SiteGround has gone completely rogue since 2019 and the value is no longer there.
But due to SiteGround’s brand ambassadors (Ivica Delic and Team Freelancers Tools) mass promoting them in 25 Facebook groups, Reddit, Quora, and Twitter (along with SiteGround demanding bad reviews be taken down), the internet is full of fake reviews about SiteGround.
Between multiple price increases (renewals, premium CDNs, and $30 migrations), a massive decline in support which no longer supports WordPress, and constant upgrades due to CPU limits, SiteGround has gotten WAY too expensive for shared hosting. Especially when you can get better performance on plenty of other hosts. Even my old host (Cloudways) was ~2x faster.
Let’s say you buy their GrowBig plan for $4.99/mo ($59.88 for 1 year).
After 350 days, it jumps to $29.99/mo. If you want to use SiteGround’s CDN, you’ll need the premium version for dynamic caching ($14.99/mo). Unless you want to go without malware scans, you’ll also need Site Scanner ($2.49/mo). Since SiteGround’s Speed Optimizer plugin does a poor job optimizing web vitals and has compatibility issues (hence the poor reviews), you’ll want a better cache plugin like WP Rocket ($59/year). You’re already at around $52/mo.
That’s $624/year (1,042% what you were originally paying) for shared hosting.
The biggest surprise comes when SiteGround suspends your account for maxing out CPU seconds which they like to blame on bots/plugins. Even though I write speed tutorials for a living, I had to upgrade to their GoGeek plan to “fix” this (now $44.99/mo) and eventually an upgraded version of their cloud hosting ($180/mo). While I don’t use Cloudways anymore, they instantly cut my bill/load time in half when I said enough is enough. So no, the value isn’t there.
Since they “restructured,” they’ve also had major issues with TTFB, Google blocking 2 million domains, and Site Tools. While SiteGround’s controversial marketing (censorship) managed to cover up lots of issues, some can still be found in Hristo’s AMA. Oh wait, that got censored too.
I was previously one of their first super affiliates and sent nearly 3,000 people to them. Lots of experience with their plans! Now, I would move even your domains away (e.g. to NameCheap).
- Watch out for CPU limits
- Renewals jump ~6x after 350 days
- Speed Optimizer plugin has issues (4.2/5 rating)
- $14.99/mo “premium” CDN is inferior to Cloudflare/QUIC
- $2.49/mo for malware scans/removal
- $30/site migrations (most hosts are free)
- $100/mo cloud hosting still has CPU limits
- Support isn’t “managed” (no WordPress support)
- SiteGround uses Facebook group admins to write fake reviews
- List of other issues and unwanted changes
- Alternatives
1. Watch Out For CPU Limits
CPU limits (e.g. suspensions + 503 errors) are so common that their brand ambassador Ivica Delic wrote canned responses for people complaining about them in Facebook groups if they don’t get deleted. “Bad bots and plugins” are a classic excuse, but in reality, you can hit your total monthly CPU limits just by running a Wordfence scan. Their cloud hosting has CPU limits too, so on top of the $100/mo for their base plan, you may need to add even more CPU + RAM.
Leaving SiteGround “Mysteriously” Fixes It
Not that I recommend any of these hosts, but here are just a few of many examples where moving from SiteGround fixed it. Or search their TrustPilot reviews for CPU limit complaints.
It’s Worth Optimizing CPU Usage, Just Not On SiteGround
I wrote one of the most popular tutorials on reducing CPU usage and still had to upgrade several times until I decided the massive price increase wasn’t worth it. While you should optimize your site for lower resource usage, it’s not worth spending time with SiteGround’s custom configurations (Site Tools, Speed Optimizer, CDN) only to find out you need to move.
2. Renewals Jump ~6x After 350 Days
Yearly plans renew 15 days prior to the renewal date which is 350 days. This includes other yearly services (e.g. Site Scanner) so be sure to put the correct renewal date in your calendar.
After SiteGround’s multiple price increases, yearly prices are now $215.88 (StartUp), $359.98 (GrowBig), and $539.88 (GoGeek). In the old days, you got the intro price for 3 years, renewals were cheaper, and a free migration. Who knows what your renewals will be after those 350 days.
