If you’ve read my UltaHost review, then, you’ll understand something very clearly: there was a time all I did was contemplate the UltaHost vs. SiteGround debate.
The review was raw and exceedingly brutal – and therein, I shared exactly what I know UltaHost to be: the good, the bad, and even the ugly. Nothing was spared.
However, after that thorough and super detailed review, it came to my consciousness that something vital was missing: how does SiteGround compare to UltaHost, SiteGround being my immediate past hosting company?
Is it a better bet in the UltaHost vs. SiteGround debate or SiteGround takes the day?
This is what I’ve set out to achieve with this entry of mine today. So, without further ado, let’s fire. But first, an overview of both companies first.
Table of Contents
An Overview of UltaHost
UltaHost is an American hosting company that was launched in the US in 2021 by Elin and Deen Doughouz.
However, it’s important to note that UltaHost wasn’t always an American company: it was first floated by ScriptSun, a multinational corporation based off in Turkey, in 2018.
Fully incorporated as an American company in 2021 as UltaHost Inc, the company has grown to have branches in the UAE and the UK (in addition to its origins of Turkey and its new home, the US).
Data center wise, the company has data centers in twenty different locations across five continents and fifteen countries including fully DMCA-ignored offshore data centers.
UltaHost caters to shared hosting needs, VPS customers, and dedicated hosting customers. In addition to hosting provision, the company also offers domain registrations and domain-specific offers such as Whois tools.
An Overview of SiteGround
SiteGround was founded in 2004 in Bulgaria by Ivo Tzenov and his university friends. Growing rapidly over the years, SiteGroud now has many offices both in Bulgaria (where it started out) and also in Spain (where it has grown to).
The company, according to Google, has over two million hosted domains, across the world, which is no mean feat. These domains are majorly hosted on Google’s cloud service, a decision that ensures better service and overall reliability, especially when compared to bare metal servers.
SiteGround has data centers in eleven locations spanning four continents and eight countries. These do not include the various CDN, backup, and email marketing locations which all serve to make sure that service is delivered in both a fast and secure manner, and that data is protected in the best manner possible.
The company focuses on shared and cloud hosting solutions, levering these two into tier offers that they nicely deploy.
However, besides hosting, the company is also in the domain registration business and has via its numerous plugins and commitments, indicated that it is also interested in website speed and overall site security.
UltaHost vs. SiteGround: Support
Support is the backbone of any hosting company. This is because, even for the very tech-savvy, there comes a point when help is needed.
Now, if/when that time comes and you can’t get the support you need, you’re actively screwed, and you won’t like your hosting provider.
UltaHost, in this regard, offers two major ways to contact support: the chat option and the ticketing method.
The chat option is INSTANT – and you get someone, a real human (not a bot), to attend to your query right after. It’s the best chat system I’ve encountered in the course of hosting any website. I tried this option around midnight on a Sunday and its efficacy did not change: I had no option but to be wowed.
There’s also the ticketing option where tickets are raised and addressed. Here, tickets are treated within the first five minutes and closed – which is the fastest I’ve also found in the industry so far.
SiteGround, like UltaHost, also has two basic support options: chat and ticket.
The chat system used to be easy – and an awesome method of getting help but not anymore. The button is now hidden and takes a lot of work to find when compared to UltaHost’s option which is open for all to see.
The company, it appears, is more interested in having you scout through the ‘Knowledge Base’ to figure out your challenges, directly. Chat, usually, is treated as a last resort, which isn’t ideal.
Assuming you manage to get to the chat option, there’s sometimes no support staff to attend to you, or during the best of times, there’s a wait time that may stretch up to ten (10) minutes if you’re not very lucky.
The good bit about the chat option at SiteGround is that complex issues are easily handled via chat, without the need for a ticket, if and once the chat connects. This is where the SiteGround chat system beats what’s available at UltaHost (which defers most complex issues to the ticket support option).
The tickets, on the other hand, are addressed in a manner that is ‘fair’ and considered ‘normal’ in the industry: when I was an active customer with SiteGround, most of my tickets were treated within the first thirty minutes, with some taking over an hour for the first response and in rare instances, a few hours.
