Good WordPress hosting for a small business has servers in Europe, up-to-date PHP, daily backups stored elsewhere, a free SSL certificate and support that answers quickly. For a brochure site, quality shared hosting or managed WordPress hosting is enough; an online store with plenty of orders needs a VPS or a dedicated server. The cheapest price is rarely the cheapest choice: a slow or broken site costs more than the hosting itself.
I’m Toure Tia Kevin, a developer in Bassano del Grappa, Italy. I host my clients’ sites on dedicated OVH servers.
Types of hosting
| Type | Who it’s for | Pros | Cons |
|---|---|---|---|
| Shared | low-traffic brochure sites | cheap, simple | resources shared with other sites |
| Managed WordPress | anyone who’d rather not deal with the technical side | updates and backups included | costs more, sometimes restricts plugins |
| VPS | growing sites, online stores | dedicated resources, more control | needs setting up and looking after |
| Dedicated server | many sites or high-traffic stores | maximum performance and control | needs someone to run it |
| Cloud | very variable traffic | scales automatically | less predictable costs |
What to check before you choose
- Server location: for a European audience and for GDPR, servers in Europe are better.
- PHP version: it must support the versions WordPress recommends. Old PHP slows the site and is a security risk.
- Backups: daily, stored on a different server, and restorable in minutes.
- SSL: a free Let’s Encrypt certificate should be included and renew itself.
- Speed: SSD or NVMe storage, server-side caching, the option to use a CDN.
- Support: real response times, and people who know WordPress.
- Hidden limits: file counts, PHP memory, included email, renewal price after the first year.
That last point catches people out most: many hosts have a promotional first-year price and a much higher renewal.
Which hosting for which site
- Brochure site or blog: quality shared or managed hosting. Support matters more than power.
- WooCommerce store: at least well-resourced managed hosting, ideally a VPS. Cart and checkout can’t be slow. The full costs are in how much a WooCommerce store costs.
- Several sites or an agency: a VPS or dedicated server, with someone to run it.
Hosting alone or hosting plus maintenance?
Hosting is only the space your site lives in. WordPress and plugin updates, backup checks, monitoring and fixing errors are still up to you. That’s why many small businesses prefer a service that covers everything: my maintenance and hosting service costs €30 to €80 a month, with hosting on dedicated OVH servers. What good maintenance should include is in the guide to website maintenance.
The most common mistakes
- Choosing on the first-year price alone, without checking the renewal.
- Keeping backups only on the same server: if the server fails, you lose them along with the site.
- Staying on slow hosting out of habit, while visits drop.
- Leaving the domain and hosting in the name of whoever built the site: if things go wrong, you can’t move.
How to switch host without losing your site
- Take a full backup of files and database, and keep it off the old host.
- Copy the site to the new host and check it on a temporary address.
- Lower the DNS TTL a few days before, so the change spreads quickly.
- Point the domain at the new server and check forms, payments and email.
- Keep the old hosting for a few days, until everything works.
If you’d rather not do it yourself, hand it to a professional as a WordPress support job: done properly, the move causes no downtime.
Frequently asked questions
Is free hosting OK for WordPress?
For tests and personal projects, yes. For a business, no: limited resources, ads, no guarantees on backups and often no domain of your own.
How much does hosting affect site speed?
A lot. Server response time is the first step in loading every page: if it’s slow, no theme optimisation fully makes up for it.
Should business email be on the same hosting?
It doesn’t have to be, and often it’s better not: a separate email service keeps working even if the site has a problem or changes host.
If you want to know whether your hosting suits your site, get in touch.
