HostGator vs HostPapa
HostGator and HostPapa compared on measured uptime, response time, pricing and features from our own tests. HostGator scores higher overall.
By Jennifer T. · Updated
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Verdict
HostGatorWins overall
Newfold's Texas-born cPanel host: four shared tiers on a 36-month term with a free domain, Cloudflare CDN and staging
Canadian cPanel host with phone support in 16 countries and five data centers; backups cost extra after year one
HostGator wins 2 of the six sub-scores and comes out ahead overall (7.4 vs 7.3).
How do the scores compare?
HostGator leads on 2 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 $10.99/mo). Intro prices need the listed term.
What does each include?
| HostGator | HostPapa | |
|---|---|---|
| Free domain | First year on every plan; $22.99 is deducted from a refund if you cancel within the year | 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, auto-renewed | Standard certificate |
| Backups | Weekly courtesy backups, restorable with one click; the terms call them a courtesy, so keep your own | Not stated |
| Free migration | A free site migration tool is listed on the plan cards; the comparison table on the same page says paid migration is available | Yes |
| Free CDN | Cloudflare with Argo routing on every plan | Not stated |
| Caching | Static content caching and object caching on every plan; the feature list names an NGINX caching layer | Not stated |
| Staging | WordPress staging site on every plan | On every plan |
| SSH and languages | SSH, WP-CLI, cron, PHP 8.2, Ruby on Rails, Perl, Python, unlimited MySQL and SFTP users | Not stated |
| Resource limits | No | Not stated |
| Data center choice | No | Not stated |
| Uptime guarantee | The plan page says 99 percent; the terms we read contain no uptime clause or credit schedule | 99.9% measured monthly, excluding scheduled maintenance, as a reasonable-efforts commitment; no credit schedule in the terms |
| Security | Malware scanning, AI-powered detection and removal from Baby up, web application firewall, DDoS protection, DDoS scrub center | Imunify360 basic on Essentials; Protection Power plus Imunify360 on Growth and above, free for the full term |
| Unlimited POP3 and IMAP mailboxes with SpamAssassin; Pro Email is a paid product after a free trial | Not stated | |
| Phone support | Baby, Business and Pro; Hatchling is chat only | 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 |