Choosing a web hosting company can feel overwhelming. The internet is littered with conflicting opinions and hidden agendas. In this honest WPX Hosting review, I talk in detail about the web host I use for this very website.
I also discuss whether a rather controversial WPX system outage that occurred in August 2021 changed my opinion on WPX Hosting – read on for more on that.
Background
Before I switched to WPX Hosting, I used DreamHost for all of my sites. I still do for several. But for reasons I shall discuss shortly, I felt I’d outgrown it for this particular site.
I looked at several “premium” options for WordPress hosting. WPX was the one that I kept coming back to, and the one I eventually chose.
For those seeking a quick TL;DR, I can summarise my WPX Hosting review by saying that I’m VERY happy with the service and give it my full recommendation. But I highly recommend you dig into the detail – because that’s how you’ll ensure that WPX Hosting is a good fit for YOU.
Why You Should Be Cautious of Web Hosting Reviews – And Why You Can Trust What I Say!
Just before we start, I’d like to let you in on a secret:
MANY web hosting reviews cannot be trusted.
There’s a lot of money in web hosting – and not just for the hosts themselves.
Hosting is something website owners pay for on an ongoing basis. Switching to a new host is a disruptive hassle, so people tend to stick with their hosts for many years.
This means that the “lifetime value” of a customer is considerable. As such, web hosts (including WPX) pay significant commissions to bloggers who recommend them and share affiliate links.
A handful of hosting firms (who I won’t mention by name) pay particularly large commissions. That’s why you see the same names come up again and again in thousands of articles about blogging.
I’ve NEVER recommended these companies. I only recommend providers I trust and hold in high regard.
I AM an affiliate for various companies. When it comes to web hosting, there are plenty I could recommend that would pay me more commission than WPX. I am a genuine paying customer – and you can check that for yourself easily enough.
I’ve been an IT professional for over 20 years, and used MANY hosting companies in that time – so you can be sure I know my stuff.
With that clarification out of the way, let’s begin.
What is WPX Hosting?
WPX Hosting is a company offering managed WordPress hosting. It has its own super fast global server infrastructure. Furthermore, all customers get access to a free CDN (Content Delivery Network) to ensure fast loading times for their websites.
WPX was set up in 2013 by CEO Terry Kyle, an online business veteran. He’d become frustrated with the service offered by most web hosts and was convinced he could do better. WPX has a strong focus on user experience, and offers live chat from a knowledgeable support team 24/7/365.
WPX is a dedicated WordPress host, with a simple service offering. It is fully managed hosting, and the support team happily helps with things that many other companies wash their hands of, such as performance optimisation and malware scans.
Online WPX reviews are overwhelmingly positive. The company proudly shows off its 4.9/5 TrustPilot rating – and rightly so.
Key Features: How does WPX Stand Out?
I’ll go into detail about my own experiences a little later in this WPX review. But first, I should explain a few of the things that make WPX stand as a web hosting company:
24/7 Live Chat with a Super Fast Response Time
It may seem a little far-fetched to expect an average 30-second response time from a hosting service support team. But WPX meet their promise.
I’ve personally contacted their support on many occasions – when I was asking pre-sale questions, during my site migration, and when I’ve had queries or issues with my live site.
Not only does WPX provide this lightening-fast support, it’s good support too. The people answering your queries via chat support are helpful and knowledgable.
There’s nothing more frustrating, especially as a techie, than knowing the person you’re talking to is winging it or following a script. There’s none of that at WPX, and it makes a HUGE difference.
Free SSL Certificates
It’s not a particularly exciting benefit, but WPX provides free SSL certificates so that you can ensure your WordPress website is secure.
It’s fair to say that more and more web hosts do provide free certificates nowadays. However, there are some notable exceptions that charge extra. Some of them are the ones you widely see recommended online (see above for why!)
Fast Performance and Free Cloud CDN
Fast site loading times are increasingly important – both to your readers and to the search engines. WPX Hosting’s laser focus on speed helps here, and the company has a unique way of ensuring high performance.