Tickets treated were closed, as it’s common, after three (3) days if no response was posted. Posting a new response, usually, revived such closed tickets, however.
UltaHost vs. SiteGround: Pricing
No matter how great a hosting offer is, pricing is going to either make or mar the offering.
The reason for this is simple and straightforward: most would-be clients are scared off, preferring a much cheaper option since most webmasters, especially new webmasters, work on a budget.
Since SiteGround offers shared hosting options with a touch of cloud, I’m forced to compare their basic shared hosting plan (StartUp) with a similar offer from UltaHost (Shared Starter).
This is comparing apples to apples and oranges to oranges. The plans too, have many things in common: a single domain option, free daily backups, and a free SSL certificate (except that whereas UltaHost gives 30 GB of storage on this plan, only 10 GB of storage is available on SiteGround).
Starting with UltaHost, this plan starts at a modest $3.80 a month – if paying monthly and further goes down to $3.50 when paying for up to a year. This is affordable, in my opinion, and is something most new webmasters, even those on a budget, can easily afford.
SiteGround, on the other hand, offers its introductory shared hosting offer for $24.99 when paying monthly. This cost only goes down to $3.99 when paying for 12 months upfront!
As can be seen, SiteGround’s introductory price of $3.99 for the first year for its entry-level shared hosting plan is more expensive than UltaHost’s modest $3.80 a month, non-introductory, payable monthly.
The deal closer in favor of UltaHost? Not only do you pay more with SiteGround, this price is ‘introductory’ and valid for the first year only. Right after the first year, they go up, making the whole offer way more expensive than it already is.
But, as it that isn’t enough, SiteGround offers 20 GB of storage less (10 GB of storage) than UltaHost’s offering (30 GB of storage).
The winner is as clear as daylight.
SiteGround vs. UltaHost: Data Center Offers
There are several advantages to a hosting company having more data centers at its disposal. With more data centers spread across several cities, countries, and continents, reliability is ensured, load balancing is achieved better, it’s easier to recover from a disaster, better geographic reach and faster speeds are a reality for users amongst many other good things.
Generally, thus, the more data centers a hosting company has at its command, the better. More, in this case, is GOOD.
SiteGround, over the years, has invested in a plethora of data centers across 4 continents. 11 to be precise. This count does not include CDN, backup, and email marketing locations.
UltaHost, on the other hand, has 20 data centers spread across 15 countries and 5 continents!
UltaHost, in essence, covers one more continent, compared to SiteGround and has nine more data centers (20) compared to SiteGrounds eleven.
Aside from having the clear advantage here, UltaHost also has a DMCA Ignored data center in Finland where content that would ordinarily not be entertained by traditional hosting companies is hosted without issues.
Once again, there’s only one winner here – and we all already know who that is…
UltaHost vs. SiteGround: Speed
Speed is of the essence in today’s hosting world; a website that loads slowly is likely to have a high bounce rate and disaffection from search engines like Google.
This was the basis of thought when I detailed the article, How To Rank An Adult Site Easily. With a high bounce rate and disaffection from Google, it doesn’t take genius to see that such a site won’t be destined for much, in the long run.
To test the speed of these, I decided to see how fast their respective homepages load, with a public, freely available tool. Afterall, you can’t give what you don’t have – the websites of these hosting options being the ultimate, acid test.
All tests were run on the same day, with a difference of about two minutes between them.
SiteGround Tested From Washington DC
SiteGround took an average of 0.54 seconds to fully load – as the screenshot below shows.
UltaHost Tested From Washington DC
UltaHost took an average of 0.26 seconds to fully load – as the screenshot below shows.
Speed Conclusions
The speed test on the homepages of both SiteGround and UltaHost is interesting and conclusive: 0.26 seconds in favor of UltaHost vs. 0.54 seconds in favor of SiteGround.
The summary? UltaHost’s homepage (and by extension, servers) are at least 2 times (plus) faster than SiteGround’s!
This isn’t what I expected since SiteGround goes out of its way to market speed as one of its strong points and has a plethora of plugins and solutions geared to that effect.
