SiteGround vs Bluehost – What’s the Best Choice in 2024

But when deciding what accommodation I should go to, I took this to the next level. I spent the afternoons observing storage limits, hosting functions, server locations, and prices.

Almost every time I found the same question: SiteGround or Bluehost? To be fair, that was not an easy choice, since both hosting providers have their advantages. To avoid spending sleepless nights trying to find out which is the best provider for you, Here I summarize my research and my learning.

I will also let you know what my choice was and why.

Let’s get started!

SiteGround vs Bluehost: Who wins in 2019?

Starting at $ 11.95, SiteGround is a more complete solution than Bluehost (which starts at $ 8.99). SiteGround support is more responsive, its performance is superior and it comes with an advanced set of functions (for example, preparation area and speed optimization options).

See this summary table to quickly compare these two providers:

SiteGround vs Bluehost – Which is the most popular?

Founded in 2003 in Utah, Bluehost Powers has more than 2M websites and employs more than 750 people. It hasn’t stopped growing since they started. EIG, a company that owns many more web hosting services, decided to buy it in 2010, and many say this was when things started going south.

SiteGround was founded in 2004, has more than 400 employees, and hosts more than 2M domain names. This Bulgarian company has managed to become one of the most popular shared hosting services in recent years, we will see the reasons below.

If this was a popularity contest (Google Trends), it would be over quickly; Bluehost is much more popular than SiteGround.

SiteGround vs. Bluehost in Google Trends \” data-lazy- data-lazy-/>

So, popularity aside, let's keep reading to find out which is the best option.
[19659008] Round 1: Ease of use: which is easier?

SiteGround and Bluehost offer cCanel-based solutions with a lot of common features (for example, FTP accounts, a file manager, email accounts and PHPMyAdmin.) You can even enable Clou dFlare (a popular CDN) easily with both providers.

Another thing that bothers me about Bluehost is that they are a little shady their prices and try to press it to register for longer periods of time (3 years).

Winner : Both have an easy-to-use system and are quite intuitive .If I had to choose a winner, I would choose SiteGround, since Blueho St feels a little seller and its price can be confusing.

Round 2 – Accommodation Features

There are many features that you should consider while reviewing a hosting provider. But in my experience, these are the most relevant for shared hosting:

Storage: how much space will you need?

This is always an essential factor to consider. You will need to choose a hosting plan with enough storage for your projects and a little more.

I have to say that 10GB is enough for most projects unless I am planning to load loads of HD images and heavy videos.

Winner : The Bluehost entry level (Basic) plan already offers more storage space than the top SiteGround plan. If you need a lot of space, Bluehost is a better option.

Sidenote : SiteGround uses SSD as its storage units. These are more expensive but also faster than traditional hard drives (for example, those used by Bluehost). Similar to comparing a Ferrari with a coach, the first one will not fit more than 4 or 5 people, but will be much faster than the bus.

Bandwidth: How many visits will you get?

This refers to the amount of traffic that your website may receive . Most of the time, hosting providers try to limit their visitors, so they are forced to update.

Winner : Good news here. Neither SiteGround nor Bluehost have bandwidth limitations, so get as much traffic as possible.

Backups: be safe!

Anything that can go wrong will usually do it. Having recent backups that can be restored quickly is a lifesaver. A reliable backup system has prevented me from being fired several times.

SiteGround supports you! They keep a daily copy of your site for the past 30 days. And you can restore a previous backup in seconds. You will also find a cPanel (generic) tool to download backup copies of your site.

But I am a big fan of your On-demand backup system, only available on GrowBig and GoGeek plans. With a single click you can make a quick backup of your entire system (eg, Before an update) and restore it even faster if necessary.

Bluehost backup system (basic)

The Bluehost approach does not It’s so good. “As a courtesy” they create backup copies that you can download and restore – seem to keep a daily, weekly, and monthly copy. The basic (free) version has limited functionality (for example, individual files cannot be restored). However, they offer an expensive sale (included with the Prime plan) with more options.