WPX Hosting offers a free cloud CDN solution called WPX Cloud. This Content Delivery Network uses a dedicated server infrastructure, with “end points” dotted across the world. Regardless of where you are located, your website users download data from the point closest to them (so a user in London doesn’t wait for data to make its way from the US, for example).
CDN technology isn’t unique to WPX. Many companies offer it, such as Cloudflare, a dedicated provider used by loads of big-name websites. However, WPX hosting’s approach IS unique, with automatic setup and no complicated configuration.
There are other WPX Hosting features that contribute to fast load times for your site(s). WPX’s technicians help with speed optimisation when you migrate a site to them, using recommended plugins with optimal configuration settings.
Finally, the servers all use SSD drives, and are intentionally “underloaded.” This is in deliberate contrast to many hosting firms who spread their infrastructures thinly to pack in as many paying customers as possible at low cost.
DDOS Protection and Malware Scanning
WPX Hosting also has a big focus on security. Your managed WordPress website is well-protected, with regular free malware scans and advanced DDOS protection.
While most managed WordPress hosting companies provide some level of security protection, it’s fair to say that this is an area where many entry-level firms gouge customers for extra bold-ons. With WPX, it’s all included.
WPX Hosting Pricing
As WPX Hosting concentrates solely on managed WordPress, there’s not a hugely complicated pricing structure to wade through.
Hosting plans start at $24.99 per month. This drops to $20.83 per month if you pay annually. A reduction for up-front annual payment is common with managed hosting services, and it’s always worth grabbing the saving if you can afford to pay in one go.
The entry-level package, called “Business,” supports up to five websites, with a total of 10GB storage and 100 GB bandwidth usage.
Next up is “Professional” at $49.99 per month (or $41.58/mth paid annually). This is the package I use, and it gives you support for 15 websites, with 20GB storage and a 200 GB bandwidth limit.
Finally, there’s “Elite.” This is $99 per month ($83.25 annually). There’s infinite bandwidth usage on this package, and 40GB of data storage.
WPX Hosting Discount Code
WPX Hosting has been kind enough to provide me with a discount code that will give you 50% off your first month. Click here and use the code HWC to use it. (Please note this is only valid for new customers, on monthly plans only).Â
Domains from WPX Hosting
You can register and pay for your website domain(s) direct from WPX as well.
The pricing is pretty standard for the industry, with a .com, for example, costing $10.99 per year.
What’s Included with WPX?
We’ve looked at the pricing now, but in this part of my WPX review I’d like to explain what you actually get beyond the hosting itself.
The good news is that there are no “hidden extras” with WPX. You don’t reach the “Check Out” page and see a mind-boggling list of add-ons.
Here’s what you get with every WPX Hosting package:
Email Support
This was a big deal for me when I chose WPX Hosting. You get unlimited email accounts for your website(s) included. When you start to explore managed WordPress hosting, you quickly find out that several of the “premium” providers, such as Kinsta and WP-Engine don’t offer an email service. This means you have to use a (and pay for) a third-party provider.
For me, this was an extra complication and an extra thing to manage. The fact email is provided was definitely something that nudged WPX Hosting onto my shortlist.
Free Migrations
If you move to WPX from another host, the company handles all the migration work for free. They offer this for an unlimited number of sites.
I was hugely worried about all of this, but they did a fantastic job, with no unexpected issues and no downtime. Even my email accounts moved to the new host, complete with the same chosen password, leaving me only a couple of steps to keep things working at my end.
Staging Areas
If you’re making changes to your site, such as trying out a new theme, and don’t want to impact the live site, a staging area is what you need. It allows you to create a duplicate site you can use as a test-bed.
You then have the option of overwriting the live site with the staged version, once you’re happy your WordPress website is exactly as you want it.
WPX includes a staging area for each of your sites, and it’s easy to manage from the service dashboard (more on that below).
Manual and Automatic Backups
WPX Hosting runs regular backups of your site(s) and keeps them for 28 days. You can also trigger manual backups from the dashboard if you wish.
