The best hosting for startups mirrors many of the same aspirations held by the ambitious founders and developers seeking the next big thing: new technologies, speed, and the ability to scale.
Nowadays, the term “startup” can mean just about anything. From the crafters selling their jewelry online to the multimillion-dollar companies in Silicon Valley, startups all seem to come back to ideas, innovation, and motivation to make something happen.
As such, startups of all shapes and sizes have different web hosting needs than casual bloggers or hobbyist designers. Startups need to build an online presence and get their brand or product seen — and do so quickly so that they can focus on growing their business instead of fighting with a website. No matter your startup’s size or industry, we’ve compiled a list of the 15 best hosting shared, cloud, and dedicated hosting solutions for your specific needs.
Best “Cheap” Hosting for Startups
When in doubt, shared hosting is a good place to start — it’s easy on the wallet and comes loaded with all the tools new businesses need to succeed. Budgets are lean when you’re just getting started, and these hosts listed below give you the most bang for your buck. We’ll go into more specifics below about which entrepreneurs and businesses might be best suited for shared hosting, but here are the five highest recommended shared hosting providers:
- Unlimited everything, from storage to databases
- FREE site builder & WP performance upgrades
- FREE daily or weekly backups
- Custom control panel and auto-installation scripts
- SSH access & unlimited FREE SSL certificates
- Get started on Hostinger now.
Starting Price/Mo. | $2.49 |
Money Back Guarantee | 30 days |
Disk Space | 50 GB SSD - 200 GB SSD |
Domain Name | FREE (1 year) |
As the shared hosting market becomes increasingly saturated, unlimited storage, bandwidth, and email accounts have become surprisingly average. Hostinger, however, extends the routine, expected metrics to greater lengths — the number of websites, databases, FTP users, subdomains, and parked domains are all unrestricted for most customers.
Go to full review »- FREE cPanel integration and Softaculous apps
- Auto daily backups and web application firewall
- Reliable and redundant cloud servers
- FREE SSL encryption and website migration
- 99.99% uptime guarantee
- Get started on HostArmada now.
Starting Price/Mo. | $2.49 |
Money Back Guarantee | 45 days |
Disk Space | 15 GB SSD - 40 GB SSD |
Domain Name | FREE (1 year) |
HostArmada’s cloud network spans four continents, with datacenters in Europe, the US, Asia, and Australia. Its server redundancy and website optimization features allow users to run stable and performant sites for end users across the globe while running a simplified hosting environment.
Go to full review »- 1-click install for WordPress, Drupal and 400 others
- Unlimited email accounts, databases & bandwidth
- 24/7 tech support for beginners and pros alike
- 12-month or 36-month plan at $2.95 /month
- Anytime unconditional money-back guarantee
- Get started on ScalaHosting now.
Starting Price/Mo. | $2.95 |
Money Back Guarantee | 30 days |
Disk Space | 10 GB SSD - 50 GB SSD |
Domain Name | FREE (1 year) |
It's tough to argue with a shared hosting service that comes with all-SSD storage and unlimited bandwidth, databases, and email accounts. ScalaHosting provides all the above and several other premium features for a very affordable price.
Go to full review »4. IONOS.com
- $1/month for 12 months
- No hidden fees, pay just $12 at checkout
- Easy setup and 24/7 expert support
- FREE domain or transfer, plus FREE SSL certificate
- Unlimited storage and databases with most plans
- Get started on 1&1 IONOS now.
Starting Price/Mo. | $1.00 |
Money Back Guarantee | 30 days |
Disk Space | 10 GB - Unlimited |
Domain Name | FREE (1 year) |
If budget is the main factor on your mind when searching for your next web host, search no more. 1&1 IONOS has an impressive range of robust web hosting and website building packages for what may be the best price we've ever seen in the world of hosting.
Go to full review »5. Bluehost.com
- Cheap shared hosting from a trusted provider
- Ideal for hosting a WordPress website
- FREE Weebly website builder and Cloudflare CDN
- Unlimited traffic and 24/7 live chat support
- Get 75% off today with our Bluehost coupon
- Get started on Bluehost now.
Starting Price/Mo. | $1.99 |
Money Back Guarantee | 30 days |
Disk Space | 10 GB SSD - 100 GB SSD |
Domain Name | FREE (1 year) |
Bluehost pricing is about as competitive as the industry offers. Sign up for a shared hosting plan for as little as $1.
Go to full review »Not sure if you’re a good candidate for shared hosting? Occupations and industries that thrive on shared hosting typically include:
- Independent Contractors (résumés and consulting services)
- Graphic Designers, Photographers, and Performers
- Nonprofits, Religious Organizations, and Humanitarian Groups
- Realtors, Brokers, and Mortgage Consultants
- Restaurants, Mom-and-Pop Businesses, and Boutiques
- Bloggers, Freelance Writers/Editors, and Online Publications
- CPAs and Financial Representatives
- Attorneys and Local Government Officials
When choosing a hosting provider for your startup, keep an eye out for particular features that resonate for your company’s goals. The best shared hosting services will give you unlimited storage space and bandwidth, along with a free domain name. Reliability, automatic backups, and top-notch support might be more important to some entrepreneurs, while others will place more value on a site builder, eCommerce tools, and marketing credits.
