A2 Hosting is one of the earliest web hosting company that originally based in Michigan, started in 2001 under their former name ‘Iniquinet’, in 2003 they decided to change their name to ‘A2 Hosting’ for easy recognition.
If you are aware that they have claimed on their website that the speed rate is 20x faster and gained 97% client satisfaction. We will do a speed test to see if they live up to what they promised and also the first term price is pretty affordable, and let’s find out about its performance does it really live up to what the company claimed to be?
Lets dig in and see if A2 Hosting is really what they said to be, this review will dig into the features, pricing, speed and server uptime rate.
A2 Hosting Host Services
Domain name registration: Just like many other web hosting companies, domain name is the basic offer that they must have. A2 Hosting offers a cheap domain name at $14.95 a year for a dotcom.
Available Extensions: .com / .info / .net / .org
Country TLDs are not available
Alternative: I would like to suggest getting a domain name at NameCheap, which is far cheaper than the renewal fee. Click here to visit NameCheap to get a new domain name.
Shared Hosting Plan: A standard shared hosting with a renewal price of $8.99 – $20.99. Ideal for a small – medium size website that doesn’t get a lot of traffic. When your traffic grows, you may need to upgrade your plan in order to cope with peak traffic. A2 Hosting doesn’t offer a good value for your investment. If you need a decent shared host with a bargain fees check out Interserver.net. Our website is hosted with them and it never disappoint us.
WordPress Hosting: For managing wordpress with automation features and optimization. Also comes with handy tools like ‘staging’, ‘built-in caching system’ and professional support technician who specialize in wordpress platforms. A2 Hosting WordPress price begins at $28.51 a month. For alternative and better wordpress host please check out WPX Hosting which is a top-notch for hosting wordpress on cloud.
VPS ( Virtual Private Server) designed for users who need a private space in the server without sharing resources with other users, the user can customize the server configuration for their purpose. VPS is being broken down into subspace and separated by walls so users can have their own private space to run their projects. A VPS is in between shared and dedicated hosting. The A2 Hosting price for VPS starts from a very small amount $5 – $100 which depends on your requirement. *VPS can be expensive and not made for amatuer unless you are a tech-savvy, however ‘Hostinger‘ does offer a great option for VPS with both Linux and Windows based platforms.
Cloud Hosting: Your website will not be hosted on a single server but a network with servers interconnected with one another like a network. Ideal for websites having a lot of traffic everyday and resources can be added as you may need. A2 Hosting’s Cloud hosting price starts from $5 with a storage space of 20GB and 512MB of RAM. Fee rate is dependent on increasing resources. Cheap doesn’t mean good, you get what you pay for and it better to check out HostGator as an alternative for better security and privacy, it is better to be secure than sorry.
Dedicated Server: For users who run a corporate website or site that get tons of traffic everyday like news media, a dedicated hosting is a must to manage and allow the traffic to flow in smoothly without narrowing down the bandwidth. Ideal for websites with high security and online sales. The A2 Hosting price of a dedicated hosting isn’t cheap, it starts from $120 a month. For larger and important website to be hosted on a dedicated server, you need a better option (we recommend Interserver.net) and most importantly more cost effective.
A2 Hosting’s Reseller Program: For users who want to resell the hosting space to other users without sticking with the A2 Hosting brand. Great for web developers or website retailers, just forward the username and password to the client and it is done, it works out just like a turn-key business. A Reseller Plan begins at $20 a month. SiteGround has been doing reseller program for a long time, we have been using their service in the past for web development project and very satisfied with them.
Note: A2 Hosting does have an unlimited and unmeasured policy agreement. Even if a user over used the maximum storage, database and bandwidth, the user will be asked to upgrade their hosting plan.
Shared Price Plan Analysis
Note: A2 Hosting has a variety price structure depending on sign up period. A 1, 12, 24 or 36 month periods. If you sign up for the longest period, you will pay the cheapest price but you have to pay in full in advance.
Lite Plan: Comes with 1 website allowed 5 databases that will let you create a maximum of 25 email accounts. Unfortunately, it doesn’t come with a restore system. Storage space and bandwidth is not metered.
