SiteGround Vs. DreamHost: Which One Is Right For Me In 2021?
It could be that you are seeking a web host that fits your growing site and business needs perfectly. You may want to compare SiteGround vs. DreamHost as they both are reputed web hosting providers. A comprehensive comparison will allow you to know more about the web hosting plan types and features offered by both companies. This will help ease your selection process.
You could have plans to develop your business site and launch it successfully. However, the type and size of your size are important, and so is the hosting platform where you plan to host your site. Hence, the platform selected should be a reliable one as well as is accessible all the time. SiteGround and DreamHost are popular web hosting providers and are worth the try.
SiteGround has its head office in Bulgaria. It presently powers 2+ million domains. On the other hand, DreamHost is a Los Angeles, US-based company providing hosting services to 1.5+ million domains across the globe. Both companies offer web hosting to professionals and newbies alike to develop their online business.
SiteGround vs DreamHost – Know the plans offered
Both offer a wide range of hosting plans and services.
SiteGround:
- WordPress (WP) hosting
- Shared hosting
- Reseller hosting
- WooCommerce hosting
- Cloud Hosting
DreamHost:
- WordPress hosting
- Shared hosting
- Cloud hosting
- WooCommerce hosting
- Dedicated server
- VPS (Virtual Private Server)
However, SiteGround does not offer dedicated server and VPS hosting services, unlike DreamHost. Both are considered to be commonly used or popularly availed hosting types. Again, DreamHost fails to provide reseller hosting services.
However, DreamHost offers annual and monthly hosting plans, unlike SiteGround that provides annual hosting plans only.
SiteGround vs DreamHost – Uptime
- SiteGround: Using GCP (Google Cloud Platform) for its operation, SiteGround assures all its clients of providing 99.9% annual network uptime. They also promise to compensate in the following ways if their uptime does not match their promises.
- For every one percent uptime that is lost below 99.00%, they will provide free hosting for one additional month.
- For 99.9% to 99.00% uptime, they will offer free hosting for a month.
- DreamHost assures its clients of providing a 100% uptime guarantee at all times. Their Terms of Service clearly mentions the following:
- DreamHost credit will be offered to customers, equal to their current hosting expenses for a day. This will be for the interruption caused in the service for every one hour or even a fraction thereof. The maximum will be 10 percent of the subsequent pre-paid renewal fee.
- Customers get compensation if their databases, website, FTP, email, webmail or SSH becomes unusable. This should, however, result from failure arising in the provider’s systems. The reason for the same could be other than what is mentioned in their scheduled maintenance, configuration or coding errors.
SiteGround boasts of having 99.98% average uptime and hence, has a better edge over its competitor DreamHost in this category. The latter has an average uptime of just 99.95%.
SiteGround vs DreamHost – Website Builder
- SiteGround: They offer ‘Weebly’, a beginner-friendly, commonly availed, drag & drop site builder. It helps with the quick creation of a functional site without the user requiring any technical skills. All hosting plans offer this important tool for free.
- DreamHost: They provide ‘WP Website Builder’ for free for all WP sites. It features a quick start inspiration wizard, drag & drop editor, 200+ industry-specific starter websites, free professional templates, etc. It also includes on-page SEO tips and 100+ design blocks, thereby allowing you to develop search engine optimized content. You can also invest in a click-to-edit site builder tool named DreamHost Remixer. Using this tool, you can develop a professional site very quickly and easily. But to avail Remixer, it is essential to choose any of the available two plans, namely, Remixer All Access or Remixer Standard. Each plan comes with free domain registration for one year and mobile-optimized themes.
Remixer All-Access plan is offered with shared hosting plans for free. If you have already invested in a Dedicated, DreamPress, or VPS plan, you can buy this plan separately to enjoy its benefits. However, DreamPress Managed WP hosting does not support the website builder.
SiteGround vs DreamHost – Domain Name Registration
For one year from registration, you stand to gain a domain name registration for free. But this faculty is limited to just DreamPress managed WP and Shared hosting plans. Registration credit for a free domain name is offered with only annual hosting plans, like a 1 or 3-year plan. It should be used in the initial 3months after which it expires and will not be available for use.
No such credits are offered with any of the plans offered to new customers at SiteGround. For new domain registration, an extra amount must be paid, which is approximately $15.95 to $1.95 a year.
SiteGround vs DreamHost – Control Panel / Dashboard
- SiteGround: They have launched Site Tools to ensure easy site management. It is considered to be a mobile-friendly and site-specific control panel. Each site comes with separate site management tools, being grouped by themes. Using this tool, you can effortlessly switch between different sites through the drop-down menu. Its main menu has been aligned to the left while comprising of essential site navigation tools.
- DreamHost: Their panel is rather a custom-built interface developed to manage sites easily. Since it operates on separate servers, it does not consume web server resources. On the left is present a central-vertical menu, a support menu, a search-field box and an account information box.
SiteGround vs DreamHost – Security
- SiteGround: They offer ‘Let’s Encrypt SSL Certificate’ for free along with all their hosting plans. This certificate is meant to safeguard your site from online frauds and threats. Also are offered advanced customized security solutions to tackle such threats. They are:
- Smart web app firewall WAF. It helps safeguard your websites from vulnerable breaches and hacks.
- Server health checks in real-time.
- Qualified and experienced system administration team monitors downtime and security issues 24/7.
- To prevent malicious traffic and unwanted online attacks, there has been introduced smart AI system.