Malware and DDOS Protection
As described above, WPX includes comprehensive security features, and proactive monitoring of them. On the one occasion I’ve noticed a security issue on my site, it was already being rectified by the time I’d typed a message to the insanely fast support team.
99.95% Uptime Guarantee
Most companies offer some kind of uptime promise with each hosting plan. WPX offers a very specific 99.95% uptime guarantee.
Having now been with WPX for some time, I’m pleased to report that the company usually manages not just to meet this target but exceed it. They have achieved 100% uptime on many months.
However, things went awry for WPX on August 2nd 2021, when the company experienced a prolonged five hour spell of downtime. I discuss this further, and give my views on it, in the performance section below.
30 Day Money-Back Guarantee
If you have any reason to be dissatisfied with WPX Hosting, the company offers the security of a 30-day money-back guarantee.
WPX Hosting Review: My Experiences
Although I’ve shared a few details of my experiences already, so far this WPX Hosting review has concentrated more on what you get than what it’s like. The latter is what we focus on now.
I was nervous when I migrated this site to WPX Hosting. This wasn’t because I had any big reasons for concern. I’d done a huge amount of research, and – as I’ve said – the reviews of WPX Hosting are overwhelmingly positive.
But moving an active site with thousands of daily visitors IS a big deal.
The first thing I should say is that the presence of the live chat support is hugely reassuring. The response time is exactly as promised, and the service is great.
One of the things that had started to annoy me about Dreamhost was the support. Despite paying for DreamPress, their managed WordPress hosting package, I’d never know if I’d get a helpful instant answer, or be waiting for a copy and pasted email response when I had a problem with my website.
With WPX, it’s clear that every person working on the support desk is a true techie. They respond at speed and they ask the right questions.
As such, I was as calm as I could be about my migration. Here’s how it went.
Migrating to WPX Hosting
Kicking off a migration to WPX involves filling out a form, with all the key details and credentials, and leaving them to get on with moving your website(s). The only thing you really have to do yourself is point your name servers to them, a simple setting change on the control panel wherever you manage your domain name.
I sent off the form and crossed my fingers.
And I’m delighted to say that the site was moved with no real issues.
I did have a couple of glitches around the caching settings WPX set up for me. They have a set of “best practice” settings to make things work optimally with their server setup and the WPX Cloud CDN. Unfortunately, for me, these settings caused a few small issues with how my site was displayed, especially around adverts.
All of this was quickly rectified with a chat to the support team. I ended up reverting to my own preferred caching plugin (WP Rocket), and everything was quickly working well.
The migration was as smooth as anyone could hope for. As an IT consultant by trade, I’ve been involved in a LOT of site migrations and this was the best I’d experienced. And it was free.
The WPX Dashboard
Like all website hosts, WPX gives you access to a dashboard where you control the settings for all of your websites.
As you can see, it’s a pretty simple interface (and if we’re being picky, not the most attractive).
Unlike some hosts, WPX opts not to use the standard-issue cPanel interface. For some very technical website owners, this might be a problem, or even a deal-breaker. But for me it’s a plus.
I just want somewhere for my WordPress website to live, and have no desire to navigate a huge panel of options I’ll never use. That’s one of the reasons WHY I pay for managed hosting!
The WPX Hosting dashboard has all the functions you need and none that you don’t. It’s not the fastest interface in the world, but it’s only a minor irritation. The sluggishness is most noticeable in the web-based File Manager, which provides direct access to your website files. However, you’re under no obligation to use this, as you can set up all the direct FTP accounts you need.
Ultimately it’s a dashboard, and it does the job. It’s easy to use, which for me is the key thing.
Email from WPX
As I mentioned earlier, WPX provides email support, so you can set up and host mailboxes in the yourname@yourdomainname.com format.
There’s nothing exciting about this, barring the fact that some big-name hosts don’t provide this as standard, or at all.
