My Pros and Cons on DreamHost Web Hosting Review in Full.
Why is DreamHost Web Hosting Review the best web hosting?
DreamHost is one of the oldest web hosting companies, found in 1996, even before the creation of Google. The company offers shared, WordPress, cloud, VPS and dedicated website hosting with stacks of features and interesting options.
DreamHost has been in business for over 20 years and it is expected that they know what they’re doing, and first impressions of the website don’t disappoint.
Their Shared hosting plans begin with the Starter plan which comes with;
50GB storage
unmetered bandwidth
free SSL
1 free domain that offers free domain privacy and an automated WordPress installation.
DreamHost Web Hosting have their shared plan which also comes with an optional WordPress Website Builder that is powered by BoldGrid builder. When enabled, the builder gives you access to its premium tools and themes which would have normally cost a little extra to access.
All these benefits and more come out to be just $2.59 for over three years. This is also their regular price, so you won’t get any unexpected surprises on renewals.
You can sign up for DreamHost Web Hosting here
If having more emails is a must then upgrading to their shared unlimited plan will get you unmetered email addresses, storage, bandwidth, domains, databases and more. Here are a few of their other plans which offer great values, $5.95 a month over three years, $6.95 annually or $10.95 billed monthly. For your information, there are no special or unexpected deals that may double the cost on renewal.
How much is DreamHost Web Hosting monthly plan?
DreamHost Web Hosting monthly plan goes for US$2.59 per month which makes them compete well with other big-name hosts.
HostGator’s similar Baby plan has unmetered domains and bandwidth, and is cheaper over three years at $3.95 a month. But that’s only due to the special introductory discount as it renews at a far more expensive price tag of $9.95.
DreamHost hosts its websites in a single US data center. And although support is available 24/7 via ticket, live chat is only available 5:30AM-9:30PM Pacific Time.
One other reason why I Love using DreamHost is that it scores well for its value. The company offers an exceptional 97-day money-back guarantee, as well as suggesting real confidence in its products and service.
WORDPRESS
What is the best web hosting for WordPress?
DreamHost is one of the best web hosting for WordPress which is why it’s highly recommended by WordPress website.
DreamHost performs exceptionally well at WordPress hosting, shared, managed and other hosting options.
The shared WordPress hosting is just DreamHost’s regular shared plans. There’s an option to pre-install WordPress and a template-based WordPress Website Builder.
One of the special WordPress features include, easy-to-use.
With just one click, you will be able to create and work on a copy of your WordPress project as well as allowing you to try new themes and plugins. You can as well make other major changes without affecting your website. It is remarkable and not something you’ll see in all other WordPress hosting plans.
DreamPress Basic Plan gets you all these features and more; 30GB storage and 100,000 monthly visitors. It’s priced from $16.95 a month on the annual plan, $19.95 monthly plan.
DreamPress Plus Plan doubles your storage space and offers more features; adds the Jetpack Professional plugin, unlimited CDN use and is built to handle 300,000 visitors a month. It’s $24.95 a month and it is paid annually, while $29.95 paid per month basis.
DreamPress Pro can handle more than a million monthly visitors which further adds more resources to its value.
Their support team monitors your site and do some more advanced troubleshooting so as to fix any problems when they appear instead of waiting for you to notice or report them.
So if you’re running a business-critical site, it could easily be worth the extra.
These are a well-balanced set of plans with something for every level of user, but there are some alternatives you might want to consider.
Bluehost Build plan offers unmetered storage and bandwidth, and also supports hosting unlimited number of websites, for an affordable or reasonable $29.95 billed monthly, $24.95 on their annual plan.
SERVERS
Where is DreamHost servers located?
Currently in the United States
What happens when you outgrow DreamHost shared hosting?
Upgrading to a Virtual Private Server (VPS) improves speeds and flexibility by giving you your own server resources, which you will never have to share with anyone.
In this DreamHost Web Hosting Review, Their VPS servers have always gotten better. The VPS Basic plan is actually very cheap as compared to other servers and this plan goes for just $10 a month over three years, $13.75 on their annual plan.
Note, the VPS is a managed product (DreamHost takes up the obligation of maintaining your server, upgrading the OS, installing security patches and more). The account has no limits on traffic, email addresses or the number of websites you can host.
| PLAN | DISK SPACE | BANDWIDTH | PRICE |
| Shared Hosting | Unlimited | Unlimited | $2.59 / mo. |
| WordPress Hosting Starter | Unlimited | Unlimited | $2.59 / mo. |
| Basic VPS Hosting | 30 GB | Unmetered | $10 / mo. |
| Dedicated Hosting | 1 TB | Unlimited | $169 / mo. |
There are several other plans options, but looking at just one; VPS Professional offers an outstanding 4GB RAM and 120GB storage for just $40 a month over three years, and $55 paid annually.
These are the decent value that might offer many options or configurability.
DreamHost’s broad range of dedicated server plans starts from an ordinary Xeon 4-Core 8-Thread and 4GB model to an enterprise-level 12-Core 24-Thread 64GB setup.