Winner: I don’t like Bluehost\’s attitude here, it feels like they are trying to blackmail you to buy their (expensive) premium backup service. No doubt, the point goes to SiteGround.

Domains, subdomains, and parked domains

With SiteGround you will be allowed to create as many subdomains as necessary. You can also park unlimited domain names with all your plans. However, does not offer a free domain name when registering, you will be asked to pay it (or buy it elsewhere). Domain names (.com) start at approximately $ 16 per year.

Bluehost plans offer a free domain Bluehost offers a free domain name with all its plans. Keep in mind that subdomains and parked domains are limited with your entry plan to 5 and 25; there are limitations with the highest plans.

Winner: Bluehost offers a free service. domain name with all your plans, this point is for them

Email Accounts – Receive and send emails

SiteGround comes with unlimited email accounts however, maximum storage per account is limited for each plan to 2GB, 4GB, and 6 GB. You can configure forwarders and aliases for your accounts. Your cPanel comes with 3 email clients to manage your accounts: Horde, RoundCube, and SquirrelMail.

SiteGround email accounts Bluehost is quite the same way, even offering the same customers of webmail. The only difference is that Bluehost limits the entry-level plan (Basic) to 5 email accounts and 100 MB of storage. The rest of the plans offer unlimited accounts and space.

Winner: Quite similar, SiteGround offers unlimited accounts with all its plans but limits storage. Bluehost limits accounts and space for the Basic level. In my opinion, both are equally good. We have a tie.

FTP and SFTP accounts

Both SiteGround and Bluehost allow you to create as many FTP accounts as you need. Using SFTP is not a problem with SiteGround. SFTP is also allowed with Bluehost, but only for the main FTP account.

Winner: Again, quite the same, so there is one point for each.

SSL & HTTP / 2

To improve security and improve your SEO ranking having SSL enabled (HTTPS) and running your site through HTTP / 2 is a great help. Therefore, the hosting providers that offer these ready-to-use products are one step ahead of their competitors.

Winner: Both SiteGround and Bluehost offer free SSL (through Let´s Encrypt) and HTTP / 2. There is nothing to complain about here!

Access to Git and SSH

These technologies make it easier for programmers to deploy and track changes, especially when working in teams.

SiteGround has developed its own SSH Access system so you can gain administrator access to your account, which is very convenient for managing large files. In addition to that, you can configure a Git repository to allow control of the version of your projects: best practices among professionals.

Bluehost SSH key generation

While Bluehost unfortunately also offers SSH the Git repository is not available with their shared hosting.

Winner: This round goes to SiteGround!

WordPress – SiteGround vs Bluehost

Most of us use WordPress as the chosen CMS. Having optimized servers for WordPress and tools that improve productivity can be excellent. Let\’s review the main features of WordPress that you get with both hosting providers:

* This is like a sandbox area where you can test code changes without affecting the production site.

Winner: SiteGround wins this one.

Let\’s summarize the features:

• Both providers are equally good at bandwidth, email accounts, FTP and SFTP, SSL, and HTTP2.
• Bluehost is more generous with the storage.
• and SiteGround Git &  SHH access and WordPress functions.

Winner: The function section item also goes to SiteGround.

Round 3 – Speed ​​ A slow The accommodation is boring and disappointing. Also, your visitors (and Google) will not like it. So let\’s see which one is faster: Bluehost or SiteGround?

* StatusCake checks the average charging time for a couple of (equal) test sites that I have.

** We use the native SiteGround integrated caching system, Bluehost does not provide one.

> More information about the speed of SiteGround

Sidenote: I performed several speed tests using the same site in both hostings, under the same conditions, and from different places. I used the following tools: GT Metrix, Pingdom, Webtestpage.org, and StatusCake.

Test results :

Winner: SiteGround, as you can see in the table above, performed much better than Bluehost. This important point goes to SiteGround.

