bluehost Review

I am an affiliate of bluehost

Name: bluehost
Website: bluehost
Price: From $3.95 to $119.95 per month
Owners: Matt Heaton and Danny Ashworth
Overall Rank: 90 out of 100

bluehost, Product Overview

Bluehost is a large US-based web hosting company. They target users from beginners to the advanced with several levels of service available. It was founded in 2003 and based out of Orem, Utah. WordPress is used for website building and they have an in-house team of experts and engineers.

When you arrive at their site you will see a WordPress menu on the left with three sub-menus: WordPress Hosting, WP Pro, & eCommerce.

WordPress Hosting (aka Shared Hosting) has four different plans available:

• $3.95/mo – Basic – 1 Website, 50 GB SSD Storage, 5 Parked Domains, 25 Subdomains
• $5.95/mo – Plus – Unlimited Websites, Unmetered SSD Storage, Unlimited Parked Domains and SubDomains
• $6.95/mo – Choice Plus – Above, plus Codeguard Basic Backup
• $14.95/mo – Pro – Above, plus high performance and dedicated public IP address

The prices will be shown below under the topic Bluehost prices. The plans include from one website to unlimited websites; free SSL certificates, different levels of performance, from one to unlimited domains, and more. As your business grows they allow for upgrading the plan that you are using to the next plan.

WP Pro has three plans available:

• $19.95/mo – Build – Professional WordPress Website Basic
• $29.95/mo – Grow – Above, plus Additional Traffic Growth Tools
• $49.95/mo – Scale – Above, plus eCommerce tools and Unlimited Video Compression

The above plans include unlimited websites, unlimited domains, unlimited subdomains, unlimited web storage, ability to test website prior to going public, and no traffic limits.

eCommerce powered by WooCommerce has three plans available:

• $6.95/mo – Starter – 1 Online Store, 100GB SSD Storage
• $8.95/mo – Plus – Above, plus Unlimited Online Stores, Unmetered SSD Storage, CodeGuard Backup Basic
• $12.95/mo – Pro – Above, plus Bluehost SEO Tools Start

All of these plans include one free domain, WooCommerce Auto-Install, Free SSL, and Unmetered Bandwidth

If you’ll look at the 2nd tab you will see “Hosting” plans that consist of Shared, VPS, and Dedicated Hosting. The shared plan is the same as the WordPress plan, plus it has a pro level show above. That leaves VPS and Dedicated Plans.

• VPS Hosting – scalable with on-demand resources, full root access for additional control
  • $19.99/mo – Standard – 30 GB storage, 2 GB RAM, 1 TB bandwidth, 1 IP address
  • $29.99/mo – Enhanced – 60 GB storage, 4GB RAM, 2 TB bandwidth, 2 IP addresses
  • $59.99/mo – Ultimate – 120 GB storage, 8 GB RAM, 3 TB bandwidth, 2 IP addresses
• Dedicated Hosting – for resource-intensive needs, ultimate security and performance
  • $79.99/mo – Standard – 500GB storage, 4GB RAM, 5TB bandwidth, 3 IP addresses
  • $99.99/mo – Enhanced – 1TB storage, 8GB RAM, 10 TB bandwidth, 4 IP addresses
  • $119.99/mo – Premium – 1 TB storage, 16 GB RAM, 15 TB bandwidth, 5 IP addresses

The Good & the Bad

The Good:

PRO #1: Lots of options with an option to upgrade your current plan readily available.
PRO #2: Solid reputation and have been in business since 2003.
PRO #3: Supports WordPress, which most are familiar with and can learn to use relatively quickly.

The Bad:

CON #1: All these plan prices are for a 3-year commitment; the monthly prices otherwise are higher.
CON #2: Perhaps too many options, how is someone just starting out going to pick the right plan?
CON #3: Although, tech support is available if you want help with building your business you will need to pay for that separately. This is a web hosting business.

Who is bluehost For?

Great for someone just tinkering around with a website who wants something a little more than what WordPress.com can offer. Good for someone who knows what they are doing and don’t need any outside assistance in building their business. Also good on the high end for businesses that need high end services and know that running a web service is a cost of doing business and have allocated a budget for it.

 

bluehost Tools & Training

bluehost offers a WordPress Hosting guide on its website. It includes the following sections:

• What is WordPress?
• Why use WordPress?
• WordPress.org vs WordPress.com
• Learn WordPress – a WordPress Tutorial Series
• Is WordPress right for me?
• Ready to get started?
• FAQ
• Additional Resources

bluehost Support

The support offered with bluehost consists of live chat and 24/7 call assistance available. They also have a searchable knowledge base with articles, guides, instructions, how to’s, and answers to most FAQs.

bluehost offers the following four paid consultation services under the Professional Services tab:

SEO services – keyword optimization, custom content creation, weekly SEO keyword reports, website analytics
Pay-Per-Click Services – marketing campaigns, target audience selection, determine advertising budget
Website Migration  – 1 free, up to 5 paid, consultation before and after move, additional assistance
Full-Service Website – designers build mobile-friendly website, keyword optimized, local search listings, social media posting

bluehost offers three Blue Sky plans under the Professional Services tab, as well:
$29.00/mo – Blue Sky Basic – On-Demand Ticket Support, Account Access Assistance, Website Back Up Assistance, and Design Guidance
$49.00/mo – Blus Sky Plus – Above, plus On-Demand Chat Support
$99.00/mo – Blue Sky Pro – Above, plus On-Demand Phone Support, Bluehost SEO Tools, & Content, Landing Page, and Mobile Optimization Assistance.

My Final Opinion of bluehost

I think Bluehost would be good for those who either have disposable income and want to invest their money into a more managed website or for medium to big businesses that want to run on a dedicated service.

VERDICT: WORTH IT for specific customers

Looking for other options?

Here is my article on How to Build a Website Easy – In Less Than 5 Minutes

and here is a comparison of my favorite webhosting provider against bluehost: