Hostinger Review 2021: Complete Overview of Pros and Cons

Hostinger was first established in 2004 in Kaunas, Lithuania.

During its inception, they used the name “Hosting Media” as a corporate brand.

Seven years on … And when they had over a million subscribers, they changed their name to Hostinger in 2011.

Since then, they have continued to expand their business to the international world until finally opening a branch in India.

Their website also uses a special extension for business entities in India (.in), and the language of the website is English.

How Does Our Process Collect Data?

In the world of affiliate hosting, the amount of commission can influence the valuation. That means there are lots of biased reviews scattered on the internet.

Maybe before this, you’ve read some of the Hostinger reviews and believe that Hostinger is the best hosting for your needs.

Maybe sure because this hosting is cheap, has good support, and claims to have a responsive server, load time or speed is fast. However, without statistically proven facts and data, it is very difficult to deny these.

We at Hosting Advisors understand this issue.

Therefore, we conducted a series of tests first.

• First, buy Hostinger’s “Single Web Hosting” package. 
• Second, installing WordPress with the default settings, which can be accessed via the address: Toptrendynews.com
• third, monitoring the webserver to see the average uptime and page load time
• And finally, testing the quality of support services.

Hostinger performance raw data can be seen in uptime and page speed data.

And now I’m going to share those interesting (statistics) with you.

Summary of Research Data

For some reason, I researched Hostinger India on January 2, 2020, and this is a review update after the research has been running for approximately 12 months.

SAMPLE	‘SINGLE’ Hosting Package (Singapore Server)
WEBSITE TEST	Toptrendynews.com
UPTIME	99.49% (2 January 2020 – 31 December 2020)
SPEED	1280 ms (2 January 2020 – 31 December 2020)
LOAD IMPACT 15 VU	101.11 ms (September 2020)
SUPPORT	Rating: 3.5 / 5  (100% via live chat only for clients)
PRICE	Starting from $0.99/mo
WARRANTY	30 days without conditions

Pros of Using Hostinger

I have to admit. I have high hopes for Hostinger’s quality.

Not that they are one of the recommended hosting providers by Cnet. However, Hostinger is a hosting service with more than 29 million users from 178 countries, including India.

About 15,000 people sign up every day, which means there is one new client every 5 seconds.

A very extraordinary achievement, right?

Of course, numerically, we can see that Hostinger is one of the best in the world.

However, the enormous quantity cannot be used as the main measure because it is not always directly proportional to quality.

Does this also apply to Hostinger?

You’ll find the answer in this Hostinger review.

1. Fairly Good Support Service (Rating: 3.5 / 5)

I did the test by contacting Hostinger customer support via chat. 

Remember, support via chat is only available for members, so you won’t find this chat service before subscribing to Hostinger.

You need to know that Hostinger Group has implemented a conversation system where all support services are handled 100% via live chat. 

They no longer use the ticketing and email systems because clients generally need to wait longer. 

The question is: Is support via their live chat faster? How does it compare with other providers that still use ticketing?

So, in September 2020, I did a rather technical test. I purposely made an error on the Hostinger test website, which was an error establishing a database connection.

An error that is very easy to fix, and I believe even junior technical support staff can handle it quickly.

In fact, of the 18 providers I tested, 8 of them were able to fix errors in 10 minutes or less. Even Jetorbit can handle it in 3 minutes.

What about Hostinger? This is the content of my live chat with Hostinger support.

The total time is taken from the start of the chat until the error is fixed at 17 minutes. The record time is only the fastest to #13 from 18 providers. 

So, I thought the support was so-so – just ‘OK.’

2. Succeeded in Load Impact Testing with 15 Virtual Users

Say your website is suddenly getting heavy traffic. Maybe one of your articles has gone viral, causing many visitors to enter your website simultaneously.

That means the server hosting will work extra hard because the resources required are also more and more.

In many cases I have encountered on shared hosting packages, the server becomes overloaded, or the website loads slower when many visitors enter simultaneously.

In my research, shared hosting can only handle a maximum of 25 virtual users. However, on average, it will be stable at 10-15 virtual users.

So, what about Hostinger?

Especially for Hostinger, I only included test data with 15 virtual users because there was something odd about the data with ten virtual users, and I didn’t have time to retest it.

TOTAL VIRTUAL USER	ERROS	REQUEST HANDLED (Higher is Better)	MAX RESPONSE TIMES (Lower is Better)
15 VU	0	6601	101.11 ms ✅

Testing with 15 virtual users

So, we can both see the average server response time is good, which is 101.11 ms. In fact, the average was the lowest among all the providers I tested (the lower, the better).

No errors occurred, and there were also no performance issues. Of the 18 providers that I tested, there were only 7 stable providers in the test with 15 virtual users. Hostinger is one of them.

3. 30 Day Unconditional Money-Back Warranty

If you are not satisfied with Hostinger’s services, your money will be fully refunded for the first 30 days.

While some other hosting providers have special terms regarding the warranty, at Hostinger, you can claim a warranty without any conditions.

