SiteGround is one of the most recommended WordPress hosting companies. They are known for their top-notch customer support, reliable and fast hosting plans, and WordPress-optimized hosting, which includes everything you’ll need to create and grow a successful website or blog. Read our complete SiteGround review to find out if it is the right host for you.
In this detailed SiteGround review, we’ll put their promises to the test. These are the areas we will look into:
- Performance: Speed is crucial for the success of any website. How fast will your website load with SiteGround?
- Reliability: Will your website be available 24/7/365 without facing any downtime?
- Customer Support: Can you count on their customer support?
- Features: Do they offer all the features and tools you’ll need to build your website?
- Pricing: How much will it cost you? Are there any SiteGround deals that can save you money?
This is a comprehensive SiteGround review with a detailed analysis of SiteGround’s hosting service. If you don’t want to read the full hosting review, here is the quick scorecard with our verdict right below it.
SiteGround Review Summary | |
---|---|
Performance grade | A+ |
Average load time | 397 ms |
Average response time | 123 ms |
Free domain | Yes |
Free SSL | Yes |
1-click WordPress | Yes |
Support | Phone / Live Chat / Knowledge base |
Start with SiteGround |
Bottom line: We found SiteGround to be noticeably faster and extremely reliable. Their hosting plans are flexible, and their customer support is one of the best in the industry.
That’s why we’ve chosen to recommend SiteGround as one of the best WordPress hosting companies.
Now, let’s dive into our detailed SiteGround review so that you can see how we reached that conclusion and decide for yourself.
About SiteGround
Siteground was founded in 2004 and has grown into one of the most well-known hosting companies.
SiteGround is a holding of companies registered in the USA, UK, Bulgaria, Cyprus, and Spain, with data centers on three continents. Today, the company has over 500 employees and hosts over 2,000,000 domains.
![SiteGround website SiteGround website](https://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/siteground-website-1.png)
Pros and Cons of SiteGround
Each hosting company has its pros and cons. Some advantages can overshadow the disadvantages, but some cons can be a total deal-breaker for your needs.
Before making a decision, you may want to review these SiteGround pros and cons.
Pros
Here are some advantages that make SiteGround one of the top-rated hosting companies in the world:
- Super fast servers: All SiteGround servers are highly optimized for speed. They use the Google Cloud platform, which is one of the fastest platforms on the market.
- Top Notch Customer Support: Their customer support is amazing, to say the least. They offer 24/7 phone support, live chat, and ticket-based support.
- Free CDN and SSL They offer an instant setup of Cloudflare’s free CDN and free SSL certificate from Let’s Encrypt.
- Multiple Server Locations They have data centers on three continents. During signup, you can choose the location you prefer.
Cons
As we mentioned earlier, every hosting company has some downsides. The following are some disadvantages of choosing SiteGround as your host:
- Limited Storage: Their plans come with fixed storage. However, this storage is quite ample, and if you are starting, you will most likely never need extra storage.
- Higher fee for monthly billing: The hosting service gets expensive if you choose monthly billing. But if you sign up for a longer billing period, then you’ll get a more significant discount and a lower rate. They offer a 30-day money-back guarantee anyway, so it’s a good idea to choose a longer billing period when you sign up.
SiteGround Performance Tests
While price often plays a significant role when choosing a web host, you cannot compromise on performance.
This is why we decided to run our tests to review SiteGround’s performance thoroughly.
SiteGround Speed Test Results
Speed is one of the most important performance metrics to look for. A faster website offers a good user experience and boosts your SEO.
In fact, a single-second delay can cause a 7% decrease in conversions, 11% fewer page views, and a 16% decrease in customer satisfaction.
![Strangeloop performance case study Strangeloop performance case study](https://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/strangeloops-speed-study.jpg)
We created a WordPress-powered test site on SiteGround and filled it with dummy content for theme development with images.
After that, we used Pingdom’s website speed test tool to run our tests. These were the results we got:
![SiteGround speed test results SiteGround speed test results](https://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/siteground-speed-test-mar2024.png)
As you can see, our test site loaded in less than a second (397 ms, to be precise) with a performance score of 95.
This is incredible, but this website had almost no traffic, so the Pingdom test alone is insufficient.
SiteGround Stress Test Results
We used K6, a stress testing tool by Grafana Labs, to test how SiteGround servers would respond to increased traffic.
