TL;DR – Winner
A2 Hosting is a clear winner in this battle. This hosting provider won in 5 out of 8 categories. Namecheap won in 2 categories and 1 category ended in a tie.
A2 Hosting is a reputable web hosting provider with a great track record. The company has nearly two decades of experience in the web hosting space under their belt and is the web hosting provider of choice for many thousands of marketers.
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Can’t make up your mind between A2 Hosting and Namecheap?
I’ve pitted them against each other in 8 different categories and one came out on top.
Continue reading to find out more!
Basic Information
| Feature | A2 Hosting | Namecheap |
|---|---|---|
| About | A2 Hosting launched in 2001 which means they have nearly 20 years of web hosting experience. The company has been independently owned eversince. A2 Hosting offers a number of web hosting plans from shared to dedicated and everything inbetween. | Founded back in the 2000 by the company’s still active CEO Richard Kirkendall, Namecheap has grown into one of the premier domain registrars with over 10 million domains under management. The company also offers web hosting services to millions of users worldwide. |
| Hosting Plan Name | Startup Shared WordPress Plan | Stellar Shared Hosting Plan |
Both of these companies are privately owned and helmed by their original founders.
This is great because many web hosting providers have been sold off to the big players in the industry over the last decade.
Once that happens, things tend to go sideways because the buyers want to get their money back as soon as possible.
Companies start to make compromises when it comes to the quality of service and customer support.
That’s why I’m excited to see companies with long histories that are still owned by their founders.
Category Winner: Tie
Pricing and Payment Options
| Feature | A2 Hosting | Namecheap |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing – Year One | $2.99 per month | $1.58 per month |
| Pricing – Year Two and Beyond | $8.99 per month | $2.88 per month |
| Paypal as Payment Option | Yes | Yes |
| Other Payment Options | Skrill, UnionPay, Visa, MasterCard, American Express, Discover | Visa, MasterCard, Discover, AmEx |
For the purpose of this comparison, I’ve taken the yearly plan into account here.
People usually buy website hosting for a year in advance plus the companies tend to offer hefty discounts for such purchases.
Even though A2 Hosting is very competitively priced for the level of service they provide, judging only by the price, this category goes to Namecheap.
Namecheap’s yearly hosting plan will cost you $1.58 per month versus the $2.99 per month price of A2 Hosting’s plan.
Namecheap’s second year and beyond renewals are also considerably cheaper – $2.88 versus $8.99.
These price hikes after the initial year are normal.
Personally, I don’t like these kinds of tactics but they’ve become the industry norm.
Category Winner: Namecheap
Server Details
| Feature | A2 Hosting | Namecheap |
|---|---|---|
| Websites | 1 | 3 |
| SSD Storage | 100GB | 20GB |
| Email Accounts | Unlimited | 30 |
| Server Locations | North America, Europe, Asia | North America, Europe |
| Uptime | 99.94% | 99.94% |
A2 Hosting will give you more SSD storage space for your website, access to more data centers around the world, and allow you to create unlimited email domain email accounts.
But with Namecheap, you will be able to host 3 domains on their basic hosting plan.
Now, if you were to host 3 sites that have tens of thousands of visitors per month, this hosting plan just wouldn’t be able to handle that amount of traffic.
But since this article is geared towards beginners that almost certainly won’t be pulling those kinds of numbers, the ability to host up to 3 websites for such a cheap price is a big plus.
Category Winner: Namecheap
Setup
| Feature | A2 Hosting | Namecheap |
|---|---|---|
| Registering New Domain | Costs extra. Can be done through A2 Hosting. | 1 domain name free from one of these domains – .fun, .host, .online, .site, .press, .store, .space, .pw, .tech, .website, .agency, .center, .digital, .live, .studio – all other domains will cost you extra |
| Migrating Existing Sites | Free site migration service by the A2 Hosting team | Free site migration service by the Namecheap team |
| WordPress Setup | Done for you automatically after order processing | Manual installation required |
| SSL Certificate (HTTPS) | Free (installed automatically) | Free (installed automatically) |
| WordPress Plugins | All supported | All supported |
If you decide to go with Namecheap, you will get a free domain name registration from a select list of domains but this doesn’t include the most popular ones like .com or .org.
For those, you’ll have to pay extra with either of these two hosting providers.
What makes A2 Hosting stand out in this category is their automatic installation of WordPress.
Once the payment has been processed, A2 Hosting will automatically install the latest version of WordPress on your server.
You will be able to log in to your WordPress dashboard and start using it almost immediately.
Namecheap, however, forces you to log in to your cPanel and install WordPress manually.
