Web Hosting Hub: Hosting Types and Pricing
Web Hosting Hub offers shared hosting with a choice of three different paid plans. This deviates from the typical provider style of providing a variety of hosting types: not just shared, but VPS, cloud, or dedicated hosting, too.
This lack of other hosting types isn’t an immediate issue. However, it does limit your choices if you ever need the advanced capabilities of a virtual or dedicated server. (If you’d like to know more about each type of hosting and which one will work best for you, check out our beginner’s guide!)
13th Place8.1 out of 10Web Hosting Hub’s plans range from $8.99 – $16.99 per month, with more services bundled in the higher your plan’s monthly fee. That range comes in a little high for shared web hosting, though Web Hosting Hub does try to justify the price with premium services.
We cover the features that come with Web Hosting Hub’s hosting plans in the next sections of this review, so jump there if you’d like to dig into the details of Web Hosting Hub’s services.
In the meantime, here’s a quick look at Web Hosting Hub’s three shared hosting packages:
| Features | Spark | Nitro | Dynamo |
| Monthly Fee | $8.99 | $12.99 | $16.99 |
| Free Domain | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| SSD Storage | Unlimited | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Bandwidth | Unlimited | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Free SSL Certificate | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Websites | 2 | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| SQL Databases | 10 | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Email Addresses | Unlimited | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Parked Domains | 5 | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Subdomains | 25 | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Free Website Transfer | 3 | 3 | 3 |
| Free Advertising Credits | $150 | $150 | $150 |
| Softaculous Installer | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| SSH Access | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Choice of Data Center | No | Yes | Yes |
| Discounted Web Design Services | No | Up to 20% | Up to 30% |
| Money-Back Guarantee | Yes | Yes | Yes |
Are Web Hosting Hub’s plans worth it? Maybe.
Taken at face value, Web Hosting Hub’s plans offer some great features (e.g., unlimited storage and bandwidth, free SSL) for reasonable prices. However, there are some caveats worth noting.
Web Hosting Hub doesn’t offer month-to-month accounts. If you want to host your website here, you’ll have to sign up for 12, 24, or 36 months.
Web Hosting Hub also adheres to the admittedly common practice of using the lowest available contract fees on its pricing page. This means the advertised prices are for 3-year contracts; if you want shorter billing terms, you’ll be paying more per month.
Web Hosting Hub also tends to charge for some services that come free with other providers. Regular backups of your website and account data, for example, cost $1/month; WHOIS privacy for your domain costs an additional $9.99; and so on. The fees themselves are relatively small, but attached as they are to services you’ll want (and expect to get!) anyway, they add up.
You Can Get Your Money Back
The good news is that Web Hosting Hub offers a generous 90-day money back guarantee. This beats many other hosting providers’ guarantee periods by a mile, and it gives you ample time to evaluate your Web Hosting Hub experience without fear of total loss.
If you do decide to cancel your account, Web Hosting Hub refunds you, no questions asked. Bear in mind, though, that the fees you’ve paid for certain services such as domain registration don’t get refunded, so you likely won’t get back the full amount you spent when signing up.
Web Hosting Hub Provides Unlimited Resources
Web Hosting Hub will give you unlimited storage and bandwidth regardless of your chosen plan. You can upload as many files or entertain as many visitors at you want—most of the time.
All of Web Hosting Hub’s servers also use SSD or solid state drive storage. These perform faster than regular hard drive storage. In turn, SSD drives help reduce loading times for your website’s visitors.
This is a good offer, but keep in mind that “unlimited” really means “within the bounds of reasonable usage” to most web hosting providers, including Web Hosting Hub. You’re on a shared hosting plan, after all, so you’re splitting a server with hundreds (if not thousands) of other users.
Web Hosting Hub, like many others in the industry, can mete out penalties if you exceed what’s deemed “typical” usage for your account. These can range from bumping you up to a higher-priced plan (with your consent) to suspending or terminating your account.
Can You Register or Transfer Domains with Web Hosting Hub?
Yes, Web Hosting Hub lets you buy new domains or transfer any existing ones that you already own. Make sure you read the fine print, though!
Each Web Hosting Hub plan includes either a free custom domain or a free domain transfer. However, if you opt to get a new domain, “free” here only covers your first year; after that, you’ll have to pay to renew ownership of your custom domain. At the time of this review, Web Hosting Hub pegs its domain renewal rate at $14.99/year.
Thinking of registering new, additional domain names? Web Hosting Hub lets you do that for a handful of top-level domains (subject, of course, to the availability of your preferred name):
- .com
- .net
- .org
- .us
- .biz
- .info
You’ll pay the same $14.99 price for domain registration, though WHOIS privacy protection (which shields your personal information from easy access) costs a separate $9.99.
If you already own other domains that you also want to use, Web Hosting Hub gives you 3 free transfers of your cPanel and website data, with a zero-downtime guarantee to boot. Web Hosting Hub will work with any domain, too, so don’t worry if yours isn’t a .com/.net/.org/.us/.biz/.info.