This tool gradually sends up to 50 users to see how the server would respond to increased traffic from multiple connections.
You can see the results in the chart below:
![SiteGround stress test results SiteGround stress test results](https://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/siteground-stress-test-mar2024.png)
The gray line is the number of active virtual users on the site, and the green line is the server response time. SiteGround performed consistently throughout the test without any hiccups.
This test shows that SiteGround is a perfect choice if you are looking for a really fast website.
One of the reasons why SiteGround performed exceptionally well in these performance tests is because of the recent innovations they’ve added.
SiteGround servers are hosted on the Google Cloud Platform. They’ve also added UltraFast PHP and created a custom WordPress plugin for optimization (SG Optimizer), which really puts them in a premium web hosting category.
SiteGround Uptime Test Results
Typically, websites hosted on shared hosting accounts slow down during top traffic hours. That’s because your site is sharing resources with other websites on that server.
Most shared hosting companies automatically kill the server process if your site is taking too many resources. This causes downtime on your website.
We tested our SiteGround site for downtime and got a 99.98% uptime result.
![SiteGround uptime test result SiteGround uptime test result](https://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/siteground-uptime-test-result-mar2024.png)
SiteGround Server Response Time
Your website’s content has a huge impact on page load time. For example, if you have high-resolution images on a page, then it will significantly increase the overall page load time.
This means that speed test results may not accurately reflect how fast your hosting server really is.
Instead of analyzing page load time alone, we decided to test the actual server response time as well.
To do this, we used a tool called Bitcatcha. It ignores page content and only tests the server’s response time.
Bitcatcha also gives you average loading speed from different global locations. The speed for each location is measured three separate times, and then the results are averaged.
Take a look at the results in the screenshot below.
![SiteGround response time test results SiteGround response time test results](https://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/siteground-response-time-mar2024.png)
As you can see, SiteGround is a great choice if your target audience is mostly located in the United States. The server responded in a fraction of a second in the United States.
It responded within less than a second for all locations.
SiteGround also allows you to change your server location. You can choose a data center closer to your target audience for even better response times in that particular region.
SiteGround Hosting Plans and Features
SiteGround offers shared hosting, WordPress hosting, cloud hosting, and dedicated hosting plans. If you are starting a new site, their shared hosting plans would be a perfect fit. However, your site will eventually grow, and you want to make sure that they have other plans that you can upgrade to.
Let’s check out SiteGround’s hosting plans and their features:
- Shared hosting: Shared hosting is recommended for new websites, bloggers, small business websites, or a startup online store. It is suitable for low-traffic websites as you will be sharing resources with other websites hosted on the server.
- WordPress hosting: This plan is the WordPress-optimized version of their shared hosting plan. It comes with SiteGround’s in-house WordPress optimizations to improve your website performance. See SiteGround WordPress hosting.
- WooCommerce hosting: This plan is a WooCommerce-optimized version of their shared hosting plan. It includes SiteGround’s optimizations, which greatly improve the performance of your online store. See SiteGround WooCommerce hosting.
- Cloud hosting: Cloud hosting plans provide a flexible upgrade to a shared hosting solution. They allow you to use resources of cloud architecture, including multi-core CPUs and bandwidth. Cloud hosting is suitable for growing websites, popular blogs, or businesses. It can also be an upgrade over VPS and traditional dedicated servers. See SiteGround Cloud hosting.
WPBeginner website is hosted on SiteGround’s Enterprise hosting infrastructure, which is an enhanced version of their Cloud platform for large sites.
Breakdown of SiteGround’s Shared Hosting Plans
SiteGround’s shared hosting options are the best way to build a new website. Their shared hosting packages are available in three levels to match different budgets:
- Startup: This plan is limited to hosting one website. It includes 10 GB disk space and is suitable for hosting a website with 10,000 monthly visitors. You’ll also get all essential features like a 1-click WordPress install, free setup, website transfer, daily backups, built-in caching (SuperCacher), free CDN, free SSL, and more.
- GrowBig: The GrowBig plan lets you host unlimited websites. It comes with 20 GB of disk space and is suitable for websites with 100,000 monthly visits. You’ll get all the features of the Startup plan, plus premium features like ultrafast PHP for even faster speed, on-demand backups, an easy staging tool, and the option to add collaborators to your sites.
