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How to Choose the best UK WordPress Hosting For your website

It is not easy to choose the best WordPress hosting service for your business website. It is a decision that you need to invest some time in because the performance and service of your hosting provider has a direct impact on your sales, SEO, website’s performance and uptime.

WordPress managed Website hosting

Some hosting providers such provide WordPress managed hosting services; they are built specially to host WordPress websites and blogs. Getting started with them is very easy and they have a dedicated WordPress support team. This is helpful, especially if you do not want to get bogged down in the technicalities of your website: should you encounter an issue with your WordPress they will look into it for you.

Also, many managed WordPress hosting services also offer additional services, such as caching systems, CDNs, WordPress auto updates, WordPress backups etc. Another out of the box feature most hosting providers have is the staging site. A staging website allows you to make changes to the website and preview them before published live.

Self-managed WordPress hosting

Self-managed hosting is the other end of the spectrum. You rent the server or hosting space and you have to install and setup everything yourself. It depends on what time of self-managed hosting service you choose, however you might have to configure the web server, MySQL database, mail server, FTP, SSH and all the other services yourself. With self-managed hosting you also have to take care of the server’s operating system, updates and security.

In case of self-managed hosting, the provider only supports you with issues related to your server package and connection. They do not support you with any issues you might have with your WordPress website.

Shared or dedicated WordPress hosting

Another decision you have to make before researching which is the best hosting provider for your WordPress website, is whether you need shared or dedicated hosting. In this section we explain what the differences are between the two.

What is shared WordPress hosting?

In shared hosting, a number of websites share the resources of a single server. Shared hosting is a good starter solution, if your website has a few hundreds visits a week. However, migrate to a dedicated solution as soon as the website traffic increases  because the performance of shared hosting services is very limiting.

In a shared hosting environment the security of your WordPress website depends on the security of other websites running on the same server. Since all the websites are running on the same server, an attacker in some cases can hack your website through a hacked website on the same server. So your efforts are almost futile unless all websites on the server are secured properly.

Dedicated WordPress hosting

With a dedicated WordPress hosting plan all the server’s resources are used solely by your website. Also, when using a dedicated server you can install all the software and applications you like. However, you also need to take care of the server’s hardening, security and management.

Hosting Features 

Once you decide on the type of WordPress hosting solution you need for your website, start comparing the hosting providers that provide such service. Here are some tips on what you need to look out for and test when choosing your hosting provider, irrelevant if it is WordPress managed hosting or self-hosting.

Web hosting support

Support is one of the most important factors. Your website will be running on a server which is installed somewhere in a datacentre, to which you do not have physical access to. Therefore when something goes wrong, or you cannot connect to your website anymore, the hosting provider’s support engineers are the only people who can save your day. A very good response time and a technical team are a must.

If you are new to WordPress look for a hosting provider whose support can help you troubleshoot both hosting and WordPress issues. There are quite a few hosting providers that provide very good WordPress support. 

Level of support

To get an idea of how good the provider’s support and after sales service is, read user reviews and ratings on independent platforms and forums. If possible, give it a shot for yourself by asking as many questions as you can during your evaluation. You can also ask for a free trial on which you can run a test website. Many WordPress web hosts do provide a free trial.

WordPress hosting provider performance

Performance is critical. Website speed can effect your website’s SEO and number of visits. There are quite a few tools you can use to test the performance of a web host. For example you can setup a simple website and use tools such as Pingdom and GTmetrix (free tools) to measure how long it takes for a website to load.

Hosting provider uptime

The uptime of your website should be as close to 100% as possible. However, achieving a 100% uptime is nearly impossible because problems do happen and maintenance is required. Though many hosting providers guarantee a 99.9% uptime.

Good hosting providers back their uptime guarantee with a reimbursement policy in their service level agreement (SLA). Many hosting providers also have a status page on their website, from where you can see the status of their network, connections, servers’ health etc.

WordPress hosting pricing

The idiom you get what you pay for applies to WordPress hosting providers as well. Although not always, in most cases the more you pay the better the service will be.