As one of the more unique cloud services around, Cloudways has made purchasing and employing a cloud service even easier. They provide a fast and secure service for anyone looking to purchase a cloud server without having to go through the hassle of doing it themselves.
However, one massive issue with Cloudways has led many to consider and opt for Cloudways alternatives, and that is its high costs and pricing. But before we get into why you should think of Cloudways alternatives, let’s talk about what Cloudways offers and what it is.
What Is Cloudways and What Does It Offer?
Founded in 2012, Cloudways is a managed hosting solution for businesses that have demanding cloud server needs. It mainly provides managed cloud hosting servers as a kind of middle-man from AWS, Google Cloud, Vultr, Linode, and Cloudways’ owner as of 2022, Digital Ocean.
Cloudways simplifies cloud service management by handling all infrastructure aspects like security, updates, and backups. It specializes in handling heavy-traffic websites as it offers features such as SSD-based hosting, PHP 7 ready servers, and integrated caching mechanisms like Varnish, Memcached, and Redis.
That said, despite these services, issues with high pricing, limited control and customizability, and even customer support challenges despite Cloudways featured live chat and ticketing support system.
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Why You Should Consider Alternatives To Cloudways
While Cloudways’ mission is to simplify cloud hosting, its various issues make you think of cutting out the middleman and just purchasing the service directly from the actual cloud service provider. So, let’s get into what issues have put users into two minds and possibly led them to opt for Cloudways competitors and alternatives.
Pricing Concerns
First and foremost, we have to talk about the considerable markup that Cloudways adds to the cloud services they purchase from cloud service providers. While Cloudways is charging extra for managing these services, you can get those services yourself for much lower prices.
You’re probably thinking that I don’t have the expertise or I don’t want to deal with managing the server myself, and you’ve got a point. However, the markup for managing the service is so much that you’re better off employing an IT expert to do it for you, especially in the long run, as users report as much as nearly twice the basic cost of purchasing the server yourself.
This markup becomes much more evident for fast-growing businesses that need constant scaling to meet their demands.
Plus, the services Cloudways provides are designed for high-traffic and demanding tasks and most probably not the type of uses that the average person would want for personal use. Moreover, you probably already have a competent team of IT personnel if you’re business is so popular and in-demand that you need high-performance servers in the first place.
Realistically, Cloudways only makes sense if you’re a small team that needs high-performance servers, has a big budget, and doesn’t want to deal with managing a cloud service especially since there are many cheaper Cloudways alternatives for managed hosting solutions.
With that in mind, one great Cloudways alternative for unmanaged hosting is Cloudzy. We offer the best bang for the buck with affordable rates and high performance that can easily handle your high-traffic websites and other tasking applications.
Our servers feature over 15 locations worldwide (including USA VPS, Europe VPS, and Asia VPS), dedicated internet connections reaching up to 10 Gbps, enterprise NVMe SSD storage, powerful 3.23 GHz turbo-speed AMD EPYC processors, and 99.95% uptime. Plus, we even provide one-click app solutions for your various needs.
Benefit from our affordable VPS hosting for various use-cases, including hosting websites or games, trading, remote desktop server, and app development & testing.
High-performance VPS hosting with low pricing
Limited Control and Customizability
While it’s convenient to have your cloud services managed by Cloudways rather than yourself, it comes with the cost of reduced control for server configurations. This is especially limiting and troublesome for developers who need in-depth access (like root access) over their server configurations.
On the one hand, Cloudways’ abstraction of server management makes everything intuitive and simple to use. On the other hand, this limits users who want to configure specific server settings, like adjusting kernel settings to optimize server performance, or those who want to install custom software like custom monitoring tools.
What if you want to implement a custom backup solution? You’ll need root access for that and you don’t have that with Cloudways. Or, if you want to customize your server by choosing specific versions of PHP, MySQL, or other software components, Cloudways only allows certain predefined parameters that may not fit your needs.
Growing Customer Support Issues
As I mentioned earlier, Cloudways is generally praised for its dedicated customer support; however, as Cloudways continues to grow, especially with its 2022 acquisition by DigitalOcean, its customer support availability has reportedly suffered.
While this issue is a serious one with traditional VPS services, its an even bigger issue with Cloudways’ managed hosting since, as we discussed earlier, you have limited control over the back end of your server.
Missing Features and Pricey Add-Ons
Considering the limitations I mentioned, Cloudways isn’t for everyone and the lack of some features only further limits the number of users who would benefit from it rather than Cloudways alternatives.
For instance, Cloudways doesn’t offer email hosting or domain registration services, which means you’ll either have to get these services from third-party providers or purchase them as an add-on from Cloudways through its elastic email add-on or integration with external SMTP services. This will only add to the already expensive bill you’ll have to pay for Cloudways’ pricey services.
Best Cloudways Alternatives
Considering the massive markup for managed services that Cloudways incorporates, as well as the various issues I’ve mentioned, let’s look at some of the best alternatives to Cloudways and what use cases they suit best.