UltaHost vs. SiteGround: Security
With the increase in bad players online, it’s important, now, more than ever, to keep websites secured in order to keep the bad players out.
Think of website security as the digital ‘bolt’ you secure your business with, after the close of the business day.
While the chunk of securing the website lie in the hands of webmasters, hosting companies play a large role in making this happen.
In this regard, options such as DDoS protection, SSL certificates, second factor authentication for account login etc are all measures that are deployed by hosting companies to mitigate this challenge, on the hosting side.
In this regard, both companies remain proactive to keep websites hosted on their servers secure and free from external threats.
For this, it’s a TIE.
UltaHost vs. SiteGround: Uptime Commitment
For a website hosted on a server on any hosting company to be publicly accessible, the server needs to be ‘online’ and working.
However, for numerous reasons, sometimes, servers go down and the websites they’re hosting, down with them.
When this happens, it’s said that the website is experiencing ‘downtime’.
In this regard, both SiteGround and UltaHost offer a 99.9% uptime guarantee – which translates to a maximum potential downtime of 8.77 hours per annum or 1.44 (potential) minutes of downtown a day.
SiteGround uses Google infrastructure for its hosting needs and UltaHost uses the best in class solid state servers, minimizing downtimes and failures.
My experience with both has been that downtimes are minimal and it isn’t unusual to run months without experiencing any sort of downtime at all (I monitor this with an independent third party service).
Again, TIE.
UltaHost vs. SiteGround: Money Back Guarantee
The hallmark of a great hosting company is a willingness to offer refunds if the service isn’t what is advertised (at the end of the day).
Generally, longer money-back intervals indicate great options and a willingness to stand by what one is offering.
Or, why would anyone stick out their neck for something they aren’t sure of? Why make a promise you’re sure will end up in having more claims than folks who actually stay?
SiteGround, in this regard, offers a 30-day refund window – the same as UltaHost.
Though this 30-day window has some caveats across these two hosting solutions, the summary is that it exists and within their terms, you’ll be due for a refund if you demand one, within the first 30 days, subject to the terms of the respective company.
The terms are simple and straight to the point. However, if you’re remotely thinking of using this option, then, the first thing to do is to first take a look at the terms and conditions before making your decision.
UltaHost vs. SiteGround: Free SSL Availability
Google, as far as back 2013, started taking SSL as a ranking signal seriously. Today, however, SSL is something that is recognized as a ranking signal fully.
What this means is straightforward: all other things being equal, Google will prioritize a site with SSL over one without it.
However, beyond the ranking benefit from search engines such as Google, the presence of an SSL certificate on a website encrypts data shared with the website, making passwords and other sensitive information shared with the website, safe.
Almost all hosting companies, SiteGround and UltaHost inclusive, now have the option to run third-party SSL certificates or buy directly from them.
This is an expensive option and many webmasters can’t afford it. This is where Let’s Encrypt comes in; a free provider of SSL certificates.
Free of cost to webmasters, one would think that all hosting solution providers will embrace it, especially since it’s free and has numerous benefits, ranking and security wise.
That, unfortunately, isn’t the case – the end result being hosting providers without any sort of free SSL solution, save the premium options under their business fold.
Fortunately, this option is freely available to deploy to users of both SiteGround and UltaHost, making it a tie.
UltaHost vs. SiteGround: Free Website Migration
From time to time, you may need to change hosting companies (for various reasons). Online, it’s rare to find any webmaster using one hosting company for upwards of five years (unless they are very good – and have a fair price).
Since this is hardly the case, migrations are common and one of the selling points of a great hosting company is the provision of this service for free (after all, business is coming your company, right?)
Well, for SiteGround, WRONG; the company ‘helps’ with transfers only when you pay the transfer fee of $25 per site (not per account). If you’re moving a suite of 10 sites, good luck.
If this option happens to be ‘too expensive’, there’s the Migrator Plugin that is recommended. In essence, you’re on your own.
UltaHost, on the other hand, offers UNLIMITED FREE website migration, irrespective of the panel type used.
$$$ saved!
