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PROS:
CONS:
GoDaddy is one of the most popular web hosting providers on the market today and, since 2013, the largest ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) accredited registrar in the world, being four times larger than its nearest competitor.
GoDaddy also had its share of scandals and controversies over time, with different organizations.
The company was founded in 1997, in Baltimore and it curently has over 14 million customers worldwide and more than 63 million domain names under its management. GoDaddy has offices all around the world, from US (California, Arizona, Iowa) to India, Europe, Australia and more. The name "GoDaddy" is not only known for the web services they provide, but also due to an excessive media exposure, advertising and sports sponsorships, such as the Super Bowl, NASCAR and others.
In 2011, PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) threatened to close their account with GoDaddy after a video was posted online, showing Bob Parsons (the founder of GoDaddy) shooting an elephant in Zimbabwe. In the same year, GoDaddy lost over 16,000 domains, after being boycotted for supporting SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act). Wikipedia was among the clients who announced that they will be moving away all their domains from GoDaddy's management.
GoDaddy offers all the web hosting services you might need for your business, from shared hosting, to dedicated and VPS, for both Linux and Windows. It also has its own website builder.
The plans include one click install for more than 125 apps (WordPress, Drupal, Joomla and others), easy, one click setup for GoDaddy registered domains, 1 GB database storage (MySQL Linux) and many more.
All three plans may come with site backup and restore, but it is a paid option, so you can opt for it only if you are willing to pay the additional fee.
VPS and Dedicated hosting offer 4 plans: Economy, Value, Deluxe and Ultimate.
VPS starts at $16,99/month (the Economy plan) and includes 1 GB memory, 40 GB storage, unmetered bandwidth, 3 dedicated IPs, free one year SSL certificate.
Dedicated hosting starts at $69,99/month (Economy) and has features such as: 4 GB memory, 4 CPU Cores, 3.1 Ghz, 1 TB storage (RAID-1), unmetered bandwidth, 3 dedicated IPs and others.
For more information on their hosting services and packages, go to https://uk.godaddy.com/hosting/web-hosting
GoDaddy is indeed a very affordable option for users who sign up for the basic plans, but the number of freebies and features offered is average and sometimes even below some competitors. The economy plan limits you to 25 subdomains, which is a small number compared to other providers. The 100 GB of storage and 100 email addresses available to your single site are also average numbers at best.
A useful thing though is the user friendly interface. GoDaddy lets you choose between the Linux-based cPanel or the Windows-based Parallels Plesk.
GoDaddy also offers free website migration services, 200 dollars worth of credits for AdWords, Yahoo or Bing and a free website builder for all plans.
The website builder also allows customers to create backup copies of their site, whenever they want.
The money-back guarantee differs, depending on the length of your chosen plan. There is a 30 day money back guarantee for annual plans and only a 48 hours money back guarantee for monthly plans (meaning all plans with less than a one year term). That is yet another 'con', if you take into account providers like InMotion or DreamHost, who go as far as to offer 90 or 97 day money back guarantees.
As mentioned before, GoDaddy offers a free domain name even with their Economy plan, but there is a condition. You have to sign up for at least one year.
The basic plan for shared hosting also uses secure shell and spam detection. If you want extra security, you have options but they will cost you extra money (such as SiteLock).
They offer 3 plans for their shared hosting. The basic Economy plan starts from $3,99/month and includes 1 website, 100 GB storage, unmetered bandwidth and a free domain if you sign up for a year. The Deluxe plan is $4,99/month and comes with unlimited websites and unmetered storage and bandwidth. The Ultimate plan is suitable for heavier traffic and more complex websites. It starts from $7,99/month and it includes unlimited websites, unmetered storage and bandwidth, 1 year SSL certificate and Premium DNS.
GoDaddy has over 37,000 live servers across the Globe and guarantees a 99,9% uptime rate, which is the standard on the market. Tests show that they generally deliver what they promise and sometimes even more (we obtained a 99,93% uptime in 30 days of testing). In terms of server response time, their shared hosting is not the fastest, but fits into standard (559 ms).
The tech staff does monitor the data centers on a 24/7 basis, to ensure the customers of their reliability.
Phone: 020 7084 1810
GoDaddy has a huge customer base so it stands to reason that they can't manage to please everyone. They do offer 24/7 phone and email support but they recently shutdown the live chat. The wait time varies from 6-8 minutes/call and the staff doesn't really have time to be extra friendly and personal. Billing issues may not take that much time to be solved, but if you experience technical issues, it is better to learn to be self-sufficient and use their tutorials, FAQ section or forums or to be willing to pay for their customer service, in order to speed things up. GoDaddy strives to improve this aspect by launching call centers in as many countries as possible.
Our editorial staff evaluates products and services independently, but Best Review Guide may earn money when you click on links. Read our advertising disclosure.
By: Kelly | Last updated April 12, 2017 
