Every single website on the internet is hosted by a hosting provider. If you’re curious, you can use a tool, such as builtwith.com, to research what your competitors are using as their hosting provider. Regardless, you don’t have to be technically savvy to make a decision on which hosting provider to use. That’s why we’re here to share what’s out there and guide you towards your ideal hosting provider. Not every hosting provider is built the same, so please take a look at our top three hosting providers for 2024.
1. AWS – Amazon Lightsail as Your Hosting Provider
When people think of AWS, they think of cloud services. AWS provides a plethora of services, such as DNS, asset storage, database servers, content delivery networks, artificial intelligence, and machine learning. You name it, AWS probably has it. The downside of AWS is understanding where to go when you need a particular service. There are a lot of moving parts and requires deeper technical knowledge to use it.
If you’re only looking for website hosting, you’ve got two options: use an EC2 instance (I’d consider this overkill for a website) or use the much simpler service, Amazon Lightsail. Amazon Lightsail is a very user-friendly managed hosting service. With Amazon Lightsail, you can connect to your website instance via SSH and easily restart your server when it’s down. You can also quickly spin up your website server from scratch in a matter of minutes as well as implement a CDN, automated backups, and SSL certificate. We find that using Amazon Lightsail allows you more flexibility and customization for website development as compared to other hosting providers like Flywheel.
The advantage of a cloud service like AWS is you can expand your digital capabilities beyond a website, such as email, automation, mobile apps, and machine learning applications. As APN consultants, Uplancer is deeply involved with AWS and can help you navigate website hosting as well as take your tech capabilities to the next level by leveraging additional cloud services.
2. GoDaddy Hosting
We feel like everyone knows GoDaddy. They’ve been around for some time and can get you the basics for website hosting. Similar to AWS, you can purchase your domains, set up servers, and trigger your emailing service. As far as websites go, this has pretty much everything you’ll need. There’s also a tremendous amount of support around their services, whether that comes from their support team or information found on the GoDaddy forums.
On the flip side, GoDaddy servers can be quite slow and you can pay a premium to unlock standard features that come with Amazon Lightsail. The other downside is GoDaddy locks you into their hosting services and can be a pain when navigating away to another hosting service.
3. Webflow as Your Hosting
Webflow has grown in popularity over the past few years with about 3% of websites being built with it. It’s a designer-friendly tool that takes an all-in-one approach to website development. It’s definitely a quick and scalable way for web designers to pump out websites with little to no technical knowledge.
The downside of using Webflow is that you can only use their website builder. This comes at a cost, being more expensive and offering less technical support than AWS and GoDaddy. Therefore, you’ll find limited help around bug fixes and the number of plugins available isn’t even close to the number found on WordPress. Additionally, if you ever decide on changing website hosting, exporting and importing a Web Flow website can be difficult and may require a ton of development work. We predict that Webflow support will improve as new businesses use it. However, it’s still not there yet and we don’t consider Webflow the superior option.
The Bottom Line / TLDR
Choosing the right hosting provider can feel overwhelming. To help you navigate this, we’ve highlighted our top three hosting providers for 2024. AWS offers robust cloud services with Amazon Lightsail, a user-friendly option for website hosting that gives you flexibility and scalability. GoDaddy is a well-known choice, but it can be slow and costly. Webflow is a designer-friendly platform ideal for building websites quickly with minimal technical expertise, though it’s pricier and offers less support and flexibility compared to AWS or GoDaddy. Each hosting provider has its strengths and weaknesses, so keep that in mind when selecting your next hosting provider.
Connect with Uplancer today to get your free consultation to select the perfect hosting provider for your business.