4. Free Hosting Migration and Free Domains on Certain Packages

Let’s say you already have hosting elsewhere and are planning to move to Hostinger, which is called a hosting migration.

Well, Hostinger will offer you hosting migration for free. 

In addition, you will get one domain for free. Com for one year by taking the Business Shared Hosting ($1.99/mo), Premium Shared Hosting ($2.99/mo).

5. Uptime Guarantee With A Credit Claim Of 5% Of The Monthly Hosting Fee For That Month

I think Hostinger is one of the fairest hosting providers worldwide.

Hostinger not only provides an unconditional 30-day guarantee, but they will even credit you 5% of your monthly hosting fee when your website server uptime is below their promised guarantee (99.90%).

You can check the server uptime on this page: https://stats.hostinger.com/.

I have asked Hostinger customer support directly, and they have confirmed that it is true.

If you look at Hostinger’s uptime stats page from January to July, there are many servers that average uptime below 99.90%, for example, as I boxed in red in the image below.

But there are also those whose performance is very good, like the one I boxed in green.

It depends on what server number your website is placed on. If your average server uptime is below 99.90%, don’t forget to claim the 5% credit.

6. There are a Complete Knowledge Base and Tutorial Page

Hostinger has a dedicated page on basic web hosting knowledge or tutorials, domains, and general information, which is very useful for customers.

I’ve checked it. There are hundreds of tutorials on hosting, domains, cPanel, and others related to your website.

Cons of Using Hostinger

You need to know a few negative aspects before deciding whether Hostinger is worthy of being your next port or not.

And unfortunately, these negative aspects make Hostinger’s quality worse, at least when I published this Hostinger review.

1. Poor Average Uptime (99.49%)

Hostinger guarantees 99.90% uptime every month, but from my monitoring results, it turns out that the results are still below what is guaranteed.

In 12 months of monitoring, the average was 99.49% or worst #13 out of 18 providers.

Hostinger average uptime from month to month:

MONTH	AVERAGE UPTIME	TOTAL DOWNTIME	TOTAL DOWNTIME
January 2020	96.84%	19 Hours	6x
February 2020	> 99.99%	1 minute	1x
March 2020	99.98%	8 minutes	6x
April 2020	99.99%	3 minutes	2x
May 2020	99.94%	25 Minutes	8x
June 2020	99.38%	4 hours	28x
July 2020	99.16%	6 hours	178x
August 2020	98.29%	13 Hours	60x
September 2020	100.00%	–	–
October 2020	99.98%	7 Minutes	4x
November 2020	99.87%	1 hour	22x
December 2020	99.98%	7 Minutes	5x

Note:  On October 16, 2019, I requested to move my Hostinger test website server from the Netherlands to Singapore.

• I just realized that when I bought hosting, it turned out that Hostinger’s test website was not placed on a Singapore server but in the Netherlands. I Ngat:  In Hostinger, consumers can not choose the server’s location at the time of booking hosting.
• I request to move it to Singapore so that it is close to India.
• They do not have servers located in India.

If you look at the table above, the problem is their server is just unstable. Sometimes it’s great. Even in September 2020, the average is 100% (very rare), but sometimes it isn’t good, like, for example, in January and August 2020, where the server was down for more than 10 hours.

2. Less Responsive Servers (Average Load Time of 1280 ms)

The server I use at Hostinger India is a server located in Singapore, remember?

And the speed test server that I use is also located in Singapore.

Logically, Hostinger’s average speed should be better than 17 other hosting providers.

But, it turns out that the speed is only 1.28 seconds. I think it’s just ‘OK,’ not fast, but not slow either.

Here’s the average for the last 5 months of monitoring:

Here’s the average for the last 5 months of monitoring:

MONTH	AVERAGE SPEED (THE SMALL THE NICE)
January 2020	0.639 seconds
February 2020	0.754 seconds
March 2020	0.864 seconds
April 2020	1.09 seconds
May 2020	1.43 seconds
June 2020	1.72 seconds
July 2020	2.12 seconds
August 2020	1.94 seconds
September 2020	0.785 seconds
October 2020	0.985 seconds
November 2020	1.14 seconds
December 2020	1.29 seconds

3. Must Log In To Do Live Chat with Support

Please note that Hostinger’s live chat option is only available if you are logged in to your Hostinger account.

That means, if you are not a Hostinger customer, you cannot communicate via live chat to ask a thing or more about their service.

I think it would make more sense if Hostinger could make their live chat support option available to everyone.

4. Hosting Package Prices are Cheap, But If You Want To Subscribe for a Long Duration….

The price of hosting packages at Hostinger is very cheap, starting from $0.99/mo, but you can only get this price if you want to subscribe directly for 48 months.

As you can see, their hosting prices are not flat, but it gets cheaper if you subscribe for a longer duration.

This is a trick that most hosting providers commonly use, namely ‘forcing’ consumers to choose a higher plan with a much cheaper price but with a longer duration.

For example, to get the promo price as they show on the website Rp’s front page. 8,900 / month, you need a 4-year subscription.

