Bluehost is a high-quality web hosting provider that has been offering hosting solutions since 2003, making it a well-established player in the industry. The company offers in-demand features that website owners want; the type and depth of features available vary by hosting plan.
Storage and Bandwidth Limits
Bluehost limits storage capacity on all of its plans. The Basic plan comes with 10 GB of SSD storage, while the top-tier Pro plan scales to up to 100 GB. Bluehost’s storage limits are a bit stingy compared to other hosting service providers.
Bluehost offers unmetered bandwidth, which allows for unlimited data transfer. While there are no restrictions on the amount of data that can be uploaded or downloaded, you are sharing processing capacity with other sites on the same server. This means you could run into slow file upload/download times as a Bluehost shared server has a 150 simultaneous database connection limit.
Extras and Inclusions
All plans include a free CDN, one free domain for the first year, resource protection and an SSL certificate. Storage allotments vary by plan tier. Higher-tier plans offer more depth and breadth of features, including e-commerce capabilities, online store analytics and optimized CPU resources that deliver stronger site speed.
Bluehost also features free WordPress website migration and a 30-day money-back guarantee. A free SEO Yoast account is available on every plan except Basic.
Ease of Use
Bluehost has built its business by focusing on helping bloggers and small businesses get their websites up and running fast. It’s an easy-to-use platform ideal for beginners and nontechnical do-it-yourselfers who are building simple websites.
Bluehost Builder
As mentioned, Bluehost can automatically install WordPress for you. If you prefer, you can create your website using the free Bluehost Builder (BB). The BB features a drag-and-drop interface and comes with hundreds of themes and simple design tools that help you design a professional online presence.
User Dashboard/cPanel
The user dashboard features an intuitive and attractive design that makes navigation simple. Access your cPanel by clicking on the Advanced tab once you’ve logged in to your Bluehost account.
Bluehost Maestro can make your job easier if you need to manage multiple WordPress sites. Maestro is a proprietary Bluehost tool that helps you organize, categorize and manage multiple WordPress sites from a single dashboard. With Maestro, you can track broken links, stage sites and perform theme, plugin and WordPress core updates. Maestro is free to use.
Security
All Bluehost hosting plans include a free SSL certificate, and all but the Basic plan come with free malware scanning. Beyond that, Bluehost’s security measures are a bit of a mystery; very little about its security standards is included on its website or in the Bluehost Help Centre.
Multiple Bluehost support reps stated that Bluehost protects its servers—though they declined to give any details about how they do this. These same reps reported it is up to the developer to code their site and keep it up to date. Most other hosting providers give at least some pertinent security details, such as whether their server sites are ISO certified and how data is encrypted.
Bluehost offers add-on security protection through SiteLock. These add-on plans start at $4.08 CAD per month to $48.93 CAD per year All SiteLock plans feature malware detection, external scan and Google blocklist monitoring. Higher-tier plans come with daily or continuous scan frequency, malware removal, SMART/Patch, a weekly scan report and advanced firewall security.