If you can’t read it, it says:
The special initial price applies for the first invoice only. Once your initial term is over regular renewal prices apply.
3. Speed Optimizer Plugin Has Issues (4.2/5 Rating)
While SiteGround Speed Optimizer has many problems, two common ones are compatiblity with other plugins/page builders and lack of features to optimize web vitals. That’s why so many SiteGround users configure WP Rocket or FlyingPress (what I recommend) and only use Speed Optimizer to add Memcached. And sometimes image optimizer, but even that has issues.
LCP Issues
If you view the 4 parts of LCP, you’ll see why many SiteGround users have LCP issues. Their plugin can’t preload viewport images or remove unused CSS, SiteGround has a history of TTFB issues (40% of LCP), and their free CDN can’t cache dynamic content or resize images on mobile.
4. $14.99/mo “Premium CDN” Is Inferior To Cloudflare/QUIC
The free version of SiteGround’s CDN doesn’t support dynamic caching which can reduce TTFB by ~72%. And with 10GB of bandwidth, it should be off the table for the majority of sites.
While the premium version does, it’s $14.99/mo after the 1st year and is inferior to Cloudflare with APO, QUIC.cloud (for LiteSpeed), and is even more inferior to Rocket.net’s free Cloudflare Enterprise. When hosting companies integrate CDNs into their service, you’re at the mercy of what features they decide to add. With SiteGround, they’re extremely limited (see screenshot).
You’re almost always better off setting up your CDN directly through the CDN provider (so you have full access) instead of the one integrated by your hosting.
While SiteGround uses a limited version of Google’s CDN, Cloudflare and QUIC.cloud are consistently top performers on CDN Performance Tracker with many WordPress-specific optimizations you can find in your dashboard or are set up automatically. Cloudflare also has roughly 2x more PoPs (330 instead of 187) and some of the highest data transfer speeds (321 Tbps). However, SiteGround discontinued Cloudflare in hopes of paying them $14.99/mo when APO is just $5/mo, and some third-party plugins even offer Cloudflare full page caching for free.
You’re required to use SiteGround’s DNS to use their CDN which was previously blocked by Google, resulting in 2 million SiteGround domains getting deindexed.
In classic SiteGround fashion, they claimed no responsibility by saying “there is no blocking on our end.” But 2 days later, they came out with a “fix” while blaming Google/Amazon. SiteGround never advised customers to move to an external DNS and many sites dropped in rankings or got deindexed in Google, resulting in lots of lost time & money. You can read responses on Twitter.
Status Update: We are glad to inform you that we have implemented a fix for the Google bot crawling issue experienced by some sites. Websites are already being crawled successfully. Please allow a few hours for the DNS changes to take effect. Thank you for your patience!
— SiteGround (@SiteGround) November 12, 2021
The lack of responsibility you are taking here is incredible. If this was simply Google’s fault, surely other hosts would be facing issues? Clearly something has changed on your set-up that has caused an issue. Are you aware just how damaging this is to many of your customers?
— Kim Snaith (@ichangedmyname) November 10, 2021
You should be advising people to move to an external DNS to resolve the issues if it is causing them massive losses in business. I have just sorted our connectivity issue in around 25 minutes by moving to googles DNS. If you had let us know 4 days ago, we wouldnt be £20k+ down!
— Jon Bunce (@thejonbunce) November 11, 2021
If you move to your Google Search Console > SETTINGS > CRAWL STATS you will, if unlucky like me, see something like this :-( pic.twitter.com/ocBEkWKsaw
— Tristan Haskins (@trishaskins) November 12, 2021
5. $2.49/mo For Malware Scans/Removal
While many hosts include malware scans/removal for free, you’ll need SiteGround’s $2.49/mo Site Scanner. To SiteGround’s credit, malware doesn’t seem like a common problem, but you don’t know you need it until you get it (on “managed” hosting, you’d think this would be free).
6. $30/Site Migrations (Most Hosts Are Free)
Once free, SiteGround now charges another $30/site for migrations.
