DreamHost and Namecheap are two popular hosting companies that offer cheap hosting packages. DreamHost has been in the hosting industry since the 90’s, and they are a reputable brand that offers reliable hosting. Namecheap, on the other hand, started out as a domain registrar, then went on to offer their own shared hosting service.
In this article, we’ll take a look at their hosting packages and find out which one offers the better service. To start off, here’s a comparison of their shared hosting plans.
DreamHost vs Namecheap Comparison Chart
| DreamHost | Namecheap | |
| Â |  |  |
| Price | Check Price at DreamHost.com | Check Price at Namecheap.com |
| Sites Hosted | Starter: 1 site Unlimited: Unlimited | Stellar: 3 sites Stellar Plus: Unlimited Stellar Business: Unlimited |
| Disk Space | Starter: 50GB Unlimited: Unlimited | Stellar: 20GB Stellar Plus: Unlimited Stellar Business: 50GB + Cloud storage |
| Bandwidth | Unmetered | Unmetered |
| Free Domain | Yes | Yes |
| Free SSL | Yes | Yes |
| Starter: additional $1.67/month Unlimited: Unlimited | Stellar: 30 Stellar Plus: Unlimited Stellar Business: Unlimited | |
| Site Migration | Free via plugin | Free |
| Site Builder | Yes | Yes |
| cPanel | No | Yes |
| Customer Support | 24/7 Chat Tickets Knowledge Base Phone Support Callback | 24/7 Chat Tickets Knowledge Base |
| Money Back Guarantee | 97 days | 30 days |
Features
Namecheap offers better features.
Features-wise, Namecheap has the advantage over DreamHost. Along with standard features such as free SSL, unlimited storage, unlimited bandwidth, free site builder and the likes, Namecheap also gives you some extra features like free site migration, data center location options and more.
Here are some features offered by both hosting companies that are worth mentioning.
Dreamhost
- 97 Days Money Back – DreamHost shared hosting comes with a 97 day money back guarantee—the best in the industry. You’ll be able to get a full refund as long as you make your request within 97 days.
- Free Domain (.com, .net, .org etc.) – Both DreamHost and Namecheap offer a free domain when you sign up to their hosting service. However, with Namecheap, you are limited when it comes to TLD options. With DreamHost, you can choose any TLD that you like.
Namecheap
- Free Site Migration – Both hosts offer free site migration, but with DreamHost, you are only given an auto-migration plugin, then you are left on your own. With Namecheap, they will do the entire process for you.
- US and UK Data Center – Having an option to choose your site’s data center location is great for users that are targeting certain audiences.
- Free email on cheapest plan – Even on their cheapest plan, Namecheap gives you 30 email accounts.
Reliability
DreamHost provides slightly better uptime and speed.
Both hosts offer an uptime guarantee—100% for DreamHost and 99.9% for Namecheap. With these uptime guarantees, you’ll have an idea of how reliable a host is. As for their actual performance, DreamHost was able to maintain an average uptime of 99.95%, while Namecheap got an average of 99.94%.
Both hosts performed well enough when it comes to uptime. While it’s not as good as DreamHost’s promised uptime of 100%, a 99.95% uptime is still considered good. As for Namecheap, their 99.94% uptime is still acceptable, but it could be better.
A host’s reliability is also measured by its speed. You want your site to load fast enough that your visitors will not hit the back button. A site that loads in under a second is good.
That said, DreamHost has an average load time of 500-600ms, while Namecheap’s average is 600-700ms. Once again, DreamHost wins.
Support
DreamHost and Namecheap both offer decent customer support.
Both hosting companies offer 24/7 chat and tickets submission. They also have knowledge bases that cover lots of topics that can be helpful to beginners, advanced users and experts.
Aside from those support channels, DreamHost also offers free email support and an optional callback service that you need to pay for.
When it comes to providing support, both have their strengths and weaknesses. For the live chat option, we found that DreamHost was more responsive and provided better answers. When we tested their ticketing system, Namecheap gave us the better experience.
Overall, both are decent when it comes to support.
Hosting Plans
Namecheap offers some of the most affordable hosting plans in the market.
Both hosting companies offer shared hosting, WordPress, VPS and dedicated servers. Namecheap also offers reseller hosting, while DreamHost offers Cloud hosting and WooCommerce hosting.
DreamHost offers two plans for their shared hosting service. The Starter plan is the cheaper plan that comes with limited sites hosted and storage, while the Unlimited plan, as its name implies, comes with unlimited hosted sites and storage. The Unlimited plan also comes with unlimited email accounts and databases.
Namecheap, on the other hand, has three shared hosting plans to choose from—Stellar, Stellar Plus and Stellar Business. With the cheapest Stellar plan, you get to host 3 websites and you get 20GB of storage. For both the Stellar Plus and Stellar Business, you can host unlimited sites and increased storage. The Stellar Plus plan comes with unlimited storage, while the Stellar Business plan comes with 50GB of storage and access to Namecheap’s cloud storage.
As for pricing, Namecheap offers the cheaper plans while providing better features and comparable performance.
Verdict
For those on a budget, Namecheap is a great option, but if you need better performance, you should consider DreamHost.
If you are budget constrained, you should definitely look into Namecheap, as their hosting plans are very affordable. Even with their cheaper plans, you are still getting a lot of features and very good performance. However, if you don’t mind spending a bit more for a little extra performance, DreamHost should be your choice.
FAQs
Namecheap is mostly known as a domain registrar, but their hosting services are considered good and legitimate.
They are based in Phoenix. For their hosting, they have data centers in both the US and the UK.
Yes, they offer affordable hosting plans and they provide good uptime and speed.
No, they use their own customized control panel.
