Cloudways Review 2023: Is It Worth It? Better Alternatives?

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Introduction to our Cloudways Review:

Welcome to our Cloudways review!

Cloud hosting is gaining traction these days as a solid alternative to more traditional web hosting services. For one thing, it ensures that your website is online all the time. For another, it is a more secure option particularly for those engaged in ecommerce.

In this Cloudways hosting review, we will see how this particular industry player stacks up against the competition. What benefits does it have for users? And how can it help those running online stores or using specific platforms like WordPress?

Our Cloudways review will touch on several points, including ease of use, features and functionality, as well as Cloudways pricing.

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Overview:

Before we go to our Cloudways hosting reviews proper, a short overview first.

Founded in Barcelona, Spain and currently headquartered in Malta, Cloudways was established in 2011. It offers hosting services for the ecommerce community, but specifically for start-ups, developers, and agencies.

That said, Cloudways is a managed cloud hosting provider that offers a number of hosting options. These range from platform-driven solutions for WordPress and Magento to managed cloud hosting via infrastructure as a service (IaaS) platforms like Google, Amazon, and Digital Ocean.

Visit cloudways.com

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Ease of Use:

The first thing we noticed in this Cloudways hosting reviews is how easy it is to set up compared to most conventional hosting services. The “simple, fast, and convenient” slogan in this case is definitely truth in advertising. You can actually build and deploy a site within minutes and all it takes to install third-party apps is a single click.

Throw in the fact that many site management processes are already automated such as migration and backup, and this hosting service is off to a great start.

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Features:

For this Cloudways hosting reviews, what important features add value to your site?

Domain Names:

Well, perhaps we spoke too soon when we said that our Cloudways review was off to a great start. One issue we noted with this particular hosting provider? The fact that it doesn’t have its own domain name registry.

It would be prudent to secure a domain name from a separate service.

Cloudways Email Hosting Rating:

Here’s another issue to note in this Cloudways review. Unlike other hosting service packages that have a set number of domain-specific email addresses already bundled in, Cloudways users have to depend on a third-party email hosting provider to add email addresses to their website.

The Cloudways email hosting add-on Rackspace can be thrown into your hosting plan of choice and it works fine. However, we feel that not including this as part of the standard Cloudways pricing package is a bit of a deal-breaker.

Databases:

In this Cloudways review, we note that the platform offers Thunderstack for database hosting.

Specifically geared towards MySQL users, Thunderstack offers a built-in SQL manager with its own suite of tools and allows for remote connections. It’s also been optimised for speed and users can further augment its functionality through a number of easy to install plugins and widgets.

However, as with the email add-on previously mentioned, we take issue yet again with Cloudways for charging extra for database hosting.

Cloudways Review of Applications:

Cloudways has the virtue of being compatible with practically any PHP-driven application. Also, it works with three specific building platforms: WordPress, Magento, and Laravel.

WordPress:

WordPress is actually the very foundation of Cloudways as a hosting service. Today, it can easily boast of hosting over 600,000 WordPress sites, offering solutions for individual site owners, ecommerce entrepreneurs, and agencies.

Cloudways’ dedicated content delivery network (CDN) helps reduce latency. Also, we note that it helps WordPress sites load faster regardless of where you are in the world. This is further bolstered by Breeze, a cache plugin specifically developed by the hosting service to improve the performance of WordPress sites.

Site Staging:

While Cloudways has fallen flat in some key aspects of our Cloudways hosting reviews, there’s one particular area where it cannot be faulted: creating staging environments that will help developers and site owners pinpoint critical issues before deployment.

Cloudways’ Staging Environment offers users a secure space in which to test out their sites before going live. Among its features is the ability to test how sites work on five different cloud providers, IP whitelisting, as well as SSL-enabled staging.

Cloudways Review of Website Builder:

For this Cloudways hosting review, Cloudways doesn’t have its own proprietary site-building platform. However, users have the option to create a site on the platform using WordPress’ Elementor Page Builder. This linkage allows site creators to build from the ground up and put it online in next to no time.

Cloudways Review of eCommerce and SSL certificate:

How does the hosting service fare in eCommerce. Here's what we found out for our Cloudways hosting reviews.

When it comes to eCommerce, Cloudways offers a specific hosting package for those working with scalable online shop building platform Magento and also for WordPress’ eCommerce plugin WooCommerce. It is so easy to set up, that all you need to do is select a server, launch your store, and start selling almost immediately. Whichever you choose, you will have access to a host of tools and solutions to make storefront building and online store management so much easier.

With regard to SSL certificates, these are already included in all Cloudways pricing plans.

Cloudways Review of Security and Backups:

Backups and security are areas significant enough to include in our Cloudways hosting reviews.

