Bluehost vs GoDaddy Hosting 2024: Which Is Better?
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Bluehost and GoDaddy are big names in the hosting world. Of the two, our top choice is Bluehost, which scores higher in our research and is the best option for web hosting overall. Bluehost offers excellent support, cost-effective plans, and free WordPress migration.
But, GoDaddy has a lot going for it as well. With plenty of valuable features, and a fast server response time, GoDaddy is a great option if you’re looking for a comprehensive solution. Below, we’ll get into a head-to-head breakdown of the strengths and weaknesses of both to help you decide which is the right fit for your site.
Bluehost | GoDaddy |
Overall rating 4.8 | Overall rating 4.0 |
Starting from $2.95 | Starting from $6.99 |
Uptime 99.98% | Uptime 99.97% |
Free backups | Free backups |
Free domain | Free domain |
Storage space 10GB – Unlimited | Storage space 25GB – 100GB |
Bluehost is better for you if you're building a WordPress site...
…And want great value for money, tons of features, and excellent customer support.GoDaddy is better for you if you want your website-building tools in one place...
…It’s also slightly easier to use, so a good option if you’re less tech-savvy.Feeling confused about your hosting choices? Take our four-question hosting quiz to narrow down your options. It’s quick, easy, and will help you pick a platform that matches your budget!
Bluehost vs GoDaddy: Quick Comparison
Check out our side-by-side comparison table to see which hosting provider best suits you.
Bluehost | GoDaddy | |
---|---|---|
Features, Performance, & Ease of Use Winner: GoDaddy | Bluehost has a large number of features to enjoy, including free backups, unmetered bandwidth, and a free domain. Its interface is more polished than GoDaddy. | GoDaddy offers a comprehensive experience, with its hosting services and website builder in the same place. It has great features, an impressive server response time, and is super easy to use. |
Pricing & Value for Money Winner: Bluehost | Bluehost's hosting plans are extremely cost-effective, and its renewal prices are very competitive. Bluehost also offers a 30-day money-back guarantee. | GoDaddy's introductory costs are a little higher than Bluehost, but its plans still won't set you back too much. Pricing between plans and hosting types can also be fairly erratic, but GoDaddy offers a 30-day money-back guarantee. |
WordPress integration Winner: Bluehost | Bluehost is the best platform for WordPress integration. All it takes is one click, and Bluehost is even recommended by WordPress! | GoDaddy does have WordPress integration capabilities, but the process is not as seamless as Bluehost. |
Migration Winner: Bluehost | Bluehost offers both a paid and free switching service. All it takes is a few clicks, and Bluehost's support team will be on hand throughout the process. | Switching with GoDaddy isn't a simple task. Although still free, you'll need to do the work yourself! |
Help and Support Winner: Bluehost | Bluehost has excellent help and support options, including an awesome knowledge center, 24/7 phone, live chat, and email services. | GoDaddy offers 24/7 phone and live chat support, but it doesn't provide help via email. |
Are You Ready? | Bluehost | GoDaddy |
Features, Performance, & Ease of Use
The Winner
GoDaddy is easier to use than Bluehost
Bluehost and GoDaddy are both excellent choices where features are concerned. As leaders in the market, they can’t afford not to be. Consequently, there’s very little to separate the two.
Bluehost | GoDaddy | |
---|---|---|
Free domain | Yes | Yes |
Control panel | cPanel | cPanel |
Free backups | Yes | Yes |
Disk space | 100GB | 100GB |
Uptime | 99.98% | 99.9% |
The uptime of both is excellent – 99.98% for Bluehost, and 99.9% for GoDaddy. That’s less than three days of downtime a year. Perfect uptime simply isn’t possible, but these two get as close as is reasonably possible.
Both use the cPanel control panel, the industry standard for managing your hosting. The interfaces are clean and easy to use, though we think Bluehost has a little extra polish.
For shared hosting, GoDaddy and Bluehost plans cap the storage space at 100GB, which could be an issue for large-scale companies. That being said, smaller websites rarely get close to that kind of limit. Importantly, both Bluehost and GoDaddy provide free backups – excluding Bluehost’s cheapest plans – which is good security to have in case something dreadful happens to your site.
Further Information
- What is Web Hosting?: Our complete beginner’s guide to the ins and outs of web hosting.
- Best Web Hosting Providers: Research-driven rankings of the best all-round hosting providers.
Ironically, the major difference between Bluehost and GoDaddy is the support you receive when building a website after you’ve signed up for a hosting plan. GoDaddy has its own in-house, drag-and-drop website builder, whereas Bluehost integrates with Weebly and WordPress.org.
This is one of the key differences between Bluehost and GoDaddy. If you want to build your own site, but you’re not technically savvy, GoDaddy provides the structured, intuitive experience you probably need. For a site built in WordPress, we’d recommend Bluehost above anyone else.
