iPage Review with Pro and Cons

For many years, iPage has been doing a great web hosting business with lots of features and professional customer support. Now, with many other hosting competitors, the company has to prove itself as a professional service provider for thousands of customers every day. This article will be the full iPage review with all the hosting features, the Pros and Cons, and everything you need to know about this popular hosting service.

What’s iPage?

iPage is one of the most renowned hosting companies owned by IPowerWeb Inc which has been hosting since 1998. It is situated in the USA and provides services to more than 150 countries all around the world. Presently the company has claimed to host more than 1.5 million domains and consists of a working force with around 800 workers in six different locations globally. And of course, there are thousands of iPage Reviews around the web.

iPage is a perfect choice for beginners especially new entrepreneurs, businessmen, and bloggers as it offers affordable hosting services. The most mind-blowing offer that iPage makes is the ‘Anytime’ money-back guarantee. And also, the company offers a wide range of bonuses and freebies on sign-up.

This is my iPage Review, based on my own experience with the company and other reviews from people I know and trust. Also, I’ve investigated many technical features and details to give you a final answer if the company is a good or bad web hosting provider.

Pros of iPage hosting

There are many advantages of using iPage and the prominent features are what everyone needs to know. Nowadays, many bloggers and entrepreneurs, especially beginners who find themselves quite indecisive when it comes to selecting a Linux hosting company for their web. Every hosting company has its own sets of advantages that make them outshine the rest and also limitations of its own.

Here are the main features of iPage web hosting:

• Unlimited disk space
• Unlimited Bandwidth
• Free domain name
• Unlimited email accounts
• Free marketing tools
• eCommerce website builder
• Free auto-installer software
• WordPress hosting
• Joomla hosting
• Drupal Hosting
• Professional customer support
• Cheap shared hosting
• Inexpensive VPS hosting
• Low-cost dedicated hosting

Following are a few couples of pros that might convince you that iPage will be a choice that you would not regret.

How did I begin using iPage? A simple and easy procedure

When I was looking for a company to host my website, I wanted something cheap, good, and reputable that will enable me to begin a happy and cheerful start. When I searched for iPage reviews, I learned about the company and I had my own apprehensions.

Since it was the cheapest I did thought it will work inefficiently and I will suffer a lot in my struggle through the initial stages. However, iPage provided its services exceptionally well. The process of ordering was both quick and easy and I had my account made and ready to be used within a few minutes after I made my payments.

Keeping the time for domain propagation aside, I had my new website all up and awake and working on iPage within the first hour. For me, iPage suited well and provided me with services that my budget can afford. It was both user-friendly and reliable.

The following image shows real iPage Reviews from real customers.

The cheapest hosting services

When I compared different web hosting services with each other, there are many similarities between them. Most of them do offer unlimited hosting, webmail, full i.e. 24-hour customer support, a free domain name with good quality of servers like 99% server uptime, and North American-based support. It would, therefore, be wiser to avail of the service cheaply and invest the remaining in other areas.

For such customers, iPage is the best choice as it offers services that are 76% to 450% cheaper in comparison with other web hosting services. For example, iPage is 100% cheaper than Arvixe, 200% cheaper than A2 Hosting, and 450% cheaper than CoolHandle. The customer has to pay only $1.99 per month for iPage.

Professional website builder tools

iPage has an auto-installer software that lets you install hundreds of open source applications. For example, you can install WordPress, Joomla, or any other application. And even, you can install e-commerce software like PrestaShop, OpenCart, Magento, and others.

Furthermore, the website builder tool offers all the features and the options to build a website easier. This is suitable for people who want a one-page website using the drag and drop tool.

Also, there are some important multimedia features that websites need, such as flash video support, and more.

A Green web hosting provider

I’m a very environmentally challenged person and so I was happy to read on the iPage official website that its hosting operation is completely powered by a renewable energy source. Though I have no evidence for this claim, nor do I know about the company’s green energy certificates. But, it was pleasant to know that there are companies who are not there just to make dollars but also attempt to make conservation for future generations.

iPage is a green web hosting service, they offer green energy badges because they are the hosting provider that uses renewable energy to make the data center work nature-friendly.

You can use the green energy hosting badge on your website. That way, people will notice that you’re hosting your website with a green hosting company.

Anytime money-back guarantee

Most web hosting companies offer a 30-45 days money-back guarantee while some also offer 90 days money-back guarantee as well. But iPage is exceptional in this case. iPage offers Anytime Money back guarantee, which the company is fully dedicated to facilitating and winning customers for business as they have made it remarkably easy to leave.

