If you’ve finally discovered that SiteGround, Bluehost, GoDaddy, and other “popular” hosts aren’t what they’re hyped up to be, you should probably switch to one that uses LiteSpeed.
LiteSpeed servers are faster and more CPU efficient than Apache/Nginx, handling up to 2x the capacity of Apache. It also means you can use the free LiteSpeed Cache plugin which connects to QUIC.cloud’s CDN. Both of these are either free (or low cost) and do an excellent job with core web vitals/TTFB compared to setups used on the hosts listed above (especially with server-side caching and QUIC.cloud’s HTML caching). It’s faster, cheaper, with less chance of upgrading due to stingy CPU limits. For these reasons, LiteSpeed has been getting popular in Facebook groups.
Not all “popular” LiteSpeed hosts are good (Hostinger is the classic example who has many scam reports). I would ideally use a LiteSpeed host with a close data center, faster NVMe SSDs, and enough CPU cores/RAM/inodes. This is a big reason why I ranked some higher than others.
1. ChemiCloud WordPress Turbo
Here’s why their WordPress Turbo plan is #1 in this list:
- 11 data centers = higher availability depending on your region.
- 9 out of their 11 data centers use NVMe SSDs (soon to be all 11).
- Turbo+ Boost add-on scales cores/RAM from 3/3 to 6/6 for $6-7/mo.
- MariaDB, cPanel, 500k inodes (same as NameHero Turbo WordPress).
- 4.9/5 star TrustPilot rating, more migrations, no incidents, cheap intros.
ChemiCloud requires 3 years to get the cheapest price, but you have the option to scale using the Turbo+ Boost add-on if you see spikes in traffic or resource usage. $6-7/mo is much cheaper than upgrading to an entirely new plan. They also have other add-ons like a dedicated IP and add-ons specifically for shared/VPS/reseller. Their LiteSpeed add-on makes it possible to use LiteSpeed on a VPS, and unlike NameHero who charges $540/year, ChemiCloud charges just $119.40/year. The main cons are the 3 year contract and they use Memcached instead of Redis.
| FastComet FastCloud Extra | NameHero Turbo WordPress | ChemiCloud WordPress Turbo | Krystal Managed WP Business 1 | Scala Entry WP Cloud | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Type | Shared | Shared | Shared | Cloud | Cloud |
| Cores/RAM | 6 cores/6GB | 3 cores/3GB | 3 cores/3GB (scalable to 6/6) | No limits | No limits |
| Storage type | SATA | NVMe (US data center only) | NVMe (9/11 data centers) | NVMe | NVMe (US data center only) |
| Storage | 35GB | Unlimited | 40GB | 10GB | 50GB |
| Database | MySQL | MariaDB | MariaDB | MariaDB | MariaDB |
| Object cache | Memcached | Redis | Memcached | Redis | Redis |
| Data centers | 11 | 2 (US + EU) | 11 | UK only | 3 (US + EU) |
| Server | LiteSpeed | LiteSpeed | LiteSpeed | LiteSpeed | LiteSpeed |
| Cache plugin | LiteSpeed Cache | LiteSpeed Cache | LiteSpeed Cache | LiteSpeed Cache | LiteSpeed Cache |
| CDN | QUIC.cloud ($.02-.08/GB) | QUIC.cloud ($.02-.08/GB) | QUIC.cloud ($.02-.08/GB) | QUIC.cloud ($.02-.08/GB) | QUIC.cloud ($.02-.08/GB) |
| Control panel | cPanel | cPanel | cPanel | cPanel | sPanel |
| Email storage | 2.048GB | Adjustable | Adjustable | £4.99/mo | Adjustable |
| Inodes | 500,000 | 500,000 | 500,000 | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Major incidents | 2022 DDoS attack on 3 data centers | 2011 2-day node outage | None | None | None |
| Migrations | 3 free | 1 free | 200 cPanel + 10 non-cPanel | 50 cPanel + 10 non-cPanel | 1 free |
| Support | B | B | B | B | B |
| TrustPilot rating | 4.9/5 | 4.6/5 | 4.9/5 | 4.9/5 | 4.9/5 |
| Monthly price | $5.49 (1-3 years) | $9.98 (3 years) | $5.99 (3 years) | £35 (monthly) | $14.95 (3 years) |
| Renewals | $21.95/mo | $19.95/mo | $19.95/mo | £35/mo | $24.95/mo |
| View plans | View plans | View plans | View plans | View plans |
Nice stack. You can see this on their partners page.
2. NameHero Turbo WordPress
NameHero’s Turbo WordPress plan is solid if your visitors are in the US.
Their New York data center uses NVMe while Netherlands doesn’t. You get Redis, MariaDB, a good amount of resources (3 cores/RAM), and cPanel. Price is the main drawback which also requires 3 years to get their cheapest intro price. I don’t recommend their VPS plans since the LiteSpeed license costs $540/yr while it’s free Scala and significantly cheaper on ChemiCloud.
While support/uptimes are usually something you have to experience yourself, you can compare their network status page with A2’s or Hostinger and will almost always find NameHero has less downtime. Their CEO (Ryan) is a genuinely helpful guy if you watch his YouTube videos. NameHero also offers a free website migration on all plans within 30 days.
I’ve seen quite a few people switch to them from SiteGround:
3. Scala Entry WP Cloud
If you want something more powerful than shared hosting but don’t want to deal with the price/management of a VPS, Scala’s Entry WP Cloud plan is a perfect middleground. It’s less expensive than a modest shared hosting plan and has all the advantages of the cloud. You get no limits on CPU cores/RAM, dedicated resources, an isolated environment, and server firewall.
Other cloud hosts usually charge extra for a LiteSpeed license (NameHero is $540/yr and ChemiCloud is $119.40/yr). But there are 2 catches with Scala: only the New York data center uses NVMe and they use their own control panel (sPanel) which is like a “lightweight cPanel.”
If you’re OK with those, I’ve been really enjoying Scala. The CEO (Chris) is passionate about what he does and their support has always been super helpful. Plus, you get Redis + MariaDB.
4. FastComet FastCloud Extra
The pros of FastComet are more cores/RAM (6/6 on their FastCloud Extra plan) and pricing (between their cheaper pricing and you get the intro prices anywhere from 1 month to 3 years).
However, they use MySQL, Memcached, and have low email storage limits. Still a solid choice but I would lean towards one of the other LiteSpeed plans which usually have faster technology.
5. JohnnyVPS Power
JohnnyVPS is WP Johnny’s hosting company.
He’s highly respected in the WordPress community and it includes his speed optimization service (I’ve already hired them for this and was quite happy with results in core web vitals). While he has a features page, I wish he listed more of the technology/specs. There’s also no network status page and other things larger hosts have. That’s why Johnny calls it boutique. Don’t expect things like 24/7 support, but more of a personal experience from an honest team.
Very fast, and everyone I’ve seen says the same.
Here’s how Johnny describes his company:
6. Krystal Managed WordPress Business 1
For UK-based sites, Krystal Hosting is generally faster than Guru.
But their lower shared plans (Amethyst and Ruby) don’t support object cache and use SATA SSDs (see the shared hosting comparison chart). Their lowest managed cloud plan also only includes 4GB storage. Which means you really need to spend £35+ to get the faster technology. So if you’re going with Krystal, at least use the Business 1 plan from their managed WP hosting.
7. HostArmada Speed Reaper
Similar to FastComet’s FastCloud Extra plan. Both have LiteSpeed, 6 cores + 6GB RAM, SATA SSDs, MySQL, and pricing. Both have the same TrustPilot rating, but FastComet is more popular.
8. A2 Hosting Turbo Boost
A2 Hosting has 2 plans that use LiteSpeed: Turbo Boost and Turbo Max.
I’ve used A2 for a few side-projects and it’s “OK” but not the best. They’ve had a history of downtimes and their network status page can often have multiple incidents in a single day (from scheduled maintenance, interruptions, etc). This is the single biggest reason I pushed them down to the bottom of the list. If they improved uptimes/support, they would be higher.
9. Control Panels
Another option is to use a control panel that uses LiteSpeed (I listed a few below). This will be more hands-on but can save you a good chunk of money when looking into higher price ranges.
GridPane is popular in Facebook Groups.
It’s run by Patrick Gallagher and has a loyal following. You probably don’t hear about them as much outside of Facebook Groups since they don’t have an affiliate program. But you get arguably one of the fastest stacks and top-notch support from Patrick and his team. Once you launch a server, you’ll be able to choose OpenLiteSpeed then use Percona, MariaDB, or Redis.
LiteSpeed WordPress Hosts I Don’t Recommend
These are the LiteSpeed hosts I wouldn’t use (A2 is OK but has downtimes):
| Hostinger Business WordPress Plan | GreenGeeks Pro Plan | WPX Business Plan | A2 Hosting Turbo Boost Plan | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Type | Shared | Shared | Shared | Shared |
| Cores/RAM | 2 cores/1.5GB | 3 cores/2GB | 1 core/1GB | 3 cores/3GB |
| Storage | 200GB SATA | Unlimited SATA | 15GB SATA | Unlimited NVMe |
| Database | MariaDB | MySQL | MariaDB | MariaDB |
| Object cache | Memcached | Memcached | x | Redis |
| Data centers | 8 | 4 | 3 | 4 |
| Server | LiteSpeed | LiteSpeed | LiteSpeed | LiteSpeed |
| Cache plugin | LiteSpeed Cache | LiteSpeed Cache | W3 Total Cache | LiteSpeed Cache |
| CDN | QUIC.cloud ($.02-.08/GB) | QUIC.cloud ($.02-.08/GB) | XDN (free) | QUIC.cloud ($.02-.08/GB) |
| CDN locations | 80 | 80 | 36 | 80 |
| Full page caching | ✓ | ✓ | x | ✓ |
| Control panel | hPanel | cPanel | WPX Panel | cPanel |
| Email storage | 1GB | 2.048GB | Not listed but frequent issues | Adjustable |
| Inodes | 600,000 | 400,000 | At discretion | 600,000 |
| Major incidents | Scam reports, fake reviews, 2019 breach | Scam reports (unable to cancel service) | Global outage blamed on dead CEO | 2 week attack, frequent downtimes |
| Migrations | Unlimited (but screws it up) | 1 free | 5 free | Unlimited |
| Support | F | B | B | B |
| TrustPilot rating | 4.6/5 (fake) | 4.2/5 | 4.9/5 | 4.3/5 |
| Monthly price | $3.99 (1-4 years) | $4.99 (1 year) | $20.83 (1 year) | $6.99 (1 or 3 years) |
| Renewals | $8.99-$14.99 | $15.95 | $20.83 | $22.99 |
- Hostinger – countless scam reports on TrustPilot and Reddit. You get less cores/RAM, one of the worst support/uptimes, and their CEO (Arnas Stupelis) admitted to writing fake reviews. They got banned from Facebook groups and tricked people into buying their hosting by pretending to be “real” customers. Hostinger is by far the worst LiteSpeed host in this list and avoid them at all costs.
- GreenGeeks – the Hotel California of hosts. You can buy a plan, but you can never leave (AKA they make it near impossible to cancel, and when you do, they can still charge your credit card. You can read about this on their 1 star TrustPilot reviews.
- WPX – no redundancy system lead to a global outage where WPX’s CEO blamed their partner’s CEO who died months earlier. To this date, they have yet to add a redundancy system and say it’s too expensive. The “fastest WordPress hosting” thing was a marketing gimmick since it’s shared hosting with MySQL, no object cache, and 1 core + 1GB RAM. This campaign was driven by affiliate commissions to Matthew Woodward where WPX called Matthew’s tests “independent.” I wanted to like them but I just can’t after that. They’re unreliable and their CDN (XDN) only has 36 PoPs + no full page caching, making it very much inferior to Cloudflare APO. Lastly, they don’t clearly list resource limits and Instead, their TOS says it’s at their discretion and they can terminate your account if you exceed the unknown limits.