GoDaddy offers a very user-friendly interface that makes it easy to get started with your hosting account.
Bluehost vs GoDaddy – Features and Ease of Use: Verdict
GoDaddy offers slightly better features and ease of use than Bluehost, though it’s definitely a close call! GoDaddy’s in-house, drag-and-drop website builder keeps the setup process simple, and it provides a comprehensive offering for users. Most websites probably won’t max out GoDaddy’s 100GB storage space limit either, and its cheapest plans start at 25GB in comparison to Bluehost’s 10GB.
Pricing & Value for Money
The Winner
Bluehost is better value for money
The real reason a lot of you are here is to find out which one’s cheaper. Bluehost and GoDaddy are both safe, reliable hosting options. But, if value for money is an important factor for you when making your decision, go for Bluehost.
There are cheaper options if you commit to a longer contract, but we’ll be sharing the per month pricing for the 12-month plans below.
Bluehost | GoDaddy | |
---|---|---|
Shared Hosting | $2.95–$13.95 | $8.99–$22.99 |
WordPress Hosting | $2.95–$13.95 | $8.99–$18.99 |
WooCommerce Hosting | $9.95–12.95 | $20.99 |
VPS Hosting | $24.99–$83.99 | $5.99–$118.99 |
Dedicated Hosting | $99.99–$139.99 | $159.99–$469.99 |
Reseller Hosting | Outsourced for $16.99–$36.99 | $8.99–$14.99 |
Further Information
- Bluehost Pricing Review: Discover which Bluehost plan offers the best value for money.
- GoDaddy Pricing Review: Learn more about the cost of a GoDaddy plan.
It’s an old trick by all of the website hosting providers to a) always have a ‘sale’ on, and b) have a bunch of add-ons that you’ll need to pay for on top of the basic monthly rate. A Tesla on sale for $50 sounds great until you learn you need to buy the wheels and engine separately.
Neither Bluehost or GoDaddy get too cheeky with their pricing. You shouldn’t expect to pay more than a few dollars per month to get a website off the ground, regardless of the one you choose. On the whole though, we think Bluehost offers a little bit more value per plan – especially given that GoDaddy’s shared hosting renewal rate soon jumps up to $8.99 per month.
It’s worth noting that our research finds Bluehost to be the best choice for dedicated hosting. Bluehost scores 4.7 out of 5 overall for the hosting type, and comes out on top for value for money in dedicated hosting.
Additionally, both providers offer 30-day money-back guarantees, which is a brilliant option to have if you want to test the waters.
Bluehost in Action: Ryan Mungia
As a small business owner, you shouldn't have to think about your web hosting too often. If it doesn't cross your mind for an entire year, it's doing a good job.
Bluehost vs GoDaddy – Pricing: Verdict
Bluehost offers better value for money than GoDaddy. Neither provider is going to burn a hole in your pocket, but Bluehost’s excellent customer support and competitive renewal prices make it the winning provider here.
Which Has Better WordPress Integration?
The Winner
Bluehost is best for WordPress integration
It would be remiss to not give WordPress.org its own section when comparing hosting providers. A solid third of the internet is built on WordPress and, if you’re looking to arrange hosting yourself, there’s a decent chance you’ll be joining those ranks.
Bluehost is the best platform for WordPress integration. That’s not solely our opinion either. WordPress itself recommends Bluehost (along with DreamHost and SiteGround) as “the best and brightest of the hosting world”.
Bluehost’s WordPress expertise extends to its WooCommerce features as well. If you’re running an online store, Bluehost’s WooCommerce plans come with one-click integrations for payment processing tools, and a compatible online store theme that’s already set up for you.
Further Information
- WordPress Review: Everything you need to know about the CMS powering 1/3rd of the internet.
- Best WordPress Hosting Provider: A closer look at the strengths of Bluehost for WordPress.
- How to Install WordPress with Bluehost: Our step-by-step guide to installing Bluehost on WordPress.
Installing WordPress.org (and/or WooCommerce) on Bluehost is literally a one-click process. If you felt so inclined, you could have a functioning website up within minutes of confirming your hosting plan. Bluehost understands that WordPress is its bread and butter, so its strength in this area is unlikely to dwindle any time soon.
That being said, GoDaddy integrates fairly smoothly with WordPress as well, but you’re here for a comparison, and Bluehost is comfortably ahead at the moment.
Bluehost vs GoDaddy – WordPress Integration: Verdict
When it comes to WordPress integration, Bluehost is the clear winner. This provider has been recommended by WordPress itself since 2005, and for good reason. Bluehost beats GoDaddy for WordPress integration, because Bluehost is simply easier, faster, and seamless to use.
Which Has a Better Switching Process?