As with many of Web Hosting Hub’s features, though, it’s worth examining the fine print here: transfers are limited to 5GB and websites with 3 or fewer databases; otherwise, you’ll pay an additional $10 for every item beyond those limits.
How Does Site Management Work at Web Hosting Hub?
You can host multiple websites with your Web Hosting Hub account (though, as you’ll see in our Pricing section, the Spark plan only lets you have two).
As for managing your websites, Web Hosting Hub gives all of its users cPanel as the default control panel. Newbies and experts alike will find this useful.
The cPanel interface is one of the most widely used for a reason: it’s user-friendly, easy to grasp, and equipped with a ton of options that cover everything from one-click app installations to account backups, file management, and analytics. People new to website hosting can easily find their way around, even with zero prior technical knowledge. And if you’re still not feeling confident, a dedicated onboarding process is part of Web Hosting Hub’s standard suite of support services, which you can read about in the Customer Support section of this review.
Experts, meanwhile, will enjoy the ease and convenience of using a popular and flexible platform. Switching from another hosting provider to Web Hosting Hub, for example, is much easier if cPanel powers both: just zip up your data and port it over to Web Hosting Hub. The cPanel interface also supports advanced options like custom Python or PHP scripts, cron jobs, and multiple FTP accounts with different degrees of access. Whether working alone or with a team, Web Hosting Hub’s use of cPanel smoothens out the process for you.
It’s not just website management, either. Web Hosting Hub also lets you create emails using your website domain (e.g., [email protected]). You can set up POP3 or IMAP email accounts. Web Hosting Hub lets you access these accounts on any device, too, so you don’t have to worry about being out of the loop.
What Apps and Software Can You Use at Web Hosting Hub?
Web Hosting Hub bundles the powerful Softaculous installer with its cPanel control panel, so you’ll be spoilt for choice when it comes to apps for your website. A few clicks through the Softaculous installer will let you install any of 400+ applications, which include:
- CMS (content management systems) like WordPress, Drupal, and Joomla
- Ecommerce solutions like OpenCart, PrestaShop, and Magento
- Learning platforms like Moodle or various wikis
- Website builders like BoldGrid or ImpressPages
The BoldGrid website builder actually serves as Web Hosting Hub’s main site builder software. You can learn more about BoldGrid in our review, but in a nutshell, it’s a powerful, user-friendly system that lets you spin up beautiful WordPress websites quickly.
If you’re set on building a blog, an online store, or other specific-use website and have been wondering if Web Hosting Hub has the tools for you, check out this review’s sections on how well Web Hosting Hub works for popular software and niches:
- WordPress hosting
- Drupal hosting
- Ecommerce hosting (Magento, PrestaShop, etc.)
Is Your Website Safe at Web Hosting Hub?
Web Hosting Hub provides free SSL encryption to all users. Comodo provides this service through the cPanel AutoSSL module. This is a convenient, low-cost way of raising the security baseline for your website and, consequently, boosting your website’s overall trustworthiness. Bear in mind, though, that this option isn’t on by default, so you’ll need to dig into your account settings and turn on the free SSL module manually.
However, if you’re hoping to use SSL to secure, say, an online store, it’s better to use a dedicated SSL certificate. Many third-party services can provide one, either for free (e.g., Let’s Encrypt) or for a fee (e.g., Comodo, Symantec). Web Hosting Hub’s support staff can help you install your dedicated SSL certificate, so even if you choose this option, the process isn’t that much more complicated.
As for your hosting account’s emails, Web Hosting Hub implements security features like SpamSafe protection. This keeps your inbox free of clutter and lowers the risk that your email might be used as an entry point for attackers who want to compromise your website.
Web Hosting Hub adds other layers of protection, such as:
- Advanced policy firewalls
- suPHP encryption
- Data backups
Take note, though, that backing up your data will cost you $1/month. True, that’s not a lot for daily copies of your website and cPanel data. But it’s still disappointing considering how many web hosting providers offer comprehensive backup services for free.
Does Web Hosting Hub Deliver Good Uptime?
First things first: Web Hosting Hub doesn’t offer an uptime guarantee. There’s no clear-cut policy, in black and white, that outlines what you can expect if your website suffers downtime from failures or shortcomings on their part.
Now, uptime guarantees aren’t ironclad protection against downtime, as we clarify in our article on web hosting uptimes. But a guarantee is still a good sign of whether your provider takes its network’s stability and reliability seriously. The lack of a solid guarantee at Web Hosting Hub isn’t an issue per se, but it’s not comforting, either.
Still, Web Hosting Hub does offer other signs of doing its best to ensure good network performance for your website. For example, users on higher-priced plans can choose the location of their data center to ensure even faster site speeds for visitors.
Various third-party monitoring services also report Web Hosting Hub’s uptime hitting an average of 99.92%, which is fair for a web host. However, some reports note that Web Hosting Hub delivers uneven performance over a prolonged period, with some months logging average uptimes below the industry average.
