If performance and speed, tailored with security and support, are the only factors to consider when shopping for a web host, then A2 Hosting will be a top contender.
Most people probably never heard of this web host. Neither had I at first, which is a shame.
Because while A2 Hosting isn’t as famous as the favorite HostGator or BlueHost, they purport to offer a speed about 20x faster.
A2 Hosting is not new in the hosting space; this web host has been around since 2001 with a previous brand name, Iniquient, which is a good move. The company has a couple of data centers in several places in the world, including Amsterdam, Europe; Singapore, Asia; and Michigan, United States.
Also, they make a lot of claims such as ‘guru support’ and ‘99.9% uptime’, which is now starting to sound too good to be real.
So, are these all true?
Is A2 Hosting one of those companies who promise loss of hosting benefits and can’t back them up with incredible performance?
Let’s find out!
A2 Hosting Review – Quick Overview
Bryan Muthig is the founder of A2 Hosting and has been gaining the people’s attention with easy-to-use and high-powered web hosting.
Their turbo servers are said to be able to deliver up to 20x faster load time relative to most regular hosting. The company has been strictly focused on creating and maintaining a web hosting company that not only the public will be interesting in using, but also their staffs will be thrilled to use it themselves.
On top of that, it offers unlimited data transfer and storage, free site migration, and free solid-state drives – just to mention a few.
Besides that, this web host is one of the cheapest providers on the market with a minimum of $3.92 per month. And it offers a full refund for customers who find their services unsatisfactory within 30 days. Even better, A2 Hosting offers a prorated refund after 30 days for service not used.
Now, let’s consider the pros and cons of using this web host.
Pros of A2 Hosting
A2 hosting claims that their customer support and speeds are impressive. But how well do they score on these factors?
It turns out – surprisingly excellent.
Let’s check out the reasons:
Fastest Shared Hosting Provider
Do not forget that A2 promises a speed as high as 20x faster than most standard hosting.
Anything close to that bold, eye-catching statement would be great and lucrative, as well.
Most top online brands have a page load time under a second because anything higher than that value can result in you losing more than half of your traffic.
So, how well do A2 hosting score in this aspect?
In one word – excellent!
In fact, we could assume that they have instant loading times.
This web host has had a mean page loading times of 376 ms for more than ten months, which is one of the highest you can find anywhere. This means A2 hosting is more than 50% faster than the 890 ms industry average.
How is this possible?
A2 hosting takes extra precaution to ensure the shared hosting servers are not overcrowded and implement more functionality such as caching which save the stress of having to go back and request information from your site each time by storing relevant data on visitor’s browsers.
Fast and Efficient Customer Support
Ultra-fast load times are excellent. But it won’t matter if you have a lackluster experience with the customer support each time you have an issue and you need all the help you can get from them.
This aspect is another place A2 hosting scores high with friendly, helpful customer support to follow up their string of outstanding performance. Their support team is available 24 hours all through the year, and you can easily reach them via chat, ticket submission, phone, and email.
Well, you shouldn’t be surprised as this host has an A+ rating with the BBB. Considering the fact that they have been at it for more than 15 years make it impressive.
All in all, no matter the time or day you try to contact their support you will be connected instantly to a representative which you will find responsive, friendly and helpful within a minute.
Free Hack Scan Security
A2 features a couple of handy, preventative measure to ensure your website is safe from hackers using HackScan, which is a free service including brute force defense, 24/7 security monitoring, virus scanning, and dual web hosting firewall.
Although some top host offers similar features available for anyone to use, it’s totally useless if you don’t have an idea of what you’re doing. A2 offers more than just having these features somewhere lying down in your website; it helps run HackScan so you can have peace of mind while you run this site. On top of that, it eliminates the need to perform technical maintenance all the time regularly.
Free Site Migration
A2 hosting offers a free relocation from your existing hosting provider provided the site uses cPanel. You don’t have to worry if you are using a top web host then you shouldn’t be bothered.
Migrating from one site to another by yourself is always stressful and time-consuming except you a tech-savvy. And can also be a menial task if you own a large site with images, videos, pages, etc. this is a huge plus for A2 hosting, as other web hosts like BlueHost require you to shell out a couple of bucks.
30-day Money Back Guarantee
A2 Hosting offers a full refund for customers who may not like their experience with this host for any reason within 30 days. This shows their high level of confidence in their product.
Note: setup fees, domain registration, SSL certificate, and other migration fees are not eligible for this offer, which is no different for what other companies do too.
Compatible with CMS (Content Management Systems)
Installing common CMS like Joomla, Magento, WordPress, Drupal, and OpenCart is a breeze. Simple, painless, hassle-free, setup.
That’s not all: this web host features a pre-installed A2 optimized WordPress plugin. Sadly, this feature is only present in the Turbo package.
Cons of A2 Hosting
With all being said: A2Host offers impressive speed and support that makes it stand out in the competition. Plus, it comes with a unique twist on pricing, as they offer some bells and whistle such as free migration.
Sadly, nothing in this world is perfect, and the same goes for A2 hosting no matter how great their service appears.
Thus, here is some downsides of this web host:
Uptime falls to 99.91%
We can’t deny the importance of uptime, as downtime can result in you losing more money than you can imagine depending on your site’s worth.
This is how some people can tell a site or person hyping their service. Promising 100% uptime is over exaggerated and far from reality. Although having a 100% uptime is achievable, on very rare cases. According to several tests, it’s hard to pick a hosting provider capable of providing a 100% uptime for over ten months.
A2 hosting started with a strong, impressive uptime. Sadly, they suddenly appear to be slipping in the past few months. Now, they have dropped to an average of 99.91%, which is a bit below the industry standard. We hope they get their uptime back to the top.
Pricey
A popular saying, “you get what you pay for” seems to be true in this case. All these bells and whistles we’ve discussed above come at a price.
A2 hosting tends to come with a hefty price than the average hosting provider on the market. Similarly, they shed some amount off for customers who sign up for a longer term.
