What is the significance of speed?

According to a research performed by the Aberdeen Group, a one-second delay results in 11 percent fewer page views, a 16 percent reduction in customer satisfaction, and a 7% drop in conversion rates.

Amazon took things a step further and performed their own research, only to discover that every 100 milliseconds of site performance optimization boosted revenue by 1%, which is a significant amount of money when you consider the company's turnover.

Basic

The basic plan from Bluehost is exceptionally affordable and gives you everything you need to set up a single, basic website. This includes unmetered bandwidth, free SSL certificate, a domain, 50 GB SSD storage, and five email accounts.

Plus

The next level up is the Plus plan. It’s slightly more expensive at roughly double the basic price but, again, still really affordable. Is it worth it? If you’re planning to have more than one website, yes, it’s absolutely worth it. The plus plan lets you host unlimited websites, bandwidth, and storage. You also get a free SSL certificate, and unlimited parked domains, subdomains, and email addresses.

Choice Plus

Bluehost’s premium plan is Choice Plus which is also surprisingly affordable. You get all the same perks as you do with the Plus plan as well as some bonus perks, like domain privacy, site backups, and help with spam.

What’s the Catch?

There is a catch to this pricing. While the monthly price is affordable, you cannot sign up and pay on a month-to-month basis. To get the best monthly price, you have to sign up for a 36-month agreement and pay upfront. There are 12 and 24 months options, too, but the longer you sign up for, the less you’ll pay per month.

There are good and bad things about this. First, if you like Bluehost and you know you’re going to keep your site up and running for a while, it’s definitely worth paying for three years upfront if you can afford it.

Depending on promotions, though, this can mean shelling out about $200. That said, it does lock you into the monthly rate, so, if the prices go up over the next three years or if a promotion expires, you won’t be surprised by an unexpected increase in a monthly bill.

Understandably, you might be hesitant to pay this much upfront and commit to three years of web hosting if you haven’t used Bluehost before. What if you’re not happy? The good news is that they offer a 30-day money-back guarantee, though there are some restrictions. As with most things, make sure you read the fine print before committing, especially for a long-term contract like this.

Also, note that the Bluehost pricing does not cover site migrations, so, if you are changing from another hosting provider, you’ll have to pay an extra fee. More on that later.

Hatchling

This is HostGator’s basic plan. It’s extremely affordable and includes one domain, one website, unmetered bandwidth, and a free SSL certification. The one thing that puts this and all other HostGator plans ahead of Bluehost is that they include free site migration.

Baby

The next tier up is the Baby plan, which is, again, extremely affordable. This plan includes everything you need to support multiple websites, including a free SSL certificate, unlimited disk space, and free site migration.

Business

HostGator’s business plan is its top-of-the-line option. It’s about twice the price of the Hatchling plan but is still very affordable. This plan gives you unlimited domains and bandwidth, a dedicated IP, SEO tools, an upgraded SSL certificate and, you guessed it, free website migration.

What’s the Catch?

HostGator is similar to Bluehost in that the longer a term you prepay for, the better your monthly rate, but you still have to pay upfront. That said, there are some notable differences.

Bluehost only offers 12, 24, and 36-month terms. With HostGator, you have a lot more options: one, three, six, 12, 24, or 36 months. You don’t really start seeing good monthly deals unless you sign up for at least a 12-month term, but having the option at least gives you a chance to try it out for a month or two before committing to a longer plan.

The price difference is significant, though. If you pay month to month, you’ll end up paying roughly three times as much as you would by signing up for a 36-year term.

HostGator has a slightly better money-back guarantee. You can try it out for 45 days but there are a lot of exceptions when it comes to refunds. For example, you don’t get back any admin fees, only those for shared or VPS hosting.

Another thing to consider is that HostGator is likely to significantly raise rates after the initial term expires. Again, make sure you read the fine print carefully so you know what you’re getting before you commit.

Bluehost vs Hostgator – Which has the better plan?

Honestly, the plans offered by Bluehost and HostGator are pretty equal. You’ll end up paying roughly the same about every month, though HostGator does give you more options. With Bluehost, the minimum term is 12 months. HostGator lets you sign up month-to-month, but it’s significantly more expensive because you can’t take advantage of special pricing.

The other big thing to consider is site migration. Bluehost doesn’t include it in its plans; HostGator does. What does that mean? With Bluehost, you can migrate up to five websites and 20 email accounts, but it’s going to cost you $150.