Best “Cloud” Hosting for Startups
Hosting in the cloud or on a VPS, otherwise known as a virtual private server, is perfect for big-budget startups, businesses with rigorous technical requirements, and companies experiencing rapid growth in web traffic that shared servers can no longer handle. For example, these organizations would do best with VPS or cloud hosting:
- Tech Startups (cost-effective, compute-capable servers for fast-growing sites)
- Healthcare Organizations (HIPAA compliance for protecting sensitive patient data)
- Retail Chains (PCI compliance secures credit card info; can display thousands of products)
- Investment Firms (helps safeguard sensitive financial and customer data)
Cloud and VPS hosting plans also give you more control over your infrastructure. If you’d prefer to focus on your business and products, however, most hosts offer various levels of managed services where their experts will take care of your hardware needs. Because your server resources scale with your traffic needs, you’ll only pay for what your site or application actually uses. Read on to see who we tab as the best cloud hosting providers:
6. Kamatera.com
- Ultimate scalability with limitless customizations
- Create and deploy servers in 60 seconds
- Easily add load balancers and firewalls
- Stellar 99.95% uptime guarantee
- Sign up today for a 30-day FREE trial
- Get started on Kamatera now.
Starting Price/Mo. | $4.00 |
Disk Space | 20 GB SSD - 4 TB SSD |
CPU | 1 - 32 cores |
RAM | 1 GB - 128 GB |
Cloud Hosting Plans | www.kamatera.com/cloud |
Starting with more than 60 operating system images to choose from, Kamatera is a strong option for developers who know exactly what environment works best for their project. Customize your cloud server as needed and deploy in less than a minute.
Go to full review »7. IONOS.com
- Start with $100 in credit for your first month
- Auto scaling with premium Intel processors
- Customized operating systems (Linux or Windows)
- Deploy Linux instances in less than 1 minute
- Transparent costs and by-the-minute billing
- Get started on 1&1 IONOS now.
Starting Price/Mo. | $4.00 |
Disk Space | 10 GB NVMe - 640 GB NVMe |
CPU | 1 - 24 cores |
RAM | 512 MB.- 48 GB |
Cloud Hosting Plans | www.ionos.com/cloud |
Boasting 99.998% platform availability, the popular cloud hosting services from 1&1 IONOS deploy more than 2,500 virtual machines each week. Customers flock to the host for its cutting-edge hardware, georedundant network, and always-there support.
Go to full review »- Managed cloud hosting with 24/7/365 monitoring
- Choose from 5 popular cloud providers
- Auto-healing cloud servers with FREE backups
- 3-day free trial with no credit card required
- Host unlimited apps with no contract lock-in
- Get started on Cloudways now.
Starting Price/Mo. | $8.25 |
Disk Space | 20 GB SSD - 4 TB SSD |
CPU | 1 - 96 cores |
RAM | 1 GB - 384 GB |
Cloud Hosting Plans | www.cloudways.com/cloud |
If you can’t beat the cloud provider behemoths, offer their infrastructure as a service. Cloudways gives customers their choice of cloud platform: AWS, Google, Linode, Digital Ocean, or Vultr.
Go to full review »- Choose your OS or application configuration
- Hourly or monthly billing for convenience
- Optional upgrades for cPanel, backups, and more
- Managed services, SSDs, and HDDs available
- Block and object storage, plus enterprise firewall
- Get started on Hostwinds now.
Starting Price/Mo. | $4.99 |
Disk Space | 30 GB SSD - 750 GB SSD |
CPU | 1 - 16 cores |
RAM | 1 - 96 GB |
Cloud Hosting Plans | www.hostwinds.com/cloud |
Hostwinds provides supremely scalable and customizable options for the savvy developer or site owner. Customers can customize their cloud environment or choose pre-built configurations optimized to run apps like WordPress, Drupal, and others.
Go to full review »The Best “Email” Hosting for Startups”
Central to any growing business is the ability to communicate — both internally among employees and externally with your customers. A strong email hosting platform helps you coordinate your organizational growth and the projects helping you achieve success. As with all things business, speed and security is a must-have feature. Even better, many of our favorite email hosting providers include additional productivity tools, such as calendars and conferencing apps, as well as newsletters and other email marketing tools.
10. Hostinger.com
- Easily import contacts, messages, and calendars
- FREE domain name with annual plan
- 1-click integrations with 50+ productivity tools
- Collaborate with polls, shared to-do lists
- Less than $1 per mailbox per month!
- Get started on Hostinger now.
