the components that make a web host worth it: customer service, value for the money, features, hosting plans, and speed.
More About WestHost
WestHost is a company that provides web hosting services aimed at business owners. It offers shared hosting, dedicated servers, VPS hosting, and more, and all of its hosting plans are relatively low-cost. With WestHost, you can also build your website or online store. The company offers WordPress hosting and plenty of eCommerce features, and its control panel is user-friendly.
Nowadays, there are many web hosts you can choose from, but not all of them can boast of having a multi-lingual team with many years of experience in the IT industry. With its span of data centers worldwide, the host has registered over 1,000,000 domain names and is still growing and getting more and more recognition. In 2008 WestHost was bought by the UK2 group.
The Past Should Stay In The Past
We can all agree that testing a fire-suppression system by actually triggering it is not a good idea! However, that is exactly what happened on February 20, 2010, when the WestHost data center underwent a standard test and a third-party technician did not remove one of the actuators activating the system.
That very same actuator triggered a release of a large blast of Inergen gas, and as a result, hundreds of disk storage systems and servers were damaged and down for about six days. WestHost did everything in its power to keep its customers informed about everything that was going on and what was to be expected, and the issue was quickly resolved (well, if we can call six days that.)
The point is, we all have to learn from our mistakes, and ever since 2010, WebHost has been putting even greater efforts into protecting their clients’ servers and data. Many data recovery experts are working for the company’s technical support, and if anything were to happen, we bet WestHost would be able to react a lot faster now.
The Most Important Features of WestHost
Aside from the intriguing hosting plans offered by the host (we will discuss them later on in our review), there are a couple of other things worth mentioning:
- WestHost Uptime
WestHost is one of those web hosting brands that offer a 99.9% uptime guarantee. However, based on our own experience, we can say that the company can provide an average uptime of about 99.86%, which is also not that bad. The host’s servers are running with no interruptions.
The top-in-line equipment used in the host’s datacenters also guarantees that your site will be up and running all the time. WestHost’s skilled tech support monitors the servers every second and is ready to fix any technical issue to eliminate interruptions.
We also like that all shared hosting plans and VPS hosting plans have regular backups included for free. Moreover, you will save yourself a lot of time and dollars since you can set up apps with one click.
- WestHost Data Centers
Premium hosting services depend mostly on the infrastructure supporting them. That’s why WestHost was meticulous in selecting where to locate its data center. In the end, the company’s data center was built 30 minutes south of Salt Lake City, Utah, in a qualified disaster-safe zone (confirmed by FEMA’s national emergency management information system.)
WestHost operates in a Tier-3 data center, relying on on-site staff, redundant power, VESDA smoke detection, cold row cooling, and 24/7 video surveillance to keep its user’s data safe. The company’s data center plays a significant role in the reliability and the uptime passed on to its clients. All websites hosted by WestHost get relatively good uptime and a really high level of security!
- WestHost Customer Support
In terms of customer support, WestHost once again scores really high (as any reliable web host should!) WestHost offers a live chat button, a United States toll-free phone number, a number for other countries, and an email. The company’s response time is quick, and the support team is ready to help you 24/7.
WestHost offers a well-organized knowledge base as well. There you can find articles on most of the questions you may have. If you want to find a quick answer, you can also check the company’s FAQ. In addition, customers get a ticketing system with a relatively short response time (although not as fast as the response time of other web hosting providers and website builders.)
- WestHost Control Panel
All WestHost.com shared hosting packages have cPanel hosting capability included. Still, the company has created its user-friendly CHI to help you get a streamlined, stress-free hosting experience without complicated instructions and technical jargon. Simply go to your CHI dashboard and access all of the cPanel functionality you love.
WestHost is ideal for all those who want to create an eCommerce store, blog, or host an entire corporation. The company’s control panel and dashboard experience offer you complete control with one login, and CHI and cPanel make the perfect duo!
- WestHost 30-day Money Back Guarantee
Another great feature of WestHost is the 30-day money-back guarantee it provides. Nowadays, all well-known web hosts do that, so we were not surprised that WestHost offered it. However, we were a bit disappointed that this applies only to shared hosting packages. Domain registration, cloud hosting, dedicated servers, and all other services do not get a 30-day money guarantee.
