Ranking comparison between the Top Providers

HostAdvice experts have listed eleven specific factors for the cloud hosting category. Each factor is allocated a particular percentage that reflects its importance compared to other factors in the same category. The higher the weight, the more critical the factor. In this regard, we give extra points for cost efficiency and scalability, as two of the most significant pros of cloud hosting.

Here are all the factors our experts used for testing and ranking the best cloud hosting providers:

• Scalable Resources (12%): Cloud hosting and its system of interconnected servers ensure no single point of failure. Your website will be hosted on multiple servers, so you can always pull resources from others if you max out the first server. Still, it would be best to choose a cloud hosting provider that allows you to manage and configure your server resources in-real time easily. You should be able to scale straight from the admin area without asking for the provider’s approval.
• Cost-Efficiency (7%): The best cloud hosting solutions offer you the infrastructure you need by default, so you won’t have to worry about capital expenditure. Instead of investing in something you might not need in the future and overspending, you will only pay for the services and resources you are using; this also relates to the ability to scale your resources on demand. Still, you should check whether the provider has minimum or maximum monthly rates on the cloud hosting plans. It would be best to select a plan with a maximum spending limit so that you won’t exceed your budget.
• Uptime Commitment (8%): The third best thing of the top cloud hosting providers is higher uptime compared to traditional web hosting. Finding a cloud hosting provider with a near-perfect uptime is a significant plus. In this regard, you should avoid anything below 99.95%. Fortunately, the best cloud hosting companies guarantee between 99.95% and 99.99% uptime, and in reality, it’s often more.
• Speed and Performance (7%): The best cloud web hosting providers boost your website’s capacity, thus improving your page loading speeds. Unlike traditional web hosting, cloud hosting providers deliver content from the nearest remote server. In turn, your website visitors can benefit from excellent responsiveness and fast loading. Here, you can also consider a fast-loading solid-state drive (SSD), typically smaller in terms of storage capacity but faster than its hard-drive-based counterparts.
• Security and Backups (7%): Since your website isn’t connected to a single physical piece of hardware, you don’t need to protect that server from harm. Cloud hosting utilizes a worldwide network of servers, usually in highly secure and remote locations. So, your site won’t suffer from any physical damages to the server. Additionally, if a single server from your cloud network fails, is compromised, or experiences an overload, your site will remain unaffected – up and running with no downtime or delays. Despite all this, you should check for additional security protection in place, along with backup and disaster recovery options. Usually, the best cloud web hosting plans feature automatic backups and software updates.
• Cloud Hosting Features (8%): Sure, you can easily upgrade your CPU, RAM, and storage with the best cloud hosting plans. But what else can you expect? In this regard, you should consider unlimited bandwidth, data, or storage. Is your definition of unlimited the same as the provider’s one? Make sure to read the fine print. Also, check the server OS, especially if you have a specific server-side application that requires Windows, root access for better control over your cloud server, and so on.
• Ease Of Use (5%): While the best cloud server hosting offers significant advantages, it’s still necessary for you to be able to navigate the interface easily. Top cloud hosting providers ensure their users enjoy a beginner-friendly solution, regardless of their skill, knowledge, and experience in the hosting industry. Here, it would help if you considered easy-to-use popular control panels, such as the industry-standard cPanel or Plesk.
• Customer Support (8%): While forums, tutorials, and knowledge bases are helpful tools, nothing compares to another human being with experience and skill in cloud hosting available 24/7 to resolve your issue.
• User Reviews (30%): Our AI technology sorts the best hosting companies considering customers’ experiences all around the globe, starting from first-time users to advanced professionals and everything in between. Users provide valuable, transparent, and honest insights into a cloud hosting company’s operation and assistance.
• Money-Back Guarantee (4%): Nothing signals quality more than a refund policy. Does the cloud hosting company offer a money-back guarantee? If yes, for how many days?
• Other Factors (4%): Awards, establishment date, brand reputation, past incidents considered.

What Is Cloud Hosting, and Who Is It For?

Cloud hosting has revolutionized how the Internet operates. With traditional web hosting, the provider stores your website on a single server, whether it’s shared, VPS, or dedicated. Depending on your choice, you might or might not share the environment with neighboring sites. Either way, you are limited to the resources of that single physical hardware with pre-defined CPU, RAM, storage, and bandwidth.

On the other hand, cloud hosting providers distribute your content across multiple virtual servers on the cloud. But why is this important? Suppose one of these servers on the cloud fails/goes down. The remaining ones will “make up for it,” allowing your site to continue running smoothly. Simply put, you can avoid unplanned downtime and benefit from better uptime rates.

Cloud hosting can support a steady increase in traffic and keep your site stable at all times. Furthermore, it’s an excellent fit for websites anticipating random traffic surges – the best cloud web hosting providers offer pay-as-you-go solutions so that you will pay only for what you use. It also accounts for a much faster and easier deployment than shared or dedicated servers.

All of this combined makes cloud hosting the perfect choice for growing businesses in need of scalability, medium and large-sized enterprises that cannot afford any downtime.

What Types of Cloud Hosting Are Available?

In reality, you cannot find two identical clouds, even if they are of the same type. You should distinguish IaaS, PaaS, and SaaS, the three main types of cloud computing services.