- GoGeek: GoGeek plan is suitable for eCommerce websites. It includes 40 GB of storage and can handle websites with 400,000 monthly visitors. In addition to all GrowBig’s features, you’ll get access to priority support, more server resources, advanced features like one-click git repo creation, and the option to manage white-label clients on your sites.
Each Siteground plan includes faster disk storage, email accounts, support for the Cloudflare free content delivery network, and a free Let’s Encrypt SSL certificate.
They also include several popular WordPress plugins like WPForms, OptinMonster, and All in One SEO to help you improve your website rankings.
![SiteGround pricing SiteGround pricing](https://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/siteground-pricing-3.png)
SiteGround Support and Customer Service
You’ll see high praise for SiteGround’s customer support service everywhere. Their support team is remarkably good at offering quick, helpful, and knowledgeable support to their customers.
Their customer support includes 24/7 phone, live chat, and ticket-based email support. Response times for phone and live chat are almost instant, and for email-based tickets, the first response is within less than 10 minutes.
SiteGround offers an instant AI assistant for users who prefer to fix things themselves. Built on top of ChatGPT, this AI is trained to answer SiteGround customer questions.
![SiteGround AI support assistant SiteGround AI support assistant](https://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/siteground-ai-support.png)
The helo resource center also includes a massive collection of knowledge base articles.
This includes step-by-step tutorials and troubleshooting guides with screenshots and videos.
![SiteGround support website SiteGround support website](https://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/siteground-support-website.png)
Since we use SiteGround to host several of our websites, we can confidently say that their support staff is very knowledgeable.
Conclusion: Is SiteGround the Right Choice for You?
After reading our detailed SiteGround review, you might be wondering if SiteGround is the best web hosting company for your website.
If you want a fast and reliable web hosting provider with excellent customer support, SiteGround is perfect for you. They have hosting plans for every budget, and each plan offers a great set of features.
All their shared hosting plans include SSD storage, site tools, easy setup of Let’s Encrypt free SSL and Cloudflare CDN service, 1-click WordPress installer, and free migration.
Built-in security features protect your website against malware, and you can add additional protection by turning on Cloudflare CDN functionality.
If you are just starting a website for the first time, then you will certainly appreciate SiteGround’s customer support.
Ready to get started with SiteGround? Click here to choose your hosting plan today.
SiteGround Coupon
WPBeginner users get an exclusive 83% discount and free SSL with our SiteGround coupon code.
All you have to do is click on this link to purchase. The discount will be applied automatically.
Frequently Asked Questions about SiteGround Hosting
In this detailed SiteGround review, we looked at all aspects of their hosting services. The following are some of the most frequently asked questions about SiteGround by our users.
1. Where are SiteGround servers located?
SiteGround servers are located in the United States, Europe, and Singapore. You can choose the server location when signing up.
2. Why choose SiteGround for WordPress hosting?
SiteGround offers a highly optimized WordPress hosting platform. Each plan includes its own in-house security features and WordPress tweaks that boost your WordPress site speed and performance.
You can easily set up a WordPress website with their 1-click WordPress installation. You can also move existing WordPress websites using the SiteGround Migrator plugin.
3. Does SiteGround support WooCommerce?
SiteGround specializes in WordPress and WooCommerce hosting. If you are building a WooCommerce store, then you can rely on SiteGround’s optimizations for consistent performance and reliability.
They are one of the top WooCommerce hosting providers and make it super easy to start an online store without any special technical skills.
4. Does SiteGround offer a website builder?
No, SiteGround does not offer its own site builder. That’s because they want users to have the option to pick the best website builder for their needs.
This is why they allow you to easily install WordPress, Joomla, Drupal, Magento, Weebly, and many other site builder platforms.
On the SiteGround platform, you can also create unlimited web pages without any restrictions.
5. Does SiteGround offer cPanel hosting?
No, SiteGround no longer offers cPanel hosting. Once cPanel raised its licensing fees, SiteGround decided to remove cPanel hosting and instead built a far superior web hosting control panel for both beginners and advanced users. This allows them to offer managed WordPress hosting-like features without the high costs.
6. Is SiteGround better than Bluehost?
SiteGround and Bluehost used to offer the same features, but with recent innovations, SiteGround has significantly improved its hosting technology.
SiteGround is better than Bluehost in terms of overall performance, technology infrastructure, and support quality. However, with all this innovation, SiteGround pricing is significantly higher.