This process isn’t too hard, but having it done for you automatically is certainly a more beginner-friendly option.
Category Winner: A2 Hosting
Support
| Feature | A2 Hosting | Namecheap |
|---|---|---|
| 24/7/365 Support | Yes | Yes |
| Live Chat Support | Yes | Yes |
| Email/Ticket Support | Yes | Yes |
| Phone Support | Yes | No |
| Self-Help Knowledgebase | Yes | Yes |
| Community Forum | No | No |
Customer support is one of those things you don’t even realize how important it is until there are problems with your site.
And when problems occur, a competent customer support team becomes invaluable.
A2 Hosting shines in that department.
I can attest to this first-hand since the site you’re currently on is hosted through A2 Hosting.
I contacted the support 3-4 times over the last year and a half and they always answered my questions and helped me out.
You can reach A2 Hosting support by phone, email, live chat, or online ticket.
Namecheap somewhat lacks in this department.
The company doesn’t offer phone support.
Category Winner: A2 Hosting
Security
| Feature | A2 Hosting | Namecheap |
|---|---|---|
| Site Backups | No | No |
| Perpetual Security | Yes | No |
| Two-Factor Authentication | Yes | Yes |
| DDoS Protection | Yes | No |
A2 Hosting offers many security features with their hosting plan.
Their Perpetual Security pack offers everything you need to reasonably secure your site from all kinds of online attacks.
Namecheap doesn’t offer anything similar to Perpetual Security.
Security is an obvious weakness of their plan and is one of the compromises the company decided to make to offer such a competitive price.
Category Winner: A2 Hosting
Reputation
| Feature | A2 Hosting | Namecheap |
|---|---|---|
| Trustpilot Score | 4.2/5 based on 1,035 reviews | 2.4/5 based on 756 reviews |
| Better Business Bureau (BBB) Rating | A+ (accredited since 2005) | D- (not accredited) |
| 10 Industry Review Sites Aggregate Score | 4.45 | 3.87 |
Based on the 10 reputable web hosting review sites that reviewed both of these providers, A2 Hosting enjoys a much better score of 4.45/5 stars versus the 3.87/5 starts of Namecheap.
A2 Hosting has built an excellent reputation among the industry reviewers over the years and this aggregated score shows just that.
A2 Hosting also has a much better Trustpilot score and a flawless BBB record which shows that their customers are satisfied and the company cares about every aspect of the business.
That’s not to say Namecheap is not a reputable company, because they are.
Namecheap has a great reputation as a domain registrar and a place to purchase your domain from.
But their hosting services just don’t seem to be on par with a stellar provider such as A2 Hosting.
Category Winner: A2 Hosting
Money-Back Guarantee
| Feature | A2 Hosting | Namecheap |
|---|---|---|
| Money Back Guarantee | Full refund within 30-days and refund for unused service anytime after 30-days | 30 days full money back guarantee |
Both companies are doing the right thing and offering 30-day full money-back guarantees.
A2 Hosting goes a step further, however.
On top of the 30-day full money-back guarantee, they offer to refund any unused service after the initial 30 days.
For example, if you change your time after 3 months and you paid for a year worth of hosting, A2 Hosting will refund the 9 months of unused service.
That’s more than fair, don’t you think?
Category Winner: A2 Hosting
Pros and Cons
| Feature | A2 Hosting | Namecheap |
|---|---|---|
| Pros | • Generous refund policy that extends even after the 30-day full money-back guarantee • Excellent (A+) BBB standing • 19 years of experience in the web hosting industry • Perpetual Security • Unlimited email addresses • Excellent Trustpilot score • Held in high regard by industry reviewers | • Very affordable • 20 years of experience in the web hosting industry • ICANN-accredited domain registrar • You can host 3 websites on this plan |
| Cons | • More expensive | • Limited to 30 email addresses • Poor (D-) BBB standing • Poor Trustpilot score • Lack of security features • Mixed reactions by industry reviewers |
Final Verdict
Overall, A2 Hosting is a much more solid web hosting service than Namecheap.
A2 Hosting won 5 categories versus the 2 categories that went to Namecheap.
One category ended up in a tie.
A case can be made for Namecheap if you want to host 3 brand new websites that you don’t expect will get much traffic in the foreseeable future on a single hosting plan.
That way you would only pay a fraction of what you would pay if you had to buy 3 separate hosting plans, one for each website.
But if you only have one brand new or relatively new website and you want a quality hosting plan, A2 Hosting is definitely the way to go.
You will not only get a decent site speed, but also an entire array of quality of life features like automatic WordPress installation, great customer support, and top-notch site security.
Check out A2’s full pricing plan here.