That was another protective customer policy of iPage that made my mind try it and then continue iPage. According to this policy, the users can attain a pro-rated refund once their 30 days trial period is over. I was personally quite impressed by the confidence displayed by iPage over their services.

Hosting freebies of iPage

iPage offers its customers a wide range of freebies and various features when they sign-up which are utilized for the promotion of the customer’s website. In the beginning, I received credits that were free of cost for Google Adwords, Yahoo or Bing sponsored search, and Facebook Advertising. These freebies and features help in my endeavor for website marketing. Along with these, I was also given the opportunity to take help from online marketing guides and also other tools like webmaster tools.

SiteLock security gives you peace of mind

And wait, there’s more! Along with these amazing features, I also got access to the SiteLock security suite totally for free. That actually has a cost of worth $100! I found this as a quite handy security feature for my website.

iPage actually has the honor to be amongst the first prominent web hosting company to provide the SiteLock Security Suite. Customers who were bothered by the spamming hacking activities can now actually put an end to it. They can do that by utilizing malware and spam scanning function that can be found in the suite.

Everyone is aware of hackers and the obstacles and hindrances they create by posting spam ads about low-quality, or even illegal item ads that they incorporate into your website. So the customers can be placated by the evidence that you can provide that you run a legitimate website free of phishing scams. The SiteLock certificate can be clearly displayed for all your visitors. This really is a very strong feature that will facilitate establishing a stable and prominent brand of your own.

Reliable network uptime

This is an essential area and a key determinant factor of performance for any web hosting company. iPage does offer a 99.9% network uptime. During my experience of using iPage, I never noticed any network downtime with iPage services. However, in case a downtime occurs to any customer, they take help from the technical support staff who are available for you all the time 24/7.

Take a look at the following iPage uptime stats, it shows the server uptime during 30 Days. So, you can see accurate and real stats about the server uptime.

Control panel options

All the customers can utilize the facility of Weebly, WordPress. And they also, have access to basic website builders through iPage’s selected control panel namely vDeck. In order to complete your website design, you are provided with templates for every choice which guide you through simple and easy-to-understand steps. That will ultimately lead you to complete your website successfully.

You can even design your first five pages totally free by using the website builder called CM4all that is provided by the iPage. I personally have used CM4all and through the first 9 pages were free, I found the interface design and template a little slow and dated. Another setback was a lack of flexibility and limited access, which made it lesser user-friendly as compared to standard the cPanel of other industries.

Here is the iPage control panel’s screenshot to get an overview of what you get in your web hosting account.

Customer support

The two prominent highlights of iPage’s customer support are an effective ticketing system and an online help center. iPage ensures that the customers have a highly-skilled technical staff to support them and clarify their problems through various means. These mean consist of e-mail, live chat to phone calls, and the customers can use any of the means to seek support and clarify doubts.

To further facilitate the customers they have made quick tutorials and FAQs which can be accessed through iPage’s website itself. Here common problems that customers might face are addressed and their tips and solutions are provided in a step-by-step manner.

I personally found the iPage’s customer support very supportive, friendly, and knowledgeable about the problem discussed, and very quick. I hate waiting and asked to hold up, but with iPage, I did not encounter that problem. I am satisfied with the supporting team and the way they treat a customer.

iPage has faster customer support, and friendly phone and chat conversations than other hosting providers like Bluehost, Hostgator, and JustHost. Look at the following chart that shows the average web hosting customer support response time compared to iPage.

iPage has a 5.2 Sec average response time for phone customer support. On the other side, HostGator has 2 minutes and 50 seconds average phone response time and that’s unacceptable for professional hosting.

Affordable unlimited hosting

You can enjoy unlimited hosting services of fairly good quality at $4.50 per month. This unlimited package includes unlimited bandwidth, unlimited disk space, unlimited emails, unlimited domains, and much more. You can even save more of your budget if you decide to subscribe with iPage for 2 or more years. Personally, I found choosing the hosting plan very easy due to the simple and easy product pricing method.

Cons of iPage hosting

There are a couple of problems encountered when using iPage. So, I’ll list them and show you how to overcome them.

It would be quite unrealistic to expect a company to provide perfect services, simply because perfection is a state that can only be aimed at and struggled to attain. The following are the probable limitations that one can encounter and some ways to overcome them.

Unlimited hosting offers are limited

iPage offers unlimited disk space and data transfer or bandwidth in their hosting plans. However, it’s clearly outlined in iPage TOS that there is a certain level that must not be overcome.

As a smart user, you must understand that the term “unlimited” is mostly used as a marketing tag to attract customers. It’s my personal experience that no company offers unlimited disk space or bandwidth without setting certain parameters. Thus, iPage is no different. So yeah, you can definitely enjoy an unlimited add-on domain from your hosting account without crossing the line.

You must not exceed the specified level of CPU resources that have been given to you and mostly you would not need so much space for your business. If you exceed the limit, only then is your hosting account suspended by iPage.

So, understand carefully that this unlimited hosting is only for normal usage as you possibly cannot have unlimited access at $1.99 per month. This is not a big issue if you plan to use your account wisely and moderately. According to my years of personal experience, I could not have been happier with iPage.

No upgrade options

There weren’t many issues that I faced with iPage. In fact, I found it quite flexible. However, there is one drawback that I faced when I wanted to upgrade my web hosting plan. There is no option for expansion with iPage, as iPage only provides shared web hosting services. This will be of no issue to small businessmen and those mostly using primitive basic applications.

However, there would be a problem when you want to expand and grow your web hosting. You simply won’t be able to upgrade to dedicated or VPS hosting services. This lack of facility for upgrading may serve as a major drawback for many customers.

A simple solution can be that you avail the facilities of iPage as it’s best for those who are just initiated their business, due to lower prices and provision of most of the other major features. Later, when you need an extension, you can simply change the web hosting company.

Unnecessary software offer without clarification about pricing

When I signed up for iPage, I was overwhelmed with so many free trials for business marketing. There was a pretty impressive long list of all the supposedly free trial marketing services in the control panel of iPage. The list included marketing services like Constant Contact, Sponsored Search Credits, Free YP.com Listing, Email Brain Small Business, and more.

Along with That, there are also a Free Toll-Free Phone Number and Google Webmaster Tools available. The list was really long and went on and on.

Maybe that’s good, but the problem is that these services are free only for the trial period and this is a fact that many customers are simply not aware of. The customers are required to pay for these services once their trial period has been exhausted. Many users are amongst those who activate the trial may be accidentally or something and later, they neglect the date on which the trial period gets over.

The services thus are still being utilized without the user knowing until it’s time to pay extra bills. Please do not be careless when you activate a trial period of free access to any marketing services. And remember to cancel the service when the trial is over to avoid frustration and unpleasant surprise in the form of extra payments for the services you did not intend to pay for.

I personally was very disappointed when I assumed that there will be notification given when the trial period was over. The extra charge was very unpleasant to my limited budget. Please do not make this mistake.

iPage compared to other web hosting services

• iPage vs HostGator: In terms of price, iPage is cheaper and affordable web hosting. But HostGator is a popular company and it’s better than iPage all the way.
• iPage vs GoDaddy: The web hosting quality of GoDaddy has been downgrading for years. And now, they have lots of downtimes and slow loading time. Compared to iPage, GoDaddy is slower, with lots of server issues, and you’ll find yourself with problems rather than solutions. On the other hand, iPage compared to GoDaddy is faster, better, and also, and affordable and reliable hosting with great customer support and help.
• iPage vs Bluehost: For beginners, and professionals, iPage is easier to use, better in customer support and quality. Also, iPage is a cheaper web hosting, with thousands of reviews and feedbacks. On the other side, Bluehost is an expensive web hosting with paid migration services and lower quality of customer support, and lots of downtimes.
• iPage vs Justhost: JustHost is owned by the same group that owns HostGator and Bluehost. You’ll find a lower quality of customer support and downtimes from time to time. In terms of speed, iPage web hosting is faster and has a great uptime that every blog and small business website needs.
• iPage vs NameCheap: While Namecheap is also a good web hosting service, however, they have issues with PHP extensions and of course, they have expensive prices for domain names and renewals.
• iPage vs InMotion Hosting: iPage is cheaper, but the quality of Inmotion Hosting is better, stronger, and more reliable. In this case, I highly recommend InMotion Hosting.
• iPage vs Dreamhost: DreamHost is an expensive web hosting service, they offer fewer features and you’ll need a premium subscription to get the phone support that should be free normally. So, iPage is better than Dreamhost if you compare the hosting plans, the features, and the cost.
• iPage vs Wix: Wix is not the right website-building tool that you can trust. They have poor quality customer support, lower security levels. And of course, there is nothing to be professional with their website builder software. On the other side, iPage is a professional web hosting with lots of features, lots of customer reviews, and amazing customer support. iPage is the recommended web hosting service compared to this one.

Conclusion: Is iPage a good or a bad web hosting service?

iPage will be the best choice for amateurs, bloggers, and experienced web professionals. After reading this iPage review, you can see that the company offers a wide array of features at a very reasonable price which enables it to outshine other companies. It’s a reliable, affordable, and efficient partner for your web hosting which you can trust.