Starting Price/Mo. | $2.49 |
Money Back Guarantee | 30 days |
Disk Space | 50 GB SSD - 200 GB SSD |
Domain Name | FREE (1 year) |
Email Hosting Plans | www.hostinger.com/email |
Showing major value, Hostinger email plans come complete with all the collaboration and productivity tools you’d expect from higher-priced hosts. We especially love the easy integrations with platforms like Twitter, Google Drive, and others.
Go to full review »11. ScalaHosting.com
- Professional business email with FREE custom domain included
- Ample email storage from 50 to 150 GB
- Spam protection and daily backups
- Compatibility with POP3, IMAP, and SMTP
- Up to unlimited emails with the cloud email plan
- Get started on ScalaHosting now.
Starting Price/Mo. | $2.95 |
Money Back Guarantee | 30 days |
Disk Space | 50 GB - Unlimited GB |
Domain Name | FREE (1 year) |
Email Hosting Plans |
ScalaHosting’s email packages cater to businesses of all sizes. With plans ranging from 50 to unlimited email accounts, enterprises and mom-and-pop stores can use its email features for businesses. Its four feature-packed email plans give you...
Go to full review »12. SiteGround.com
- Unlimited email hosting at your domain
- Compatible with multiple webmail and email clients
- Secure email protocols and anti-spam solutions
- Easy oversight via cPanel and FREE site builder
- Ideal for business email hosting with 99.9% uptime
- Get started on SiteGround now.
Starting Price/Mo. | $2.99 |
Money Back Guarantee | 30 days |
Disk Space | 10 GB SSD - 40 GB SSD |
Domain Name | New or Transfer |
Email Hosting Plans | www.siteground.com/email |
SiteGround offers excellent email hosting services — compatible with all major webmail and email clients, including RoundCube and Outlook. Email hosting customers get unlimited email accounts at their domain, secure email protocols, and SPAM filters.
Go to full review »The Best Web Hosting for Startups Scales to Dedicated Servers
Truthfully, not many startups are going to need a dedicated hosting plan out of the box except for those with big ambitions and investments. Applications relying on large databases or susceptible to high traffic spikes will need the extra computing firepower and security measures to remain online and growing. After all, nothing is worse for a young company than not being there for its early advocates.
If performance is king and price isn’t an issue, however, then dedicated servers are the way to go, because you’ll never have to worry about your website crashing due to a spike in visitors. Here are our top picks:
- Bare-metal or managed servers available
- 1-on-1 time with a server administrator
- 99.99% uptime via Smart Routing™ technology
- Tier 1 network with redundant bandwidth
- SSH root access and DDoS protection on all servers
- Upgrade for cPanel, migration, and auto backups
- Get started on InMotion now.
Starting Price/Mo. | $69.99 |
Disk Space | 1 TB SSD - 3.2 TB SSD |
CPU | 12 - 32 cores |
RAM | 192 GB DDR4 - 512 GB DDR4 |
InMotion Hosting offers amazingly fast and reliable dedicated hosting on market-leading hardware — making it an easy choice for anyone seeking a premium dedicated server host. From free SSDs to a fanatical support team, InMotion has all the bases covered for both small-scale and large-scale operations.
Go to full review »14. IONOS.com
- Explore server deals to find the best rates
- High powered modern AMD and Intel processors
- Unlimited traffic and 1 Gbit/s network connectivity
- 8-minute deployment with full API control
- Auto backups, DDoS protection, and RAID-1 storage
- Get started on 1&1 IONOS now.
Starting Price/Mo. | $32.00 |
Disk Space | 480 GB SSD - 2 TB HDD |
CPU | 2 - 32 cores |
RAM | 12 GB - 256 GB |
If you need blazing-fast speed, optimum uptime, top-notch flexibility, and full control over the fate of your website the dedicated servers from 1&1 IONOS have you covered. The company offers an assortment of entry-level, performance-focused, and business-class server options.
Go to full review »15. LiquidWeb.com
- Linux or Windows with choice of 3 control panels
- 100% network and power uptime guarantees
- Custom configurations and instant provisioning
- Auto-migrations, backups, and real-time monitoring
- Block/object storage and load balancer add-ons
- Get started on Liquid Web now.
Starting Price/Mo. | $75.00 |
Disk Space | 480 GB SSD - 960 GB SSD (+ 2 TB SATA) |
CPU | 4 - 16 cores |
RAM | 16 GB - 64 GB |
Liquid Web's strong suit is managed dedicated server hosting. The company owns and operates five state-of-the-art datacenters in the US and Europe works tirelessly to build and maintain custom solutions for added performance and security.
Go to full review »See more top dedicated hosts »
Hopefully, all the startup leaders reading this will find themselves needing a dedicated hosting plan at some point — when your website is large enough to demand its own resources, you know you’ve made it. The Silicon Valley types might be closer at achieving that goal, but the right host can make all the difference for helping small companies grow.
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