Swift Tier: Unlimited numbers of websites can be hosted on this account plan. Together with an unlimited database which allows you to create as many email accounts as you want. The restore function is enabled, every backup can be restored. In case, if your website grows you can add more resources by upgrading your plan.
Turbo Package: This is the plan with the highest performance and packed with resources. The server is run on a HTTP/2, with less shared space with other users. Caching options such as the ‘A2 Optimized Site Accelerator’ are available for use. Including caching systems made for WordPress, Magneto and Prestashop platforms.
Add-ons: Please don’t misunderstand, there aren’t any upsell options. Most plans covered the basic features and tools that a user might need. If you need any upgraded features you can purchase from the add-on section. Add-ons include extra 5GB backup storage at $1.99 a month, SSL certification, spam filter and cloudflare ‘CDN’ are available as well.
Either Swift or Turbo packages are sufficient to run your website that has tons of traffic each month. If you need to double the resources such as RAM and CPU, you can purchase these additional upgrades for only $3 a month.
A2 Hosting Pros & Cons
Pros
-High Speed: A2 Hosting has the fastest speed rate that we have ever tried.
-Advanced tools come with a higher plan. Important features such as ‘staging and built-in caching’ are included too.
-A2 Hosting backup 7 copies of your websites only. The restore function is only available for Swift and Turbo plans.
-Multiple Region Location: The servers are located in East and West coasts of America, Europe and Asia.
-Unlimited Storage and unmetered bandwidth: Unlimited store for files (but never exceed 600,000).
-Window-based hosting server is available.
Cons
-Uptime is unstable
-Not support PCI compliance. Not suitable to run an Ecommerce website.
-Not include on-demand backup system, have to purchase the add-on separately. After you sign-up, there will be tons of add-on offers on the checkout page.
-Limited concurrent HTTP connection: All A2 hosting shared plans have limited the concurrent connection to 35, which means there can be a maximum of 35 users connected to the server at the same time.
A2 Hosting is For if:
You need a reasonable price for a web hosting service with unlimited storage and bandwidth. Most importantly a reliable server.
You need advanced tools that other competitors are not offering such as built-in server side caching system, staging area, and speed optimization plugins for WordPress, Magneto and Prestashop
You are a solo blogger, small to medium size business who are looking for a reliable web hosting provider. Also great for serious entrepreneurs who run SEO, consultation service and require a large storage space at a fair price.
You want to host on a window-based server.
A2 Hosting is NOT for:
To run a large project with peak traffic due to the limitation of 35 concurrent HTTP connections which may cause other clients not to be able to access your website for a short while.
Server up-time isn’t quite stable for some time. Not recommended for huge corporations that rely on their website for sales. But small to medium size online stores are fine.
eCommerce websites that rely on PCI compliance (Payment Card Industry). A2 Hosting doesn’t have PCI out of the box service, you need to use from an outside source.
Alternative: If PCI is important for your eCommerce website, I suggest you look for another web hosting company, we highly suggest SiteGround.
Summary
A2 Hosting is a decent web hosting company. Suitable for small to medium size business, solo blogger or individual entrepreneurs for a reasonable price and reliable server without aggressive upsell.
A2 Hosting has a really decent speed rate like they promised to, however their uptime isn’t as good as their speed, it isn’t bad however still have more room for improvement. Not a great idea to use it to run your large business website otherwise more traffic and sales opportunities may be lost. It is fine for a small to medium size online retail website or blog.
It includes various add-on that you can pick to use at a very cheap fee. There is no complaint over this as long as they aren’t tripping us off.
Their support is great and doesn’t let us down. Their team does know what they are doing and able to get our trouble solved fast.
It isn’t our most favorite web hosting brand but it is included on our top5 best web hosting. We could have put it on our top 3 if not for its below average server uptime and 35 concurrent HTTP connection. If A2 Hosting looks into improving these issues, this company will be a better web hosting company.
There are other alternatives you may want to consider, SiteGround, Interserver and DreamHost.