ScalaHosting calls itself the “next step in hosting evolution.” Their flagship service is offering fully managed, cloud-based VPS at what they claim are affordable prices.
From the get-go, it’s clear that ScalaHosting positions itself as a superior service that doesn’t compromise on quality. Although they focus on VPS hosting, they also offer a straightforward range of shared hosting packages.
ScalaHosting’s technology and infrastructure are impressive thanks to partnerships with Amazon AWS and DigitalOcean. They’ve also developed a number of powerful in-house features, such as the SShield security system, SWordPress Manager, and even their own hosting control panel, SPanel.
At this point, ScalaHosting might seem a bit too good to be true. So, to help you see whether they really do all that they promise, we’ve created this in-depth review of their biggest strengths and weaknesses.
ScalaHosting: Pros
Let’s start with all the things about ScalaHosting that impressed us. These are all good reasons to consider ScalaHosting as your next hosting provider:
1. Everything You Need to Host a Website
Almost all shared hosting providers today offer a free domain and SSL certificate with your hosting. However, ScalaHosting goes one step further by also offering these freebies with their Managed VPS packages.
The only type of hosting you need to arrange this with yourself is for self-managed VPS. However, this is pretty normal. And, ScalaHosting themselves can help you arrange domains and SSL certificates.
What’s more, ScalaHosting will provide a free site migration service when you sign up with them. And, shared hosting users will benefit from the free integration of a CDN.
It used to be the case that ScalaHosting only offered Linux-based (CentOS) hosting services. However, they recently expanded into offering Windows hosting services too.
2. Advanced Features
No matter what type of hosting you go with, ScalaHosting is not your average hosting provider. One of the ways in which they justify their prices is by offering more advanced features than most other hosts.
For example, all customers benefit from the speed of SSD-powered hard drives. And, all accounts are secured using their custom SSheild Security system.
Shared hosting customers can also look forward to the following exceptional features:
- Unlimited emails, databases, and bandwidth
- 1-click WordPress installer
- Automated and on-demand backups
- HTTP/2 support
The same goes for VPS hosting:
- Free snapshots
- Softaculous free software installer
- Dedicated IP address
- HTTP/3 support
Self-managed VPS customers can also expect plenty of flexibility and scalability. In fact, ScalaHosting allows you to adjust your resources to order:
3. SPanel VPS Hosting Control Panel
You’ve all heard of cPanel, but have you heard of SPanel?
SPanel is ScalaHosting’s internally-developed VPS hosting control panel. ScalaHosting provides it for free with their hosting plans. They’ve created it to be an easy-to-use and feature-rich control panel without cPanel’s licensing restrictions.
For new users, the good news is that the interface is very similar to cPanel, so it’s not hard to learn. It’s 100% compatible with cPanel which means that you can transfer your seat to/from cPanel hosting seamlessly. You can also install and use most of the same applications and tools, such as the 1-click WordPress Installer.
SPanel is an all-in-one hosting control panel, just like any other WHCP-based panel.
In fact, two of ScalaHosting’s top features, SPanel Shield and SWordPress Manager, are built into SPanel. We covered SPanel in the security section. However, SWordPress Manager is an admin utility tool that helps make managing your WordPress site easier. It allows you to Clone, stage, back up, and restore your website from a simple and intuitive interface.
4. Uptime and Performance
Today, speed and uptime are important competitive factors when hosting a website. Solid speed and uptimes improve the user experience, prevent you from losing opportunities, and even boost your search engine rankings.
ScalaHosting is partnered with Amazon AWS and DigitalOcean, two of the largest cloud providers in the world. Through this partnership, they can offer access to amazing infrastructure. This includes 35+ enterprise-grade data centers all over the world with dedicated cloud environments.
Based on the cloud, this means Scalahosting can offer superior speed and reliability.
As a customer, you can choose ScalaHosting’s native servers in Dallas, New York, or Sofia. Or, you can opt for servers operated by its partners in many other locations. Choosing a server closer to your target audience will improve your site’s performance for them.
It’s also not just talk. ScalaHosting’s customers often praise the reliability and performance of its network. During a one month test, we also found the performance to be incredibly stable with a low average latency of 200ms:
You can also choose to have LiteSpeed Web Server installed on your server with a suitable license. This is one of the world’s leading high-performance, high-scalability web servers.
