A2 Hosting Review 2023: How Fast is A2 Hosting? Let’s Find Out.

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A2 Hosting has been in the business since 2001 and is known for its page loading speed.

Their server speeds are among the fastest we’ve seen in the past 12 months. 

Additionally, the uptime of A2 Hosting’s hosting service is very high, making it a very reliable host.

Their plans are Developer-friendly, and an “anytime” money-back guarantee is unique, which makes them different from others.

One disadvantage of the service is that the renewal rate rises rapidly after the first period. On the other hand, if you’re looking for cheap web hosting ($1.99/month) with the ability to scale with your website-related needs, A2 Hosting might be the right choice.

After signing up, paying for, and putting A2 Hosting through its paces, we give you a detailed analysis of its pros and cons.

General Info & A2 Hosting Overview

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Our Rating:	Our Verdict: 5.0
SPEED:	285 ms (April 2020 to March 2021)
UPTIME:	99.97% (April 2020 to March 2021)
SUPPORT:	24/7 Live Chat, Email, Phone, Ticketing
APPS:	These include wordpress, Joomla, Drupal, openCart, and Magento
FEATURES:	Website Staging, DDoS Protection, Cloudflare CDN, Free SSL, Anycast DNS, Unlimited Bandwidth, Free SSL, and more.
HOSTING PLANS:	VPS, Reseller, Shared, and Dedicated servers
SITE TRANSFER:	With shared hosting, you get one free site transfer ($10/site thereafter)
PRICING:	Starting at $1.99/month (renewing a $10.99/month)

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A2 Hosting Pros

It’s one of the best solutions you might not know about, but you should.

Why?

They offer fast and reliable speed, excellent uptime, friendly customer service, innovative security features, and a generous refund policy. Plus, they’re even eco-friendly.

We’ll take a look at A2 Hosting’s features in greater detail.

1. The fastest loading speed of a page (285 ms)

When you visit A2Hosting.com, you notice that speed is a recurrent theme.

A2 Hosting is indeed fast. Their average speed in the past 12 months has been 285 milliseconds.

A2 Hosting average speed | See stats

And what’s even better?

A2 hosting is showing improved results month after month.

2. Reliable Uptime of 99.97%

Additionally, A2 Hosting is quite reliable as well as lightning-fast.

Several years ago, their uptime was below the industry standard of 99.93%. 

Despite the problems, they have achieved an average of 99.97% uptime over the last year. Their servers experienced over two hours of downtime.

A2 Hosting average uptime | See stats

Last 12-month average uptime of A2 hosting:

• March 2021: 99.99%
• February 2021: 100%
• January 2021: 99.85%
• December 2020: 100%
• November 2020: 100%
• October 2020: 99.99%
• September 2020: 100%
• August 2020: 99.99%
• July 2020: 100%
• June 2020: 99.84%
• May 2020: 100%
• April 2020: 100%

3. Malware scans and server monitoring 24×7

Preventing issues before they occur is the best way to keep your site secure.

Users may encounter performance problems if they undergo additional scanning, firewalls, or layers of encryption. A2 Hosting isn’t like that. 

With loads of additional security features, they can still perform at the highest level.

The servers of A2 Hosting are protected by HackScan, a 24/7 monitoring service that looks for malware and other attacks.

You’re also protected from denial of service attacks (DDoS) with their scalable data centers. 

An attack like this aims to overload your server and take it offline. With A2 Hosting, you don’t have to worry about unexpected, sudden surges.

4. Free Site Migrations (1-25 Depending on the Plan)

A2 Hosting offers free website migration with all plans.

If you want to migrate multiple sites from a shared hosting plan, it costs $10 extra per site. 

On the other hand, if you go with Reseller, Dedicated, or Managed VPS hosting, you get 25 free site migrations. Everything is spelled out in their terms of service.

If you’d like to avail of this feature, you’ll need to contact their customer support team and give them your cPanel credentials.

There might be a small charge if your website has any other control panel than cPanel.

5. Content Management Systems (CMS) and Developer-Friendly Tools

All major content management systems are compatible with A2 Hosting.

You can install WordPress, OpenCart, Drupal, Joomla, and Magento without hiring a developer with just a few clicks.

Performance-enhancing plugins are also available from A2 Hosting for these CMSs, starting from the “Turbo Boost” plan. All hosting packages come with free Cloudflare CDN, which further speeds things up.

If you’re a webmaster or agency seeking to host multiple sites under one roof, they’d be happy to assist you. A2 Hosting boasts developer-friendly tools to help you with that. 

It offers a free rewinding backup feature so you can go back in time, PHP, MySQL, Apache, Python, Ruby, and more.

Additionally, A2 Hosting offers a site builder called A2 SiteBuilder. The feature isn’t included in the standard hosting plans as it is a separate service.

6. Anytime Money-Back Guarantee

We’ve reviewed many hosts that offer 30-day money-back guarantees. However, A2 hosting provides an anytime money-back guarantee that can be invoked at any time.

During your first 30 days, you still receive a full refund. Nevertheless, if you are dissatisfied with the service, you can cancel at any time and receive a prorated refund for the time you have already paid.

However, a few snags do exist.