As well as the ability to set up and manage accounts, there’s also a functional webmail client available. You have the option of specifying a size limit for mailboxes, or using unlimited storage up to the limits for each of the hosting plans.
WPX Hosting Review: Performance
WPX Hosting has a focus on (and a reputation for) great performance. As such, the question you probably want to ask is what mine is like!
I shall let my performance report from GTMetrix speak for itself.
I should probably point out that I’ve done a LOT of work on the speed of my site. But as you can see, it’s VERY fast on WPX.
Here’s a screenshot from an inner article page with more images and more going on:
It’s still not too shabby at all.
Unfortunately, with so many different factors in play, it’s impossible for me to provide a direct speed comparison between WPX Hosting and Dreamhost. There are so many different factors around plug-ins and different CDNs that any such comparison would be rather subjective.
However, I undoubtedly got myself a speed boost from switching to WPX. The configuration is also much simpler than it was before.
Uptime
When I first published my WPX review, I said the following:
“I’ve had no significant episodes of downtime on my website since I switched to WPX Hosting.”
There was one occasion the site was down when I checked in the morning, but it was rectified in minutes. On another, I woke up to an unexpected redirect, but again this was sorted in no time at all. I’m not entirely clear how it happened, and maybe it was the free malware scanning that picked it up, but – again – in was sorted very quickly.
Unfortunately, WPX subsequently blemished their record, with me and with all of their customers, when they had a high profile downtime incident on August 2nd 2021.
Not only did ALL of WPX’s client sites go down, their OWN site went down too, leaving frantic clients to panic and vent on Twitter and Facebook.
In total, the WPX outage lasted around five hours – and many of their customers were very unhappy about it. WPX published a full statement, along with a video apology. The outage was blamed on a faulty network switch at Steadfast Networks, a company supplying WPX’s core network infrastructure.
Obviously, this situation was far from ideal. I lost traffic, and probably a little money. Bigger blogs and eCommerce sites likely lost a lot more than me.
I perhaps have a more charitable take on this than some; I have an IT background, and accept that things go down sometimes. As I’ve said to many clients over the years, 99% reliability still means that a system could be down for more than three days each year. Companies spend a vast amount of time and money pushing reliability up to 99.9%, 99.99% or 99.999%. Those extra 9s are expensive.
So yes, there was a WPX system outage. But it hasn’t in any way made me feel inclined to switch away. If it happens again, I’ll have a very different view, and I’ll be updating my review of WPX again!
For what it’s worth, the company has laid out its action plan to prevent the same thing happening again. Given their focus on customer service, I’m very much prepared to give them the benefit of the doubt.
Even the largest companies have outages sometimes – it’s the transparency in the aftermath, and what they do to prevent a repeat performance that matters most to me.
Other Reviews of WPX Hosting
Before I signed up to WPX Hosting, I was sure to check plenty of reviews. I was keen to find out about both the user experience and the reliability.
Thankfully, TrustPilot (and other sites) are packed with reviews saying stuff like this:
WPX Hosting takes its service seriously, and I can only add to the plethora of great reviews with this one. Owner Terry Kyle got into this business because he was unhappy with the kind of service the typical host provides. It’s clear that WPX executes solidly on his plan.
I should also point out that despite the downtime incident, WPX still maintains an average 4.7 star TrustPilot rating at the time of writing.
WPX vs DreamHost
As I explained at the start, I produced this WPX Hosting review because I wanted to provide an honest account of the provider’s performance and service.
I’m not in a position to create a “by numbers” comparison of WPX Hosting vs lots of other web hosts, and nor do I want to. I’m not a web hosting review site – although I have worked for one in the past!
However, I AM uniquely positioned to give you an accurate summary of WPX Hosting vs DreamHost. More specifically, I can compare WPX with DreamPress, DreamHost’s managed WordPress service.
As you’ve probably guessed, WPX blows DreamPress away in almost every area.
First off, full support for DreamPress isn’t really available 24 hours. If a problem happens at the right time and live support is available, that’s fantastic – but sometimes you’re left waiting on an email response.
