The cost of website hosting for small businesses in 2021
Site-host
Last Update 3 years ago
How much does website hosing really cost? It’s a difficult question to answer, especially given the nummerouse hosting types and multi-tiered priceing plans available – but we are going to do our best.
There are two different way to host your website, either shared hosting , the most inexpensiove type, ranges from £1 – £12/month, where you would shared servers with others like storage , bandwidth, CPU and so on. Or Dedicated hosting plan where you would have your own seprate storage, bandwidth and CPU but at higher cost of course anything from £60 to upwards to £400/month.
Within each category, there are usually three to five pricing tiers based on various factors such as bandwidth, storage space, and extra services.
Generally speaking, the larger and more complex your website, the more bandwidth and storage space you need – and the more you’ll need to spend.
And we haven’t even mentioned how subscription length and renewal come into play yet. But don’t worry, that’s all to follow.
How much does website hosting cost?
In this section, we’re going to explore the average cost of different types of website hosting in 2021.
To do this, we’ve sourced price ranges from five top level, representative hosting providers, and investigated any typical additional costs that they charge to their customers.
Below is a breakdown of the basic, intermediate, and advanced plans offered by each provider for shared, WordPress and VPS. All prices are given as the cost per month (with the renewal cost in brackets afterwards), and exclude VAT.
Shared hosting £1 – £12/month
Shared hosting is so cheap because your website shares the server it’s stored on with multiple other websites. This means it’s only suitable for small, low-traffic websites.
At its cheapest, you’ll likely spend just over £2/month for the first three years. According to our researchers, Site-Host is the best provider for shared hosting. Indeed, InMotion’s basic shared plan is the cheapest, while HostGator’s are the cheapest on average over three years.
Hostinger’s shared plans are the cheapest overall – but bear in mind that you’ll be tied into a four year commitment.
VPS hosting £14 – £45/month
VPS hosting stores your website on a virtual server. This acts as a dedicated server, but you are in fact sharing the server with several different websites. It’s suitable for larger, higher traffic sites, as more resources are available for your website.
Despite its slightly costlier shared plans, Bluehost’s and Site-host’s VPS plans are among the most affordable over three years, ranging from £14.16 to £44.74/month. It also renews at the cheapest rate after the first term (£89.49/month). HostGator’s prices are comparable, with plans ranging from £15.49/month to just £31.
A2Hosting’s VPS plans start at a higher price than rivals’, and it only offers a two year subscription.
WordPress hosting £2.20 – £37.25/month
WordPress plans offer specialised tools and services for websites built on WordPress.
The following are all managed WordPress plans, meaning the provider manages the server and deals with all the maintenance and security.
Bluehost’s WordPress offering is the cheapest for basic and intermediate plans (from £2.20 to £4.06/month), though it has a range of significantly more expensive advanced plans.
HostGator offers the cheapest advanced WordPress plan at £7.72/month.