The Winner
Bluehost makes it easy to switch providers
If you already have a hosting provider, and are looking to make the switch to Bluehost or GoDaddy, then you’ll want to make sure you don’t end up with a technical headache that could’ve been avoided. The good news is that neither provider makes website migration particularly difficult – but there is a clear winner between the two!
Bluehost offers a professional switching service for a one-time fee of $149.99, which migrates up to five websites and 20 email accounts. All the work is done for you. Bluehost’s team of experts offer expedited service and complete migration of all the databases and files associated with your old hosting account – and you don’t have to lift a finger, or have any migration knowledge!
On the other hand, switching your website to GoDaddy involves a little more work. It’s definitely doable, and it is free – but that’s because GoDaddy doesn’t offer a completely hands-off migration process. Non-WordPress websites have to be migrated manually, which involves downloading your website’s files from your old hosting provider, and then uploading them to GoDaddy. WordPress websites are a little easier – these can be migrated to GoDaddy in the “My Products” section of an existing GoDaddy account, where you’ll need to choose your desired hosting plan and provide information about the site you’d like to transfer.
Bluehost vs GoDaddy – Switching Process: Verdict
Bluehost is the winner when it comes to switching your hosting provider. Its free WordPress migration option is a huge asset, and the paid migration option is stress-free. Switching a website to GoDaddy isn’t painful, but it definitely isn’t as easy as switching to Bluehost.
Further Information
- How to Move a WordPress Site to a New Host: Learn how to manually migrate a WordPress site in eight steps.
- How to Transfer a Domain Name to a New Host: Five steps for moving your domain name.
Help and Support
The Winner
Bluehost has better customer support overall
Good help and support is invaluable when it comes to hosting. Things don’t go wrong often, but when they do, you want the techies in your corner.
Bluehost and GoDaddy both tick most of the boxes, offering knowledge centers, live chat, and 24/7 phone support. For commonplace problems, this is all you’re likely to need.
Bluehost’s knowledge center is a bit more thorough overall. That said, GoDaddy’s knowledge center is also helpful. And, if you don’t find the information you’re looking for there, both providers are so widely used that someone, somewhere, will have encountered the same problem as you and shared the solution online.
The big difference is Bluehost offers support tickets, while GoDaddy doesn’t. Sometimes only personalized attention will do, and, at the very least, it’s good to have the option. The race is close between the two providers in this category, and there are other key differences to scrutinize between Bluehost and GoDaddy.
Bluehost vs GoDaddy – Support: Verdict
Bluehost has better customer support than GoDaddy. Bluehost offers support tickets while GoDaddy doesn’t, and tickets are an easy way to solve many website issues. Bluehost’s knowledge base surpasses GoDaddy’s, and you can learn a lot by browsing the articles posted there.
Bluehost vs GoDaddy Hosting: Conclusion
Bluehost and GoDaddy are such established, reliable hosting platforms that going with either will put you in safe hands. The pair have both been around for an age in internet terms, so the two know what they’re doing. Here’s a quick recap of how each one performed in all of the important areas:
Bluehost | GoDaddy | |
---|---|---|
Features, Performance, & Ease of Use Winner: GoDaddy | Bluehost has a large number of features to enjoy, including free backups, unmetered bandwidth, and a free domain. Its interface is more polished than GoDaddy. | GoDaddy offers a comprehensive experience, with its hosting services and website builder in the same place. It has great features, an impressive server response time, and is super easy to use. |
Pricing & Value for Money Winner: Bluehost | Bluehost's hosting plans are extremely cost-effective, and its renewal prices are very competitive. Bluehost also offers a 30-day money-back guarantee. | GoDaddy's introductory costs are a little higher than Bluehost, but its plans still won't set you back too much. Pricing between plans and hosting types can also be fairly erratic, but GoDaddy offers a 30-day money-back guarantee. |
WordPress integration Winner: Bluehost | Bluehost is the best platform for WordPress integration. All it takes is one click, and Bluehost is even recommended by WordPress! | GoDaddy does have WordPress integration capabilities, but the process is not as seamless as Bluehost. |
Migration Winner: Bluehost | Bluehost offers both a paid and free switching service. All it takes is a few clicks, and Bluehost's support team will be on hand throughout the process. | Switching with GoDaddy isn't a simple task. Although still free, you'll need to do the work yourself! |
Help and Support Winner: Bluehost | Bluehost has excellent help and support options, including an awesome knowledge center, 24/7 phone, live chat, and email services. | GoDaddy offers 24/7 phone and live chat support, but it doesn't provide help via email. |
Are You Ready? | Bluehost | GoDaddy |
Whether you go with Bluehost or GoDaddy depends entirely on your needs. If you want great value for money, or want to host a WordPress.org site, Bluehost is a better fit. If you want all of your website elements in one place, GoDaddy takes the lead. Both providers offer 30-day money-back guarantees, so there’s minimal risk to give one of them a spin.
FAQs
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