Cloudways vs HostPapa
Cloudways and HostPapa compared on measured uptime, response time, pricing and features from our own tests. Cloudways scores higher overall.
By Jennifer T. · Updated
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Verdict
CloudwaysWins overall
DigitalOcean's managed cloud layer: servers from $11 a month on five clouds, billed hourly, staging and caching included
Canadian cPanel host with phone support in 16 countries and five data centers; backups cost extra after year one
Cloudways wins 3 of the six sub-scores and comes out ahead overall (7.8 vs 7.3).
How do the scores compare?
Cloudways leads on 3 sub-scores, HostPapa on 2. Higher is better.
Which one is faster and more reliable?
Which one costs less?
On renewal, HostPapa is cheaper ($8.99/mo vs $14.00/mo). Intro prices need the listed term.
| Cloudways | HostPapa | |
|---|---|---|
| Cheapest plan | DigitalOcean Premium Micro | Essentials |
| Intro price | $14.00/mo | $2.95/mo (better) |
| Renewal price | $14.00/mo | $8.99/mo (better) |
| Required term | 1 months (better) | 36 months |
| Websites | unlimited | 1 |
| Storage | 25 GB | 25 GB |
| Money back | 0 days | 30 days (better) |
What does each include?
| Cloudways | HostPapa | |
|---|---|---|
| Free domain | No | First year, on terms of one year or longer, select extensions; a non-refundable domain fee applies if you cancel in the first term |
| Free SSL | Let's Encrypt certificates on every application | Standard certificate |
| Backups | On-demand and scheduled server backups with one-click restore; offsite storage billed at $0.033 per GB per server | Not stated |
| Free migration | Free migration of existing sites | Yes |
| Free CDN | No | Not stated |
| Caching | Lightning Stack (NGINX), Object Cache Pro and Redis included on every plan | Not stated |
| Staging | Advanced staging and cloning on every plan | On every plan |
| No | Not stated | |
| Resource limits | A whole server per customer: 1 to 8 GB RAM and 1 to 4 vCPU on the listed sizes, larger sizes and other providers available | Not stated |
| Data center choice | The provider's regions, chosen per server: DigitalOcean 9, Vultr 30, Linode 25, AWS 28, Google Cloud 28 | Not stated |
| Uptime guarantee | No | 99.9% measured monthly, excluding scheduled maintenance, as a reasonable-efforts commitment; no credit schedule in the terms |
| Security | Built-in firewall with IP blocking, WordPress vulnerability scanner, bot protection and dedicated firewalls per the pricing page | Imunify360 basic on Essentials; Protection Power plus Imunify360 on Growth and above, free for the full term |
| Free trial | 3 days without a credit card | Not stated |
| Phone support | No | 24/7, local numbers in 16 countries |
| Windows hosting | No | No |
| Automated backups | Not stated | 1 GB on Essentials and 5 GB on Growth free for the first year; a paid add-on afterwards |
| CDN | Not stated | Yes |
| Server resources | Not stated | Relative tiers 1x, 2x, 4x, 8x; cores, inodes and database size not published on the plan cards |
| Choice of data center | Not stated | Toronto, Buffalo, Miami, Los Angeles or Amsterdam, per the data centers page |