If you’re looking for a cheap hosting provider, it’s pretty much a given that you’ll come across both Bluehost and iPage. They are both very cheap and are great for the budget conscious that prefer cheaper hosting solutions than more premium ones.
In this Bluehost vs iPage article, we’ll take a look at how they differ and see which one is better for you. To start, here’s a comparison of their web hosting (shared) plans.
Bluehost vs iPage Shared Hosting Comparison Chart
| Bluehost | iPage | |
 |  | |
| Price | Check Price at Bluehost.com | Check Price at iPage.com |
| No. of Websites | Basic: 1 website Unlimited for Choice, Choice Plus and Pro | Unlimited |
| Storage | Basic: 50 GB SSD Unlimited for Choice, Choice Plus and Pro | Unlimited |
| Bandwidth | Unmetered | Unmetered |
| Free SSL | Yes | Yes |
| Free Domain Name | Yes | Yes |
| Hosted Domains | Basic: 1 Domain Unlimited for Choice, Choice Plus and Pro | Unlimited |
| Control Panel | cPanel | vDeck |
| 1-Click Installer | Yes | Yes |
| Money Back Guarantee | 30 days | 30 days |
Price and Plans
Both Bluehost and iPage offer affordable hosting packages.
Bluehost has four shared hosting plans – Basic, Plus, Choice Plus and Pro. The Basic plan starts at $2.95/month, Plus and Choice Plus at $5.45/month and Pro at $13.95/month. These prices are for three year subscriptions; pricing for one and two year terms are a bit higher. Also, these prices are only for the initial term, once your contract is up, renewal prices are as follows: $7.95/month for Basic, $14.99 for both Plus and Choice Plus and $23.99 for Pro.
For iPage, they only have one plan and it is priced at $1.99/month for a three year subscription; pricing for one and two year terms are higher. This is also only for your initial contract, if you decide to renew, price goes up to $7.99/month.
When it comes to pricing, iPage clearly has the advantage. They made things simple and only offer one plan at a very cheap price. You get features such as unlimited websites and storage – if you want these features from Bluehost, you have to choose the more expensive plans.
Aside from shared hosting, both iPage and Bluehost offer WordPress, VPS, dedicated and reseller hosting services.
Features
Bluehost offers more additional features than iPage.
When comparing hosting providers, you should expect them to have unlimited sites, bandwidth, storage, at least one free domain name and other standard features to come with their package. Aside from those, you should also consider additional features such as free ad credits, auto site backups and more.
Bluehost offer a lot of extra features such as a drag and drop builder, SSD storage, auto site backups, free CDN, support and integration of 3rd party tools and applications, option for a dedicated IP address, free Microsoft and Google Ad credits, spam protection and more. While their plans may be more expensive, they do offer more for the money.
For iPage, their shared plan comes with free Google and Microsoft Ad credits and a drag and drop site builder. Missing features include no free CDN, no auto backups and no SSD storage.
As you can see, both iPage and Bluehost offer additional features but Bluehost offers a bit more. If your most important consideration when choosing a host is the price and you don’t mind that it only comes with a few additional features, iPage is a good choice as they have one of the cheapest plans in the market. If you want more advanced features so you have better control over your site, Bluehost is the better choice for you.
Performance
Uptime and load time should be a priority when choosing hosts, don’t just look at the price.
When it comes to performance, you want a host that can give your visitors the best experience and this comes in the form of uptime and load time. Uptime is the time your site is accessible. You don’t want any prolonged downtime as it can affect your search engine rankings and you might also lose sales or leads.
As for load time, it’s important because visitors don’t like it when a page takes too long to load; if it does, they’ll just leave. Time spent on site and long load times affect your search engine rankings as well, as it is part of Google’s algorithm.
As you can see from the image above, Bluehost is more consistent when there is a surge of traffic to your site. They managed to maintain stable load times even when the number of visitors increased. iPage, on the other hand, had a bit more trouble at the beginning of the surge but they managed to stabilize it as more users visited.
As for uptime, both Bluehost and iPage perform very well. They both maintain over 99.95% uptime, which is the standard.
User Friendliness
Bluehost offers a custom version of cPanel while iPage has their own vDeck control panel.
Bluehost has a custom cPanel UI instead of the standard cPanel that you may be accustomed to. It has a more minimalist style but it’s just as easy to use so you won’t have problems interacting with it.
With cPanel, you can perform 1-click WordPress installs, manage your domains and access your database. It also allows you to manage your account. Overall, it’s very easy to use and you won’t have a hard time familiarizing yourself with it.
On the other hand, iPage has their own custom version of cPanel called vDeck. If you don’t have experience with cPanel, you’ll find vDeck easy to use, but if you are used to cPanel, it might take a little time to get the hang of it. Once you get used to it, it’s just as easy to use and navigate.
One downside to using vDeck instead of the standard cPanel interface is with site migration. If you have an existing site that you need to transfer to iPage, you might find the process harder so you need to get help from their customer support team.
Verdict
Bluehost is the better choice for a hosting provider as it outclasses iPage in all areas, except for price.
In this Bluehost vs iPage comparison, we recommend Bluehost over iPage. Sites hosted on Bluehost will have a slightly better performance. While their shared hosting plans are more expensive, they do come with a lot more features. Their control panel is very easy to use and navigate. Site migration is also easier.
Bluehost also offers WordPress, VPS, reseller and dedicated hosting. You can expect stellar performance for all these hosting packages, just like their shared hosting service.
As for iPage, their shared hosting is not bad. It’s a good option for users that are on a very tight budget that don’t need too many additional features.
Aside from their shared hosting, iPage also has WordPress, dedicated, reseller and VPS hosting packages. These packages are significantly better than their shared offering.
FAQs
Yes, in a lot of ways. Performance-wise, Bluehost has better loading speed and uptime. When it comes to features, Bluehost has a lot more to offer as well.
Yes, their plans are affordable and offer good performance.
No. They use their own custom control panel called vDeck. It’s similar in a lot of ways to cPanel and it’s also easy to get used to it.
It depends on the hosting plan that you choose. They often offer discounted prices for your first contract and then increase the price to normal rates when it’s time for renewal .
