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Site5 Review: Is This Small Host any Good?

With so many hosting sites geared towards the beginner, there are some like Site5 which are designed for web designers, developers, and professionals. This specialization has helped Site5 set themselves apart for over two decades. In this Site5 review we’ll dive into what they have to offer.

In my opinion, Site5 is not the most beginner friendly web host. I’d consider it to be a better fit for more moderate to advanced users. For those who are thinking of starting or switching to Site5, there are some things you need to know.

What follows in this Site5 review is a rundown of the hosting plans, an evaluation of the support, the advantages and disadvantages, and a quick review of the money back guarantee.

What is Site5?

Site5 was founded in 1999. They were created by Matt Lightner and Rod Armstrong. Later the company sold to EIG in 2015. EIG is a conglomerate that also owns Bluehost, HostGator, and other hosts. You canc heck out this post to learn more about why people hate EIG.

Site5 Hosting Plans

Site5 offers three basic types of hosting plans designed around their customer needs. Each plan has different tiers depending on the services you desire. The plans range from shared to reseller to fully managed VPS hosting.

Shared

This is the basic shared plan with three different pricing tiers. All three tiers include unmetered diskspace, free migration, backups, 99.9% uptime guarantee, backstage, and the 45-day money back guarantee.

Site5 Plans

  • hostBasic: $6.95 per month, 1 website, and no monthly plan
  • hostPro: $10.95 per month, unlimited websites, and $12.95 monthly plan
  • hostPro + Turbo: $13.95 per month, unlimited websites, and $19.95 monthly plan

Reseller

All Reseller hosting options come with unmetered resold accounts. They also include free billing software, a domain reseller account, cPanel/WHM, Custom DNS nameservers, free migration, backups, monthly plans, uptime guarantee, and the 45-day money back guarantee. This covers almost everything you’d want to offer as a reseller. Below are the plans and prices.

  • Starter: $25.95 per month, 50GB of disk space, and 500GB of bandwidth
  • Standard: $36.95 per month, 80GB of disk space, and 700GB of bandwidth
  • Premier: $54.95 per month, 120GB of disk space, and 1000GB of bandwidth

Fully Managed VPS

For the best in security and protection, Site5 offers seven VPS web hosting plans which provides a server for you. Fully managed VPS plans use fast SSD drives. Sites on this plan are hosted on an isolated virtual server for the greatest security and protection.

You get complete control over your database environment which allows you to commit the resources needed to make your site what you desire.

  • VPS2: $62 per month: 2 cores, 2GB memory, 50GB disk space, and 1TB bandwidth
  • VPS3: $89 per month:2 cores, 3GB memory, 75GB disk space, and 1.5TB bandwidth
  • VPS4: $117 per month: 4 cores, 4GB memory, 100GB disk space, and 2TB bandwidth
  • VPS5: $166 per month: 4 cores, 5GB memory, 125GB disk space, and 2.5TB bandwidth
  • VPS6: $188 per month: 6 cores, 6GB memory, 150GB disk space, and 3TB bandwidth
  • VPS7: $276 per month: 8 cores, 8GB memory, 200GB disk space, and 4TB bandwidth
  • VPS8: $359 per month: 8 cores, 10GB memory, 250GB disk space, and 5TB bandwidth

Site5 Support

Site5 support is about average. The site support services that Site5 offers includes the following;

  • Live Chat
  • Email Support
  • Solid Knowledge Base

What’s important to keep in mind that is that Site5 is now part of EIG and shares in their massive support system. This means that they have a robust live chat system. However, they are nowhere near some of the best hosting support options out there.

When speaking with live chat support we were able to get out questions answered. Also, email support for longer or more complex questions exists.

The email support is good, but not quite as efficient as the live chat. Plus, there are many articles and frequently asked questions that are found on the site. These can be a quick way to get many of your possible questioned answered without having to talk to anyone at the company.

Site5 Support

It is important to note that they do not offer phone support. This is a huge negative. We realize it’s expensive to field phone support, but it is a must have. There are simply times when speaking to a live person via phone is vital.

Site5 Pros

In this Site5 review, a full evaluation of both the advantages and disadvantages were considered.

We found that Site5 performs similarly to many hosting sites in terms of the basics such as speed, support, and uptime.

These are usually the three biggest criteria that must be met for any hosting site to be worth trying. Some of their highlights include:

  • Free Transfers
  • Server Location Options
  • 30-Day Free Trial

The ability to transfer your website to Site5 for free is certainly quite good. No fees in transferring makes Site5 quite popular with those who are fed up with their current host.

You can migrate up to 25 cPanel accounts and up to 10 non-cPanel ones for free which is quite astounding. Considering how long of a process it is for so many transfers, this is a generous offer to say the least.

In addition to the free transfers, Site5 also has numerous server locations around the world. Unlike some of their competitors, Site5 offers multiple servers in the following locations;

  • North America: Both the US and Canada
  • South America: Sao Paulo and Joao Pessoa, Brazil
  • Europe: Including the UK, France, Netherlands, and Romania
  • Asia: China and Singapore

The multiple server locations around the world means fast service for those who live in or near these areas. This is an area where Site5 excels. Many hosting companies only have servers in North America and maybe Europe. Site5 offers them around the world which makes them a better option for someone living in Asia or South America. By choosing your server location, you can slightly boost your local SEO rankings.

Site5 Cons

Like all hosts Site5 does have some cons. In fact, they have a few glaring issues that need to be considered before you decide if they are right for you.

  • Expensive Plans
  • No Short-Term Plan Options
  • No Phone Support

Considering that Site5 is geared towards website designers and developers, a higher than normal pricing structure is normal.

However, Site5 uses many of the shady tactics considered normal within the hosting industry. One is to lure in many with a seemingly low offer only to be hit with an upsell or high renewal costs.

For example, the reasonable $6.95 per month is only valid if you pay upfront and commit for two years to get that price. Otherwise, it is $8.95. This might not seem like much, but it adds up over months or years.

There are no month-to-month or even six-month pricing plans. Another EIG company called HostGator offers this which makes it somewhat surprising.

It would help if Site5 was more upfront about its pricing structure. At least you know what you get right away instead of having to wait until being ready to pay for their services.

Phone support is a big issue in my opinion. Paying rates that are more than other awesome hosts like SiteGround or HostPapa, and not getting phone support is bad.

Site5 Money Back Guarantee

Site5 does offer a 45-day money back guarantee period. This is 15 days longer than the standard 30-day money back guarantee offered by many hosts in the industry. However, it should be noted that their VPS hosting plans are shorter at 15-days.

Site5 Money Back Guarantee

If you’re looking for even longer money back guarantees you can try hosts like InMotion or A Small Orange.

Site5 Review: Final thoughts

I don’t want to go as far as saying Site5 is an awful host. However, I will say that there are many better hosting options out there. I’ve reviewed dozens of hosts in great depth. They simply don’t stand out from the crowd with what they’re offering.

I cannot recommend Site5 to my audience here. Their prices don’t cut it in terms of what they’re offering their customers. In fact, they fall into my below average category in my overall rankings.

My rating for Site5 is a 7.5 out of 10.

Have you used Site5 before? If you have I’d love to hear your own mini Site5 review in the comments below!

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