A2 Hosting vs. HostGator (2024)

Alexandra Anderson

By: Alexandra Anderson

Alexandra Anderson

Alexandra Anderson, Contributing Expert

Alexandra is a web marketer, Agile Product Owner, and die-hard wordsmith who's contributed to HostingAdvice, InMotion Hosting, HostGator, and other prominent hosting and technology blogs, as well as Forbes. She has a master's degree in information technology from Virginia Tech and more than 10 years of experience building websites, advising on web and mobile app design, and crafting content that engages and converts. Her primary subject matter expertise spans WordPress, UX design, Agile project management, and, of course, web hosting.

Lillian Castro

Editor: Lillian Castro

Lillian Castro

Lillian Castro, Senior Editor

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.

Cristian Lopez

Reviewer: Cristian Lopez

Cristian Lopez

Cristian Lopez, Contributing Expert

Cristian Lopez uses his Business Marketing background from the University of Illinois at Chicago to create comfortable environments for customers, clients, and colleagues to share their thoughts and ideas openly. From interviewing tech leaders to conducting UX market research projects, Cristian knows the importance of storytelling — a key variable for innovation and inspiration. His goal at HostingAdvice is to wow readers on the ever-evolving nature of the tech industry and bring his audience the most reliable and exciting content on all things hosting.

Alexandra Anderson Alexandra Anderson Hosting Expert
“We tested A2 Hosting & HostGator — The winner is A2 Hosting!”

We’ve all heard that it’s impolite to brag, but when comparing hosting providers, we typically let this rule slide. HostGator boasts a consistent reputation for reliability and an impressive number of servers, while the A2 Hosting team has built a reputation for custom-built solutions aimed at security and speed. In this comparison, we’ll highlight the best features of each provider to help you choose the best host for your website. Let the humble bragging begin!

Overall Rating
4.9/5.0 ★★★★★
Visit A2 Hosting »
Overall Rating
4.9/5.0 ★★★★★
Visit HostGator »

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Overall Hosting Comparison

Best Overall Rating

★★★★★ 4.9/5.0

If speed and performance, partnered with support and security, are at all priorities in your web host shopping, A2 Hosting should be a leading contender.

When A2 Hosting first launched in 2003, the company was focused on serving developers; A2 Hosting was among the first providers to offer PHP 5 and to support Ruby on Rails on shared servers.

As the company grew, the focus shifted toward performance, following a customer survey that revealed loading times trailed only support and reliability as top priorities. As such, A2 Hosting was also one of the first to offer hosting with high-speed solid-state drives, which now reside across the company's entire portfolio of services.

A2 Hosting's full-stack optimizations unlocked a 300% increase in page load speeds The company took performance yet another step forward when it launched its Turbo hosting platform, which boasts fewer users per server, pre-configured caching options, and twice the allocated physical memory.  

With the Turbo Server option, caching tools, and other optimized software, sites experience page loads speeds up to 20 times faster than average.

Whether you want a dedicated server, standard shared hosting with cPanel, VPS, or anything in between, A2 Hosting can offer the services to meet your needs.

With expertly-tuned servers that house fewer accounts, the company promises uptimes of 99.9% or higher, with Guru Crew customer support available all day, every day.

Overall, you can't go wrong in choosing A2 Hosting as your web host. The company's inventive hosting solutions, impressive performance and security measures, and the constant thought put into the user experience warrant our high praise for their services.

  • SSDs and TurboServer for 20x faster pageloads
  • Host unlimited websites and FREE site transfer
  • Optimized plugins and 1-click installs for WP
  • Pre-installed OPcache and Memcached caching
  • FREE HackScan with restore options
  • Get started on A2 Hosting now.
Money Back Guarantee
30 days
Disk Space
100 GB SSD - Unlimited SSD
Domain Name
New or Transfer

Best Overall Rating

★★★★★ 4.5/5.0

HostGator has been around for more than a decade and is well-respected for its large number of servers and consistent reliability.

