I secretly test hosts every month for speed, reliability, and support. Here’s a comparison between DreamHost: How Good (Or Bad!) Is Their Hosting Speed & Uptime? and GoDaddy with real proof of their performance.
DreamHost: How Good (Or Bad!) Is Their Hosting Speed & Uptime? Hosting Plan
Dreamhost is known for their unlimited resources at a great value. They have been around since 1998 and hosts over 10 million sites. Data centers are located in California and Virginia.
I have purchased a hosting plan on DreamHost: How Good (Or Bad!) Is Their Hosting Speed & Uptime? and set up a typical web site. I use that example website to run these tests. Learn more about how I test.
Here is the plan information I chose:
| Plan Name | Happy Hosting |
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| Cost | $10.95/month |
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| Disk Space | Unlimited |
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| Bandwidth | Unlimited |
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| Uptime Guarantee | 100% |
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| Money Back Guarantee | 45 days |
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| Notes | Site was ready within minutes after I purchased. |
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GoDaddy Hosting Plan
GoDaddy claims to have fast, secure, and reliable hosting. They were created in 1999 and now host over a million websites. They have data centers throughout the US, primarily in Arizona.
I have purchased a hosting plan on GoDaddy and set up a typical web site. I use that example website to run these tests. Learn more about how I test.
Here is the plan information I chose:
| Plan Name | Deluxe Linux Hosting with cPanel |
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| Cost | $8.99/month |
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| Disk Space | Unlimited |
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| Bandwidth | Unlimited |
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| Uptime Guarantee | 99.9% |
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| Money Back Guarantee | 45 days |
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| Notes | Site was ready within minutes after I purchased. |
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Page Speed Test Results
This test measures the total time it takes to load a standard web page. Lower is better. Learn more about the Page Speed Test.
DreamHost: How Good (Or Bad!) Is Their Hosting Speed & Uptime? performs above average in the Web Hosting Speeds: Which Hosting Brands Are Best & Worst For Your Site? Test, with an average result of 2.99 seconds. It's best result was 0.00 s but it has been as bad as 21.25 s. DreamHost: How Good (Or Bad!) Is Their Hosting Speed & Uptime? most recent result on Dec 10 was 0.00 s. I expected Dreamhost to have poor performance, but they're not that bad. There are faster hosts out there, but you're not going to be disappointed with them.
GoDaddy performs above average in the Web Hosting Speeds: Which Hosting Brands Are Best & Worst For Your Site? Test, with an average result of 2.9 seconds. It's best result was 0.31 s but it has been as bad as 37.97 s. GoDaddy most recent result on Dec 10 was 2.00 s. GoDaddy consistently has very fast page load speeds. I'm attributing this to the fact that they have a stellar Hosting Optimization team, headed by Dave Koopman. He actually reached out to me after seeing this site to not only give me kudos for doing this, but offer additional testing resources (which at the moment I am not using). Regardless, he's pretty passionate about their hosting performance and their stats prove it.
Let’s see how DreamHost: How Good (Or Bad!) Is Their Hosting Speed & Uptime? and GoDaddy compare in detail for their page speed stats:
Uptime Test Results
This test is performed by measuring the % uptime of a host. Higher is better. Learn more about the Uptime Test.
DreamHost: How Good (Or Bad!) Is Their Hosting Speed & Uptime? performs miserably in the Web Hosting Uptime: Which Hosting Brands Are Best & Worst? Test, with an average result of 83.36 percent. It's best result was 100.000 % but it has been as bad as 0.000 %. DreamHost: How Good (Or Bad!) Is Their Hosting Speed & Uptime? most recent result on Dec 9 was 0.000 %. Dreamhost has had a few significant outages, but I've seen worse. Their ping response time is pretty impressive, faster than most hosts, showing they have a decent network.
GoDaddy performs stellar in the Web Hosting Uptime: Which Hosting Brands Are Best & Worst? Test, with an average result of 99.97 percent. It's best result was 100.000 % but it has been as bad as 94.722 %. GoDaddy most recent result on Dec 9 was 100.000 %. GoDaddy has shown rocky uptimes when you first start hosting with them, however after a month things become pretty stable. Their tech team reached out to me to explain that they think it only happens when new customers get added to the server and apache needs to restart - and after the server is full it does not need to reload as often. The stats I've collected seem to support this theory, and they claim they're working on a solution.
Let’s see how DreamHost: How Good (Or Bad!) Is Their Hosting Speed & Uptime? and GoDaddy compare in detail for their uptime stats:
Support Response Test Results
This test measures how quickly the host’s support team responds to your request. Lower is better. Learn more about the Support Response Test.
DreamHost: How Good (Or Bad!) Is Their Hosting Speed & Uptime? performs okay in the Web Hosting Support Response Time: Which Hosts Are Best & Worst? Test, with an average result of 2.79 hours. It's best result was 0.20 h but it has been as bad as 11.00 h. DreamHost: How Good (Or Bad!) Is Their Hosting Speed & Uptime? most recent result on Mar 22 was 1.30 h. Dreamhost will usually get back to you within an hour, although that's not always the case. Regardless their support is average.
GoDaddy performs great in the Web Hosting Support Response Time: Which Hosts Are Best & Worst? Test, with an average result of 0.12 hours. It's best result was 0.10 h but it has been as bad as 0.30 h. GoDaddy most recent result on Mar 22 was 0.10 h. GoDaddy is the only host that doesn't offer email support. At first I thought this horrendous - I waiting on hold on the phone. But from the times I've called, they're usually pretty quick to get to me. I'm okay with their customer service.
Let’s see how DreamHost: How Good (Or Bad!) Is Their Hosting Speed & Uptime? and GoDaddy compare in detail for their uptime stats: