Last Updated on
Ante Rados
These two are among the most popular providers in the hosting industry. Making a decision on which one to choose isn’t easy, especially for people venturing into hosting for the first time.
The NameCheap hosting vs HostGator choice is especially hard because they both try to appeal to the same target market. If you are having problems with picking between the two, this detailed guide of all their plans and features will make the HostGator vs NameCheap decision easier for you.
HostGator has lower domain renewal prices and a better website builder. On the other hand, NameCheap has better response time and cheaper pricing across all hosting plans. Due to the pricing difference, this NameCheap vs HostGator battle goes in favor of NameCheap.
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HostGator vs NameCheap hosting comparison
Our #1 Choice For Hosting Blogs
62% Off Exclusive Offer Applied at Checkout
Regularly
$6.95/mo
Starting From
$2.64/mo*
- Free 1 Year Domain Registration on Select Plans
- FREE SSL Certificate
- Drag-and-drop Website Builder
- E-commerce Ready
- 1-Click WordPress Installation
Namecheap or HostGator for shared hosting?
Namecheap
☆☆☆☆☆ 4.5/5
HostGator
☆☆☆☆☆ 3.5/5
Namecheap offers three plans for shared hosting:
Stellar: $2.88/month
- 3 domains
- Free domain included
- 20 GB SSD storage
- Unmetered bandwidth
Stellar Plus: $4.88/month
- Unlimited domains
- Free domain included
- Unlimited SSD storage
- Unmetered bandwidth
Stellar Business: $8.88/month
- Unlimited domains
- Free domain included
- 50 GB SSD storage
- Unmetered bandwidth
- Cloud Storage (only with US data center)
The amount of data isn’t the only limitation to the data you can store; there is also inode limitation. An inode is a data structure on a filesystem on Linux that stores information about data. To make it simple to understand, you can think of an inode limit as a limit to the number of files, folders, emails, etc. you can store in your account regardless of their size. The inode limit is 300,000 for Stellar and Stellar Plus, and 600,000 for Stellar Business plan.
If you want to register a dedicated IP, that will cost you an additional $2/month. For servers in the UK, there is another additional fee of $1/month.
HostGator also has three different shared hosting plans in their offer:
Hatchling Plan: $6.95/month
- 1 domain
- Free domain included
- Unclear hidden limit to bandwidth
Baby Plan: $9.95/month
- Unlimited domains
- Free domain included
- Unclear hidden limit to bandwidth
Business Plan: $14.95/month
- Unlimited domains
- Free domain included
- Unclear hidden limit to bandwidth
- Free dedicated IP
- Free SEO Tools
HostGator’s hidden limits are a huge letdown. Terms of service state that HostGator may terminate access to the services, apply additional fees, and remove or delete user content for excessive usage of resources. This would be fine if they didn’t market unlimited bandwidth on their hosting plans.
Even if you ignored dishonest marketing tricks they use, Namecheap’s offers are better and come at a lower price. Namecheap walks away with an easy win in this Hostgator vs Namecheap duel.
Our #1 Choice For Hosting Blogs
62% Off Exclusive Offer Applied at Checkout
Regularly
$6.95/mo
Starting From
$2.64/mo*
- Free 1 Year Domain Registration on Select Plans
- FREE SSL Certificate
- Drag-and-drop Website Builder
- E-commerce Ready
- 1-Click WordPress Installation
Namecheap vs HostGator for WordPress hosting
Namecheap
☆☆☆☆☆ 4/5
HostGator
☆☆☆☆☆ 4/5
Let's check out Namecheap's WordPress hosting plans:
EasyWP Starter: $3.88/month
- 10 GB SSD storage
- 50,000 monthly visits
EasyWP Turbo: $7.88/month
- 50 GB SSD storage
- 200,000 monthly visits
EasyWP Supersonic: $11.88/month
- 100 GB SSD storage
- 500,000 monthly visits
Namecheap doesn’t have a detailed overview of WordPress hosting packages. In addition to the lack of a proper overview, there is nothing special in any of the offers besides low pricing.
This part of HostGator vs Namecheap competition is evenly balanced and it all depends on whether you plan to use Google Adwords or not.
HostGator WordPress hosting plans are somewhat more expensive than their shared hosting plans:
Starter Plan: $9.95/month
- Single domain
- Email marketing included
- 100,000 monthly visits
- Unclear hidden limit to bandwidth
Standard Plan: $15.95/month
- Unlimited domains
- Email marketing included
- 200,000 monthly visits
- Unclear hidden limit to bandwidth
Business Plan: $22.95/month
- Unlimited domains
- Email marketing included
- 500,000 monthly visits
- Unclear hidden limit to bandwidth
- Free dedicated IP
A free .net or .org domain is included with 12, 24 or 36-month plans.
All plans come with $100 credit. You can use the $100 on Google Adwords. This makes up for the steeper price. The price difference between the HostGator cheapest plan and Namecheap cheapest plan is $73. If you intend to spend money on Google Adwords, you can pick HostGator and save yourself $27.