4 years is not short. Maybe this is what is called a big commitment. 🙂

Because you don’t know if you will always like Hostinger for the next 4 years.

5. There is a Daily And Weekly Backup Feature, But It Is Only Available On the Business Package

Hostinger offers a daily and weekly backup feature, but this feature has limitations where the daily backup feature is only available on the Business plan. The ‘Premium’ package is only available for weekly backups.

How about the cheapest package or ‘Single’? Your website will not be backed up either on a weekly or daily basis.

What if you subscribe to the Single or Premium package and want your website to be backed up daily?

You must be willing to pay the following prices: $0.79 for a month.

Also, Hostinger limits backups to the amount of storage below 10GB. If it goes over 10GB, then Hostinger is not responsible.

6. The “Single” Package Has Limitations Resources

The “Single” package is only for the needs of 1 website with 10GB of storage, 100GB of bandwidth and can only create 1 email account and 1 MySql database.

But if you aim to create a personal web or a web portfolio that doesn’t require a lot of resources, I don’t think this limitation will be a problem for you.

In addition, as I mentioned in the previous point, in the ‘Single’ package, your website will not be automatically backed up by the system unless you are willing to pay for the backup feature.

7. Do not have servers located in India

Hostinger only provides servers located in the United States, United Kingdom, Netherlands, Lithuania, Singapore, and Brazil.

Even though they are already based in India, they do not have servers in India. But you can choose a server located in Singapore because the distance is not too far from India.

Please note: You cannot choose the server location when placing your hosting order. You can request to be moved to the Singapore server when your hosting is active. Usually, the process takes a few hours, depending on the amount of storage on your website.

8. Not using cPanel

Hostinger built their own hosting control panel, which in my opinion, looks simple and easy to use.

In this control panel, you can easily track your hosting account orders, such as renewing, upgrading, or changing domains.

If you are used to using cPanel, you might find it strange when you first see Hostinger’s control panel.

But, for advanced users, I don’t think this will be a significant problem.

What if you want to use cPanel? 

You have to pay to use cPanel. It depends on the type of cPanel you choose (Silver / Gold). I can say the price is very high. Maybe because of the impact of the cPanel license upgrade too. 

I don’t think it’s worth it at all to use cPanel on Hostinger.

Hostinger Hosting Plans Summary and Other Information You Need to Know

Overview of Hosting Plans at Hostinger:

Hostinger offers three web hosting types from general web hosting, cloud web hosting, and VPS web hosting.

• Share Web Hosting (Single, Premium, and Business): Prices start from $0.99/mo. If you are just starting, this type of web hosting is what you need to take up. It has sufficient resources to build a new website and is suitable for the low-to-medium traffic category. 

• Cloud Hosting (Startup, Professional, and Enterprise): Prices start at $0.99/mo. It is claimed to have 3x faster performance and dedicated resources, meaning that it feels like you have your own space like in VPS type web hosting. This is a managed cloud hosting service where the Hostinger team will manage the servers while focusing on managing your website only. 
• By the way, despite the name cloud hosting India, they don’t have servers in India.
• WordPress Hosting (Starter, Premium, and Business): WordPress dedicated hosting with prices starting from $1.99/mo.

Other important information:

• Server options: United States, United Kingdom, Netherlands, Lithuania, Singapore, and Brazil.
• Account activation: The account will be activated immediately after the payment is confirmed
• Control Panel used: hPanel or Hostinger Panel.
• Free 1 domain: If you buy at least the “Premium Web Hosting” package
• Installation of applications (WordPress, Joomla, Drupal, etc.): Can be installed very easily. There is already a Softaculous tool in cPanel.

Do I Recommend Hostinger To You?

If you have read my past review, you will understand that three main indicators determine the quality of hosting service, including uptime, page load time, and support.

So far, Hostinger’s support has been pretty good (rating: 3.5/5). However, it is a shame that the average uptime is bad, and the average speed is also slow.

Some limitations make me hesitate to recommend it to you, such as the daily backup feature only available on the ‘Business’ package, not using cPanel, no server available in India (the server is even scrambled and can be thrown to a Dutch server), etc.

Yes, I am recommending Hostinger to you.

6 PROS

• Fairly Good Support Service (Rating: 3.5 / 5)
• Success in Load Impact Testing with 15 Virtual Users
• 30 Day Unconditional Guarantee
• Free Hosting Migration and Free Domains on Certain Packages
• Uptime Guarantee With Credit Claims 5% Of The Monthly Hosting Fee For The Month (Check Hostinger Uptime Status)
• There are a Knowledge Base page and a complete tutorial

8 CONS

• Poor Average Uptime (99.49%)
• Less Responsive Servers (Average Load Time of 1280 ms)
• Must Log In To Do Live Chat with Support
• The hosting package price is cheap, but if you choose and want to subscribe for a long duration.
• There are daily and weekly backups, but they are only available on the business plan.
• The “Single” Package Has Limited Resources
• Do not have servers located in India
• Not Using cPanel