Round 4 – Downtime

Along with the hosting speed, uptime is the most critical performance metric. Some shared accommodations are inactive at any other time, and as you can imagine, this is not good for the user experience. Search engines like Google also dislike service interruptions.

A good general rule is with the objective of at least 99.95% availability.

Every time I check my statistics, I am impressed by the activity time of SiteGround. In my experience, they offer the best results for the shared hosting industry.

Bluehost vs SiteGround: Uptime test

I had many problems with Bluehost\’s activity time In the past, it was nothing happy. But I must admit that in recent times, it seems that has improved.

Winner: Despite Bluehost improvements, SiteGround still offers a little more. So this point is for them.

Round 5 – Server location

One of my favorite things about SiteGround is that they have more than one data center location. They have servers in the USA. UU. (Chicago), the United Kingdom (London), Netherlands (Amsterdam), and Singapore. 4 global locations, very good, huh?

SiteGround data centers

When investigating the Bluehost website there is not much information about its data centers. If you dig a little deeper and request your support, you will be informed that your servers are, somewhere, in Utah. Not sure why, but they are a bit cryptic about this.

Winner: 4 locations for SiteGround and 1 for Bluehost. This is a clear victory for SiteGround.

Round 6 – Site Migration

Migrating a website from one host to another can be a nuisance, especially if it\’s the first time for you. SiteGround will migrate 1 website for free. Afterward, you can also request a migration, but you must pay $ 30 for each site migration. They also offer a migration add-on for WordPress users, which didn’t always work for me.

Bluehost does not offer migration services unless it pays (approximately $ 150). For this price, they migrated up to 5 sites and 20 email accounts.

Winner: Another clear victory for SiteGround.

Round 7 – Scalability

It is important that your hosting can grow with you. It will not be fun if your site is successful overnight and your hosting provider cannot accommodate your increased traffic.

If the GoGeek plan SiteGround is not enough for you, you have a couple of options you can check:

• SiteGround cloud hosting: This starts at $ 80 per month. This is a more flexible solution than shared hosting since you can add more resources (for example, storage, RAM, etc.) with just one click. Ideal for dealing with traffic peaks. Note that bandwidth is limited to 5 TB, but this is a lot.
• Dedicated SiteGround servers: for those who need even more resources, this is not cheap, it starts at around $ 270 a month. Storage, RAM, and processing power are the main updates here.
• SiteGround Enterprise Hosting: If your needs are so great that you need a customized solution.
• Reseller plan: If you are a developer and maintain your Customer websites you may be interested in your reseller plan.

Bluehost also offers a variety of alternatives to classic shared hosting:

• Bluehost cloud hosting: similar plans to shared hosting, its price starts at around $ 10 a month – This is suspiciously low if you ask me. The good thing here is that you can add more resources as you need them, keep in mind that this will increase your bill.
• Bluehost VPS: Your VPS plans offer SSD storage and more processing capacity. They start with approximately $ 30 a month.
• Bluehost dedicated server: For approximately $ 120 a month, you will have your server. This is only suitable for large projects that need a performance increase.

Winner: Both Bluehost and SiteGround offer similar advanced solutions (for example, dedicated servers). Another draw!

Sidenote: To be 100% honest, I\’ve never had to use anything else than shared hosting. So I can\’t & # 39; t say how good or bad the advanced solutions of Bluehost and SiteGround are.

Round 8 – Security

SiteGround comes with SSL, SFTP Access, and SSH all of which are important for security. They also use PHP 7 by default (apparently a safer version), monitor traffic to block brute force attacks, and update, their security rules every week. They also sell SG Site Scanner, an add-on that will scan your site for malware: it costs an extra $ 1.50 per month.

Bluehost & # 39; s SiteLock plans  To be honest, Bluehost offers a similar approach with SSL, SFTP, and SSH. They don’t share much more about their security protocols, but they do offer SiteLock, an external security solution that starts at around $ 30 per year.

