Bluehost.in Review (2024) – Bluehost India Review

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About BlueHost

BlueHost is one of the oldest and largest web hosting companies, founded in 2003 by Matt Heaton. EIG (Endurance International Group) later acquired it in 2010.

The company BlueHost has gained recognition in WordPress hosting, becoming an official WordPress recommended hosting provider.

It hosts over 2 million websites and has gained immense popularity. BlueHost recently introduced the WP PRO plan having several features with Managed hosting.

BlueHost.in targets Indian customers. It provides shared hosting, WordPress hosting, VPS Hosting, Dedicated hosting and Woocommerce Hosting.

BlueHost.in vs BlueHost.com

BlueHost.in is the Indian variant of the web hosting company, while BlueHost.com is the universal website that targets the US audience. Both used different servers since the start resulting in different speeds.

But the company claims that both websites now provide hosting from the same servers.   

Well, the results of my tests on hosting bought from the two websites tell a different story to the claim. Continue reading the article to know the results of the tests along with some interesting facts.

Also, with bluehost.in you can make payment in rupees via Indian Payment methods like UPI & Debit Cards. While with bluehost.com you need to have international credit card to make payment in USD.

GST Invoice is also available on bluehost.in for business registered in India.

For Customer Support you can get 24/7 call support in India with bluehost.in while with bluehost.com you can only get 24/7 chat support in India.

BlueHost Features Overview

Bluehost.in Review Video

For video lovers here’s the quick review of Bluehost.in

BlueHost Hosting Plan – Types and Pricing

The following is the list of different hosting and their plans (include 36 months plans).

BlueHost WordPress hosting

All the plans include a free SSL certificate, free domain for 1 year and other BlueHost tools.

Plan	Price (per month)	Additional features
Basic (1 website)	Rs.175	–
Plus (unlimited websites)	Rs.299	1. Unlimited databases
Choice Plus (unlimited websites)	Rs.299	1. Unmetered SSD storage 2. Free Website Backup 3. Free site migration

Shared hosting

All the plans include unmetered bandwidth with a free SSL certificate and a free domain for 1 year.

Plan	Price (per month)	Additional features
Basic (1 website)	Rs.175	–
Plus(unlimited websites)	Rs.279	1. Unmetered SSD storage 2. Unlimited domains and subdomains
Choice Plus (unlimited websites)	Rs.279	1. Free daily website backup 2. Unmetered SSD storage 3. Unlimited domains and subdomains
Pro (unlimited websites)	Rs.859	1. Dedicated IP 2. Unmetered SSD storage 3. Unlimited domains and subdomains 4. Free daily website backup

VPS hosting

Plan	Standard	Enhanced	Ultimate
Price	Rs.1159 / month	Rs1859 / month	Rs.3659 / month
Storage	30 GB SSD storage	60 GB SSD storage	120 GB SSD storage
RAM	2 GB RAM	4 GB RAM	8 GB RAM
Bandwidth	1 TB bandwidth	2 TB bandwidth	3 TB bandwidth
IP Address	1 IP address	2 IP address	2 IP address

BlueHost Dedicated Hosting

BlueHost also provides Dedicated Hosting with a dedicated server for your website so that you can have privacy and advanced security. But this hosting package is expensive and the plans start at Rs.6499/month.

If you are looking for the most pocket friendly pricing plans, then check out Hostinger.

User Interface

The User Interface is easy to use, and access but the response was slow. With the BlueHost dashboard, you can manage your hosting account (profile), which includes your billing information and renewals. 

My Sites

Here, you get a list of your websites and get a quick overview of each of them. You can access the website’s plugins, install security, check performance, backups and settings in this tab. Pretty straightforward, is easy to use. 

This panel helps you to use the maximum of the server resources with plugins, backups and other features.

cPanel (Advanced)

Similar to hPanel in Hostinger, we have cPanel in BlueHost. You can access the email settings and other features of emails, access files, software installed and security in this panel. 

You can install extra security tools, install new software and access the databases. We can manage all additional tools and see changes done to the website here.

Marketplace

Under Marketplace, you get add-on tools to take your business to the next level. These tools are optional and unnecessary for simple websites. 

You get a list of additional tools for purchase here like Plugins, Themes, Services and other features.

BlueHost Payment Options

Below is the list of payment methods accepted by BlueHost:

• Credit Card (auto-renewal)
• EMI option (Available for Credit card and Debit card, or ZestMoney)
• Debit cards 
• Amex
• Net Banking
• UPI
• Digital Wallets

Having Indian payment options such as UPI is a huge plus for Indian users as not everyone is having access to international credit cards.