Kinsta – Best for Managed WordPress Hosting
If you believe that managed hosting is the best service for you, then Kinsta offers the best managed hosting services for WordPress websites. With Kinsta, WordPress comes preinstalled, with its automatic updates and free migration for your first website.
Kinsta, which is one of Cloudways competitors, also provides SSD storage, free KeyCDN with limited bandwidth, built-in caching, over 24 data centers, and a 99.9% uptime guarantee. In terms of security, Kinsta offers free SSL certificates, automatic daily backups, a firewall, and a hack-fix guarantee.
That said, Kinsta is a better alternative to Cloudways for WordPress hosting as you can’t use any other CMSs and only get servers from Google Cloud Platform, unlike cheaper cloud service providers like Digital Ocean and Vultr, which Cloudways offers.
Hostinger – Best Affordable Alternative to Cloudways
By simply removing Cloudways as a middleman and getting managed hosting from the cloud service provider itself, you can cut costs quite a bit. One very affordable Cloudways alternative in that regard is Hostinger.
Additionally, Hostinger, another Cloudways competitors, offers a free domain, free SSL certificate, free Cloudflare CDN, free dedicated IP, free site migration, SSD storage, Wanguard anti-DDoS traffic analyzer, intelligent firewall rules, BitNinja or Immunity360, CloudLinux OS, custom server rules, free SSL certificates, regular automatic backups.
However, with such low rates and freebies, you might be expecting a catch, and you’re right. One major issue with Hostinger is its horrible customer support. Users have reported slow, unresponsive, and clueless customer support.
While the initial rates provided by Hostinger are tempting, you should be aware that its renewal rates are significantly higher. More importantly, its advertised lowest prices require you to commit to year-long (or even longer) plans, with shorter plans costing much more.
To avoid these types of misunderstandings and potential budget loss, check out our guide where we provide an in-depth analysis of Hostinger and its competitors.
Cloudzy – Best Unmanaged Alternative for Developers
Cloudzy is a great Cloudways alternative if you want to cut the cost of Cloudways’ markup and take control of your server hosting directly.
While you’ll have to run your servers yourself, this is an advantage for developers who want a more in-depth and hands-on access to their servers to change and optimize their servers, something you don’t have with Cloudways managed services.
You also don’t need to worry about performance since Cloudzy offers the same level of reliability and power you’d expect from any top-tier provider, but with the added advantage of full control over your server environment and a far more affordable rate.
Take a look at our Cloud VPS pricing and see how much you can save without sacrificing performance or control.
Amazon Web Services (AWS) – Best for Enterprises
No matter how much knowledge you have about the cloud services industry, you’ve most probably heard about AWS. AWS’ services are specifically suited to enterprise-grade businesses as it requires a high level of technical expertise to figure out its services as well as a dedicated accounting team to make sure you don’t pay for what you don’t need.
It offers the widest variety and the highest number of cloud services across the highest number of data centers worldwide, with over 240 products in over 245 countries. While its services are comprehensive, AWS tends to cost quite a bit and has many issues of its own.
IONOS – Best Cloudways Alternative for Small to Medium-Sized Businesses
One of the most affordable managed hosting alternatives for Cloudways is IONOS. IONOS’ exceptional pricing particularly suits smaller businesses due to its ease of use and low rates while offering reliable services and performance.
IONOS features dual-platform technology that combines Windows and Linux servers, allowing greater flexibility and compatibility. Additionally, you don’t have to worry about data loss as your data is stored across several locations.
Moreover, not only do you get free SSL certificates like many other Cloudways alternatives, but you also get Wildcard SSL certificates, meaning not only is your main domain secured, but so are your subdomains.
Lastly, IONOS offers a mobile app for iOS and Android that allows you to monitor and manage your services easily. That being said, I believe IONOS, like other providers, is not perfect and has its flaws. We’ve covered both the pros and cons of IONOS alternatives in a comparison post that will give you a clearer overall picture.
Final Thoughts
Considering the many issues with Cloudways, you can easily cut costs and get in-depth access to your services by simply purchasing your servers from the provider directly. Even if you don’t want to manage your servers yourself, you can always opt for the many, many Cloudways alternatives, the best of which I’ve mentioned above.
FAQs
What is Cloudways?
Cloudways is a managed hosting platform that provides and manages cloud-based servers that are purchased from popular cloud service providers, including AWS, Google Cloud, Vultr, Linode, and Cloudways’ owner as of 2022, Digital Ocean.
Is Cloudways a good hosting service?
Cloudways simplifies cloud service management by handling all infrastructure aspects like security, updates, and backups. It specializes in handling heavy-traffic websites as it offers features such as SSD-based hosting, PHP 7-ready servers, and integrated caching mechanisms like Varnish, Memcached, and Redis.
What are the disadvantages of Cloudways?
Cloudways’ high prices, limited customizability, customer support issues, missing features, and pricey add-ons have led users to consider alternatives to Cloudways and potentially opt for unmanaged services at a much better rate.
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