Hosting.com vs IONOS
Hosting.com and IONOS compared on measured uptime, response time, pricing and features from our own tests. Hosting.com scores higher overall.
By Jennifer T. · Updated
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Verdict
Hosting.comWins overall
The former A2 Hosting under World Host Group: stated cores and RAM, 30-day backups, staging from Pro, phone support
The former 1&1: unlimited sites and traffic from $8 a month at renewal, with a free domain and wildcard SSL
Hosting.com wins 4 of the six sub-scores and comes out ahead overall (7.7 vs 7.1).
How do the scores compare?
Hosting.com leads on 4 sub-scores, IONOS on 2. Higher is better.
| Hosting.com | IONOS | |
|---|---|---|
| Performance | 8.5 (better) | 6.5 |
| Uptime | 8.0 (better) | 7.5 |
| Support | 6.0 | 6.5 (better) |
| Features | 8.5 (better) | 7.5 |
| Value | 7.0 | 7.5 (better) |
| Ease of use | 7.5 (better) | 7.0 |
Which one is faster and more reliable?
| Hosting.com | IONOS | |
|---|---|---|
| Overall score | 7.7 (better) | 7.1 |
| Uptime (published)Kripesh Adwani 365 d vs Cybernews 14 d; methods differ | 99.99% | 100.00% (better) |
| Response time (published)HostingStep vs Cybernews; methods differ | 500 ms (better) | 1749 ms |
Which one costs less?
On renewal, Hosting.com is cheaper ($13.99/mo vs $14.00/mo). Intro prices need the listed term.
| Hosting.com | IONOS | |
|---|---|---|
| Cheapest plan | Starter | Plus |
| Intro price | $1.99/mo | $1.00/mo (better) |
| Renewal price | $13.99/mo (better) | $14.00/mo |
| Required term | 48 months | 12 months (better) |
| Websites | 5 | unlimited |
| Storage | 15 GB | 350 GB |
| Money back | 30 days | 30 days |
What does each include?
| Hosting.com | IONOS | |
|---|---|---|
| Free domain | First year | One domain free for the first year on every plan: .us, .ca, .com, .net, .org, .info, .me, .biz or .online |
| Free SSL | Standard on Starter and Pro; premium certificate on Max | One DV wildcard certificate on Essential, Starter and Plus; unlimited wildcard certificates on Ultimate |
| Daily backups | Stored off-server, restore to any point in the last 30 days | Not stated |
| Staging | 3 sites on Starter, 20 on Pro, 200 on Max | No |
| Free managed migration | Yes | Not stated |
| Web application firewall and malware removal | Yes | Not stated |
| Caching and hardware | LiteSpeed caching, tuned MySQL, AMD EPYC CPUs, NVMe storage | Not stated |
| AI website builder for WordPress | Yes | Not stated |
| OpenAPI and MCP server | On every plan; Claude skills pack and Node.js from Pro | Not stated |
| Uptime guarantee | 99.9% per month; 5% of the service fee credited per hour of unscheduled downtime, up to the full month, on request | 99.99% in the general terms, with a credit for the month proportional to the downtime, on request and at IONOS's discretion |
| Service level agreement | Max plan only | Not stated |
| Phone support | +1 (734) 222-4678, 24/7/365 | 24/7, with a personal consultant |
| Windows hosting | No | No |
| Backups | Not stated | Daily backup of storage and databases with data recovery, every plan |
| Free migration | Not stated | No |
| Free CDN | Not stated | Starter, Plus and Ultimate; not on Essential |
| Caching | Not stated | Server compression and HTTP/2 listed; no caching layer named on the plan page |
| SSH, SFTP, WP-CLI and Git | Not stated | Every plan, with 200 SFTP accounts, Perl and Python |
| PHP versions | Not stated | 8.4, 8.3 and 8.2, with paid extended support for 5.6 and later |
| Resource limits | Not stated | CPU priority 1x, 3x, 5x and 10x by plan; 262,144 inodes on every plan; cron jobs 10, 25, 50 and 100 |
| Websites and traffic | Not stated | Unlimited websites and unlimited traffic on every plan; 5,000 subdomains |
| Not stated | 1, 2, 4 or 5 accounts of 2 GB by plan, with forwarding, webmail and anti-spam | |
| Data center choice | Not stated | No |
| Security | Not stated | Daily malware scanning (basic, or advanced with automatic removal on Ultimate), DDoS protection, geo-redundancy |
Company facts
| Hosting.com | IONOS | |
|---|---|---|
| Control panel | cPanel with the hosting.com panel on top | IONOS's own control panel (no cPanel) |
| Data centers | 5 (better) | 2 |
| Support channels | chat, ticket, phone, email, knowledge-base | chat, phone, email, knowledge-base |
| Founded | 2003 | 2018 |