JustHost vs. GoDaddy (2024)

Ryan Frankel

By: Ryan Frankel

Ryan Frankel

Ryan began developing websites in the late '90s and has personally tested just about every web host and cloud platform worth trying on the market today. With a masters degree in electrical and computer engineering from the University of Florida, he leverages his extensive knowledge of hardware, software, and their engineering relationship to inform HostingAdvice readers of the technical implications of their hosting choices. Ryan's subject matter expertise includes, but is not limited to, WordPress, cloud infrastructure management, product UI/UX design, and popular web development languages such as JavaScript and PHP.

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Editor: Lillian Castro

Lillian Castro

Lillian brings more than 30 years of editing and journalism experience to our team. She has written and edited for major news organizations, including The Atlanta Journal-Constitution and the New York Times, and she previously served as an adjunct instructor at the University of Florida. Today, she edits HostingAdvice content for clarity, accuracy, and reader engagement.

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Alexandra Anderson Ryan Frankel Hosting Expert
“We tested GoDaddy & JustHost — The winner is GoDaddy!”

JustHost and GoDaddy both serve as go-to resources for beginner website owners. Affordability and support are at the top of the wish list for most beginners as they learn to navigate the web building world. These two hosts definitely deliver on those requirements. They each have their specialty: For domains or email hosting, GoDaddy is a natural fit; meanwhile, JustHost plans include a free website builder that’s geared toward beginners. Let’s take a good look at each web host.

Overall Rating
4.7/5.0 ★★★★★
Visit GoDaddy »
Overall Rating
3.7/5.0 ★★★★
Visit JustHost »

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Overall Hosting Comparison

Best Overall Rating

★★★★★ 4.7/5.0

GoDaddy is exceptionally well-known in the hosting space, typically serving as site owners' introduction to the world of web hosting.

The company makes it incredibly easy and affordable for folks to choose a domain name, sign up for hosting, and start building their online business or personal web property. While known for its domain, email, and shared hosting services, GoDaddy offers options for virtual and dedicated servers as well.

Pre-built templates come with the hosting company's basic WordPress offering, or upgrade to managed WordPress services for top support or help with your online store.

The company makes the migration process as seamless as possible, so you shouldn't shy away from scaling your site as your business needs grow; GoDaddy is a hosting home that will grow alongside you.

The user control options are pretty popular in the hosting space: your choice between the easy-to-use cPanel or Plesk control panels, plus root (administrative) access for more tech-savvy customers.

If you're particularly interested in webmail, GoDaddy offers an intuitive interface for keeping up with the unlimited email accounts you have available to you as a customer. Each email account comes with 256-bit encryption and enhanced privacy protection.

Customer support has been a focus of the GoDaddy team of late. Today, the team has an award-winning collection of experts on staff, readily available to handle customer phone calls and messages 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Luxury services like WordPress Premium Support and Website Security also add support ticketing functionality. While GoDaddy is on hand to talk you through any issues, the team is also keeping an eye on your server (as well as other clients sharing your server).

The hosting provider's around-the-clock security monitoring enables GoDaddy to guarantee uptime rates of 99.9% or better. This uptime rate is by no means outstanding in the industry, but for most end users, it's all that's required.

The bottom line is this: GoDaddy is a go-to domain web host for millions of users worldwide for a reason. The company maintains an ever-expanding network of users by offering blazing-fast load times, award-winning security and support, and a free domain registration when you sign up for a year-long plan.

It's a great hosting deal, particularly for first-timers and small business owners, at a really great price point.

  • Industry-leading load times
  • Award-winning support and security
  • World's #1 Domain Name Registrar
  • Choice of cPanel or Plesk included
  • 99.9% uptime guaranteed
  • Get started on GoDaddy now.
Money Back Guarantee
30 days
Disk Space
25 GB - 100 GB
Domain Name
FREE (1 year)

Best Overall Rating

★★★★ 3.7/5.0

JustHost includes a lot of free extras that come with its one-size-fits-all shared hosting service, making them a solid, affordable option to power your online presence. The company's website is easy to use, just like its account and site management tools. The JustHost web administration panel, the industry standard cPanel, is designed in the same vein and makes site operation a breeze when compared to other hosts with more complicated interfaces. Both beginners and experienced users will appreciate the ample storage space and unlimited bandwidth JustHost allocates to users, along with the unlimited data transfer and email accounts. The included domain name is also a perk everyone needs and can enjoy. JustHost becomes one of the most affordable shared hosts in existence particularly if you sign up for a two- or three-year plan. For folks who are new to the hosting space, however, this term length can be daunting and hard to justify — fortunately, the company is one of a handful to offer a monthly term option, as well. JustHost also offers a relatively standard 30-day money-back guarantee and 24/7 customer support, positioning the brand among industry leaders.