UltaHost vs. SiteGround: Constant (Automated) Backups
Backups are a great thing online: without them, you’ll be screwed when something goes wrong. As a result of this, most hosting companies offer this service, for free, for at least the last 30 days.
With this backup, reverting back to an earlier point in time is easy and straightforward; as easy and straightforward as a few clicks.
SiteGround and UltaHost offer this, as default – irrespective of the service plan bought.
For UltaHost VPS plans (which I’m a customer of), this can be set up and enabled manually, to meet one’s direct needs – if the custom setting isn’t ideal.
UltaHost vs. SiteGround: cPanel Availability
Over the years, cPanel has become the gold standard when it comes to managing web hosting. Powered with Web Host Manager (WHM); it’s a powerful force that for now, amounts to a deal breaker or closer, at least, for many webmasters.
The attraction to cPanel is its ease of use and importantly, the fact that more than 90% of hosting solutions use it (so it’s easier to migrate when the time comes).
That said, some hosting companies have found ‘love’ with other hosting panels and others have gone a step further to develop their proprietary options. One such option is SiteGround.
UltaHost, on the other hand, still uses cPanel and to add to it, also has several other panels, free and premium that one may elect to use if one so chooses.
The winner here is clear.
UltaHost vs. SiteGround: Beginner Friendliness
It’s pointless offering a hosting service that makes it impractical for beginners to access (or, make sense of, given that they’re the plethora of customers who find themselves online today).
Hosting providers thus go to great extents to make sure that their company offers are beginner-friendly.
Curiously, the hallmark of being beginner-friendly, in the hosting world, is offering what the customer is already familiar with so that there’s little or no learning curve.
This is where SiteGround fails the test, flat. Besides running a proprietary control panel that will take anyone not used to it time to figure out, it also famously puts items like the chat button away from view, necessitating an active hunt for it.
Not very beginner-friendly, you’ll agree.
UltaHost, on the other hand, offers the standard cPanel that everyone is already familiar with and has no proprietary software that will need getting used to.
However, if for any reason one prefers another option, then, there’s Hestia and Cyber Panel (free). Then, cPanel and Plesk – which are premium options.
The choice of panel, with UltaHost, is strictly in the hands of the customer…and you can easily choose what you’re already familiar with, reducing the amount of time learning or mastering the ‘curve’.
The winner? UltaHost!
UltaHost vs. SiteGround: DMCA Ignored Servers
There are instances when regular, conventional hosting doesn’t cut it. A government that is interested in silencing a voice/narrative, an individual hell-bent on ‘cleaning’ their records online, etc. are classical examples.
In such an instance, all such a fellow (or government) need do is reach out to your hosting provider and you’re threatened to take down such content or move off their servers!
Not so – if your hosting company has an offshore location…if it does, such a complaint is simply IGNORED!
Unfortunately, SiteGround has all its servers on onshore locations and can’t offer any DMCA-ignored services.
On the other hand, UltaHost has an offshore server in Finland where it specifically offers DMCA-ignored hosting. So, if someone thinks they can bully you into silence by using your host against you, good luck to them!
Again, another WIN for UltaHost.
Wrap Up
The SiteGround vs. UltaHost comparison was done as fairly and as objectively as possible. 13 metrics were used as the basis for the comparison and here’s the summary:
- Support (winner: UltaHost).
- Pricing (winner: UltaHost).
- Datacenter offers (winner: UltaHost).
- Speed (winner: UltaHost).
- Security (tie).
- Uptime commitment (tie).
- Money-back guarantee (tie).
- Free SSL availability (tie).
- Free website migration (winner: UltaHost).
- Constant (automated) backups (tie).
- cPanel availability (winner: UltaHost).
- Beginner friendliness (winner: UltaHost) and
- DMCA ignored servers (winner: UltaHost).
Of the thirteen (13) metrics compared, eight (8) were WON outrightly by UltaHost with the remaining five (5) being tied.
SiteGround scored a total of ZERO (0)!
Without mincing words, the conclusion is simple and to the point: UltaHost presents a better hosting offer when compared to SiteGround. The hefty price tags offered by SiteGround, additionally, do not translate to better service.