So, when it comes to pricing, Bluehost is better than SiteGround because not only is it cheaper, but it also offers a free domain name with each account.
For more details, see our honest comparison of SiteGround vs. Bluehost vs. WP Engine.
7. How does SiteGround compare with other hosting providers?
Readers often ask us how SiteGround compares with GoDaddy, Hostinger, HostGator, GreenGeeks, DreamHost, A2 Hosting, and other web hosting services.
They all used to provide similar features and technology, but over the last year, SiteGround has really stepped up its innovation.
With all the managed WordPress hosting features, Google Cloud infrastructure, and custom performance optimization, SiteGround is now in a class of its own with its premium hosting.
8. Does SiteGround offer a free domain name?
No, SiteGround does not offer a free domain name. You can buy a domain name from another registrar and point it to your SiteGround account or buy one from SiteGround during signup at an additional cost.
9. Can I cancel my SiteGround account and get a refund?
SiteGround offers a 30-day money-back guarantee with all its shared plans. During this period, you can try out its services. If you cancel your account during this period, you are eligible for a refund. However, domain name registrations are non-refundable.
10. Which SiteGround plan is best for me?
Each SiteGround plan has different server resources. However, if you are just starting out, then their Startup plan would be perfect for that. You can upgrade at any time if you need more resources. Choose your SiteGround plan to get started.
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Katie Martz says
Hands down the only company I will work with for hosting and management needs. They are incredible, quick, funny, and will help you through it all!
Ronald says
customer service agent was quick and knowledgeable. great service.
Cory Felton says
Great customer service was extremely helpful.
Paul Stradling says
Petar on the live chat was great! Very knowledgeable and solved my issues immediately!
Bianka says
I rarely leave reviews, but I have to say I am extremely happy with the level of customer service in SiteGround. All the issues I had (on multiple occasions) were solved quickly, professionally and with a great deal of kindness and patience.
Additionally, my website loads fast, and I didn’t experience any problems with it.
Thank you for making managing a website painless for a non-IT person!
Dave says
Thanks again for helping with what is probably very simple (URL change) problems. You guys are the most helpful and have the patience of Job;-)
Heidi Richards Mooney says
Siteground has the best support around! I have been with two other hosting platforms and never experienced the superior quality of support I get from the team at Siteground. Patient, smart and eager to be of service are three ways I would describe Siteground. Thank you for being here for me, for my clients and for all future clients I refer. You folks are the BEST!
Fabio says
I was extremely well attended, please keep up the good work!
Marie says
Great and quick help !! Thanks
Robert Walker says
Always a pleasure dealing with the professionals at SiteGround.
Deborah Jacobs says
SiteGround’s chat support is GREAT! Rosen was quick to respond and resolved my issue in under five minutes. Thanks for the great service!
Jennifer Miller says
As always, I had a great experience with siteground’s chat support. He was friendly and a real person! My question was answered quickly and knowledgably.
Mr. Tarver says
This is a great and super friendly company. They also have the best hosting prices in the business. Thank me later for this 5-star review!!
Andy Ellis says
Cant fault the customer service at Siteground. Whenever I need a little help with anything really technical they are always there to lend a hand. Highly recommend them!
Bianca Rodi says
Nice! My issue was solved quick!
russel says
Been very helpful. knowlegeable. Thank you.
Brayden Butterfield says
Why do I move every site to Siteground?
Your chat service is the most helpful customer support of any service I have ever had.
Karen Ahl says
I had Dima take care of my WordPress issue today and she was fantastic! Super helpful and patient and helped me troubleshoot a database issue I was experiencing.
Craig Kirkby says
Special mention to the agent who helped me today! Very patient and very helpful.
Gerald Dlubala says
What an awesome experience! Ivan was prompt, attentive, and informed me of available options and what SiteGround could do for me. He made it easy and very understandable, Using my hosting service research combined with his service and expertise, I immediately knew this was the right choice for me. Glad to be part of the SiteGround team.