Very few international web hosting companies provide Indian payment options. Other two that I know of are Godaddy and Hostinger.

Testing Parameters

This review is based on Choice Plus shared hosting plan which I have been using for over 2 months now. I have tested the parameters for my website based on OceanWP Theme with a Gym template. 

I have used the built-in single server cache and two additional plugins, W3 Total Cache and Auto Optimize. 

The shared plan includes features like unlimited website option, unlimited domains, free SSL certificate, unlimited bandwidth (unmetered) and daily backups, to name a few.

Server Response Time

When a user requests the website, the time taken by the server to respond to the request is the Server Response Time.

As the data centre of BlueHost is in the US, the server response time is the least for the US server (30 ms). The slowest being the Mumbai server (262 ms).

The overall server response time on average is solid, but BlueHost servers are not the quickest. Hostinger and SiteGround have better response times.

Website Loading Speed 

This refers to the time required for my webpage to load on my screen. I found the servers were slow as the time taken to load was on average 2.6 sec.  

The reason for concluding the servers are slow is that I have used the built-in cache and two extra cache plugins, W3 Total Cache and Auto Optimize. After using these cache plugins, the test results suggested the speed was still slow. 

So, the page load speed did not impress me and there are other budget hosting providers like Hostinger who have better load speeds (for the Indian audience).

Website Uptime

Website Uptime is the time that a website is available to users with no problem, for a certain period. Higher uptime of your website results in improved performance and an increase in visits. Bad uptime can affect your business and often results in the loss of your customers. 

Now, no hosting provider can help you with 100% uptime. So, the expected uptime should be around 99.99% to 99.90%. In a month, if the website uptime is 99.9%, then the total downtime is 43 minutes 50 seconds and only 8 hours 45 minutes in a year.

I have tested the uptime of my website for the past 128 days using the Better Uptime tool. This checks the uptime for every 30 seconds and the results were pretty decent. 

The uptime was 99.95% for the past 316 days, with the total downtime being only 33 minutes. Only 8 incidents were reported, and the duration for which they lasted was pretty short. The longer incident of 10 minutes was because of the load test I performed on my website. 

The latest uptime as of November 2023 was 100%.

October 2023	99.86%
September 2023	99.91%
August 2023	99.96%
July 2023	99.99%
June 2023	99.99%
May 2023	99.92%
April 2023	99.99%
March 2023	99.43%
February 2023	99.99%
January 2023	99.33%
December 2022	99.79%
November 2022	100%
March 2022	99.99%
February 2022	99.83%
January 2022	99.99%
December 2021	99.77%
November 2021	99.84%
October 2021	99.82%
September 2021	99.93%

Note – I do have the active plan of Bluehost.in and I’ll update the uptime regularly on this article.

I found no issues with the website uptime and found it to be pretty reliable. However, if you wish to have an unmatched uptime, you can check out Cloudways, StableHost, or Rocket.net.

Now, let’s talk about the Load tests.

Load test

Load test suggests the maximum load your website server can take. For this, I sent 50 virtual users to my website to see how the servers manage if there is an increase in real-time users.  

Well, as you can see, the results turned out worse than I expected. As the number of users increased, the failure rate of the requests increased as well. 20 users were the maximum load the server could handle.

Out of the 3809 HTTP requests made, 3401 requests failed and only a few requests were successful. So, the failure rate was very high, suggesting the server couldn’t handle the load. The server displayed an internal error (server failure) message on my website and it was down for about 10 minutes. 

Even after using the cache plugins, the failure rate was very similar with no success in the load test. This might cause problems if you have a good online presence and expect a sudden spike in traffic.

Load Test for BlueHost.com server

Even though the company claims that both the server for BlueHost.in and BlueHost.com are the same, the results suggest that BlueHost.com servers were better with the faster loading speed and could handle the load better than the BlueHost.in servers. 

Check out my video on BlueHost.com review to know more.

Data centres 

Bluehost has only one data centre in Utah, USA. Many notable hosting providers have several data centres across the globe.

But BlueHost has only one data centre in the USA. The drawback here will be the speed if your target audience is out of US. If your target audience is in India then you should have a data center in India or Singapore.

Having a data center nearest to your target audience means better speed.

Bluehost Cache

Bluehost provides only one inbuilt cache option. I prefer using additional W3 Total Cache and Autoptimize plugins for WordPress on BlueHost.

Inbuilt (single-server cache control)

We can access the inbuilt cache manager under the performance tab. This boosts the performance of the website and helps to increase the speed. 

Plugins

1. W3 Total Cache

W3 Total Cache is the most widely used plugin for WordPress performance optimization. This improves the server performance by reducing load times and provides CDN integration.