- DreamHost: To ensure greater hosting account security, they allow using of MFA (Multifactor Authentication). They also provide SSL Certificates for free. Based on your selected hosting plan/account, you are provided with additional advanced security features.
- VPS: Auto software updates, .htaccess (Password Protection) and SSH (Secure Shell) Access.
- Shared: Auto daily WP site backup and free privacy protection.
- WordPress: Automatic backups, free privacy protection and auto WP updates.
- Dedicated: Full Root & SSH (Shell Access) and round-the-clock DDOS Protection.
SiteGround vs DreamHost – Migration Services
- SiteGround: If you own multiple WordPress websites and are interested to migrate them, then you can use the free WP Migrator plugin. This plug-in is offered in all WP hosting plans. In case, you have a non-WP-hosted website, then you are to invest in a professional website migration service. It costs around $30 a site.
- DreamHost: This provider allows WP site transfer to any of their accounts from the existing web host. For this, you can avail of their free auto migration plug-in. They also offer migration service, but at a price of around $99 a site. This will be essential to transfer all non-WP sites from within or to DreamHost accounts.
SiteGround vs DreamHost – Customer Support
- SiteGround: They have launched AI chatbot as well as manage a comprehensive knowledgebase. It features useful articles availing which you can get solutions to different hosting-related issues. Their dedicated customer support team is also easily accessible through:
- Helpdesk tickets
- Phone support
- Live Chat
There are times when you might experience issues that are beyond the free technical support scope. To solve such issues, you may pay some amount to avail of their additional support service.
- DreamHost: They offer prompt customer support through the given below platforms:
- Knowledgebase
- Support Forums
- Live Chat
However, phone support is not offered by this provider. But they do offer their clients with callback request option to get assistance. Some hosting plans come with free callback features. For other plans, you will require to shelve out some money to derive this support feature. The cost involved will be around:
- For monthly 3 callbacks – $14.95 a month
- For one-time callback – $9.95
SiteGround vs DreamHost – Money-Back Guarantee
- SiteGround: In case, you are not interested to continue with their services, you can terminate your account easily whenever desired. Eligible hosting plans come with a money-back guarantee. It includes the following:
- Cloud hosting for 14 days
- Shared hosting for 30 days
The company will provide a refund on termination or cancellation of the entire package on their Reseller hosting plan. But after thirty days of account activation, this facility is not offered.
- DreamHost: Shared hosting plan that is purchased through a debit or credit card at DreamHost’s official website comes with a 97-day money-back guarantee. They provide thirty-day money-back assurance on their DreamPress managed WP hosting and VPS services.
SiteGround vs DreamHost – Site Response Time / Speed
The other important site performance metrics to consider besides uptime is site response time and site load time. Again, this is vital before registering with any web host to ensure greater satisfaction from their services.
- SiteGround: To enable blazing-fast site speed, they use SSD and GCP persistent storage. They also use state-of-the-art speed technologies. It includes ultrafast PHP, the latest PHP versions, custom PHP managing setup and QUIC protocol. All these features help enhance website loading speed. Besides this, they also offer speed-boosting solutions like:
- SG Optimizer plug-in exclusively for WP sites.
- Free Cloudflare CDN.
- NGINX-based, powerful, in-house caching solution referred to as ‘SuperCacher’.
- DreamHost: They offer fast SSD Storage to enhance site responsiveness. It is considered this storage to be 200% much faster when compared to traditional HDDs. Each hosting plans that they have on offer come with free Cloudflare CDN.
SiteGround vs DreamHost – WordPress Hosting
WordPress.Org is a popular website provider and strongly recommends both SiteGround and DreamHost for WP hosting. Both providers are among the only three WP hosting companies recommended by WordPress.org. This shows their dominance in the industry.
- SiteGround: They offer three levels of Managed WP hosting plans, namely:
- Startup: This plan allows the hosting of just a single site. It includes unmetered traffic and webspace of 10 GB.
- GrowBig: It includes webspace of 20 GB, unlimited website hosting, speed-boosting caching, on-demand backup copies, collaboration tools and staging.
- GoGeek: It includes all benefits offered with Startup as well as GrowBig plans. Also is provided a webspace of 40 GB, Ultrafast PHP for faster page loading, white-label clients including Priority support.
Their Managed WordPress hosting plans come with the following:
- Unlimited databases
- Unmetered traffic
- Free WP Migrator
- Free WP Installation
- Free SSL
- WP Auto updates
- Free email
- Free CDN
- Daily backup
- SSH and WP-CLI
- DreamHost: Three different types of WP hosting services is offered, namely:
- ‘Basic’ affordable hosting targeting beginners.
- ‘DreamPress’ managed hosting
- ‘VPS WP’ hosting is designed for those seeking greater resource controls.
DreamPress Managed WP hosting: This plan offers advanced features like the site staging tool, inbuilt caching, on-demand backups, and auto daily backups. Three different plans offered are:
- DreamPress Plus: Designed for monthly 1+ million visitors
- DreamPress Pro: Designed for monthly 300k+ visitors
- DreamPress: Designed for monthly 100k+ visitors
SiteGround vs DreamHost – Conclusion
When considering response time and uptime performance metrics, SiteGround is found to have the edge over DreamHost. However, it is important to remember that DreamHost provides 97-day money-back assurance combined with a 100 percent uptime guarantee at all times.
Moreover, SiteGround does not offer dedicated servers or VPS hosting. Again, DreamHost lacks technical phone support and reseller hosting.
With both having their own share of pros & cons, you need to select one that matches your site needs perfectly.
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