- Plenty of Bandwidth
One thing that immediately grabs our attention regarding hosting providers is the bandwidth included in their shared hosting packages. WestHost surely knows how to impress its clients, for all of its plans have plenty of bandwidth and storage options. The most extensive shared plan, Business Hosting, even includes unlimited bandwidth.
- Quick Set-Up Time
Once we signed up, our account was set up within 24 hours. We received an activation notice in our email that also included our account info. We began uploading files to our site immediately, and since we were still waiting for our domain registration to be completed, we were given a temporary address to access the site before the completion.
WestHost Hosting Plans and Pricing
The value of money is pretty much the most important factor for all small businesses. WestHost gets that and has tried to come up with hosting packages that are both intriguing and affordable.
Shared Hosting Plans
WestHost offers three web hosting plans:
- Personal Hosting- $1.99 per month
- Preferred Hosting- $5.20 per month
- Business Hosting- $6.40 per month
It’s essential to notice that the mentioned prices are discounted, and all packages have renewal prices after the first initial period. That way, the cheapest suggestion will renew at $8 per month after the first 12 months, and the last two will cost you $13 and $16.
The personal hosting plan includes one website, one database, 1000GB bandwidth, and 50 GB space. The second suggestion gives you unlimited websites, 200GB disk space, unlimited database, 2 500GB bandwidth, and one free domain name.
The Business hosting plan is the most impressive since it offers you unlimited websites, disk storage, bandwidth, and database, plus one free domain, one dedicated IP, and a free SSL certificate. All three suggestions include free set-up and unlimited 10GB email accounts.
WordPress Hosting
Here you once again get to choose between 3 different plans. The first one starts at $2.oo per month and renews at $4.99/mo. It includes 5GB SSD disk space, one domain name, up to 10,000 monthly visits, and 5 x 10GB Pro IMAP emails.
The second WordPress plan, Primary, has a $4.00/mo starting introductory price point and features one domain name, 10GB SSD disk space, 25x10GB Pro IMAP email addresses, and up to 25,000 monthly visits. It renews at $9.99 per month, which is also good in the long term.
The last plan, Pro, starts at $5.20/mo and offers one free domain name, 50 x 10GB Pro IMAP Emails, 20 GB SSD storage, and 100 000 monthly visits. All three WordPress plans have backups, 50 optimized web design themes, Cloudflare CDN, FTP access, automatic malware removal, and a money-back guarantee (30 days.)
Website Builder/ e-Commerce Website Builder
WestHost has three site builder plans. The cheapest one starts at 3.71 per month and the most expensive at 10.46 per month. We, however, will focus our attention on e-Commerce plans since they are the most popular nowadays.
WestHost has three plans for your e-Commerce site:
- Online Store Builder 10- $5.21/mo
- Online Store Builder 50-$8.96/mo
- Online Store Unlimited- $13.46/mo
All of them accept Debit/ Credit Card and PayPal payments. The first plan is the most simple one and offers 10 eCommerce products. If you want to tag products, set different delivery rates, and sell items with variations, you will have to opt for one of the other two plans. Keep in mind that only the Online Store Unlimited package allows you to set different tax rates on your site and includes unlimited eCommerce goods.
Dedicated Server
The cheapest plan here costs $124.95/mo and includes 4 cores, 3.4 GHz speed, 8GB RAM, 10 TB bandwidth, 1Gbps connectivity, and HDD 2 x 1TB SATA. For $34.05 more, you can take advantage of HDD 2 X 3TB SATA, 3.6 GHz speed, 16GB RAM, and CPU E3-1271v3.
Wrap Up
There are many user reviews on providers available; however, few of them describe the first-person experience. That’s precisely why we decided to review WestHost ourselves! We made this article to help you see what features this host offers and how reliable its services are.
We liked WestHost because you do not have to be a web hosting expert in using the host’s services. Customers get a user-friendly interface, live chat, and helpful knowledgebase, as well as excellent customer support ready to help them 24/7.
In conclusion, we would say that when it comes to hosting, WestHost is definitely worth the try! Customers get many add-ons and free features included in the packages, and the host’s uptime is also relatively high. The host offers everything one needs for their site and eCommerce store as well. All packages are also SEO orientated.
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