Automated backups are done on a regular basis across all Cloudways hosting plans and migration from one hosting provider to your Cloudways account is offered for free.

Security is another thing Cloudways users don’t have to worry about. Along with SSL certificates already bundled into the package, the hosting service protects user sites through dedicated firewalls, IP whitelisting, application isolation to prevent cross-contamination in the event a site on the same server is hit by an attack, and database security measures.

See more Cloudways features

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Performance:

Of course, we shouldn't neglect to evaluate performance in this Cloudways hosting reviews.

Server Locations:

Cloudways operates more than 65 data centres worldwide with locations in North America, Europe, Australia, and Asia.

Note, however, that only its Frankfurt, London, and Sydney locations host servers for all five of its affiliate IaaS services; other locations only host one or two at the most.

Cloudways Review of Speed Results:

For this Cloudways hosting reviews, on average, Cloudways-hosted websites load in less than two seconds.

Cloudways Review of Average Uptime, Bandwidth, and Webspace limits/Storage:

Having 99% uptime has essentially become the average where today’s websites are concerned, and Cloudways sites are compliant with the standard at 99.96%.

Bandwidth and storage are, of course, dependent on what hosting plan you’ve subscribed to.

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Support and Resources:

For this Cloudways review, what is the quality of support that the hosting service offers?

Cloudways offers 24/7 multiple channel tech support across all subscription plans and this is bolstered quite well with a regularly updated and maintained knowledge base. The service’s blog is also a great fountain of information and those looking for a third-party provider for specific functions will find it an excellent resource as it regularly features top ten lists for Cloudways apps and plugins.

See more Cloudways support features

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Cloudways Pricing:

What's the value for money with Cloudways pricing? Are there Cloudways promo codes to apply?

Free Plan:

Unfortunately, Cloudways does not offer a free subscription.

Cloud Hosting:

Cloudways pricing for cloud hosting are all dependent on which cloud service you want to use.

Here are the current ranges being offered:

• Digital Ocean: $10 to $80 monthly
• Linode: $12 to $90 monthly
• Vultr: $11 to $84 monthly
• Amazon Web Services: $36.51 to $274.33 monthly
• Google Cloud: $33.18 to $225.93

Cloudways WordPress Hosting:

For Cloudways pricing on both WordPress and WooCommerce hosting, it follows the standard Cloud hosting price range above and is as low as $10 monthly and can go as high as $721.94 per month depending on the IaaS provider you choose.

Cloudways Free trial, refund policy, and money-back guarantee:

Surprisingly, Cloudways terms page states the shortest free trial period (3 days) of any hosting provider we’ve encountered. Interestingly, Cloudways prides itself on its pay-as-you-go billing wherein users only pay for the services they actually use.

>>Check the latest Cloudways promo codes and discounts<< 

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Conclusion and Recommendations to our Cloudways Review:

To wrap up this Cloudways review;

Cloudways is one of the best managed cloud hosting platform for WordPress. It's one that truly focuses on cloud hosting alone as opposed to those who offer hybrid and scalable hosting.

What is it best for?

Ecommerce users, particularly those familiar with WordPress and WooCommerce.

What is it not best for?

For this Cloudways hosting reviews, we feel that it is probably not a good option for beginners.  It has a certain degree of complexity and definitely requires a dedicated budget as some add-ons will cost you.

Cloudways Alternatives:

Here is a list of the best Cloudways Alternatives:

• Cloudways vs Siteground: Comparing both hosting services, Siteground is easier to use and cheaper than Cloudways pricing, but Cloudways is the speedier option.
• Cloudways vs Kinsta: Both platforms stand shoulder-to-shoulder in terms of performance, but Kinsta provides better features for WordPress sites.
• Cloudways vs DigitalOcean: DigitalOcean offers a more raw infrastructure with root access for more technical control.

Cloudways Review Final word:

For this Cloudways hosting review, while Cloudways is an excellent option for cloud hosting, particularly for those on WordPress, we do recommend that users shop around for alternative solutions and hybrid options featuring a site builder and hosting service depending on their budgets and requirements.

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FAQs:

Does Cloudways offer shared hosting?

No, it doesn’t. Cloudways is strictly a cloud-based managed hosting service.

Can I use Cloudways hosting for an online store?

Yes, particularly if your site was built using Magento or WooCommerce.

Does Cloudways offer options as to which cloud service to use?

Yes, it currently allows users to choose from Digital Ocean, Vultr, Amazon Web Services, Google, and Linode.

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That’s all for now:

Thanks for reading our Cloudways hosting review, and don’t forget to keep an eye out for our ever-growing blog of review and comparison articles. Check out related website builder, and eCommerce platform review and comparison articles such as;

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