Hostgator vs Bluehost: 2023 Comparison [Backed by Data]

HostGator and Bluehost are two leading web hosting providers known for their affordable packages. As industry veterans, we’ve extensively tested both to bring you a comprehensive head-to-head comparison.

In our analysis, we pit Bluehost against HostGator on 16+ features and performance tests, ultimately crowning a winner in this close competition.

Although both companies rank among the top ten hosting providers worldwide, popularity doesn’t always equate to performance.

Our in-depth comparison of HostGator and Bluehost covers essential categories, such as speed, uptime, security, and customer support, to help you make an informed decision about which provider best meets your needs.

Introducing Hostgator

Founded in 2002, Hostgator quickly made a name for itself in the hosting market. It has hosted over 2.5 million websites and operates with over 1,000 full-time staff.

So it’s no surprise why Hostgator was acquired in 2012 by the Endurance International Group (EIG) for an aggregate purchase price of $299.8 million.

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Introducing Bluehost

Founded in 2003 in Utah, Bluehost also powers over 2 million websites. With 750+ employees on its roster, the company has seen slightly lower growth levels than Hostgator.

However, Bluehost has been on an upward trend with no signs of slowing down since it first opened its doors. In 2010, they were also acquired by EIG which now owns a solid portfolio of hosting companies.

Now, you might be wondering whether there’s any difference between these services given the same parent company now owns them.

We were surprised to see one company does indeed offer better performance. However, the other web host offers move value and a lower price tag.

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Bluehost vs Hostgator: Web Hosting Plans Compared

The only initial differences appear to come down to managed Woocommerce hosting and cloud hosting options. At first glance, it appears that the plans offered by Hostgator and BlueHost are very similar.

Bluehost supports e-commerce store owners using WordPress by offering managed Woocommerce hosting. Hostgator doesn’t.

On the other hand, Hostgator offers cloud hosting options though Bluehost doesn’t.

In the next few sections, you’ll see how the plans offered by each host compare at a more detailed level.

All in all, Hostgator and Bluehost are very popular because of their cheap pricing. So all their services are suited to website owners who are willing to sacrifice performance for a lower price tag.

1. Shared Hosting

When looking at Hostgator vs Bluehost pricing, first impressions can be deceiving. Both web hosts offer cheap deals on the condition that you sign up for a long-term plan.

In addition to their evergreen deals, you can also score extra discounts during sale periods such as Black Friday and Cyber Monday.

Essentially, both Bluehost and Hostgator are using loss-leader pricing strategies. They won’t make as much money from the initial sale, but they will make more sales by dropping their rates as low as they do. They recoup their profits by charging more upon renewal or through upselling offers.

That’s why they have as high a market share as they do. They are among the most affordable web hosts on the market.

Evergreen Promotional Pricing

Bluehost’s promotional pricing is available for a 12-month term, whereas Hostgator’s is available for up to 3 years if you buy 36 months upfront.

Interestingly, if you wanted to buy 36 months upfront with Bluehost, you’d be charged $4.95/ month instead of $2.95/month (for their lowest tier). It’s still a discount compared to the renewal rate through almost double the cost of their cheapest deal.

In any case, if the price is your biggest concern, Hostgator’s promotional pricing works out cheaper.

Renewal Pricing

Winner: Hostgator is a clear winner on shared hosting if the price is a concern for you. It comes in cheaper for both the promotional and renewal pricing rates.

2. Managed WordPress Website Hosting

Bluehost is a top hosting provider for many WordPress websites. It is recommended by WordPress.org[1], alongside DreamHost and Siteground.

However, Hostgator also offers WordPress site hosting.

As per the above data, both Hostgator and Bluehost offer managed WordPress website hosting and shared WordPress hosting.

We have covered the difference between Dreamhost and Hostgator, and Siteground vs Hostgator in different articles.

Hostgator does not offer managed Woocommerce hosting for any WordPress-based e-commerce stores though Bluehost does.

Promotional Pricing

Renewal Pricing

Winner: Hostgator comes out on top with regard to pricing for shared and managed WordPress hosting.

If you have an e-commerce store, Bluehost is the better host of the two.

3. VPS & Dedicated Hosting Plans

When comparing dedicated and VPS hosting to shared hosting, we must note that we’re not comparing apples to apples here.

VPS Hosting

It depends on whether price or features matter more to you. As far as price goes for VPS web hosting, Hostgator has slightly lower promotional prices. They’re negligible unless you’re considering a plan offering 8GB RAM.

Winner: However, we’ve chosen Bluehost for this round because of their significantly cheaper renewal prices. You could save up to $50 a month!

In saying this, if you’re looking for more SSD storage, Hostgator offers significantly more and with unlimited bandwidth to boot!

Dedicated Hosting

Once again, at first glance, it appears that Bluehost is significantly cheaper than Hostgator. However, for the value that Hostgator’s hosting plans include, the additional price may be worth it to you.

Winner: We’re handing it to Hostgator for this round.