Michele Miers says
Have been using SiteGround for a bit over 2 years now and more than happy with their Hosting Service. I feel very re-assured my Website is automatically backed up Daily for peace of mind in case something goes wrong. I also like the fact it is scanned for threats weekly also and I receive an Email verifying it has “reported Clean” – another re-assurance. Site Speed is another vital factor with a Website and they seem to be very switched on with keeping up with that and changing when need be. I also very much appreciate the information, tips, tutorials etc that have available for us to better learn how to optimise our Sites and also protect it amongs many other things. I have just renewed for another 2 years, with confidence that SiteGround know what they’re doing, know what they need to continue doing and that they care about what they’re doing. Thanks SiteGround – please continue doing, what you’re doing.![:)](https://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-content/plugins/classic-smilies/img/icon_smile.gif)
Keval S Thanki says
Siteground is THE OG Company when it comes to Customer Support and Hosting.
Its amazing how responsive their customer support is, will definitely implement this type of customer support even in my company.
Gary Hum says
Your customer service is the BEST!!! I love, love, love the quick and efficient responses I have gotten from previous (and now current) questions and/or concerns. I would recommend SiteGround to anyone and everyone who asks me about hosting services. KUDOS!!!
Andrea Koppelmann says
Maksim Z. took such great care of me! He deserves a big pay raise! He was so very knowledgeable and patient.
SiteGround is amazing.
Kel C. says
I was totally overwhelmed transferring my domain to a new host. I was up late working on it and panicking I had done something wrong! Live chat was available (even though it was 10pm my time), and I was so grateful to talk to Dobrin A. He put all my worries at ease and walked me through everything step by step. He was even able to check on his end to make sure I had processed things correctly. He also explained things along the way so I could understand what I was doing. I am so, so glad I ended up choosing Siteground. This experience alone has proven to me that it was the right choice, and I’d recommend them to anyone!
James Guthrie says
Siteground is fantastic. Their speeds are incredible, their tools are excellent, their support is absolutely second to none, I can’t recommend enough!
Greg DiVilbiss says
Siteground is the best host I have ever used. I have used a variety of shared, VPS, unmanaged and now managed Siteground. Siteground is undoubtedly the best!
The backend is slightly different but once you get through a short adjustment period it is great. The staff is always helpful and fast. I love Siteground!
Dimitri Hlentzos says
Outstanding support every time
very very happy with siteground
Frank Okun says
Thank you, Diana for your expertise and advice on the renewal of my GrowBig plan!
Sheila Crew says
This was a great experience. I had an issue with my “A” and “MX” records and was patiently assisted by Nikola who stayed with me during the process. I really appreciate his kindness and patience. Those tweaks should resolve my problem with the help of Nikola.
David says
Beatriz helped me with a complex site move and really knew her stuff. Thank you!!
Andres says
Answered my questions! Good job!
Mark Bennett says
Fantastic support – I am very impressed with how quickly and efficiently your team handles my issues..
Victor Chan says
Today I had a billing problem that Anastas K helped me with, and it was resolved in super quick time. I am so glad to be a customer of SiteGround, truly the best customer service I have experienced online!
royce says
explained about problems and resolve it.
thanks .
Tatiana Proctor says
Thank you for your timely responses and solutions.
Michael Williams says
Eliza was very helpful and quickly located the issues provided an immediately resolution that worked perfectly.
Micheal says
Excellent customer from Sitegroung. Thank you for your 24/7 customer support.
Luis Colomé says
Varteres has been a Rock star since the beginning. Friendly and helpfull, he has helped me solving the issue and in minutes I was working again on the site.
Shay S. says
Georgi was incredibly responsive and knowledgeable. Assisted with my issue in a timely manner and quickly answered any follow up questions I had. Also used full sentences and proper grammar, which is always a big plus when chatting with support of any kind! Very friendly and polite as well. A+!
Tracey Mulry says
Very helpful person who gave me the information I needed. Love Siteground !
Bethany says
Online chat was easy and the Siteground rep was fast with a fix that had been troubling me most of the day. Thank you!
Tarun says
Thank you so much for your help / support, it means a lot for me, thank you.
Regards:
Tarun
Yeny says
The support was great! Thanks
Marie says
Rosan A is very helpful he is very patient and very easy to talk with
Steph T says
I really appreciate the customer service I get from Siteground. All of the technicians are super competent, friendly and helpful!
Jaehyun says
A quick and precise solution to my problem
Andrea Perry says
These guys have been so AMAZING to work with. So patient with me. I am so glad I came across you thank you thank you thank you
Rosina Lippi says
It took a while for the chat to get started, but once Yordan Z. was in on the chat, it went very well. He was able to sort out the problem quickly and then fixed it. His efficient and polite manner made it all far easier than expected.
Richard says
Courteous and professional