  • FREE domain name, email, and marketing tools
  • FREE site builders and instant account setup
  • $200 in Facebook, Google, and Bing advertising credits
  • 24/7 live phone, chat, and ticket support
  • Easy-to-use cPanel control panel
  • Get started on JustHost now.
Money Back Guarantee
30 days
Disk Space
50 GB - Unlimited
Domain Name
FREE (1 year)

Cheap Hosting Comparison

Cheap Rating

★★★★★ 4.5/5.0

#10 out of 10 in Cheap Hosting reviews

A major pull factor for GoDaddy's hosting services is certainly the cost. It's hard to beat web hosting for just a few dollars per month, especially when the company includes a free domain name, control panel, impressively fast load times, and unlimited websites with most plans.

The company makes it not only affordable but super easy to get started on a shared hosting plan — for first-timers, bloggers, business owners, and others.

You can choose a GoDaddy hosting plan based on your exact needs, with a range of options for disk space, email, processing power, and other resources.

If your site grows to need scalable and/or dedicated resources, the company's team makes that transition easy — but with most plans coming with unlimited storage and unmetered bandwidth, you should have plenty of room.

Virtual and dedicated servers can be provisioned in minutes, with root and cPanel access, and no re-provisioning is required for upgrades.

All GoDaddy plans are equipped with the user control of cPanel (or Plesk, if you prefer). From cPanel, you can easily install and set up popular web applications for blogging and/or ecommerce.

A big name in the budget web hosting space, GoDaddy is consistently improving the performance of its servers, website, and services to offer a great customer experience.

With cPanel control and 1-click installations for standard web apps, you can get your website up and running quickly. The company's 24/7 security monitoring and DDoS protection allow you the comfort in knowing the professionals are making sure your site is online, loading quickly, and hacker-free.

We do wish the web hosting provider would include a free SSL certificate with each shared plan, however. All in all, the web hosting service comes with incredible power and peace of mind, at such a low price point, making GoDaddy quite a value deal.

  • Manage your domain and hosting under one roof
  • Choice of cPanel or Plesk control panels
  • Up to unlimited bandwidth and storage
  • Microsoft 365 inboxes included FREE for first year
  • Get 51% OFF by signing up today
  • Get started on GoDaddy now.
Money Back Guarantee
30 days
Disk Space
25 GB - 100 GB
Domain Name
FREE (1 year)

Cheap Rating

★★★★ 4.2/5.0

A lot of freebies come along with JustHost, making the shared hosting brand a great value. The basic plan is very affordable, and the best deals are saved for those customers who sign up for multiple years. Some of the nice features included on the base account are unlimited bandwidth, five email accounts, a free domain name registration, and a drag-and-drop site builder. As you upgrade to the company's larger, yet still affordable plans, you unlock unrestricted email, disk space, domains, and email inboxes. JustHost also has a simple-to-use website builder. The custom-built solution may not be as robust as some of the other offerings you might find, but the platform's user-friendly interface serves beginners remarkably well. Users will find a ton of templates (400+) and support for ecommerce carts. Finally, JustHost offers a 30-day money-back guarantee with all of its hosting plans, which should put some minds at ease about selecting a long-term contract and getting the best deal.

  • Unlimited email accounts and FREE site builder
  • $200 in Facebook, Google, and Bing ad credits
  • 24/7 support via phone, email, and chat
  • Website builder, marketing tools, and SEO tips
  • FREE domain name registration
  • Get started on JustHost now.
Money Back Guarantee
30 days
Disk Space
50 GB - Unlimited
Domain Name
FREE (1 year)

Dedicated Hosting Comparison

Dedicated Rating

★★★★★ 4.6/5.0

GoDaddy dedicated server hosting plans feature managed support options, on-demand resources, and the intuitive user control of cPanel and Plesk.

The company offers plans for Linux and Windows users, with a variety of options for operating systems, RAM, processing power, disk space, and hardware choices. As a bare-metal solution, GoDaddy dedicated hosting gives customers 100% control over their server in a single-tenant environment.