Most hosts do this for free for obvious reasons (they want it to be easy). ChemiCloud does 10-200 free migrations, Rocket.net does unlimited free migrations, and many others do at least 1.
7. $100/mo Cloud Hosting Still Has CPU Limits
You’d think upgrading from GoGeek to $100/month cloud hosting would fix CPU issues. Nope! Like others, I was still getting 503 errors and had to add more CPU/RAM until I was at $180/mo.
After months of paying a ridiculous bill, I moved. Thankfully, before they restructured more.
SiteGround’s cloud hosting uses Google Cloud’s N2 machine family which aren’t designed for high traffic sites (unlike the C3D and C2 machines used by Kinsta + WP Engine). However, I don’t recommend those hosts either also due to low resource limits.
Since SiteGround likely gets generous discounts from Google Cloud, you don’t even want to know their price to run these machines, but I can tell you it’s a lot less than what you’re paying. This is the same gripe I have with Kinsta and WP Engine… they buy Google Cloud servers at a discount, add lots of resource limits, label it “managed” WordPress hosting, then sell it to you.
8. Support Isn’t “Managed” (No WordPress Support)
SiteGround dropped all WordPress support in 2020.
When your host doesn’t include free migrations, malware scans, and the typical response when hitting CPU limits is to upgrade, what exactly is SiteGround managing? If there’s a problem with your site, it’s your problem. The scope of support says “WordPress problems not related to our servers’ configurations are outside of our scope of support.” So expect links to documentation :/
Good onboarding and experienced/helpful support is the minimal standard for managed WordPress hosting. If your host doesn’t have either, it’s just a fancy label.
I laughed when I noticed SiteGround’s support was some of their top Autocomplete results because they’ve made it overly difficult to find. Can’t even find their phone # on their website.
There are many other instances showing how inconsistent support is, including quite a few Reddit threads. Another example is when they straight up disabled live chat, or when they suspended accounts in certain countries like India, New Zealand, Singapore, and Philippines.
9. SiteGround Uses Facebook Group Admins To Write Fake Reviews
In 2014, Ivica Delic meets with SiteGround’s Hristo Pandjarov.
The same year, Ivica (SiteGround’s affiliate at the time and CEO of Freelancers Tools), creates multiple Facebook groups about WordPress hosting, performance, security, plugins, and others.
Shortly after, Ivica removes his SiteGround affiliate links but continues to promote them as a brand ambassador without the use of disclosures. You can still use web.archive.org to see his previous affiliation with SiteGround, including an affiliate link in the footer, affiliate disclaimer, and his SiteGround journey from 2013 which is still posted. His old SiteGround affiliate link was https://www.siteground.com/index.htm?afcode=ac78c9133e0502d79db55cc05c57e70c
Today, with the help of Team Freelancers Tools, Ivica manages 25 Facebook groups with hundreds of thousands of members where he still promotes SiteGround without disclosures.
Combine this with their cease and desist letters for bloggers who write bad reviews and no wonder SiteGround has such glowing reviews. I also got a cease and desist letter for my review.
Here’s a screenshot before the post got modified (see how it looks now).
Ivica sure posts an awful lot about SiteGround for just “using” them (same on his Reddit):
Since posting this, Ivica blocked me from his Facebook groups and Twitter account.
Many of SiteGround’s glowing reviews are fake. Brand ambassadors from Team Freelancers Tools control 25 Facebook groups and promote SiteGround, remove negative comments/reactions, and ban people who speak negatively about them.
10. List Of Other Issues And Unwanted Changes
Time Wasted Configuring Custom SiteGround Products
What’s the point in spending all that time configuring SiteGround’s Speed Optimizer plugin, CDN, and Site Tools only to move to another host 350 days later when the renewal comes up?
SiteGround also moves you onto their products prematurely when there are still bugs/issues (Site Tools was a classic example).
TTFB
Backlinko’s 2019 TTFB test showed SiteGround had the slowest TTFB of all hosts tested.
Attempted To Limit Number Of Websites
SiteGround limited the number of sites on each plan. This backfired and although they eventually reversed this, it’s another sneaky thing they tried to limit their plans even more.