Known mostly as a shared hosting provider, HostGator still supplies decent dedicated and VPS options if you need your site to scale.

HostGator costs slightly more than some of the other budget-minded shared hosts, but that echoes the brand's reputation for strong infrastructure and helpful support.

HostGator offers decent features in its basic shared hosting offerings, such as unlimited disk space, a nice control panel, and free website templates. Plus, you get the flexibility to add numerous add-ons for privacy, security, and productivity as you see fit.

Aimed primarily at the semi-technical user, HostGator's flexibility is its strong suit. Dedicated, VPS, and Windows hosting is available if that fits your needs, as well. Root access, SSH, and support for Ruby, Perl, Python, and other languages are available on all plans.

HostGator has nearly limitless options and control available for their servers, with the support and beginner-friendly tools that will appeal to the full range of customers.

  • Familiar and easy-to-use cPanel control panel
  • FREE drag-and-drop custom website builder
  • Unlimited disk space, email, and bandwidth
  • Flexible term lengths with no contract required
  • 77% off your first three years
  • Get started on HostGator now.
Money Back Guarantee
30 days
Disk Space
10 GB SSD - 40 GB SSD
Domain Name
FREE (1 year)

Cheap Hosting Comparison

Cheap Rating

★★★★★ 4.9/5.0

#3 out of 10 in Cheap Hosting reviews

There are plenty of excellent cPanel shared hosting providers out there, so what sets A2 Hosting apart from the rest?

Not only does the company offer a ton of features, but it has custom-built its packages for enhanced performance, speed, and security — putting your priorities above pricing.

A2 Hosting packages include a free Cloudflare content delivery network, 24/7 Guru Crew support, and multiple SSD speed boost solutions. Within the comfortable cPanel control panel, users will find Softaculous — featuring easy, 1-click installations of popular web applications.

With A2's Perpetual Security features, users receive free HackScan protection and KernelCare, which runs rebootless auto-updates to kernels daily.

The company promises 99.9% uptime and 24/7 network monitoring, plus virus scanning and defense against brute-force attacks.

Not only was A2 Hosting one of the first to offer SSD hosting — featuring three times the page load speeds of standard hosts — but the company also invented its own Turbo hosting platform. A2 Hosting's Turbo Servers yield 20 times faster page load speeds, using less CPU and memory, with fewer users on each server.

We appreciate how A2 Hosting spends a great deal of time and effort on performance testing and ensuring its giving customers the best speed, security, and support available at a price users can afford.

The highly optimized solutions make getting started easy, and the usefulness and reliability of A2 Hosting's products make them extremely cost-effective.

With 24/7 support, including a WordPress-specific department, we're confident A2 Hosting can provide the assistance you need to get an affordable site launched and thriving.

  • FREE Cloudflare CDN and SSD speed boost
  • Optimized caching and 1-click installs
  • Unlimited email, domains, and databases
  • Advanced security and FREE HackScan
  • 24/7 support via phone, chat & tickets
  • Get started on A2 Hosting now.
Money Back Guarantee
30 days
Disk Space
100 GB SSD - Unlimited SSD
Domain Name
New or Transfer

Cheap Rating

★★★★★ 4.6/5.0

#10 out of 10 in Cheap Hosting reviews

HostGator is a great compromise between performance and price. The company offers unlimited emails, MySQL databases, disk space, and bandwidth, plus one-click installs of popular open-source projects, in addition to a 99.9% uptime guarantee on its shared hosting plan.

HostGator’s price-to-performance perks also apply to its vast array of other hosting options, such as VPS, dedicated servers, and even reseller hosting.

The company's many hosting options make HostGator a great choice for sites on the rise, in need of options for the future.

For those just getting started and looking for a good, cheap host, HostGator bundles some nice features that hosting newbies can appreciate.

The Hatchling Plan is perfect for users who just want to create one website, while upgrading to the HostGator Baby Plan unlocks unlimited bandwidth, domains, and email inboxes.