Even better, ScalaHosting guarantees 99.9% uptime for its hosting services.
5 High Security
It’s clear that Scalhosting has invested a tremendous amount of effort into the security of its hosting.
ScalaHosting has developed its own proprietary security system, SShield. They claim that this system can prevent 99.998% of attacks. And, it’s automatically deployed for anyone using ScalaHosting’s servers. No configuration is needed and it will provide real-time protection.
It uses built-in AI to automatically detect malicious attacks. It can then kick off automated countermeasures and send immediate notifications. The system is powered by both AI and machine learning to deal with malware, viruses, DDoS attacks, and other threats.
Similarly, all customers will also get a free SSL certificate that’s automatically activated.
At the same time, automated backups will prevent you from losing huge amounts of your precious data.
6. Customer Support
It’s easy to underestimate the importance of support, until you need it. Luckily, ScalaHosting is known for offering excellent customer service from friendly, helpful, and knowledgeable experts.
One-on-one customer support is available 24/7 over both email and live chat. Both Advanced shared hosting and VPS hosting products come with priority support services. Not only do they offer free migration services to everyone, but they can also help with highly technical issues or aspects of your website.
However, one of the main reasons why people sign up for ScalaHosting is their managed VPS hosting. In this case, their in-house experts will handle pretty much every aspect of the day-to-day administration of your VPS. 24/7 proactive monitoring can also be added as a paid-for service to respond to cyber threats or technical issues more quickly.
If you’re more of the self-help type, the knowledgebase is packed with useful information and guides.
7. Developer-friendly Hosting Environments
Developers definitely have plenty to look forward to when hosting a website with ScalaHosting.
To begin with, all servers come pre-loaded with all the programming frameworks you’d expect. This includes PHP, Python, NodeJS, etc. You can manage your WordPress website from the backend using the WP CLI command interface and access your hosting via SSH.
Other developer features include:
- Git and SVN
- Apache error logs
- Mod_security protection
The SPanel control panel also allows developers to clone and stage their WordPress websites. This makes it easier to continue working on your website without making it unavailable to visitors.
Cons:
Like any other host, ScalaHosting also has its cons. While it’s an excellent host overall, here are some reasons it might not be for you:
1. Relatively High Renewal Prices
As you well know, you usually get what you pay for in life. All things considered, ScalaHosting is a premium hosting provider. They offer features, customer support, and performance that goes above and beyond the average hosting provider.
So, it shouldn’t be surprising that their prices start at a somewhat higher price point. If you’re looking for low-cost shared hosting that starts at $1/month, this isn’t it.
That being said, I feel like ScalaHosting is still good value for money considering what you get. With the first-year discount, shared hosting starts at a very reasonable $3.49/month. And, $14.95/month (for the first year) is extremely affordable for managed VPS hosting.
However, some customers do complain that the renewal rates are much higher than the first-year rates. For shared hosting, it nearly doubles to $6.95/month while it more than doubles to $31.95/month for managed VPS.
Still, these prices are nowhere near exorbitant. ScalaHosting just offers hosting solutions for customers who are willing to pay a bit extra for guaranteed quality.
2. No Website Builder
Nowadays, it’s common practice for web hosts to offer a beginner-friendly website builder with their shared hosting plans. Although full-fledged CMSs are easier to use than building a website from scratch, they still require a bit of time and effort to learn compared with options like Weebly.
With ScalaHosting, you will need to be comfortable using a CMS like WordPress, Magenta, Joomla, etc.
However, the upside is that they provide a 1-click installer that makes it effortless to install the software. The powerful SPanel control panel can also handle most updates for you.
But, it does still mean that ScalaHosting may not be suitable for customers of all experience levels.
Verdict
On the balance of things, we have to give ScalaHosting a solid A for its shared and VPS hosting. If you decide to join ScalaHosting, you’ll definitely experience more pros than cons.
In the end, whether ScalaHosting is for you depends largely on the answer to these two questions:
- Are you willing to pay a little extra for guaranteed quality when it comes to performance, uptime, customer support, and features?
- Are you either looking for managed/self-managed VPS hosting or to host a website using a CMS like WordPress, Joomla, Magento, etc.?
If the answers to both these questions are yes, ScalaHosting might be the ideal hosting provider for you.
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