Cloud hosting plan comparison
Namecheap
☆☆☆☆☆ 0/5
HostGator
☆☆☆☆☆ 4/5
Namecheap has no cloud hosting in their offer. We can’t compare them with HostGator, but you can still click the toggle switch to check out what HostGator has to offer.
HostGator has three cloud hosting plans you can choose from:
Cloud Hatchling: $9.23/month
- 2 CPU cores
- 2 GB RAM
- Unclear hidden limit to storage
- Unclear hidden limit to bandwidth
Cloud Baby: $11.95/month
- 4 CPU cores
- 4 GB RAM
- Unclear hidden limit to storage
- Unclear hidden limit to bandwidth
Cloud Business: $17.95/month
- 6 CPU cores
- 6 GB RAM
- Unclear hidden limit to storage
- Unclear hidden limit to bandwidth
HostGator or Namecheap for VPS hosting?
Namecheap
☆☆☆☆☆ 4/5
HostGator
☆☆☆☆☆ 3/5
Namecheap has only two options for VPS hosting:
Pulsar: $14.88/month
- 2 CPU cores
- 2 GB RAM
- 40 GB SSD storage
- 1 TB Bandwidth
Quasar: $24.88/month
- 4 CPU cores
- 6 GB RAM
- 120 GB SSD storage
- 3 TB Bandwidth
Their plans cover the basics, but you will have to pay for additional software. For example, cPanel will cost you $10.88/month extra, and WHMCS Professional license will cost you $28/month.
Namecheap seems cheaper at first glance, but the final Namecheap hosting vs HostGator choice will depend on all the extra purchases you decide to make.
As with all their previous types of hosting, there are three hosting plans for VPS hosting:
Snappy 2000: $79.95/month
- 2 CPU cores
- 2 GB RAM
- 120 GB storage
- 1.5 TB Bandwidth
- 2 IP addresses
Snappy 4000: $119.95/month
- 2 CPU cores
- 4 GB RAM
- 165 GB storage
- 2 TB Bandwidth
- 2 IP addresses
Snappy 8000: $149.95/month
- 4 CPU cores
- 8 GB RAM
- 240 GB storage
- 3 TB Bandwidth
- 2 IP addresses
When choosing your VPS hosting provider between these two, you should calculate the pricing of all the additional software you will have to purchase with Namecheap. Even with those additional costs, HostGator will probably cost you more.
Dedicated hosting comparison
Namecheap
☆☆☆☆☆ 5/5
HostGator
☆☆☆☆☆ 3/5
Namecheap has 23 different servers to offer. Here are three of them for a simple preview of Namecheap hosting vs HostGator offers:
Xeon E3-1240 v3: $52.88/month
- 4 CPU cores
- 8 CPU threads
- 8 GB RAM
- 1 TB HDD
- 100 TB / month bandwidth
Xeon E-2136: $87.88/month
- 6 CPU cores
- 12 CPU threads
- 32 GB RAM
- 2 x 480 TB SSD
- 100 TB / month bandwidth
Dual Xeon Gold 5218: $298.88/month
- 16 CPU cores
- 32 CPU threads
- 128 GB RAM
- 4 x 1 TB SSD
- 100 TB / month bandwidth
Namecheap has a huge variety of servers to choose from, and they come at a better value for money. You should choose Namecheap for dedicated hosting.
Here is what HostGator has to offer:
Value: $189/month
- 4 CPU cores
- 8 CPU threads
- 8 GB RAM
- 1 TB HDD
- Unmetered bandwidth
Power: $249/month
- 8 CPU cores
- 16 CPU threads
- 16 GB RAM
- 2 TB HDD or 512 GB SSD
- Unmetered bandwidth
Enterprise: $289/month
- 8 CPU cores
- 16 CPU threads
- 30 GB RAM
- 1 TB SSD
- Unmetered bandwidth
As you can see, HostGator has dedicated servers that cost more and give you less. Namecheap is a far better choice in this Namecheap vs HostGator battle.
Compare HostGator vs Namecheap domain registration
Namecheap
☆☆☆☆☆ 3/5
HostGator
☆☆☆☆☆ 4/5
These are the prices that your domain extension will renew at, NOT the introductory offers (green denotes the cheaper option):
- .com $12.98/year
- .net $14.98/year
- .org $14.98/year
- .site $16.88/yea
- .online $19.88/year
- .us $10.48/year
These are the prices that your domain extension will renew at, NOT the introductory offers (green denotes the cheaper option):
- .com $12.95/year
- .net $12.95/year
- .org $12.95/year
- .site $0.95/yea
- .online $1.95/year
- .us $5.95/year
HostGator vs Namecheap website builder
Namecheap
☆☆☆☆☆ 3/5
HostGator
☆☆☆☆☆ 3.5/5
Namecheap’s website building experience starts with choosing your template. After you select a template, you are able to customize, resize and move around page elements easily.