The web hosting company’s custom website builder comes with more than 4,500 drag-and-drop, mobile-friendly templates to help users launch their website, blog, or ecommerce store, while the familiar HostGator cPanel interface helps customers seamlessly manage domains, email, databases, and one-click software installations.

If you are looking for a solid web host, with a ton of flexibility, plenty of power, and great price points, you should consider making HostGator your web host of choice. Be sure to use a HostGator coupon to make sure you score the best deal!

  • Host up to unlimited websites on a single plan
  • FREE SSL certificate included on all plans
  • Unlimited bandwidth & email addresses
  • 1-click WordPress installs & FREE blog tools
  • Get 77% OFF by buying 36 months upfront
  • Get started on HostGator now.
Money Back Guarantee
30 days
Disk Space
10 GB SSD - 40 GB SSD
Domain Name
FREE (1 year)

Dedicated Hosting Comparison

Dedicated Rating

★★★★★ 5.0/5.0

#1 out of 8 in Dedicated Hosting reviews

Whether you're looking for managed or self-managed hosting, A2 Hosting offers three extremely reliable dedicated server plans to meet your needs, depending on your levels of comfort and experience.

With A2 Hosting's Unmanaged Flex Dedicated Server plan, users get administrator-level control with root access and their choice of Linux operating system.

Your server will be ready for configuration with an optional cPanel license available. Plus, the company offers 24/7/365 server monitoring and maintenance for hardware.

We found this package to be most useful for experienced developers who are familiar with the command line. The Managed Flex Dedicated Server service removes the operating system choice and root access — along with any of the hassle or stress of server maintenance and management.

Blending the best of both worlds, A2 Hosting also offers a managed server with root access as part of its Core Dedicated Server plan.

A2 Hosting's dedicated servers feature its proprietary SwiftServer platform — expertly-tuned hardware with performance enhancements.

The company was one of the first to offer SSD hosting, a perk passed down to all dedicated server customers that unlocks page load speeds as much as three times faster than those of standard web hosts.

Servers are never overloaded, and A2 notifies you of targeted server occurrences, such as high load volume or when a filesystem becomes full. With four datacenters strategically located on three continents, A2 Hosting offers high redundancy and global distribution.

  • Root access and 3 levels of server management
  • Expertly managed servers deployed instantly
  • Choose from 4 datacenters across 3 continents
  • FREE redundant SSD storage in RAID-1 arrays
  • Choice of 13 Linux operating systems
  • Get started on A2 Hosting now.
Money Back Guarantee
30 days
Disk Space
1 TB SSD (RAID-1)
Domain Name
New or Transfer

Dedicated Rating

★★★★★ 4.6/5.0

#5 out of 8 in Dedicated Hosting reviews

Founded in 2002, HostGator is one of the largest web hosts with a long lineage of dedicated server hosting. With updated hardware, including Intel Xeon Quad-core processors and a boatload of RAM, HostGator balances performance, quality web hosting service, and competitive pricing.

As one of the few hosts to offer managed support and a Windows-based operating system, HostGator is an excellent fit for those seeking hassle-free ASP.NET support.

HostGator boasts a top-of-the-line, fully redundant network and datacenter, which dedicated hosting users should appreciate.

The company also offers several dedicated IP addresses per HostGator server hosting account.

Finally, HostGator has a fantastic support team and 24/7 customer service available via phone, chat, or email. Combining that HostGator support with plenty of power, HostGator is a very respectable choice for a dedicated server host.

  • Linux or Windows servers available
  • HDD or SSD storage plus unmetered bandwidth
  • Fully redundant network and datacenter
  • SSH access and support for multiple languages
  • Managed or semi-managed solutions
  • Get started on HostGator now.
Money Back Guarantee
N/A
Disk Space
512 GB SSD - 2 TB HDD
Domain Name
New or Transfer

VPS Hosting Comparison

VPS Rating

★★★★★ 4.8/5.0

#5 out of 9 in VPS Hosting reviews

While A2 Hosting's turbocharged shared hosting platform gives site owners ample room to grow, the company's tech prowess is on full display with its portfolio of VPS options.

