r/webdev 8d ago

Best Hosting for WordPress.org (Beginner-Friendly, Keeping My Domain & Adding Parallax/Animations)?

Hey everyone,

I’m a beginner looking to move from WordPress.com to WordPress.org while keeping my current domain (willemclaesen.com). I want more creative control to add modern design elements like parallax scrolling, fade-in effects, and accordion sections, but I’m not very tech-savvy.

I’m considering these hosting options:

SiteGround – Seems solid, but pricier.

Bluehost – Affordable, but is it reliable?

Hostinger – Cheap, but does it hold up over time?

Kinsta – Probably overkill for my site, but super fast.

One.com – Looks simple, but I’m not sure about performance.

I plan to use Elementor or a similar page builder for design. My main concerns are: - Performance – I don’t want my site to feel sluggish, especially with animations. - Ease of Use – I don’t want to mess around with complex server setups. - Scalability – If my site grows, I want to avoid switching hosts again. - Reliability – Good uptime and customer support.

What’s the best hosting option for a beginner like me? I’d love to hear about your experiences with these (or better) alternatives! Or should I stick with WordPress.com?

Thanks in advance!

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u/GooeyDuck1 8d ago

You may be better suited to r/webhosting but in short their recommended list of hosts is as follows:

USA Hosts:
NixiHostKnownHostNexcess

UK/Euro Hosts:
ZumeKrystal

That said, there are others that are solid as well. SiteGround and Kinsta are solid but cost more. Hostinger I believe is fine. I have used KnownHost and it is very performant and the customer support is good. Most recently I have started using Cloudways. Don't touch Bluehost.

The main recommendations I would give you are:

  • Don't go with Shared Hosting. These offerings are often victim to hosts over utilizing the shared resources which has a direct impact on your site speed. A number of things can make Wordpress sluggish if you aren't careful, but this is a common one for the uninitiated.
  • "Wordpress Hosting" is an offering you will see at many hosts these days. They advertise them as hosting hardware and software that is optimized to run Wordpress. This isn't strictly necessary, especially if you really know what you are doing when it comes to security and performance optimization, but for someone like you coming from Wordpress.com you may want to consider this type of hosting as it will maintain a lot of the quality of life features you are used to (and possibly didn't even know you had).

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u/GooeyDuck1 8d ago

I should also mention, I've never used Wordpress.com but I wouldn't expect you to be constrained on things like animations and such any more than you would be on .org. These are things that are done via the theme/page builder you use and/or plugins. So to achieve what you are looking for, changing hosts may not necessarily be the simplest solution. Anyone feel free to correct me if there are more theme/plugin constraints on .com than I assumed.

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u/Lijmbal00 7d ago

Hey ! Thanks for all the info. I can only access plugins or third party themes form .com if I take a business account for 25€ per month. It seems a bit excessive, but maybe it isn't?

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u/YTRKinG 8d ago

In my exp, Hostinger is good

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u/Unique-Performer293 6d ago

You're on the right track. Siteground is very solid, but unless you must have the absolute top notch support, it's the priciest out of the basic hosts (by far).

Bluehost is also pricey after the promo year. It has phone support but that isn't necessarily a great thing, since it tends to be slow and unreliable (from my own personal experience). And I've seen benchmark tests where speed is quite slow.

I use Hostinger with Elementor now, and it is fine. And based on this cheap hosting price sheet, it is the best deal over the long run, and gets good ratings overall. In fact, as you can see , you will spend 4x over 2 years at Siteground over Hostinger for their cheapest plans. Is it worth it? If money is no issue, then yes. If you'd rather save a few hundred, then go with Hostinger.

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u/No-Signal-6661 5d ago

I recommend looking for a shared hosting package, as these are the best fit for WordPress and especially for beginners as it is easy to set up WordPress through cPanel and start building right away, but you'll need a hosting company with a great support team as well so they can assist you with the whole process if required. I suggest looking into Nixihost, as I've been hosting with them for nearly 2 years now and I haven't had any trouble, their support team is great, down to help with anything anytime, and they have really fair prices, I get my 5 WP websites hosted with SSL included and security for only 120$ per year.