The rest of the website building experience is not as smooth as the first part. It isn’t especially difficult, but compared to other builders (including Gator Website Builder), there are tools that aren’t as good as they could have been.
Alot of small details aren’t terrible but they aren’t really good either. For example, blocks with multiple components are difficult to delete, the undo tool doesn’t undo item placement, eCommerce software is not intuitive, etc.
All in all, Namecheap’s website builder is ok, but it isn’t any better than ok.
HostGator also has a drag-and-drop website builder. This one is called Gator Website Builder.
There is another similarity between the builders; Gator Website Builder also starts with the choice of a template. After you choose the template and name for your site, you can move on to the editor.
HostGator’s builder is very intuitive. Even a complete beginner will find their way around all the included features quite easily.
Gator website builder has all the basics covered. It is mobile responsive, and it has eCommerce support and great social media integration. When it comes to the creation of websites that are more sophisticated, you will find out that your options are limited.
When we compare it to the Namecheap website builder, their limitations are more or less the same, but Gator builder is more elegant.
HostGator vs Namecheap hosting speed, uptime, and reliability
Namecheap
☆☆☆☆☆ 4.5/5
HostGator
☆☆☆☆☆ 2.5/5
All the big hosting providers have almost 100% uptime, and Namecheap is no exception.
Their response time isn’t that great. 761 ms isn’t bad (especially when you compare it to HostGator’s 2,337 ms). Some hosting providers keep their response time under 300 ms, so this isn’t really a great response time but it is acceptable.
- Support: 24/7 live chat
- Response time: 761 ms
- Uptime: 99.97%
Hostgator also has almost 100% uptime, but their response time is terrible. It is one of the worst response times among all hosting providers and a good reason to choose another hosting provider.
- Support: 24/7 live chat
- Speed: 2,337 ms
- Uptime: 99.90%
Reseller hosting comparison
Namecheap
☆☆☆☆☆ 4/5
HostGator
☆☆☆☆☆ 3.5/5
Let’s check out what kind of reseller hosting you can get from Namecheap:
Nebula: $18.88/month
- 30 GB storage
- Unmetered bandwidth
- Unlimited Domains
- 25 cPanel Accounts
Galaxy Expert: $32.88/month
- 90 GB storage
- Unmetered bandwidth
- Unlimited Domains
- 100 cPanel Accounts
Universe Pro: $48.88/month
- 150 GB storage
- Unmetered bandwidth
- Unlimited Domains
- 200 cPanel Accounts
NameCheap is once again the cheaper option, but they have limits to the cPanel accounts you can open. If you don’t require more cPanel accounts, you should choose Namecheap.
Here are HostGator’s plans for reseller hosting:
Aluminum plan: $29.95/month
- 60 GB storage
- 600 GB bandwidth
- Unlimited Domains
Copper plan: $41.95/month
- 90 GB storage
- 900 GB bandwidth
- Unlimited Domains
Silver plan: $59.95/month
- 140 GB storage
- 1400 GB bandwidth
- Unlimited Domains
They are more expensive than Namecheap’s reseller plans, and the only benefit they have is the unlimited number of cPanel accounts you can open.
Namecheap vs HostGator pricing comparison
Namecheap
☆☆☆☆☆ 5/5
HostGator
☆☆☆☆☆ 3/5
Based on 1-year subscriptions (green denotes the cheaper option):
- Shared: $2.88/month
Cloud: N/A - WordPress: $3.88/month
- Reseller: $16.88/month
- VPS: $14.88/month
- Dedicated: $51.88/month
Namecheap has much cheaper pricing across all their plans.
Based on 1-year subscriptions (green denotes the cheaper option):
- Shared:
- $8.95/month
- Cloud: $10.95/month
- WordPress: $79.95/month
- Reseller: $29.95/month
- VPS: $79.95/month
- Dedicated: $189.99/month
HostGator also has 2-year and 3-year plans (prices for 3-year are the prices used in previous sections of the article). For an objective comparison, I chose 1-year plans here because Namecheap has no 3-year plans.
Namecheap hosting vs HostGator hosting conclusion
The winner is NameCheap!
The offers these hosting providers have are very similar, but the Namecheap hosting plans come at a lower price. HostGator doesn’t have much in repertoire to justify the price difference, so you will be better off with NameCheap.
Namecheap versus HostGator final score
Namecheap vs HostGator FAQs
Is Namecheap good for hosting?
Namecheap is an excellent host for beginners. They have low prices across all their plans. Features they offer should be satisfying for any beginners, but experienced users with special requirements might need to look elsewhere to be satisfied.
Where are Namecheap servers located?
What is HostGator used for?
Can I use HostGator in the UK?
Is HostGator shared hosting?
HostGator is a hosting provider that isn’t limited only to shared hosting. They have three shared hosting packages in their offer. The Hatchling plan starts at $6.95/month, the Baby Plan starts at $9.95/month, and the Business Plan starts at $14.95/month.