2. Autoptimize

Autoptimize helps in optimizing your images and can aggregate, minify your scripts and styles, optimize Google Fonts and more!

BlueHost Domains

Free Domains

All the plans on BlueHost include a free domain for 1 year. This is pretty good as most of the hosting providers include the free domain in very few of the plans. You can claim your free domain while buying the hosting plans.

If you wish to enjoy a free for lifetime domain, check out ChemiCloud hosting!

New Domain Pricing

Bluehost also functions as a domain registrar so you can purchase your domain name and hosting from their website itself. Prices for new domain names is not the cheapest on BlueHost, but have standard prices.

If you are still figuring out a domain name for your website, you can take a look at these domain name generators for some interesting ideas.

Temporary URL

Similar to taking a test drive of a car before buying it, you can set up a preview URL to test the servers. You can do this without connecting your domain with the web servers. 

BlueHost does not administer a temporary URL on the website settings. You need to contact customer support to get your preview URL. And it is quite difficult to remove the temporary URL as you have to change the backend settings through the PHPMyAdmin options table.

If you still wish to have a Preview URL for your site, then you can go with other hosting providers like Hostinger, A2 Hosting, Cloudways, or FastComet.

Bluehost Security

BlueHost includes a free SSL certificate for your website on all the plans. SSL certificate is necessary for websites that accept payments from customers or receive crucial information.

Google now flags websites that are not secured with an SSL certificate. SiteLock provides security from malware attacks. 

BlueHost has above-average security features with secured servers.

Bluehost Backups

Bluehost includes free daily backups only in Choice Plus and PRO plans. Backups help restore the website to the previous state if a problem occurs because of an update or an attack on your website.

CodeGuard

We can back up the website on BlueHost through CodeGuard, which is a reliable backup system. I have used CodeGuard before and it is amazing to use. 

So, the backup system of BlueHost is above satisfactory and reliable. 

Bluehost Customer Support

You get 24/7 live chat support with quick replies. But the replies you get are not up to the mark. You may feel that the replies are less specific and they could train the executives better. 

Also, the replies are not very thorough and you will need 15 to 20 minutes to solve a simple query, even with call support. Sometimes, you would need to ask the same questions repeatedly or differently to get the solution you are looking for. 

However, live chat support is an amazing option to have in emergencies as you get quick replies. Another advantage here is BlueHost offers call support in many Indian languages. You can get help in English, Hindi, Kannada and other languages on request. Amazing!

Overall, the customer support is quick but needs to improve the knowledge on the specific queries.

Bluehost Inode count

Inode count equals the counts of all the files of your website and directories. This includes emails, files, folders and everything that you store on the server. For each file, you add or get a new mail, the inode count increases by one.

The inode count for shared hosting in BlueHost is 50k per cPanel, which is too less. They also have stated that the soft limit is 200k, as 50k count is less and not everyone can reduce the file count to that less a number.  For no restrictions on inodes, you can go with Rocket.net.

Refund Policy 

Bluehost offers a 30-Day Money-back Guarantee. This implies you can try out any plan and if not satisfied with the service after 30 days, you can claim a 100% refund.

A note here. In the Terms and Conditions, they state that if the plan includes a free domain, then the company will deduct the cost of your domain from the refund amount. So, if you plan to claim a refund, it would be better not to opt for a free domain.

If your priority is refunds, then A2 Hosting is the best because it charges you on pro-rata basis.

Free Website Migrations

BlueHost provides free website migration for a single website, included only in their Choice Plus and Pro plans. If you want more migrations, check out ChemiCloud that offers 50 cPanel migrations!

Bluehost Website Builder

They did not provide any site builder in my plan, which is Choice Plus shared hosting. Last when I checked bluehost.com I got SitePad sitebuilder. Not sure if that is still available.

Bluehost Cloudflare CDN

Cloudflare CDN helps improve page load speeds, reduce CPU usage on the server, and reduce bandwidth usage.

A CDN (content delivery network) is used to provide high availability and performance by using a distributed network of proxy servers and their data centres in different places. It boosts your response time and reliability on your website.

CDN helps in the global reach of users and helps to reach 100% uptime. It also saves lots of money as Cloudflare CDN is free of cost.

About EIG

EIG (Endurance International Group) acquired BlueHost in 2010. Founded in 1997, EIG was previously named as BizLand. It acquires many small hosting companies, which the company operates under their original brand name and continues the service. 

EIG, after acquiring the hosting companies, overloads their servers by selling more than the suggested number. EIG does this often and hence, I am not a fan of the EIG group. 

An interesting fact is that BlueHost fired 440 people in 2017, after being acquired by EIG. Read more about this here.