Do you agree with how I ranked these LiteSpeed hosts? Let me know in the comments and remember to read my guide on configuring the LiteSpeed Cache settings with QUIC.cloud CDN.
Cheers,
Tom
Chemicloud now uses NVMe Storage on all WP plans!
I’ll be updating this very soon, thanks for the heads up.
I think TMD hosting uses light speed servers also but I did not see them on the list
Hello Tom,
I’ve read few articles from your blog as i’m interested to start my own blog as well and i’m searching for a hosting platform. :) Btw, your articles helped me a lot, and i kind i’ve took the decision to go with Chemicloud ( based on my location ).
Btw, maybe it will help you to find out that Chemicoud is using NVMe storage, i just chatted with them and they confirmed me that.Also, if you on their website under “Services” -> “Shared Hosting ” you will that is mentioned about NVMe storage (unfortunately i can’t paste a pic here :) ). Hope this info helps.
I appreciate that Amalia, I’ll update it soon. Just start updating my LiteSpeed Cache guide too with some new settings.
ChemiCloud should be a lot better than the typical hosts most people start with. Let me know if you have any questions while setting everything up!
Chemicloud now has NVMe Storage, just for the sake of updating article. :) I am addicted to read blog. Really Amazing.
My opinion based on my personal experience: (Don’t want to get sued for speaking the truth).
I have used WordPress.com and Bluehost. Both suck!
At WordPress.com new creators seem to be guinea pigs for the testing phases of the Beta editor/Gutenberg editor. Daily issues with themes, customization, display… Support is also gone really slack, not that it was applaudable. Was a hopeful paying subscriber for an entire year, sadly never even got to publish my website.
Couldn’t let all my hard work go to waste… Googled best web hosting services. I could not find negative reviews about any web hosting service. Now I know why, but I also have my own theories…
Bluehost ranked no1 on most sites. Almost certain, even Forbes Advisor named Bluehost as best Hosting provider until recently – article has been edited. (That sticks in my mind as to why I chose Bluehost).
Getting started is pretty easy, even non-tech savvy creators can find their way. Sales support answered questions in real time. The problem began when I had a minor technical query… Support agents to the rescue: I waited for around 45 minutes to reach a Web Advisor, yet the live chat bot indicated that my query will be attended to within 5 minutes. To make matters worse, many of the ‘knowledgeable’ Web Advisors fed me with absolute bulldust. Poor me for disagreeing due to valid reasons. My facts were totally ignored. My entire website was messed up. I was even locked out of my Production site, so I wasn’t even able to try and fix their mess-ups. To my disbelief, I was just expected to live with it. I don’t think I need to say much more… I cancelled and asked for a full refund.
If it wasn’t for such pathetic client aftercare service, I think I would have actually stuck around.
On the search for more web hosting reviews that are not biased due to affiliate links and commission.
Thank you for your article.
Hello Tom, I have exactly the same issue with SiteGround. I have been pushed from GoGeek plan the cloud plan, but still have the CPU and RAM issue.
So I am thinking about switching to Namehero or ChemiCloud. I can see they both offer the wordpress plan (Shared) and VPS cloud plan. Will the VPS cloud plan also have the benefit of Litespeed and Quic Cloud? Is the setup process the same as what you decribed in your article named “NameHero Review: My #1 Choice For LiteSpeed Hosting “? Thanks.
If it’s on LiteSpeed then yes, and I believe it is (see here). Probably obvious since I’ve been mentioning them a lot, but it may be worth looking into Rocket.net too. They use Nginx with LiteSpeed’s PHP. You would need email hosting and a cache plugin like FlyingPress.