Does Web Hosting Hub Provide Good Customer Support?
Yes, you’ll find knowledgeable, responsive support at Web Hosting Hub.
All new customers get an onboarding call, where Web Hosting Hub’s support staff walk you through the process of setting up your account.
Those phone lines remain open to you at all times: Web Hosting Hub offers 24/7 phone support from their US-based service centers to US and international customers. You can also contact them through live chat, email, the support ticket system, or Skype.
From our experience, Web Hosting Hub generally takes a few minutes to reply. That’s fairly fast turnaround for a web hosting service, though some top competitors are faster.
If you’d like to try DIY troubleshooting first, Web Hosting Hub also has an extensive Help Center packed with tutorials, articles, and even advanced resources for when you want to take your website-running skills up a notch.
WordPress Hosting at Web Hosting Hub
More than a fifth of the Internet runs on WordPress, and your website might soon be part of that number. WordPress is a powerful content management system (CMS), but its sprawling complexity can be a tad overwhelming for beginners. The number of moving parts involved (themes, plugins, etc.) can get dizzying, and each one can be a possible point of failure: an incompatible plugin update could easily cause errors for your website. Plus, WordPress’ popularity means there are tons of malicious attacks tailored specifically to exploit WordPress-powered websites.
A good WordPress host, then, has two main jobs:
- Make WordPress as accessible and easy to use as possible.
- Make WordPress as secure and reliable as possible.
Web Hosting Hub offers a number of features to accomplish both of those goals.
First, you can choose to have WordPress pre-installed to your account when you first set it up. (Otherwise, installing via Softaculous takes just one click.)
Second, Web Hosting Hub includes the powerful BoldGrid website builder for free. BoldGrid overlays a user-friendly, drag-and-drop interface on WordPress, so actions like customizing your theme, writing mixed-media posts, or organizing your archives don’t require as much fiddling.
Third, Web Hosting Hub configures its servers to ensure the best possible performance for WordPress-powered sites. That means measures like using suPHP for better security, supporting the latest PHP and MySQL versions, and implementing PHP caching to reduce page loading times for WordPress sites.
These features don’t quite compete against fully managed WordPress hosting solutions, but they’re good enough to ensure a smooth WordPress-running experience.
Drupal Hosting at Web Hosting Hub
As with WordPress, Web Hosting Hub offers full-featured Drupal installations through Softaculous. This means one-click deployment not just of the core Drupal system, but of valuable add-ons like theme galleries and modules, too.
Web Hosting Hub’s server-side optimizations for WordPress work equally well for hosting websites that use Drupal. Measures like page caching and enhanced security measures will, after all, benefit any website—Drupal-based ones included.
Ecommerce Hosting at Web Hosting Hub
Ecommerce websites have some special requirements to achieve peak performance. Great speeds, for example, reduce the risk of losing impatient customers; excellent security ensures that neither you nor your target market lose money to failed or hacked transactions.
Web Hosting Hub’s many features jive well with ecommerce websites’ needs. We’ve covered the benefits of unlimited SSD storage and bandwidth, for example, as well as robust SSL encryption support.
To further boost your site’s page loading speeds, you can select a data center location that’s geographically closer to your target market. However, Web Hosting Hub’s location options are limited to the continental US, so this isn’t as big an advantage if you’re specifically eyeing global markets.
The inclusion of the Softaculous installer means you can deploy any ecommerce or shopping cart system you want, be it Magento, PrestaShop, OpenCart, or something else. You can even ask Web Hosting Hub to pre-install your preferred ecommerce software when you sign up.
What’s great is that Web Hosting Hub also gives you $150 in advertising credits for search engines like Bing and Yahoo. This can go a long way towards boosting your online store’s visibility and helping you reach your target customers.
What's the Verdict on Web Hosting Hub?
Should You Host Your Website at Web Hosting Hub?
Web Hosting Hub is a decent choice. You get unlimited SSD storage and bandwidth, plus server-side optimizations that ensure better security and speed for your website. Features like the Softaculous installer, cPanel interface, and BoldGrid website builder all create a user-friendly, convenient experience. Plus, Web Hosting Hub’s extensive support resources and fast customer support team mean you’ll have reliable guides at every step of your website-building journey.
However, Web Hosting Hub does have its obvious limits. The lack of advanced hosting options like VPS or dedicated servers, for example, can limit your site’s growth. This can be especially tricky if you find yourself gaining a wide audience or serving customers from around the globe. Long billing terms can mean prohibitive starting costs, which can rule this out as an option for those with tighter budgets. Finally, the lack of an uptime guarantee isn’t a bad sign per se, but it does mean you’re without clear compensations in case you do experience excessive downtime.
That said, one of Web Hosting Hub’s unique strengths is its lengthy 90-day money-back guarantee, so you’ve got some room to experiment. If you’re fine with its selection of shared hosting plans, Web Hosting Hub is worth a try.
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