What started as a small European web hosting company in 2008 has now grown into a global player focused on virtualization and cloud computing: Host1Plus is a good example of both organic growth and timely business pivots.
The provider we’ll be reviewing today is one of a plethora of companies which have sprung up to conquer the hosting market on the wave of the “cloud revolution”, fuelled by the continuing advancements in networking as well as hardware and software improvements. What’s different about Host1Plus is that it existed long before the boom, showing that pre-cloud providers can also become successful in this market, given a mix of innovativeness, customer focus, and resilience.
The Host1Plus Offer
The company positions itself as a developer-focussed service provider, meaning that their hosting is mostly intended and tailored for folks who understand what they’re doing. Clients can choose between three types of hosting infrastructure: cloud servers, virtual private servers (VPS), as well as classic shared hosting.
The latter is a rather self-explanatory option which comes with popular app installers, email, backups and other features which are more or less a standard package these days; what can be noted separately though is the free domain offer which comes with any of the hosting plans, even the basic Personal variety.
The more interesting part is the Host1Plus VPS, which is currently the flagship product: scalable virtual machines based on physical servers on each continent, distributed and multiple-copy storage to avoid data loss, and fast set-up make for a very decent package even for the most discerning webmasters. The cherry on top? It’s priced lower than most other high-profile VPS providers, even before considering the discounts for orders with longer billing cycles. One area where improvements can be made here is the storage technology: at the moment the company’s servers use a mix of SSD and rotating hard drives, with the load being smartly distributed by a specialized software suite for optimal performance; this difference is generally not felt in practice, since the above setup functions in the same way as the hybrid SSD/HDD drives frequently installed in laptops, allowing for maximum price-performance tradeoff. In any case, completing the transition to a 100% SSD setup would definitely not hurt, adding yet another selling point in Host1Plus’ already hefty arsenal.
The cloud hosting offer is full of features on par with the industry-leading alternatives, and is priced quite attractively as well. Anything you want to expect from a cloud host, from backups and DNS management to SSH, live stats and geolocated IPs. The underlying infrastructure is still in its early phases, though, with only two servers available as of mid-2017; the company plans on adding more in the future, in order to stay closer to its customers in various regions.
Support and Knowledge Resources
Host1Plus’ attitude towards its customers is a pleasant surprise: as a mid-sized hosting company, they realize perfectly well that while the underlying tech and know-how are easily transferable, the only way to sustainably compete with the largest players is to provide top-notch support. Which they do, with dedication. The round-the-clock support team is easy to contact and acts more often like they care about solving the actual problems than about competing with each other on the number of closed support tickets.
Apart from the above, Host1Plus provides a range of additional resources to complement the human to human support: a support center with a knowledgebase consisting of frequently asked questions, a tutorial board with over 400 items on all aspects of their product range, from installing WordPress on a shared hosting to setting up a secure cloud server. They’ve also introduced a feature requests section recently, where new and existing clients can ask for specific improvements in the feature set.
Strong and Weak Sides
For a more comfortable and unbiased assessment of Host1Plus, let’s lay down their advantages as well as not-so-strong sides:
+ Competitive pricing for all hosting types, especially cloud
+ All major types of developer-tailored hosting under one roof
+ Friendly and accessible client support
+ Extensive knowledgebase and learning resources
+ Long and stable company track record
– Few server locations available for cloud hosting at the moment
– No live chat with customer support
Should You Use Host1Plus?
The primary advantage of Host1Plus is its value for money: given the service offers which are in no way inferior to other leading providers, the pricing is quite competitive. For example, most cloud hosting packages are more affordable than their close analogs e.g. by Digital Ocean, giving the confidence that your hosting will retain a pricing advantage even when you start scaling up.
The sweet combo of a solid feature set and caring customer support is something that Host1Plus gets right, and this fact can make up for the still growing server infrastructure. Overall, if you’re looking for a world-class VPS or cloud solution with a stable reputation and care about not being overcharged, then Host1Plus definitely deserves your attention.
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