Hostgator’s smallest plan offers 4 core/ 8 thread and 8 GB RAM. To get the same features with Bluehost, you would be paying more per month unless you buy 36 months in advance.

Honestly, if you can afford to pay that much upfront, your website will likely need a better-performing solution than what either Bluehost or Hostgator can offer.

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Features Comparison

1. Ease of Use

Both Bluehost and Hostgator offer classic cPanel-based solutions. It can seem a little daunting for people just starting to navigate a cPanel dashboard. You can also feel overwhelmed with all the upsell offers that show up.

However, there are many features and actions you can perform in this space once you get the hang of it.

Winner: Both are just as intuitive and easy to use as each other.

2. Speed

Slow-loading websites are constantly losing money. Poor web hosting services could also be costing you a tonne of hard-earned cash.

So we put Bluehost and Hostgator to the test to see who puts their money where their mouth is.

GT Metrix

Pingdom

Winner: We’re handing this one to Bluehost. The data above indicates better performance compared with Hostgator; that much is clear.

But, we’re not gonna lie; we weren’t super impressed by either of these companies as far as speed performance is concerned.

If speed is an essential feature for your website, check out our post on the fastest web hosting companies. Compared to other companies on this list, Bluehost does offer a nice balance between affordability and performance.

3. Uptime

Any decent web host should be able to put their money where their mouth is and deliver the uptime levels they guarantee.

In saying that, no web host can guarantee 100% uptime. Hostgator guarantees 99.90%, whereas Bluehost guarantees 99.98%.

Hostgator Uptime

Historically, Hostgator had the highest uptime guarantee for shared web hosting at 99.99%.

We’ve noticed that Hostgator’s servers’ performance was unable to meet this level of uptime over recent years. Instead of improving its server infrastructure, Hostgator has opted to reduce their uptime guarantee to 99.90%.

This allows Hostgator’s servers to experience up to 8 hours and 45 minutes of downtime per year instead of just 52 minutes – per the original guarantee.

While Hostgator’s web hosting packages were unable to meet the original guarantee, uptime is generally relatively stable, with only 4 downtime events in 2021. According to Pingdom’s uptime monitoring, Hostgator’s average uptime has been 99.89% since 2015.[2]

Bluehost Uptime

Bluehost has experienced a few more downtime events than Hostgator in recent years. In 2021, there were 22 minutes of downtime in total, and most downtime events lasted longer than 3 minutes.

This means that Bluehost occasionally is unable to meet its guarantee. However, historically, Bluehost has a higher uptime rate than Hostgator even when it is unable to meet the guarantee.

Winner: We’re handing it to Bluehost. Solid uptime is a critical feature you should be looking for in your web hosting provider if you care about your site’s performance.

4. Customer Support

Given that Hostgator and Bluehost are both web hosting aimed at beginner markets, customer support is another crucial feature that their audiences will need to rely on.

To compare the level of customer support between these two web hosting providers, we turned to Trustpilot. You can access Bluehost’s page here, and Hostgator’s here.

Bluehost’s Support

Bluehost’s rating on Trustpilot

Hostgator’s Support 

Hostgator’s rating on Trustpilot

It’s clear in our Bluehost vs Hostgator comparison that they both offer average support.

Winner: If we had to pick one, we’re going with Hostgator only because there is a smaller percentage of bad reviews. The overall average is also higher so that helps.

But, making this decision is like voting for a politician based on who you hate the least. Thankfully with hosting, you can look beyond these two choices and go with a company that offers MUCH better support.

Check out our list of the best small business hosting companies for alternatives if customer support is as important to you as it is to us.

5. CDN

To help deliver your content to audiences worldwide, web hosting companies rely on content delivery networks (CDN).

Both Hostgator and Bluehost offer free CDN options, and you can choose between SiteLock CDN or Cloudflare.

As far as the best free CDN service available, Cloudflare is firmly in the lead. Offering incredibly fast content delivery for both static and dynamic content, Cloudflare can help businesses reach global audiences without sacrificing the loading speed of their websites.

Compared to Cloudflare, SiteLock leaves a lot to be desired.

Winner: It’s a tie since both hosts offer the same features for free and through the same providers.

6. Servers & Locations

For anyone targeting audiences in a specific location, it’s worth looking at where your website’s servers are located.

Both Hostgator and Bluehost have servers in the US.

The locations of Bluehosts’s data centers are unclear on their website. So we reached out to support and confirmed they are only available in Utah, US.

Hostgator’s data centers are located in Utah and Texas. You can find out more about Hostgator’s servers here.

Winner: It’s a tie. Neither company offers flexibility with server locations.

7. Storage

For anyone with a media or data-heavy website, storage will be a big factor for you to consider. Most website owners won’t reach their storage limits; however, if you know you’ll need more storage space than the average website user, here’s what we’ve found.

Hostgator offers unmetered storage on all shared plans. Bluehost offers only 50GB on their lowest tier of the shared web hosting plan and unlimited on the rest.

A quick word about unlimited vs unlimited bandwidth. Essentially, it’s the same thing. No web host can truly offer unlimited storage since every server has a storage capacity.

