SiteGround vs Kinsta
SiteGround and Kinsta compared on measured uptime, response time, pricing and features from our own tests. SiteGround scores higher overall.
By Jennifer T. · Updated
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Verdict
SiteGroundWins overall
Managed-feel shared hosting on Google Cloud with daily backups and staging; the renewals are the price
Managed WordPress hosting from $30 a month with flat renewals, 30 data centers, edge caching and 14-day backups
SiteGround wins 2 of the six sub-scores and comes out ahead overall (8.0 vs 7.9).
How do the scores compare?
SiteGround leads on 2 sub-scores, Kinsta on 1. Higher is better.
| SiteGround | Kinsta | |
|---|---|---|
| Performance | 8.0 | 8.0 |
| Uptime | 8.5 | 8.5 |
| Support | 8.5 (better) | 8.0 |
| Features | 8.5 | 8.5 |
| Value | 6.5 (better) | 6.0 |
| Ease of use | 8.0 | 8.5 (better) |
Which one is faster and more reliable?
| SiteGround | Kinsta | |
|---|---|---|
| Overall score | 8.0 (better) | 7.9 |
| Uptime (published)HostingStep 243 d vs HostingStep 366 d; methods differ | 99.97% | 100.00% (better) |
| Response time (published)HostingStep vs HostingStep; methods differ | 745 ms | 525 ms (better) |
Which one costs less?
On renewal, SiteGround is cheaper ($17.99/mo vs $30.00/mo). Intro prices need the listed term.
| SiteGround | Kinsta | |
|---|---|---|
| Cheapest plan | StartUp | Single 20GB |
| Intro price | $2.99/mo (better) | $30.00/mo |
| Renewal price | $17.99/mo (better) | $30.00/mo |
| Required term | 12 months | 12 months |
| Websites | 1 | 1 |
| Storage | 10 GB | 10 GB |
| Money back | 30 days | 30 days |
What does each include?
| SiteGround | Kinsta | |
|---|---|---|
| Free domain | First year only; regular renewal fee after that | No |
| Free SSL | Yes | Wildcard certificates through Cloudflare on every plan |
| Daily backups | Kept for 30 days; on-demand backups on GrowBig and GoGeek | Not stated |
| CDN | SiteGround CDN on Google Cloud, 170+ edge locations | Not stated |
| Email hosting | Unlimited accounts with webmail and spam protection | Not stated |
| Staging | GrowBig and GoGeek; GoGeek adds Git | Free one-click staging environments on every plan |
| Free migration | Automatic WordPress migrator on every plan; expert transfer by staff | Unlimited migrations by Kinsta's team |
| Caching | Multilevel caching with the Speed Optimizer plugin | Server-level caching and edge caching through Cloudflare |
| WP-CLI and SSH | Yes | Not stated |
| Fair-use limits | CPU seconds per hour 1,000 / 2,000 / 4,000; inodes 200k / 400k / 600k; 768 MB RAM per process; databases up to 1 GB | Not stated |
| Uptime guarantee | 99.9% per month; 5% of that month's fee as a service-extension credit | 99.9% per month in the SLA updated 25 September 2025, with credits as a percentage of the monthly value once downtime passes 43 minutes; up to 99.99% on custom plans |
| Choice of data center | 11 locations on Google Cloud, chosen at signup | Not stated |
| Phone support | No | No |
| Windows hosting | No | No |
| Backups | Not stated | Daily automatic backups kept 14 days on the entry plans (20 or 30 days higher up), plus manual, downloadable and hourly add-on backups |
| Free CDN | Not stated | Cloudflare CDN with edge caching, 260+ points of presence per the pricing page; 125 GB of CDN bandwidth a month on the entry plans |
| Not stated | No | |
| Resource limits | Not stated | Each site runs in its own container; plans are sized by server bandwidth or visits, storage and CDN bandwidth, with PHP worker counts in the compare table |
| Data center choice | Not stated | 30 locations chosen per site at creation |
| Security | Not stated | Fully managed WAF with DDoS protection, bot protection, free malware removal, SOC 2 Type II and ISO 27001 |
| Developer tools | Not stated | SSH, WP-CLI, Git, DevKinsta local environment, Kinsta API, built-in APM |
Company facts
| SiteGround | Kinsta | |
|---|---|---|
| Control panel | Site Tools (SiteGround's own panel) | MyKinsta (Kinsta's own dashboard); no cPanel |
| Data centers | 11 (better) | 1 |
| Support channels | chat, ticket, knowledge-base | chat, ticket, knowledge-base |
| Founded | 2004 | 2013 |