Ranging from unmanaged, bare-metal environments to stress-free, fully managed space, A2 Hosting is sure to have the perfect option for your expanding online presence.

No matter which option customers choose — and there are many — A2 Hosting allocates ample storage, bandwidth, and memory to VPS customers.

Site owners or app developers can customize their hosting package to include root access, cPanel, or high-performance solid-state disks.

We highly recommend the company's Core VPS packages, which combine managed services with root access to provide the best of both worlds.

The configurations start with a whopping 4GB of RAM, 4vCPUs, 75GB of SSD storage, all well above average elsewhere in the industry.

Experienced developers who are comfortable with the command line and willing to spend the time managing and maintaining their VPS will find a great deal with A2 Hosting's unmanaged servers, which also enable customers to select from a staggering 15 different operating systems.

Beyond the myriad of management and operating system options, customers can also select cloud-powered VPS options to receive the ultimate redundancy and reliability, custom-fit servers, and flexible resource monitoring and scaling.

When it comes to speed and performance, A2 Hosting pulls out all the stops. The company's Turbo option, paired with its exclusive Site Accelerator software suite, produce page load speeds up to 20 times faster than competitors. A2 Hosting holds a breadth of opportunities for flexibility, cost control, and custom solutions built for VPS customers.

With an emphasis on performance and a commitment to solving customer problems, you won't regret going turbo with A2 Hosting's VPS packages.

  • Turbo server & cache options for faster page loads
  • Well-built plans starting with 4GB RAM
  • FREE CDN plus auto-installs with Softaculous
  • Multilingual support and up to unlimited databases
  • Enhanced security with and daily kernel updates
  • Get started on A2 Hosting now.
Money Back Guarantee
30 days
Disk Space
20 GB SSD - 450 GB SSD
Domain Name
New or Transfer

VPS Rating

★★★★★ 4.7/5.0

#7 out of 9 in VPS Hosting reviews

HostGator has built a great reputation in the industry for its shared web hosting options. The company's VPS hosting solution, with optional cPanel support, provide a nice and easy introduction to those who are new to VPS hosting and know their needs require more than a typical shared plan.

Starting at low price points and boasting tons of support, HostGator makes transitioning to a VPS plan reasonable and doable.

Each plan comes with two IP addresses and a bunch of storage, and recently expanded CPU and RAM offerings lend a ton of computing power.

If you're not sure a VPS hosting package is a good fit, take a look at the revamped HostGator cloud offerings, which offer additional scalability and redundancy at remarkable price points.

For those managing multiple hosting accounts, be sure to consider a HostGator reseller hosting plan, as well.

HostGator’s strongest point comes from its state-of-the-art datacenter. Featuring a fully redundant network with no single point of failure and multiple bandwidth providers, uptime should almost never be a concern.

Founded in 2002, HostGator is one of the largest online web hosts. The company has more than 12,000 servers under management and award-winning support. If you are looking for a small VPS server or value the strength of a great network, give HostGator a shot.

  • Full root access with fully or semi-managed options
  • Redundant network with multiple layers of security
  • FREE website, domain, MySQL, and script transfer
  • RAID-10 storage for data protection
  • Get up to 75% off when you sign up
  • Get started on HostGator now.
Money Back Guarantee
30 days
Disk Space
120 GB SSD - 240 GB SSD
Domain Name
New or Transfer

WordPress Hosting Comparison

WordPress Rating

★★★★★ 5.0/5.0

#2 out of 9 in WordPress Hosting reviews

As experts in performance optimization, A2 Hosting is a top choice for powering resource-heavy WordPress websites.

The company offers shared or managed plans for the ultra-popular content management system, with the benefits extending to Joomla, Drupal, and other platforms.

A2's shared web hosting plans come with cPanel control panel, where users can access Softaculous auto-installer. Easily install popular web applications, including your choice of CMS, with one click.

Alternatively, A2 Hosting experts will pre-install and configure WordPress for you, complete with PHP7 and HTTPS protection.