If you need to talk to your host and get a full, professional response, at any time of day or night, WPX Hosting is the MUCH better option.
WPX is best for reliability too. As a techie, I do sympathise when firms have infrastructure issues, but it was a run of these that caused me to migrate away from DreamPress. Week after week I was experiencing downtime, and credits for my hosting plan were little consolation for such poor reliability.
Speed wise, it’s another win for WPX Hosting. My site was already well optimised, so I didn’t experience an enormous bump in performance when switching. However, when I perform speed tests, it’s very rare to see load times impacted by a slow server response – sadly that wasn’t the case with DreamHost.
This part of my WPX Hosting review raises two questions: Are there ANY areas where DreamHost is best, and why do I still use DreamHost for several of my sites?
The answers are simple: it’s about cost. The Business Plan that I’m on with WPX costs twice as much as I was paying with DreamHost. It’s also only fair to point out that storage and bandwidth limits are more generous there too, and each plan includes email.
Also, in DreamHost’s defence, DreamPress was the only one of their services I had an issue with. My other sites are on a VPS (Virtual Private Server), and although performance isn’t amazing, it’s perfectly adequate.
Because I now pay for the WPX Hosting Business plan I have room to move more sites over. In the longer term I probably will. However, I should emphasise that I remain perfectly happy to use DreamHost for smaller and less busy sites, which it remains great for.
Conclusion
As you can no doubt guess, my WPX Hosting review is going to end on a positive note!
Not only is WPX Hosting a great choice for websites of all kinds, it offers some of the best support I’ve experienced in a long IT career – and that support is on offer 24 hours per day.
My load times are fast. My site is reliable. I can see myself sticking with WPX Hosting for many years to come.
WPX Hosting was clearly created with user experience in mind, and the CEO deserves great credit for executing on the vision and ensuring his team share it.
If you use WordPress and are looking for the perfect host, I can’t imagine you being unhappy with WPX Hosting.
In some limited circumstance, you may want to consider other hosts. If you don’t use WordPress, you’ll have to look elsewhere. Similarly, if the plan for your websites is only a small one, you may not want to pay $24.99 per month when cheaper hosts are out there (although it’s worth noting that price covers you for up to five websites).
Really though, great service doesn’t come for free. My own migration to WPX Hosting has been the ultimate demonstration that you get what you pay for. If you plan to build a thriving online business, why not start out with a service that will go the distance?
WPX Hosting is Great For:
- Anyone launching a site who’s willing to pay for a quality managed service.
- Established bloggers seeking faster load times and reliable service.
- Website owners who’d rather leave the technical detail to the experts.
- People seeking a premium hosting service that includes email.
WPX Hosting is NOT So Great For:
- Non WordPress sites (not supported at all).
- Very technical users who want direct access to all the hosting nuts and bolts.
- Entry-level bloggers on a limited budget.
Find all the pros and cons of WPX Hosting in the summary section below.
WPX Hosting: A Great Choice for WordPress
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Speed
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Reliability
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Service and Support
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Features
WPX Hosting: A Great Choice for WordPress
WPX Hosting promises fast and reliable service and more than delivers. From slick migrations to the peace of mind of a quick response to every problem, WPX Hosting is a service that “gets out the way,” leaving you with the time to get on with the most important thing: building and growing your website.Â
Pros
- Insanely fast and reliable service.
- Great performance.
- Competitive pricing for a managed service.
- Slick migrations.
- Support for domain email accounts included.
- Fast CDN.
- Thoughtful features like backups and malware scanning included at no extra cost.
Cons
- More expensive than “entry-level” hosts – but you get what you pay for.
- Simplified dashboard may annoy techies.
- Sluggish control panel.
- WordPress only.
Founder of HomeWorkingClub.com – Ben has worked freelance for nearly 20 years. As well as being a freelance writer and blogger, he is also a technical consultant with Microsoft and Apple certifications. He loves supporting new home workers but is prone to outbursts of bluntness and realism.