However, instead of only allocating you a fixed amount of the disk’s storage space, with unmetered hosting, you can use as much as you need. Fair usage rules apply, but most websites won’t come close to reaching those limits.

Regarding dedicated and VPS hosting, Hostgator offers more storage and RAM for lower prices.

Winner: Hostgator since there is no hard limit on any shared hosting plans, and they also offer more storage for lower rates on VPS and dedicated hosting plans.

8. Security

If you look on the website of any web host, you’re bound to find some version of “we offer the best security” there.

It can be challenging to look beyond the sales pitch and know for sure that they will stand by their words. There’s also the matter of how each company defines “best” and to what lengths they will go to ensure your website is safe.

Winner: It’s a tough call since many features sound the same on the surface. We’re handing it to Hostgator, though.

We like that they include free backups on all tiers of their shared hosting. Backups are crucial in case something goes wrong!

However, there are caveats with both Hostgator and Bluehost when it comes to their backup policies. Let’s look at that next.

9. Backups

Since most people using Hostgator or Bluehost are beginners, backups will be an essential feature.

If anything ever goes wrong, being able to restore a backup easily will make all the difference.

However, upon researching the backup policies of both Hostgator and Bluehost, we’re a little disappointed with what we found.

Bluehost’s Backup Policy

Bluehost makes it very clear that they take no responsibility for failed backups. They do offer free backups for customers, but they’re “not guaranteed in any way.”[3]

Since most people buy Bluehost’s cheaper plans, likely, they won’t receive any backups at all. Free backups are only included in Bluehost’s more expensive plans.

Customers on the cheaper plans need to pay extra for a third-party service to take care of daily automated backups.

Also, Bluehost doesn’t offer redundant or mirrored backups.

Hostgator’s Backup Policy

Hostgator’s approach to backups is also very similar to Bluehost’s.

Hostgator makes it very clear that they take no responsibility for failed backups. They do offer free backups for customers, but they’re also “not guaranteed in any way”.[4]

Besides, they only take backups once a week on a random day.

Winner: Hostgator. All their customers get free weekly backups. Although this isn’t great in itself, it’s a step up from Bluehost’s non-existent backups for most customers.

With both companies, the option to buy a third-party service to handle daily, automated backups is available.

10. Domains

Both Bluehost and Hostgator offer a free domain name for the first year. This offer is bundled with their hosting plans and cannot be added separately to other plans.

Bluehost also offers domain privacy completely free on its expensive hosting plan tiers. Hostgator doesn’t.

If you get a free domain name with your hosting plan, it will renew for around $18 per year. We recommend looking at cheaper places to buy domains if budget is a concern for you.

Both Hostgator and Bluehost offer unlimited domains for parking and unlimited sub-domains on comparable plans. So for these domain features, we’ve considered them equal.

All in all, the Hostgator and Bluehost offers are very similar.

Winner: We’re handing this one to Bluehost because they include free domain privacy on some plans.

11. Migrations

If you have an existing website and want to switch hosting providers, you’ll need to factor in the cost of migration.

Hostgator offers free professional migrations, whereas Bluehost charges a fee.

Bluehost’s free migrations are limited and not available to all users. Even so, they are through a website migrator plugin which can often be hit or miss. You can, however, pay to migrate up to five websites.

Winner: Hostgator. Being able to offer free professional migrations for beginners is a great incentive!

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Pros & Cons

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FAQs

Is Bluehost Good for Beginners?

Yes, Bluehost is good for beginners. It is simple and straightforward, and it serves both novice and seasoned webmasters well.

Because of its user-friendliness, WordPress is the platform of choice for many inexperienced webmasters, and Bluehost offers an excellent WordPress hosting service.

Is Hostgator Better Than Bluehost?

Whether Hostgator is better than Bluehost is hard to say. We believe it is a tie. HostGator has superior features for beginners but is just as good as the other providers when it comes to things like support and speed.

Yet, Bluehost’s WordPress plans shine brighter than HostGator’s, and Bluehost’s overall speed is superior. Even though Bluehost is our top pick, the ideal host for you will depend on your specific requirements.

Who Owns Bluehost and Hostgator?

Bluehost and Hostgator are owned by The Endurance International Group (EIG). EIG is a web hosting specialist with over 2,000 workers in the IT industry. EIG also owns the iPage, Fatcow, Dotster, PowWeb, Netfirms, and BigRock hosting names.

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Hostgator vs Bluehost: The Ultimate Winner

If you have a WordPress website and are choosing between these two popular web hosting companies, our top pick is Hostgator.

Hostgator is a better option for you if you are making a price-conscious decision. Not only are the dollar values lower on most accounts, but Hostgator also squeezes more into their hosting plans than Bluehost does.

However, it had some significant shortfalls too.

The main difference between Bluehost and Hostgator is Bluehost performed much better in our performance tests than Hostgator did.

As supported by the data shared in our Hostgator vs Bluehost review, most other features are equal between these two hosting companies.