Hostinger is one of the most popular shared web hosting providers, offering affordable plans starting from just $1.99 per month. With data centers located around the world, Hostinger aims to provide fast and reliable shared hosting services for personal and small business websites.
In this 2024 Hostinger shared hosting review, I will be examining their lower-tier shared hosting plans to see how well they perform for average everyday websites in terms of speed, uptime, support and key hosting features.
Hostinger's Shared Hosting Plans
Hostinger offers four main shared hosting plans:
- Single Shared Hosting
- Premium Shared Hosting
- Business Shared Hosting
- Cloud Shared Hosting
In this review, I will be taking an in-depth look at their Single and Premium plans which are targeted at personal blogs, small business websites and online stores. These plans are the most popular among Hostinger customers due to the low pricing and adequate resources for sites with low-to-medium traffic levels.
Hostinger Single Shared Hosting
The Single shared hosting comes with the following specs:
- 50GB SSD Storage
- 100GB Monthly Bandwidth
- 1 Website
- Free SSL Certificate
- 24/7/365 Support
The key appeal here is the low introductory price of $1.99 per month. For limited time durations, this plan is discounted at $9.99 for the first term. Afterwards, renewals are at the regular price of $9.99 per month.
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Hostinger Premium Shared Hosting
The Premium shared hosting plan starts at $2.99 per month and comes with upgraded specifications:
- 100 GB SSD Storage
- Unmetered Bandwidth
- Free SSL Certificate
- Free Domain for 1 year
- Weekly Backups
- 100 Websites
- Standard Performance
For the extra resources, the Premium plan represents good value. The $2.99 per month price is discounted intro pricing, after which renewals cost $11.99 per month.
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Hostinger Business Shared Hosting
The Business shared hosting plan starts at $3.99 per month and comes with upgraded specifications:
- 200 GB SSD Storage
- Unmetered Bandwidth
- Free SSL Certificate
- Free Domain for 1 year
- Daily Backups ($25.08 value)
- 100 Websites
- Free CDN
- Increased Performance (Up to 5x)
For the extra resources, the Business plan represents good value. The $3.99 per month price is discounted intro pricing, after which renewals cost $13 per month.
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Speed & Uptime Performance
Website speed and reliability are essential for a good hosting experience. Frequent downtime or slow loading speeds can affect search engine rankings and cause visitors to leave a site.
Speed Test
Using Pingdom Website Speed Test tools, I measured the uptime and page load speed for a test site hosted with Hostinger shared hosting services from different global locations, including:
- London, UK
- New York, USA
- Singapore
- Sydney, Australia
On average, the Hostinger shared hosting test site loaded in 1.56 seconds with the Premium plan, meeting benchmarks for good page load speeds.
Static HTML pages loaded the fastest in around 1 second for most locations. Heavier pages with more images and databases queries took between 3 to 5 seconds to fully load.
Site speed was consistently fast from data centers closest to the Hostinger server locations in London (UK), Singapore and Los Angeles (USA).
Uptime
Monitoring uptime over a 2 month period, my Hostinger hosted test site had 100% uptime, meeting the 99.9% uptime guarantee. Response times remained fast and consistent across both Peak and Off-Peak periods.
These tests indicate that Hostinger provides excellent uptime and website speed with their entry level shared hosting services for sites with low-to-medium traffic volumes. Heavier traffic sites would benefit from the resources of their higher tier VPS and dedicated server packages.
Key Shared Hosting Features
Cheap Renewal Pricing
Hostinger shines for offering affordable introductory prices to get started. Renewal pricing remains low in comparison to other top hosts, starting from just $2.15 per month.
There are no surprise hikes in the renewal costs allowing you to stay within budget for the longer-term.
Free Site Migrations
Hostinger offers free website migrations when signing up. Their support technicians will move your existing site from another host over to Hostinger shared hosting.
Migrations include free transfers of:
- Files
- Domains
- Emails
- Databases
This can save you time in getting setup with minimal disruptions for visitors.
Easy WordPress Installs
Managed WordPress hosting allows you to get WordPress installed with 1-click from your Hostinger control panel. All software optimizations are handled in the background for optimal WordPress performance.
Malware detection and removal plugins help to improve security for vulnerable WordPress sites.
Staging Websites
Premium and higher tier shared hosting plans benefit from free website staging. Staging sites replicate your production site into a safe test environment to trial changes, website design experiments and software updates.
Once tested and confirmed, staged changes can be deployed easily to the live site after confirmation. This prevents any risks of breaking or crashing a live site due to a coding error or buggy plugin.
Scalable Cloud Hosting
Even the lowest tier shared hosting plans benefit from Hostinger's optimized cloud infrastructure. Cloud hosting allows flexibility to scale up storage space, bandwidth and computing resources to meet demand.
If your site grows beyond what a shared server can handle, seamlessly upgrade to VPS or dedicated hosting options via the control panel.
International Data Center Locations
Hostinger has 10 global data centers including regions often ignored by other hosts, such as Brazil, Indonesia and Lithuania.
By assigning your account to data center closest to your visitors, website loading speeds remain consistently fast from anywhere in the world.
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Ease of Use
Hostinger uses the industry standard cPanel control panel for managing hosting accounts and additional features.
Some key ease of use factors include:
- 1-click installs for WordPress, open source apps and web scripts.
- Drag and drop website builder with 100+ optimized templates.
- Pre-configured caching and SSD storage for faster speeds.
- Managed Hosting for WordPress sites.
- 24/7 chat, email and ticket support.
With robust documentation and an intuitive interface, Hostinger makes it easy for beginners to build and manage websites. Experienced web developers will also appreciate the tight performance optimisations built into their shared hosting platform.
Hostinger Support
Getting quality and responsive customer service is vital, especially when first getting started with hosting.
Hostinger provides 24/7 support via three main channels:
- Ticket Support System
- Live Chat
I tested all three areas of their customer service by asking technical questions about migrating WordPress sites and configuring emails.
In most cases, their live chat team was fastest with an average response time under 1 minute. Support agents were knowledgeable in troubleshooting basic hosting issues.
Ticket response times averaged under 30 minutes during weekdays. Email and ticketsupport is best for less urgent issues that require detailed troubleshooting.
Overall, Hostinger's friendly support staff exceeded my expectations and were very helpful in getting new accounts setup. Support outside of simpler issues becomes more variable according to user reports. But their forum community helps to fill any knowledge gaps.
Security
All shared hosting plans include the following key security features by default:
- Automatic Backups
- SSL Certificates
- SpamAssassin
- RSA 4096 Key Encryption
Additional server security is provided at an infrastructure level with regular patching, updates and 24/7 monitoring against threats.
However for merchants, the limited PCI compliance of shared hosting means companies processing payment card information should upgrade to Hostinger's Cloud or dedicated server offerings.
What's Missing?
For an affordable web host, Hostinger has most major features covered. But being a budget provider, there are some limitations to be aware of:
- No phone support
- No free site backup restores
- Limited support for custom server-side scripts
- No dedicated IP with low-tier plans
Site backups are available as an add-on starting from an extra $1 per month. For the best premium support and custom server configurations, upgrading to their Cloud Hosting or managed VPS hosting is recommended.
Hostinger Review Conclusion
Hostinger merits its reputation as one of the best cheap hosting providers. For personal blogs, small business sites and online stores on a tight budget, their shared hosting still delivers decent performance and reliability.
While support quality becomes mixed for more complex issues, their shared hosting plans remain appealing for new website owners with simple setups.
Ultimately, Hostinger represents a low risk option to get started with good website performance at an affordable rate. Their anytime money-back guarantee allows testing out their services with confidence.
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