They might not always appear configurable at first as we may like but there are ways around it. The featured list includes unmetered bandwidth, PHP acceleration via OPcache, a good custom control panel, unlimited IPv6 addresses, 24/7 server monitoring and technical support.
SIGNING UP
The DreamHost website does a decent job of explaining what is offered by each of its plans, and how much you’re expected to pay.
DreamHost scores well for its overall price transparency, thereby enabling us to see monthly, one and three-year prices on the main page, at one click. That’s a major improvement on other hosts who might tell you a plan is ‘$5/month’, but force you to click ‘Buy’ before you get to see the subscription length and the renewal price.
CREATING A WEBSITE
In this DreamHost Web Hosting Review, let’s also talk about how to create a website. DreamHost’s customized web dashboard opens with a Build Website panel which offers multiple ways to begin your web project.
A user-friendly WordPress Editor option launches BoldGrid’s excellent site builder platform. In a click or two, you’re able to choose a template site, begin editing the content to suit you, then configure it with your details (Your name, email address, social media links, and more.) Click Install and your template site is set up. Then you’re directed to a conventional WordPress dashboard and ready to start managing your site as usual.
If you already have a WordPress site, or you’re an experienced WordPress user and happy to build a site from scratch then you’re free to bypass BoldGrid and log in to use WordPress directly.
DreamHost also provides one-click installs of concrete5, Joomla, MediaWiki, phpBB and Zen Cart.
DreamHost is user-friendly, doesn’t bundle cPanel with its shared hosting and so doing, you’re able to access similar features from its own custom control panel.
The file manager enables uploading an existing site or working with files installed by other applications.
SUPPORT
During the cause of this DreamHost Web Hosting Review, we’ve come to understand that DreamHost’s website orientation gets the company off to a good start. You can enter a keyword into the control panel search box to look up relevant articles, and a Help menu brings up links to all your web-based support options, such as; knowledgebase, community forum, live chat and email.
Their Live chat is outstanding and time, though their Live chat is ‘only’ available 5:30AM-9:30PM Pacific Time, but support via ticket is available 24/7, and when we ran into some issues, in our experience the team provides accurate and reliable help.
DREAMHOST WEB HOSTING REVIEW ON PERFORMANCE
In our experience, Shared hosting generally doesn’t deliver great speeds, especially at the budget end of the market. Though, some providers can surprise you but we were sensitive to see what DreamHost can do.
We began by signing up for DreamHost’s most basic shared hosting package, then uploaded a very simple static website.
Next, we had Uptime.com monitor our site’s availability and response times from multiple locations around the globe. Checks were made every five minutes over a five-day period, totaling more than 800 individual samples.
Our site achieved 100% uptime, no outages at all. That’s what we would expect to see in a short test, but it’s still good news.
The Response times averaged 312ms. Not bad but very broadly, the best providers manage 150-200ms, and most others are in the 200-350ms area.
Our results were unimaginably consistent, too, with a range around 285-412ms.
To conclude this DreamHost Web Hosting Review, Some might say that our results were mere luck, but at the end of this test, it proves that our server wasn’t overloaded with other sites, which if they were to be overloaded, they will all be fighting over bandwidth and resources. So DreamHost’s basic shared hosting is providing decent value for money.
FAQs
Here are some of the most frequently asked questions about DreamHost and their services.
Which of the DreamHost plan should I get?
It depends on your hosting needs. For instance, if you’re starting out new then simply choose DreamHost shared hosting plan. They have only one single shared hosting plan, which makes it very easy to sign up to an account. If your needs are to create an online store, then we highly recommend using DreamHost WooCommerce hosting which is specifically tailored to handle eCommerce websites uniquely.
Can DreamHost handle high amount of traffic?
DreamHost is very much capable of handling high traffic. But notwithstanding, it all depends on the plan you choose or sign up for. If your site starts consuming too many resources, then the system will ask you to upgrade to a higher plan.
Can I upgrade my DreamHost plan later on?
Yes. We recommend users to always start with the smaller plans and as the need increases then upgrading becomes necessary. DreamHost user interface makes it quite easy to upgrade.
Does DreamHost offer a monthly payment option?
Yes. DreamHost offers a monthly payment option. However, there is a significant amount of discounts for longer-term deals.
Can subdomains be created in DreamHost?
Yes, subdomains can easily be created in DreamHost.
Do I have to register my domain name with DreamHost?
No. Even though you can claim a free domain name when purchasing a hosting plan, you’re not obliged to register a domain name with DreamHost. You can use BlueHost, HostGator, or any of your preferred domain name registrar.
Do DreamHost offer free SSL?
Yes, DreamHost offers free SSL.
Do I need to purchase DreamHost addons?
No, DreamHost Addons are not mandatory at the time of purchase. Should there be a need for them later, you can always add them up to your account.
Can I create an eCommerce site on DreamHost?
Yes. DreamHost’s WooCommerce hosting plan comes pre-configured with all the features and things you may need.
Also Read: BLUEHOST REVIEW
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