There are over 80 companies under the EIG group and some notable companies are HostGator, FastDomain, ResellerClub. The companies which I find good are BlueHost and BigRock.

Clearlake Capital Group recently acquired EIG in 2020 for $3 Billion. And EIG was since renamed Newfold Digital. After this merger, let’s wait and see how the company performs under its new parent company.

Bluehost Pros and Cons

Pros

1. Superb Uptime

BlueHost provides good uptime, and this also showed in the test results. Most of the websites have 99.9% uptime, with few websites having problems because of the sudden increase in traffic.

So, according to my tests, the uptime for my website was 99.97% which is a good result.

2. Codeguard backups

We get Codeguard backups in few plans which is great. I have used Codeguard before and I would recommend it. We can do easy backups and restorations using this feature.

3. User Interface is Easy To Use

The user interface of BlueHost is simple and easy to use. cPanel has all the features laid out in a pretty simple manner. And it is easy to manage multiple websites as well. 

Overall, this is helpful for users with limited coding knowledge. Easy to set up the websites and manage them with a very convenient dashboard that is easy to use. 

4. 24/7 Live Chat Support

BlueHost has 24/7 live chat support which is good in case of any emergency. My experience with support has given me a mixed opinion on them. 

The replies are quick but they take time to understand the problem and you could spend some time before you find a solution with them. The same goes with call support, yet a good option to have.

5. Affordable Pricing (with GST invoice)

Prices for all the plans are affordable, with excellent features and options. You also get a further reduction if you buy the plans for more duration. 

For Choice Plus Shared Hosting, the price is Rs.459 per month if bought for 12 months duration plan. The same plan with 36 months duration costs Rs.279 per month.

Also, you can get a GST invoice for the GSTIN of your business. 

Cons

1. Slow Speed

Although the uptime is amazing with BlueHost, the load speed also matters. Based on my tests I think the speed of my website was slow which might affect the user experience. 

2. Bad Load Handling

BlueHost is affordable and is great for budget-friendly websites, assuming you get minimum traffic. The servers of BlueHost cannot handle the load of over 20 to 25 users, which is also the recommended limit by the Bluehost support, for shared hosting. 

So, for websites that get good traffic, you can either upgrade your plans or switch to another provider. 

3. Less Inode Count

BlueHost inode count is very less, even though the soft limit is 200k. The company should increase the count benefiting its customers.

4. Customer Support Not The Best

BlueHost customer support is not the most knowledgeable. You might get stuck with them for 15 to 20 minutes for a simple problem.

BlueHost should improve the trainees by updating them with more problems and their solutions.

5. Temporary Domain (URL) Difficult To Use

A temporary URL helps to check the server’s capabilities without having to own a domain. To set up this, you need to contact support to create one. And it is even more difficult to remove the temporary domain.

6. Only 1 Website Migration 

Most providers offer free website migration of more than 1 website. BlueHost offers migration of a single website included only in a few of the plans.

7. Backup Restrictions

BlueHost restricts the CodeGuard feature only to higher-level plans.

8. Data Centers Only in the US

BlueHost has data centers only in the US.

Who Should Buy Bluehost?

BlueHost is a pretty decent web hosting that offers a range of hosting plans with loaded features. Considered great choice for budget-friendly companies planning to launch a new website and easily, and great for WordPress websites too. 

You get all the hosting features required for basic websites with an easy user interface.

We can consider BlueHost for websites having a US audience, websites using HTML/PHP, small audience and need call support in India.

For everything else there are better options available.

Alternatives to Bluehost

ChemiCloud

ChemiCloud is a great option if you are looking for litespeed servers with good customer care support. ChemiCloud offers discounts for new users and has excellent customer support as well. 

FastComet 

Looking for a Bluehost alternative at similar pricing then take a look at FastComet. Provides good speed, support and have a data center in India as well. This is a good hosting platform for WordPress websites.

Hostinger 

Hostinger is a good budget Bluehost alternative for WordPress websites. They have litespeed servers and have performed good with speeds & load tests in my Hostinger Review.

Bluehost Vs Chemicloud Vs Fastcomet

Conclusion

Learnt some amazing facts now, did you? Let me know your thoughts about BlueHost. Hope you got the relevant information on Bluehost.in.

Also, BlueHost.com and BlueHost.in have different prices, which I doubt might be due to them using different servers. But they claim otherwise.

Let me know if you require any more details or have any doubts regarding BlueHost hosting. Leave a reply in the comment section below and I would love to get in touch with you. You can also stay updated with my latest blog posts by joining my weekly newsletter.

This is Kripesh signing off! Take care and happy learning!

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