While the company's all-SSD infrastructure enables sites to fly, A2 Hosting's enhanced Turbo Servers and proprietary Site Accelerator particularly shine with WordPress plans, enabling 20-times-faster page loads and automatic compression and caching options.

To boost security and protect customers, the company build another custom program that auto-hardens WordPress sites for proactive protection against malicious attacks.

Additionally, A2 Hosting offers virus scanning, a firewall, and brute-force attack protection — not to mention spam filtering for emails, which are also IMAP, POP3, and SMTP supported.

A2 Hosting offers 24/7 customer support and tons of optimized features made with WordPress users in mind. Whether you're an online retailer looking to launch a fresh site with WooCommerce or a moderately web-savvy WordPress user looking for speed and security excellence, we'd highly recommend A2 Hosting.

  • FREE Cloudflare CDN and 1-click WP installs
  • Turbo Server, SSD speed, and optimized caching
  • A2-optimized plugins for performance and security
  • FREE SSL certificates and 24/7 support
  • FREE HackScan and KernelCare
  • Get started on A2 Hosting now.
Money Back Guarantee
30 days
Disk Space
50 GB SSD - Unlimited SSD
Domain Name
New or Transfer

WordPress Rating

★★★★★ 4.8/5.0

#7 out of 9 in WordPress Hosting reviews

HostGator is great for all things shared hosting, and application-specific services — such as the classic one-click-install WordPress hosting — are no exception.

The team recently updated its already clean and intuitive HostGator cPanel dashboard, wherein users can find a myriad of free apps and scripts to install, including WordPress.

You could quite realistically have a WP-powered site up and running in as little as an afternoon. As is the case with many of our favorite shared WordPress hosting providers, including sister company Bluehost, HostGator offers unlimited emails, databases, disk storage, and bandwidth.

The one downfall is the lack of the popular free domain perk, but domain names are easy to obtain for around $10 to $15 bucks with any registrar.

You can also select, register, and pay for a domain directly from the HostGator signup page. If you're serious about your WordPress hosting, we recommend HostGator's new(er) managed WordPress platform, which is optimized for performance with cloud resources, multiple layers of caching tools, and a complimentary CDN.

Managed WordPress plan subscribers enjoy up to 2.5x faster page load speeds for their HostGator website or blog.

If you're running a business WordPress site, this is an excellent investment.

Once your site is designed and ready for promotion, HostGator helps you kickstart your online marketing efforts with $100 in paid advertising credits. Attract blog readers, potential clients, or online shoppers browsing Google search results.

We wish you the best of luck in your blog or online business hosting endeavors. WordPress is a known favorite in the space, and HostGator has established itself as a trusted partner well worthy of your consideration.

  • Managed WordPress hosting on shared servers
  • WordPress is preinstalled on all plans
  • Unlimited email addresses hosted at your domain
  • 99.9% uptime guarantee for your blog
  • $150 in Google Ads spend match credit
  • Get started on HostGator now.
Money Back Guarantee
30 days
Disk Space
20 GB SSD - 100 GB SSD
Domain Name
FREE (1 year)

Site Builder Hosting Comparison

Website Builder Rating

★★★★★ 4.8/5.0

When it comes to site-building, A2 Hosting sets users up with all the tools they need to get a website built, launched, and thriving.

The company's own drag-and-drop site builder offers total simplicity for those without coding experience, or users can opt for design tools from Microweber or RapidWeaver.

Additionally, the inclusion of the cPanel control panel and Softaculous script library means dozens of other blogging, ecommerce, and content management systems are just a one-click installation away.

A2 Hosting strives to make these setup processes as simplistic and intuitive as possible, and the company has built optimized plugins to configure each application to its specific infrastructure advantages automatically.

While we appreciate the wide range of site builder options, we're a little surprised to see relatively simple website elements, such as a blog, SSL certificate, or ecommerce store, are held out of A2 Hosting's introductory site builder plan. Upgrading to more expensive plans probably means the company is pricing themselves above many first-time site owners' budgets.