Refund requests beyond 120 days must be processed through PayPal. 

In addition, ‘additional’ services like domain registrations, setup fees, or migration fees are not refundable. Anything that is not refunded to you remains yours, for example, your domain name.

7. Green Web Hosting

At A2 Hosting’s hometown, there are 50,000+ trees and 150+ parks in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Therefore, A2 feels the responsibility to protect planet Earth from global warming.

Their partnership with Carbonfund.org supports renewable energy initiatives and reforestation. Additionally, an initiative called “FutureServe” helps offset emissions that come from their servers.

You probably don’t need to pay attention to this when signing up with a web host. It’s also nice to know that your hosting provider cares about the environment.

8. Fast Customer Support

A2 Hosting offers 24/7 customer support through live chat, email, and ticketing. If you prefer to learn something new or find an answer yourself, they also have a vast knowledge base.

Live chat is our favorite, so we always like to try it out.

Customer support was able to connect us with a representative almost immediately after we asked a question about their shared hosting plans.

Their customer support representative was knowledgeable and polite.

It’s also great to see A2 Hosting offering live chat again to its customers. Until recently, live chat was only available to registered users.

A2 Hosting Cons

Despite A2 Hosting’s many perks, we found a few problems.

Take a closer look at each of these downsides.

1. Domain Name is Not Free

A2 Hosting does not offer a free domain name with any of their shared hosting plans. 

In the hosting industry, this is not common since most of the hosts we’ve reviewed offer domain names for free (at least for the first year).

At A2 Hosting, you would have to pay, for example, $14.95/year to register or transfer a .com extension (renewable at the same price).

2. High Renewal Rates (And a 15-Day Deadline)

Long-term plans offered by A2 Hosting are more affordable. When you sign up for their plans for the first time, they offer introductory prices that are more than half of their regular prices.

When the initial period ends, this sweet deal ends, and the automatic renewal takes effect at regular pricing. You will see a price increase of approximately four times over the monthly average price you paid at first.

It gets worse.

If you want to cancel the renewal of your account, you will need to submit the request “15 days before the Renewal Term” through their customer portal by sending them an email to billing@a2hosting.com.

What happens if you miss this 15-day time? 

Your next renewal will be automatically renewed, and you won’t be eligible for a refund.

3. Restrictions on the Cheapest Plan

A2 Hosting offers its cheapest shared hosting plan (“Startup”) for $1.99/month. Although it’s not the lowest price we’ve seen, it’s still pretty good.

However, the lowest costing plan has multiple restrictions. It comes with just one website, 100GB SSD storage, and it lacks features like automatic backups and server rewind. 

Their next plan starts at $3.99/month. You receive unlimited websites, SSD storage, free automatic backups, and twice the resources compared to the basic plan.

The cheapest plan seems to promote a low price, while the valuable features and resources to build a website are primarily found in more expensive plans.

A2 Hosting Pricing, Hosting Plans & Quick Facts

A2 Hosting has four pricing tiers for its shared hosting:

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	Startup Plan	Drive Plan	Turbo Boost Plan	Turbo Max Plan
Pricing	$1.99/month Renews at $10.99/mo	$3.99/month Renews at $12.99/mo	$4.99/month Renews at $20.99/mo	$9.99/month Renews at $25.99/mo
Websites	1	Unlimited	Unlimited	Unlimited
Bandwidth	Unlimited	Unlimited	Unlimited	Unlimited
Storage	100 GB	Unlimited	Unlimited	Unlimited
Email Accounts	Unlimited	Unlimited	Unlimited	Unlimited
Other Features	–	• 2x Server Resources• Automatic Backups	• 2x Server Resources• Automatic Backups• Site Accelerator• Chacing Plugins	• 5x Server Resources• Automatic Backups• Site Accelerator• Chacing Plugins

Quick Facts about A2 hosting review 2023

• Their shared hosting plans do not include a free domain name.
• Free Features: SSL, CDN, and DNS.
• Signup is easy with three steps. Quite easy.
• Methods of payment are: Money Order, PayU Latam, PayPal, Skrill, PayPal, and PayPal, or Check.
• Rates for renewals are higher than for introductory periods. If you don’t cancel 15 days before the renewal period, you will be automatically charged. Purchases of domain names are not refundable.
• During the registration process there are a few subtle upsells.
• Instant account activation.
• cPanel is the control panel and dashboard.
• Installing Apps and CMSs (WordPress, Joomla, etc.): 
• During checkout, you will have the option of installing WordPress and other popular CMSs.

Do We Recommend A2 Hosting?

Yes, we do.

For the last several years, A2 Hosting has provided its customers with fast, reliable web hosting. 

Their uptime has also improved, which is now more reliable. They also offer free SSL certificates and free site migrations for all their shared plans.

As a customer, if you run into any issues at any time, you can request a refund for the unused time that has been prorated.

We do not like the high renewal rates and the strict terms that remain after the initial period. 

Even if you purchase the most expensive shared plan that allows you to host unlimited websites (“Turbo Max”), you still get one free migration. 

It is also worth noting that their shared hosting plans do not include a free domain name.

I hope this a2 web hosting review help you, if so don’t forget to share it with your friends.