• IaaS (Infrastructure as a Service): The provider manages the cloud infrastructure, the actual servers, network, virtualization, and data storage through an Internet connection. The company, in this case, takes care of all outages, repairs, and hardware issues. You, as the customer, rent the infrastructure and get access through an API or dashboard to manage things like the OS, apps, and middleware. It’s the typical deployment model of cloud storage providers.
• PaaS (Platform as a Service): The cloud hosting company provides and manages the hardware and an application-software platform. You, as the user, need to handle all apps running on the platform and the data backing up these apps. This solution is best suited for developers and programmers.
• SaaS (Software as a Service): The cloud service provider manages a software application, typically a web or a mobile app, that you can access using a web browser. As the user, you need to take care of software updates, bug fixes, and other general software maintenance, connecting to the cloud applications via a dashboard or API.

Factors to Consider When Choosing A Cloud Hosting Plan

As you understand by now, it’s challenging to choose the best hosting for your needs, even if you have a list of the best cloud web hosting companies on the market. After all, where the competition’s high, choices are hard.

Here’s how you can increase your odds of finding the perfect match for your website.

Your Website Needs: Before starting your search of cloud hosting companies, it would be best to determine what you are looking for – what’s the scope, requirements, and goals of your project? How much traffic do you expect to get?

• Type Of Cloud Hosting: The best cloud hosting providers offer you the needed versatility to match your growth needs over time. Still, you need to develop a list of cloud server hosts that tune in with your needs. Compare and choose from IaaS (Infrastructure as a Service), PaaS (Platform as a Service), and SaaS (Software as a Service) solutions before going further.
• Hardware Components: Once you define what you are looking for, it’s best to start evaluating the hardware of the best hosting offers. At this point, you should consider CPU, RAM, type and amount of storage, bandwidth, inherent speed and security of these parts, etc. Does the cloud host provide sufficient resources for your present needs and future growth?
• Feature Set: In addition to hardware, you should also review the software. It would be best to review and compare the built-in options in different cloud hosting plans. For instance, one cloud hosting plan might support Linux but not Windows. You might get a free feature in a specific plan but have to pay for it with another company, and so on.
  Support Assistance: 24/7 customer support via live chat, email, or phone is essential for running a successful website on the Internet. In addition, the cloud hosting company’s support team must be knowledgeable, responsive, and fast to solve all your queries without any delays.
• Valuable Insights: There’s nothing more valuable than a transparent expert review or an authentic customer experience. Before you spend your money on a cloud hosting plan, make sure to browse the web and search for these first-hand insights. Better yet, you can check our rankings for these honest responses. You’ll find out what the current clients say about a service, where the main dissatisfaction with the company comes from, and more.
• Price-to-Value Ratio: At last, you should weigh in the price factor to the equation. How much are you paying, and what are you getting in return? Do these deals fit your current and long-term budget? Do the prices increase at renewal, and can you ask for a refund if you don’t find the cloud hosting service up to your standards?

If you ask the right questions, you’ll undoubtedly be able to find the right cloud hosting plan. But it will indeed take some time and effort. So, if you want to avoid these hassles or feel unprepared for searching yourself, we’ll take the load off your shoulders.

We have matched the best cloud server hosting by popular demands so that you don’t have to!

Best Cloud Hosting by Other Popular Demands

• Kamatera – Best Flexible Cloud Hosting
  The most flexible cloud hosting plans allow you to scale up/down on-demand, pay only for what you use, and migrate from another provider worry-free.
• Linode – Best Cloud Hosting For Developers
  Developer-friendly cloud web hosting solutions offer easy software and framework integration, root access to admin privileges, and plenty of server resources (CPU, RAM, Bandwidth, Storage) for high performance.
• Webdock– Best Unmanaged Cloud Hosting
  If you go for an unmanaged, aka self-managed, cloud hosting plan, you’ll pay for the resources you use. It’s a DIY model, where you’ll usually store your site on a public cloud (rent the infrastructure and get administrative access to manage it).
• Hostinger – Best Features Cloud Hosting
  The best cloud web hosting providers allow for scalability, rapid elasticity, flexibility, security, automation, pay-as-you-go plans, and rich feature sets with many freebies (SSL, CDN, website migration, domain registration/transfer, daily backups, and more).
• Inmotion – Best Cloud Hosting For Ecommerce
  As an eCommerce store, you cannot afford any downtime because it translates to a loss of customers. The best cloud hosting for your store should guarantee superior uptime, excellent speed, and fast-loading speeds.
• AWS– Best Cloud Hosting For SaaS
  The best hosting company for your SaaS app must provide technologies compatible with your solution stack, enough privacy and security, scalability, and a tight SLA.
• A2Hosting – Best Cloud Hosting For Magento
  Magento cloud hosting is fully optimized to deliver the fastest performance. You should be able to deploy in minutes, manage the cloud server efficiently, and get advanced caching technologies.

Best Cloud Hosting Services: Final Recommendations

Whether you are a blogger, startup, well-established business, or a billion-worth company, cloud hosting can bring many benefits to your operation. Compared to traditional hosting, the cloud is much more flexible, affordable, fast, and easy to navigate. You can start small and scale up as your business grows hassle-free. If, however, your business is shrinking, you can reverse the process and scall down to avoid unnecessary expenditures. Simply put, you pay for what you use!

The best cloud hosting providers can match your needs perfectly. However, you must first determine what you are looking for. After all, you can find shared, VPS, and dedicated hosting on the cloud – so it’s up to you to choose. Furthermore, you can select managed cloud hosting solutions, which are pretty easy to use. On the other hand, you can go for a self-managed cloud hosting solution to make use of your development skills or experience. Once you select the type of cloud hosting you need, you must also evaluate the hardware components, feature set, support assistance, price-value ratio, and so on.

But most importantly, remember to check what others are saying. Please choose one of our recommended cloud hosting providers, or browse the web to assess other users’ experiences. Either way, don’t rely exclusively on what the provider says on its website. Focus on real-life experiences and testing instead!