Unlimited bandwidth is always nice, as is the ability to choose between high-capacity HDDs and high-speed SSDs for storage. Site owners can also choose to host their server in datacenters in U.S. or Europe.

With the optional fully managed services, GoDaddy support is not only available around the clock to help you troubleshoot issues with your server but the team is keeping an eye on your server status.

The company offers a 99.9% uptime guarantee and premier DDoS protection, anti-hacking services, and other security add-ons. Each server comes with a free year of SSL certificate protection, and GoDaddy fully managed hosting customers benefit from the assurance that the experts will facilitate security patches and bug fixes regularly and on time.

Each dedicated hosting plan comes with Panopta monitoring for your server, application, and network services. Users can easily view uptime and system-level metrics like CPU, RAM, storage, or set up alerts and notifications.

With resource configurations customized to meet your needs, GoDaddy offers dedicated server hosting that you can grow your business with.

The GoDaddy tech support team is available 24/7, guarding your site against malware, hackers, unexpected downtime, and DDoS threats. Meanwhile, the company's support agents are handling any requests that come through the phone lines or chat portal.

With on-demand resources and industry-leading page load speeds, GoDaddy is a dedicated host worthy of your consideration.

  • Dedicated resources provisioned in minutes
  • Maximum performance and data protection with RAID-1 disk mirroring
  • Admin control via root access, cPanel, or Plesk
  • Choose from semi- or fully-managed services
  • Get 11% off of your first term
  • Get started on GoDaddy now.
Money Back Guarantee
30 days
Disk Space
500 GB SSD - 1 TB HDD (RAID-1)
Domain Name
New or Transfer

Dedicated Rating

★★★★ 3.8/5.0

JustHost's modern hardware and multiple dedicated IP addresses are the centerpieces of the company's dedicated server offerings. Each machine is fully-managed with an enhanced cPanel, making JustHost a good choice for a first-time user's dedicated server. Experienced users who want to manage or configure all aspects of their servers, however, still have root access. Instant provisioning is a greatly-appreciated and rare feature for dedicated servers, which can often take hours to configure and deploy. What's more, all storage comes with RAID-1 protection and available storage upgrades of up to 2TB. JustHost is one of the rare companies to included dedicated servers in its 30-day money-back guarantee, providing uncertain customers a chance to check out the company's services and support without risk. Even better, customers can register a new domain name for free for one year. Customers can reach JustHost's support teams around the clock through phone calls, chat messages, and email tickets. Those with dedicated servers have exclusive access to a dedicated team of server experts, making the company an excellent and affordable option for your first dedicated server.

  • Fully-managed hosting plans with instant provisioning
  • Instant provisioning with root access and cPanel
  • Mirrored storage with automatic RAID-1 protection
  • Enhanced write-back caching with its own RAM
  • Dedicated support team available 24/7
  • Get started on JustHost now.
Money Back Guarantee
30 days
Disk Space
500 GB - 2 TB
Domain Name
FREE (1 year)

VPS Hosting Comparison

VPS Rating

★★★★ 4.2/5.0

If you're looking to grow and scale your website, GoDaddy has you covered. Developers and web enthusiasts will be pleased to hear that GoDaddy offers root access, making it easy to install PHP modules, applications, stacks, and various customizations to fine-tune your virtual server for peak performance via the command line or remote desktop.

Plans also include a variety of control panels, led by cPanel and Plesk, so you can easily manage your hosting service with an intuitive graphical interface.

The surprisingly powerful virtual servers can have up to 32GB RAM and 400GB of SSD storage that boasts three times faster page loads. In addition to unlimited bandwidth and KVM virtualization, GoDaddy boasts global datacenters on four continents and tons of modern operating systems.

Choose from platforms like CentOS, Ubuntu, and Windows Server. Meanwhile, the GoDaddy team will monitor your server 24/7 to alert and ward off traffic with malicious intent. Customers will have to patch their operating system as needed, but GoDaddy provides around-the-clock hardware monitoring with failover solutions and snapshots to minimize downtime.

Panopta monitoring is also included with all semi- or fully managed VPS accounts, giving you a window into network and application services via easily configurable alerts and notifications.

The GoDaddy name may not immediately bring VPS hosting to mind. Nonetheless, GoDaddy's virtual server offerings include the security, support, worry-free fully managed services, and value combination that embodies the GoDaddy reputation in the hosting space.

