The Hostinger vs Cloudways comparison is on the way, and we have ample ground to cover. Hostinger is famous for its outstanding managed WordPress hosting services. Meanwhile, Cloudways doubles down on reliable cloud hosting. While Hostinger owns its servers, Cloudways is technically a reseller that sells third-party cloud hosting resources. Which is better?
During our assessment, we found Hostinger a tad better overall.
However, like Hostinger, Cloudways offers plenty of excellent features, convincing performance, and budget-friendly cloud hosting plans. Don’t leave yet. Read our full Cloudways vs Hostinger comparison and determine which hosting service best meets your demands.
Hostinger vs Cloudways – Quick Comparison
| 🏆 Hostinger | Cloudways | |
| 🌐 Shared (WordPress) Hosting Price | $2.99 monthly | / |
| 💾 VPS Hosting Price | $4.99 monthly | / |
| ☁️ Cloud Hosting Price | $7.99 monthly | $11 monthly |
| 🆓 1-Year Free Domain | Yes | No |
| 🔐 WHOIS Domain Privacy | Yes | No |
| 🌎 Data Centers | More than ten locations | More than fifty locations |
| ✅ Uptime Guarantee | 99.9% | 99.9% |
| 🖥️ Free SSL Certificate | Yes | Yes |
| ⏬ Automated Backups | Yes, with on-demand backups | Yes, with on-demand backups |
| 💿 Storage | 25 GB to 300 GB NVMe | 20 GB to 3,840 GB |
| #️⃣ Number of Hosted Websites | 25 to 100 | Unlimited |
| 🤖 AI Website Builder | Yes, included in all plans | No |
| 💸 Money-Back Guarantee | 30 days (no free trial) | No (3-day free trial) |
Hosting Plans, Pricing & Features
Hostinger and Cloudways differ in many ways, and subscription plans are the most attention-grabbing. As a cloud hosting service, Cloudways provides only this hosting type. However, it has two variants:
- Cloudways Flexible. This is managed hosting for Magento, WordPress, Laravel, and other PHP apps. You also get complete control over server resources.
- Cloudways Autonomous. A fully-managed hosting service with a more user-friendly design, but less freedom and flexibility.
Meanwhile, Hostinger offers several types of hosting, such as:
- Shared hosting, which is also fully-managed WordPress/WooCommerce hosting. It’s sort of a 2-in-1 offer, helpful in making WordPress sites.
- Cloud hosting, which provides better performance and more server resources.
- VPS hosting, which gives you a Virtual Private Server with isolated resources for various purposes, such as n8n hosting, game server hosting, etc.
It’s clear that Hostinger is more diverse, but it’s hardly enough to conclude anything.
Pricing Comparison
We’ll analyze their plans to get one step closer to a conclusion.
Here’s how much you’ll spend on Cloudways Flexible:
The cheapest Micro plan from DigitalOcean is $14 monthly, but you can switch to the Standard plan and spend $11 monthly on the same plan. Cloudways’ pricing structure is complex, offering multiple cloud providers and different server types. It isn’t easy to catch all the details right away.
The priciest plans are from AWS and Google Cloud, which typically start at over $20 monthly and reach thousands of dollars for more resources.
On the other hand, its Autonomous plans start with Plan 1, which costs $35 monthly, and end with Plan 4, which costs at least $240.
Here’s Hostinger’s pricing:
The Premium plan costs $2.99 monthly, but the best overall option is the Business plan, which costs $3.99 monthly. You’ll say this is shared hosting, but we’d say it’s the best in the business! If you want cloud hosting, you’ll spend only $7.99 monthly on the Cloud Startup plan.
Remember that Cloudways costs way more and offers smaller storage.
Even if you pick the Cloud Enterprise plan at $29.99 monthly, you won’t spend much, but you’ll get more than Cloudways’ Medium plan from DigitalOcean, which costs $54 monthly. Price-wise, an equivalent would be Cloudways’ small plan, but this is what it offers.
| Cloud Enterprise Plan (Hostinger) | DigitalOcean Small Plan (Cloudways) |
| 6 vCPU cores | 1 vCPU |
| 12 GB RAM | 2 GB RAM |
| 300 GB NVMe storage | 50 GB NVMe storage |
| 100 websites | Unlimited websites |
| Two free domains | No free domain |
| CDN | No CDN (paid extra) |
What About Their Features?
We already mentioned some of their features. According to the previous Cloudways vs Hostinger comparison, the latter sounds like a superior option for money. Hostinger’s outstanding value is hard to beat, with many freebies included at the price.
Here are our favorite Cloudways features:
- Unlimited visits
- Unlimited sites
- Free website migration
- Free SSL
- Redis cache + object cache pro
- Vertical scaling
- WordPress vulnerability scanner
- Website staging
- Daily backups
Hostinger’s Cloud Startup plan, which we tested, includes:
- Unlimited visits
- 100 websites
- Daily automated backups
- AI website builder
- Free email marketing
- Dedicated IP
- Free CDN
- Two free domains
- Fully-managed WooCommerce & WordPress
- AI SEO tools
- Free SSL, and more.
We haven’t touched on their security features, where Hostinger also excels by including everything out of the box, while Cloudways hides many things behind a paywall. We criticized this in our Cloudways test.
Winner: Hostinger
With all due respect to Cloudways, we’ll admit we prefer Hostinger’s pricing structure and features. It costs less, has superior hosting variety, and offers more features, making it a no-brainer option in 2026.
Cloudways vs Hostinger Performance Comparison
It’s time to assess their performance. By performance, we refer to loading speed, uptime, and response times. During our Hostinger vs Cloudways comparison, we noticed that both providers perform admirably.
We tested Hostinger’s Cloud Startup plan for this duel, the least expensive cloud hosting.
To make things fair, we used the Micro plan from DigitalOcean in Cloudways (also the least expensive).
Before we set things in motion, we selected US-based data centers for our websites. After that, we installed WordPress on both sides and made an identical website using the Astra theme. We chose this one because it’s lightweight and makes the website look good without taxing the server resources.
GTmetrix Speed Test Results Evaluation
Let’s start with page-load speeds.
We used GTmetrix and set the default testing server to Canada (Vancouver). This server is free; you can use it without subscribing to GTmetrix. In our Cloudways vs Hostinger speed tests, we observed these parameters:
- Time to First Byte, also known as TTFB
- First Contentful Paint, also known as FCP
- Largest Contentful Paint, also known as LCP
- Fully Loaded Time, also known as FLT
- Time to Interactive, also known as TTI
Having run multiple tests on both sides, we chose the best results. Here they are:
| Hostinger | Cloudways | |
| TTFB | 291 ms | 331 ms |
| FCP | 435 ms | 487 ms |
| LCP | 533 ms | 1.0 s |
| FLT | 733 ms | 1.1 s |
| TTI | 656 ms | 583 ms |
Hostinger defeated GoDaddy in a recent duel on our site. However, the battle with Cloudways is a bit tougher. Both providers performed remarkably, with some of the best loading speeds we measured. For example, the fully loaded time of 733 ms in Hostinger and 1.1 s in Cloudways is impressive.
Their servers have a short response time of under 350 ms, which implies outstanding performance.
While Hostinger bettered Cloudways in most parameters, Cloudways only had better TTI, which is the time it takes for the website to become interactive. However, the difference is only 73 seconds, so it’s negligible in practice. Nevertheless, Hostinger is faster for page loading.
Measured Uptime & Response Times
Let’s discuss their uptimes.
Both providers promise 99.9% and, luckily, adhere to that effortlessly. Having used Pingdom and examined it in the past three months, we achieved these results:
- Hostinger’s measured uptime was 100%.
- Cloudways’ measured uptime was 99.98%.
You could argue that Hostinger is better, and it is, but again, the difference is minor. Hostinger had no outages in the three-month period, while Cloudways had only two brief outages under five minutes.
After our uptime tests, we fired up Loader to test their average response times. Here are the results:
- Hostinger’s average response time is 592 ms.
- Cloudways’ average response time is 322 ms.
When we compared their lows and highs, they were identical (about 230 ms). However, Hostinger had a sharp spike that ruined its average. We can assure you that practical tests displayed no tangible differences, but we’ll let the numbers speak for themselves.
Winner: Hostinger
Hostinger displayed shorter loading times and superior uptime. On the other hand, Cloudways had considerably shorter server response times. If we do the math, that’s 2:1 for Hostinger, which ultimately took this round as the faster of the two.
Which Hosting Provider is Easier to Use?
Hostinger and Cloudways are easy to use, but the former is more straightforward because of its nature. As a fully-managed WordPress host, Hostinger’s goal is to provide a hassle-free setup and manage security and optimization for you. Meanwhile, Cloudways is only partially managed.
Initial Setup
The initial setup is pretty simple on both sides.
When you sign up for Hostinger, which you can also do with this coupon to save an additional 10%, you’ll be able to register a domain name and install WordPress with a click. With this out of the way, you can sign in to your WordPress admin dashboard and start to build a website.
Cloudways follows in the similar footsteps. During subscription, you can choose to pre-install WordPress. However, as it doesn’t offer a free domain, you must purchase one elsewhere, point it to the server, wait for the DNS propagation, and start working on your website.
We haven’t mentioned that you must also manually apply your free SSL. Otherwise, your website’s security will be compromised because it lacks encryption.
Interface & Control Panel
You’ll be thrust into a control panel when you pass the welcoming committee.
If you choose Hostinger, you’ll be staring at this screen:
If you choose Cloudways, it’ll look somewhat different:
Hostinger uses an in-house hPanel hosting environment, and although it has cPanel hosting plans, they regularly cost more and aren’t worth it.
Hostinger’s hPanel is one of the best control panels. The home screen contains more than sufficient information about hosting, security, on-server files, PageSpeed Insights, and even actionable tips to improve multiple aspects of your website. All menus are on the left side.
From there, you can access your WordPress admin panel, tweak website security parameters, and access business emails for easier management. Hostinger’s snappy hPanel feels premium and beginner-friendly, making it great for both beginners and seasoned users.
Cloudways is no less intuitive when you get its gist.
Installing apps is straightforward, while managing other hosting aspects is performed through the menu on the left. The “Add Application” button is always there, and the home screen displays your apps for easier access. Everything is laid out beautifully.
However, its panel is a bit less informative and lacks Hostinger’s slew of hosting-related information that would make it more insightful.
Website Staging
Both providers offer website staging, so we analyzed that in our Cloudways vs Hostinger comparison.
Cloudways allows you to host unlimited websites, so staging copies don’t take up space on your server. Hostinger’s limited number of sites comes to mind here, but since you can host up to 100 and likely not make more than 90+ staging copies, it shouldn’t be a problem.
Cloudways allows you to make a staging copy with a click.
From here, you can experiment on that copy and copy all changes to the live version. However, you can also pull elements from the live version to the staging copy.
Hostinger’s staging functions identically. Go to WordPress, click Staging, and select Create Staging.
Select your domain, and Hostinger will duplicate it within 15-20 minutes. Once you make the desired changes, you can immediately publish them, and they’ll be applied in about 20 minutes, from our experience.
Winner: Hostinger
Cloudways and Hostinger have equally intuitive control panels and staging environments. Cloudways is a tad harder to set up initially because it doesn’t include a free domain and requires more manual “labor” (applying an SSL, for example). Hostinger is a more straightforward provider from start to end, which gives it an advantage in this round.
Which Web Hosting Is More Secure?
The most secure web hosts should offer at least the basics, but premium-grade options like Hostinger and Cloudways should go a step or two forward. Are they secure enough, and if so, which one prevails?
Drawing from our experience, Hostinger is just a bit better overall, as Cloudways locks most of its essential security features behind a paywall. Here’s what Cloudways offers out of the box:
- Firewall with IP blocking
- Automated daily backups
- DDoS protection with Imunify360
- Free SSL
- Auto-healing servers
- WordPress vulnerability scanner
We then have Hostinger with:
- Managed WAF
- Malware scanning and removal
- DDoS protection
- WHOIS privacy with a free domain
- Automated and on-demand daily backups
- WordPress auto-updates
- WordPress vulnerability scanner
- Free unlimited SSL
Hostinger offers more features that don’t depend on the plan: even the cheapest Premium plan offers all of them! Meanwhile, Cloudways charges extra for malware protection, which costs $4 per website monthly. You will also be charged $3 per website monthly for SafeUpdates for plugins and themes.
While not necessarily a security feature, Cloudflare CDN is paid extra in Cloudways and costs $4.99 per domain monthly. Finally, Rackspace Email (professional email) is $1 per mailbox monthly. Now count all the costs and add them to your Cloudways subscription.
As you can see, Cloudways can match Hostinger, but at a price that makes it obsolete compared to its rival. For less money, you can even consider SiteGround, which has outstanding security features.
Winner: Hostinger
While Cloudways is by no means unsafe, Hostinger edges it out again by providing countless security features that are out of the box without forcing you to spend extra. Cloudways charges you for many things you’ll get in Hostinger at a multiple times lower price.
Customer Support
Flagship hosting isn’t always strictly about speed or raw performance.
It’s about customer service, ready to tackle your every need. Luckily, both providers come to your aid through 24/7 live chat support and extensive knowledge bases filled with helpful articles and how-to guides.
We communicated with Hostinger and Cloudways. We rarely had to wait more than ten minutes for a response, and all our questions were answered effectively. Hostinger even includes Kodee, a handy AI chatbot, which works surprisingly well for remediating basic issues. We’re not usually fans of chatbots.
Cloudways offers a higher support level if you snag its Advanced Support Addon.
At $100 monthly, you could argue it’s priced exorbitantly. However, this support extends to other aspects, such as plugins, themes, and performance optimization, making it worth the extra cash if you’re inexperienced.
Winner: Tie
Judging from our Cloudways vs Hostinger experience, their support teams operate equally efficiently and tackle problems and inquiries exceptionally well. While you can occasionally find a few nitpicks, they’re minor and don’t detract from an overall excellent experience.
Hostinger vs Cloudways: Closing Remarks
Hostinger defeated Cloudways both score-wise and in practice.
The score speaks for itself and is perfectly aligned without real-life experience. Having tested Cloudways vs Hostinger using their cloud hosting plans, we found that the latter was faster, slightly more straightforward to use, more secure, and much less expensive overall. The last bit is pretty important.
Cloudways is fantastic for what it offers, and if you spend more money on it, you can get a beastly cloud hosting server that would outperform its competition. If you need that much computing power, by all means, go for Cloudways because Hostinger’s extent is shorter.
However, if you’re looking for remarkably powerful hosting that costs little and provides fully managed WordPress with all the essentials, like security, ease of deployment, and more, Hostinger is an unbeatable option. To remind you, it starts at only $2.99 monthly.
The Cloud Startup plan, which costs $7.99 monthly, is the real deal to get the most out of it. Click below to test Hostinger risk-free and start strong with the #1 hosting service in 2026.