Unsanctioned Migration To Google Cloud
A while back, SiteGround moved customers to Google Cloud Platform without any warning. Many customers were hesitant to host their websites with one of the biggest data harvesting companies in the world. But SiteGround pulled out the excuses on how they follow GDPR, how information is protected, etc. They didn’t give a warning (or an option) not to use Google Cloud.
11. Alternatives
Use a LiteSpeed host (or Rocket.net for dynamic/WooCommerce sites).
Why LiteSpeed?
Why not? Their servers are efficient with resource usage (e.g. CPU/RAM), you get to use the free/performant LiteSpeed Cache plugin, and QUIC.cloud’s CDN is up there with Cloudflare.
All these use faster LiteSpeed servers, NVMe SSDs, and you usually get more resources for significantly cheaper. Once you choose a LiteSpeed host, use my tutorial to configure LiteSpeed Cache with QUIC.cloud’s CDN (or try Cloudflare).
ChemiCloud’s WordPress Turbo Plan – more CPU/RAM (3 cores + 3GB RAM) and no extra limits on CPU usage. Also significantly cheaper (around $5-7/mo depending on whether you choose 1 or 3 years). They use cPanel with Imunify360 which includes malware scans/removal. They have 9 server locations and use fast 3.8 GHz AMD EPYC 9354 processors in Portland + Washington DC locations. CPU/RAM is scalable through their add-on which is cheaper than buying a new plan if you need to upgrade. 4.9/5 star TrustPilot rating and many people who moved from SiteGround. Here’s a demo site I set up on the WordPress Turbo plan (you can use KeyCDN to test the TTFB).
Scala Hosting (VPS or Entry Cloud plan) – if you want something more powerful than shared, Entry Cloud is a good jump with dedicated resources (2 cores + 2GB RAM) and OpenLiteSpeed. For even better performance + scalability, use one of their VPS plans. Both use SPanel which is the most robust custom control panel I’ve used by a host and uses less resources than cPanel. You don’t need to pay extra for cPanel, LiteSpeed, or Imunify360 licenses since you get SPanel, OpenLiteSpeed, and SShield, (this can easily save you $35/month since you would need these on many VPS plans). They have a 5/5 TrustPilot rating with people who moved from SiteGround.
Vultr High Frequency On xCloud (Or RunCloud) – similar to Cloudways with significantly better performance/price (Cloudways’ performance has been poor). First, get $300 in free credits when signing up for Vultr using that link. Next, sign up for xCloud or RunCloud. Finally, follow their video on adding your Vultr API key. Now you can launch Vultr High Frequency servers at retail price (instead of ∼2.2x markups on Cloudways) with better performance (a much more lightweight control panel which supports OpenLiteSpeed and Nginx). You also get access to all Vultr’s server locations (instead of 23/32 you get on Cloudways). Support seems to be the biggest complaint which is pretty standard when saving money through control panels.
Rocket.net – highly optimized for dynamic/WooCommerce sites with a 100ms global TTFB average and much more “set and forget.” For WooCommerce, they use arguabaly the most powerful version of Cloudflare Enterprise as well as a more powerful version of Object Cache Pro on their Business plan and up (unlike Cloudways, it supports Relay). You get access to 32 cores + 128GB RAM, NVMe SSDs, no PHP worker limits (unlike Kinsta), and 10x more monthly visits than Kinsta/WP Engine. The reason they’re more “set and forget” is because their control panel is dead easy, Cloudflare Enterprise is 100% automatic, and support is night and day and does unlimited free migrations. People who moved saw a 500% faster TTFB (and 200% – 450% faster LCP) and they have 94/94 5 star performance reviews on TrustPilot. Probably will cost more than SiteGround due to the bandwidth limits, but arguably better in every other category.
Despite SiteGround’s 19,000+ TrustPilot reviews, you’ll find 0 people who moved from ChemiCloud, Scala Hosting, and Rocket.net. But if you search those other host’s reviews, you’ll find many people who moved to them from SiteGround. Based on SiteGround’s reviews, people usually come from hosts like GoDaddy, Bluehost, and HostGator. That doesn’t say much.
Regardless of which host you end up at, you know my stance on them.
Cheers,
Tom