That being said, we appreciate the company's focus on providing an above-average experience for all types of customers. An emphasis on modern, high-powered hardware is combined with personalized and responsive support to help users learn about how to design, launch, and grow a website.

  • Multiple website builder options for code-free design
  • Softaculous 1-click installs for WordPress, Drupal, and Joomla
  • A2-optimized caching (6x faster page loads) and Turbo Server (20x faster)
  • FREE blogging and ecommerce tools available, plus SSL security
  • 24/7/365 Guru Crew support
  • Get started on A2 Hosting now.
Money Back Guarantee
30 days
Disk Space
50 GB SSD - Unlimited SSD
Domain Name
New or Transfer

Website Builder Rating

★★★★★ 4.6/5.0

#4 out of 9 in Website Builder Hosting reviews

Setting itself apart from the scores of competitors that rely on white-labeled website builder solutions, HostGator spent the time to painstakingly craft its own platform.

Gator provides a frustration-free experience that pairs the simplicity of drag-and-drop design with the company’s powerful and respected web hosting services.

Signing up is a breeze, and HostGator gives customers an option to add a suite of social media marketing tools. Users are quickly ushered into a gallery of more than 200 modern, mobile-responsive, and visually impressive templates that can be sorted by categories like beauty and fashion, music and entertainment, real estate, business consultant, portfolios, and others.

Gator covers blogs and ecommerce stores, even coming with a free domain name and SSL certificate.

Once you choose your basic look, Gator ushers you through a 15-second tour to show you the basic features of the editor — and it’s all you need.

Clicking on any element opens a menu that gives you options to change styles, whether it’s a section’s complete design or something simple like font or color.

We especially appreciate how Gator’s drag-and-drop interface gives users pixel-perfect control while still suggesting guides and grids for appropriate spacing.

Throughout the customization and design phase, users can seamlessly switch between desktop and mobile views to understand how your site will appear to all visitors.

Adding a blog or ecommerce store takes just a click. We wish Gator would suggest a select few designs that matched the current site’s template instead of the dozen or so options that reflect a wide range of categories, but we were impressed that the in-depth previews covered both the blog page and individual posts, for instance.

All in all, HostGator can be incredibly proud of its proprietary site builder — and customers can sit back and enjoy the confidence in having such a well-rounded tool at their design disposal.

  • Drag-and-drop design with the Gator™ site builder
  • Hundreds of mobile-friendly templates
  • FREE hosting, domain name, and SSL certificate
  • Easily add a blog, store, and social media
  • Analytics portal helps gauge site performance
  • Get started on HostGator now.
Money Back Guarantee
30 days
Disk Space
10 GB SSD - 40 GB SSD
Domain Name
FREE (1 year)
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A2 Hosting vs. HostGator - Our Conclusion

Alexandra Anderson Alexandra Anderson Hosting Expert
“We tested A2 Hosting & HostGator — The winner is A2 Hosting!”

You can’t go wrong with either of these companies if you’re looking for the best experience out of your web host. These providers place an enormous emphasis on customer support and quality hosting. A2 Hosting offers feature-rich dedicated hosting plans for users looking for something with a lot of power and speed. But for small businesses or new website owners, HostGator has got your back with its quality shared hosting plans.

Overall Rating
4.9/5.0 ★★★★★
Visit A2 Hosting »
Overall Rating
4.5/5.0 ★★★★★
Visit HostGator »

About The Author

Alexandra Anderson’s interest in website administration was sparked in her teens, priming her for a fast-paced career in managing, building, and contributing to online brands, including HostingAdvice, Forbes, and the blogs of prominent hosting providers. She brings firsthand experience reviewing web hosts, perfecting website design, optimizing content, and walking site owners through the steps that add up to a successful online presence. With a master's degree in information technology from Virginia Tech, she combines her extensive writing experience and technical understanding to unpack some of the most complex topics that daunt novice website owners, as well as the subjects that excite veteran technologists within the HostingAdvice readership.
Alexandra Anderson