If you search online, there is much talk about Bluehost websites that are being hacked. However, this could be because they host thousands of websites, often created by beginners.

Winner: As far as I know, both providers make efforts to keep their platforms safe.

Sidenote: I am not a security expert, so if this is a really important issue for you, contact one.

Round 9 – Support

For me, support is really important, probably the most important aspect when choosing a hosting provider.

SiteGround offers 24-hour assistance via telephone email (ticket) and live chat. Your support has always been friendly to me, has given me a solution, and has been very fast. As far as I can remember, they provided the best support I\’ve had from a hosting company: I know a bold statement, but I support it.

Bluehost support section

Bluehost support is not so good. In my experience, they are slower, not so useful, and try to push for more sales. This is usually a problem among large hosting providers. You can communicate with them all day by phone or by live chat.

Winner: As you might anticipate, Bluehost support cannot compete with SiteGround. One more (crucial) point for SiteGround.

Round 10 – Prices and plans

Judging prices is very personal. Some do not mind paying a little more if they get more quality, and others prefer cheaper alternatives with (perhaps) less quality.

A piece of advice? Do not go cheap with your accommodation.

Generally speaking, SiteGround prices are slightly higher. However, I think they offer better service and performance. SiteGround shared hosting plans:

• Start-up for $ 11.95 per month : Hosting for 1 website, 10GB of storage, No bandwidth limitations, 24-hour support and its entry Caching system.
• GrowBig for $ 19.95 per month : Hosting for unlimited websites, 20GB of space, unlimited bandwidth, advanced caching system, organization and backups on demand.
• GoGeek for $ 34.95 per month : Same as previous plans, priority support and Git repository preinstalled.

These are Bluehost shared hosting prices:

Bluehost pricing page: the promotional price also stands out

• Basic for $ 7.99 per month: Host 1 website, 50GB of storage and unlimited bandwidth.
• More for $ 10.99 per month: unlimited websites, unlimited storage, and unlimited bandwidth.
• Choice Plus for 14.99 per month: same as the Plus plan with the advanced backup solution.

See this price guide for more information. Bluehost vs. SiteGround: comparing their prices

Sidenote: Please note that both companies offer significant discounts for the first year.

Winner: Hard call. In general, Bluehost is cheaper, but it will depend on your needs. SiteGround may be the most economical option for you and save you money in the long term (for example, less developer fees). However, point to Bluehost.

SiteGround vs Bluehost – Who is the winner?

SiteGround is a better option than Bluehost. Your shared hosting comes with more reliable support, higher performance, and advanced features (for example, trial or on-demand backups). Nor can Bluehost match the experience and features of WordPress from SiteGround.

Let\’s recap! That was an impressive 9 – 3 for SiteGround which has been especially high in hosting performance (speed and uptime), support, and server locations.

I would recommend SiteGround if:

• I need the best performance: the speed and uptime with SiteGround are excellent.
• You want your hosting provider to have its caching system.
• He prefers to have receptive, fast, and friendly support.
• Do not want constant sales plots. You want to have more backup options.
• Requires advanced hosting features (for example, a preparation area or a Git repository).
• You want to have multiple server locations (for example, USA, Europe, and Asia).
• Don & # 39; Do not worry about paying for your domain.
• You don\’t need much storage: less than 30 GB.

Opt for Bluehost if:

• You need a lot of storage.
• You want the domain name included – it costs about $ 10 per year.
• Want the cheapest offer?
• You don’t need the best p
• I am willing to be patient with your support.

What did I choose?

I don’t care about the additional price for better support and performance. That’s why I have several websites hosted on SiteGround. And for now, I am not planning to migrate them to a new hosting provider.

Espero que esta guía haya sido útil y te haya ayudado a decidir cuál es tu mejor opción. Si aún tienes preguntas, deja un comentario e intentaré ayudarte.