Is iPage WordPress Hosting Worth the Try?
iPage launched their dedicated wordpress hosting plan for bloggers and wordpress fans. Their people announced to conquer all competitors by superb server features and support service. Is that true? How users talk about this service and how is compared to some reputable wordpress server plans?
iPage WordPress Hosting Overview
Aside from their traditional single shared hosting, iPage provided two extra plans dedicated for wordpress site purpose – starter & essential plan. Comparing to their old budget service, the wordpress hosting plans have everything configured for this software such as server setup, plan features and even hosting control panel. From official announcement, they configured SSD server to power expert wordpress sites with sitelock protection. To be more specific, the ipage wordpress plans come with following:
Dedicated for wordpress. No any other kind softwares hosted on this server, only wordpress acceptable so their people can apply any necessary maintenance efficiently. Especially when there is any problematic site on server, they can easily track down for urgent fix. Because there's only wordpress on server, the tech team can deeply optimize the environment without worring compatibility for other softwares. It's super point for those who wants blazing fast wordpress server at affordable cost.
Essential plugins pre-installation. iPage wordpress team has some essential wordpress plugins pre-configured when installing the software in control panel. Some reputable plugins like W3 total cache & Jetpack already included. Also, their people provide a list of some great themes to power your new site installation quickly.
WordPress control panel. Completely for wordpress! The team has completely revised the control panel for wordpress user. All we see is about wordpress management like installation, backup and database operation etc. Either wordpress professional and start user be able to familiar with it in short time.
Enhanced security. For essential plan users, account is created on SSD servers with sitelock protection. Except for daily vulnerabilities scanning every day, it will automatically removes any potential threat and admin will get notified. Not only potential security issues being scanned, some popular issues like comment spam and attack are also filtered by the firewall. What people get is a clean and safe site.
As we see, it's complete new service comparing to their all-in-one shared hosting plan. Regardless those advantages they announced, is it really so cool? Especially when comparing to some leading providers? Let's see
Comparison
Actually, they have provided a comparison list to other providers like godaddy and even wpengine. Following is screenshot
They compared to multiple popular wordpress hosting using ipage essential plan. The result is ipage wins on almost each crucial points like price, disk space and number of visits etc. The only I can tell is there's no much proof their server can work better than those competitors. Because their wordpress service is pretty new while their competitors have collected plenty experience. What ipage really can do is to gain more users by competitive price and high quality service. Only in this way, they can receive lots of positive feedbacks then they can proudly show the comments to the world.
How to Choose?
iPage provides two plans for wordpress with big difference for initial registration. However, difference for renewal rate is pretty small according to their policy. Let's see following about the actual rate
Starter plan:
- 36-month term: $8.99 a month (billed $323.64 for 3 years)
- 24-month term: $9.99 a month (billed $239.76 for 2 years)
- 12-month term: $10.99 a month (billed $131.88 for 1 year)
Essential plan:
- 36-month term: $10.49 a month (billed $377.64 for 3 years)
- 24-month term: $11.49 a month (billed $275.76 for 2 years)
- 12-month terms: $12.49 a month (billed $149.88 for 12 months)
The answer is clear. If we want to use all ipage wordpress server advantages, essential plan is the best choice. While the starter plan is priced half for less features, the renewal price is very close to essential plan. So why should we select starter plan in the begining?
Check out ipage wordpress hosting plan details www.ipage.com/wordpress-hosting