For those who may not quite be ready to make the jump to a VPS plan, the hosting company's Business Hosting packages combine the best of both worlds: the amped-up power of a virtual private server with the ease and simplicity of shared hosting.

  • Designed to handle traffic with Linux or Windows
  • Admin access via root access, cPanel, and Plesk
  • High-speed SSDs and 99.9% uptime guarantee
  • Unlimited bandwidth and lots of processing power
  • Fully or semi-managed servers with optional control panel
  • Get started on GoDaddy now.
Money Back Guarantee
30 days
Disk Space
40 GB SSD - 200 GB SSD
Domain Name
New or Transfer

VPS Rating

★★★★ 4.1/5.0

JustHost is a mid-tier web host that has somewhat pricey VPS options, given the amount of processing power you get. With that said, the company's interface is extremely simple to navigate and offers cloud-driven scalability that is likely worth the investment. We'd like to see faster solid-state drives included with the cloud infrastructure, but enhanced virtualization via OpenStack and KVM means resources are provisioned instantly. JustHost paves the way for customer growth and success with its cloud VPS platform. First-time users who know they’ll need a VPS will be happy to have the familiar shared hosting staples like a cPanel control panel and free domain registration. Migrating to a larger server, should you need one, is also painless. Though JustHost doesn't provide huge CPU and RAM numbers, customers receive plenty of storage and bandwidth for most use cases.

  • Guaranteed server resources from enhanced virtualization
  • Cloud-powered scalability with OpenStack and KVM
  • Instant provisioning and guaranteed resources
  • Feature-rich enhanced cPanel control panel
  • FREE domain registration and 24/7 technical support
  • Get started on JustHost now.
Money Back Guarantee
30 days
Disk Space
30 GB - 120 GB
Domain Name
FREE (1 year)

WordPress Hosting Comparison

WordPress Rating

★★★★ 4.4/5.0

#8 out of 8 in WordPress Hosting reviews

As champions of low-cost, high-impact hosting, GoDaddy understandably offers a slew of services geared for all levels of WordPress users.

Starting with the company's basic shared hosting services, which start at $8.99 per month, each GoDaddy customer who signs up for an annual plan receive a free domain name and the power to control their site via the cPanel or Plesk control panels.

From either of these interfaces, you can quickly install and set up the WordPress environment in one click at no additional cost. GoDaddy's improved cPanel is configured with CageFS to protect your content and uses CloudLinux to keep your site's resources truly balanced.

While you're busy adding content, photos, or products to your WordPress site, GoDaddy ensures that your web pages are loading quickly.

More serious WordPress users may prefer to step up to the web host's suite of optimized WordPress hosting plans, which feature an automatically installed SSL certificate, backups, and daily malware scans.

Users can create and launch unlimited websites with most of these packages, and you can choose to automatically upgrade your plan as you need extra resources.

Even higher up, GoDaddy Pro Managed WordPress Hosting starts site owners with a delightful onboarding experience and one-click migration tool to make it easier than ever to get started.

Once you configure your free CDN and built-in caching, you can take advantage of daily backups, automatic core updates, pre-built sites, and a staging environment to ensure your WordPress website is picture perfect.

  • 1-click WordPress installs via cPanel or Plesk
  • FREE domain from the world's #1 registrar
  • Experience 24/7 expert support
  • Award-winning security monitoring
  • FREE year of Office 365 business email services
  • Get started on GoDaddy now.
Money Back Guarantee
30 days
Disk Space
10 GB SSD - 30 GB SSD
Domain Name
FREE (1 year)

WordPress Rating

★★★★ 3.9/5.0

Although JustHost doesn't have much in the way of WordPress-specific upgrades, site owners using the world's most popular content management system are still well served by the company's ample resources and reliable infrastructure. JustHost starts users off with unlimited bandwidth, a free domain registration, and a one-click WordPress installation via the Mojo Marketplace script library. From there, site owners can add and install SiteLock security and an SSL certificate, along with a wide selection of ecommerce shopping carts. As you build your brand, the company's free email accounts and marketing credits will help spread the word, all while the company's team of support agents are on standby to offer customer support and troubleshooting if any issues arise. All in all, JustHost is a solid WordPress hosting option for beginners and small businesses testing the WordPress waters and looking for a speedy and secure place to scale.

  • One-click WordPress installations with PHP 7
  • Unlimited bandwidth and included SSL certificate
  • FREE SiteLock security scans and malware protection
  • FREE domain registration and marketing tools
  • HostingAdvice readers receive up to 74% off
  • Get started on JustHost now
Money Back Guarantee
30 days
Disk Space
50 GB - Unlimited
Domain Name
FREE (1 year)

Site Builder Hosting Comparison

Website Builder Rating

★★★★★ 4.8/5.0

GoDaddy uses a custom website builder and easy access to dozens of content management systems to offer a user-friendly site-building solution to customers.

Most of GoDaddy's hosting plans include these options at no additional cost. Plus, if you sign up for an annual hosting plan, this world-leading domain name registrar will include a GoDaddy domain for free.

The company's Websites + Marketing plans combine the GoDaddy website builder with built-in marketing tools to seamlessly integrate your website, social media, and online reviews to attract the most visitors.

Even better, you can get started for free! To unlock the full publishing power, though, plans start around $10 per month.

You can save money by signing up for a shared hosting account, which will point you toward easy-to-use content management systems like WordPress, Joomla, and Drupal. You'll still get a lot of options for customizations and one-click installations but not quite the same drag-and-drop simplicity you'll find on most site builders.

Regardless of which you choose, the GoDaddy team is working around the clock to ensure your site will remain online and performing speedily while you worry about making your website beautiful and professional-looking.

The company's award-winning security team keeps an eye out for downtime, hackers, and other security threats.

The end result is their uptime guarantee of 99.9%, which does the job for most users.

The bottom line is that you can get started with multiple GoDaddy's website builder options for a dollar or less per month and choose from hundreds of theme options to start designing the site of your dreams.

  • Get started for FREE, no credit-card required
  • Easy-to-use interface with tons of customization
  • GoDaddy InSight™ provides tailored action plans
  • 99.9% uptime with an award-winning support team
  • Built-in marketing tools and expertise
  • Get started on GoDaddy now.
Money Back Guarantee
30 days
Disk Space
Unlimited
Domain Name
New or Transfer

Website Builder Rating

★★★★ 3.9/5.0

With JustHost, website building options are seamlessly built into the company's shared hosting service. While not as robust as a Weebly-based drag-and-drop system, JustHost's custom solution includes more than 400 templates, which should satisfy even the pickiest of users. In addition to the site builder, you get all of the perks of the company's shared hosting plans, such as a free domain registration, unlimited email accounts, unlimited data transfer, ecommerce shopping carts, and cPanel, which is further contributes to usability. For business users, the included $150 in advertising credits will help get your new site welcomed exposure. Aimed at the first-time user, JustHost is very intuitive to use. Bundling a free domain and the company's instant provisioning, JustHost gets you up and running and building your site in just minutes, without having to wait for the server to be configured for you. Finally, JustHost offers fantastic 24/7 customer support that is very well known in the industry. The experts at JustHost will help you keep your site running if there are issues, and who better to answer your site builder questions than the developers and employees who created the platform.

  • Custom site builder with drag-and-drop simplicity
  • 400+ templates, including ecommerce stores
  • FREE domain name and email addresses
  • $200 in Facebook, Google, and Bing advertising credits
  • 24/7 support available via phone, chat, and email
  • Get started on JustHost now.
Money Back Guarantee
30 days
Disk Space
50 GB - Unlimited
Domain Name
FREE (1 year)
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GoDaddy vs. JustHost - Our Conclusion

Alexandra Anderson Ryan Frankel Hosting Expert
“We tested GoDaddy & JustHost — The winner is GoDaddy!”

With a range of plans and contract lengths to choose from, both hosts excel in flexibility among first-time site owners. GoDaddy may have an edge in hosting features, but JustHost delivers a simplified and affordable environment for users to get started on their hosting endeavors. No matter which host you choose, you can leverage their 30-day free trials to get a swing of things before committing.

Overall Rating
4.7/5.0 ★★★★★
Visit GoDaddy »
Overall Rating
3.7/5.0 ★★★★
Visit JustHost »

About The Author

Ryan Frankel has been a professional in the tech industry for more than 20 years and has been developing websites for more than 25. With a master's degree in electrical and computer engineering from the University of Florida, he has a fundamental understanding of hardware systems and the software that runs them. Ryan now sits as the CTO of Digital Brands Inc. and manages all of the server infrastructure of their websites, as well as their development team. In addition, Ryan has a passion for guitars, good coffee, and puppies.
Alexandra Anderson