BlueHost Review
24/7 U.S. Phone Support, No Overseas Outsourcing
I was excited to write a review about BlueHost, mainly because I’ve heard a lot of good things about them. With so many web hosts, and so few (good and honest) reviews, it’s really hard to tell who’s good and who isn’t.
From looking at the BlueHost.com web site, the company appears to be a serious and professional web host. A visually appealing web site, clearly posted contact information, lots of awards (from legitimate places), and grammatically correct text on site, all help make BlueHost seem like a formidable web host. A great feature (that seems to be awfully rare) is that BlueHost provides a demo of their control panel (a very slightly customized cPanel using the X skin) that actually works and isn’t impossible to find. It’s a great feature that allows you to review how cPanel works if you aren’t familiar with it.
BlueHost Features and Pricing
The features BlueHost provides seem pretty standard (nothing lacking) with all of the expected features of a web host such as cPanel, multiple database support, FTP, email, etc. BlueHost’s one (the only one I could find, at least) package features unlimited diskspace, and unlimited bandwidth. There’s a limited number of databases (50 each for MySQL and
Postgre) and more FTP and email accounts than you could ever use (1,000 and 2500, respectively). Unlimited numbers of addon domains, parked domains, and subdomains are given. Pricing varies depending how long you sign up for:
- 3 Months: $9.95/month + $30.00 Setup + Domain ($10.00 if purchased from BlueHost)
- 6 Months: $8.95/month + $30.00 Setup + Domain ($10.00 if purchased from BlueHost)
- 12 Months: $7.95/month (no setup fee, free domain included)
- 24 Months: $6.95/month (no setup fee, free domain included)
I have never been a big fan of a minimum of three months contract, and you do have to click around (to the second step in their order process, actually) just to find out the price. Ignoring the minimum contract length, pricing is quite competitive.
Terms of Service
BlueHost has a very unique Terms of Service - there’s no legal jargon at all. It’s just some bullet points on a page with the major points included in most Terms of Service agreements. The shady point is “All activities may be monitored, recorded, and examined by any authorized person, including law enforcement.” with a semi-shady “Any violation found or fraudulent activity that system personnel deem inappropriate may have your account immediately terminated without notice and any recorded evidence reported to authorized persons.” However, in fairness to BlueHost, the points are quite clear, and not hidden within a 10 page agreement.
cPanel Control Panel
Two clicks later, I was into my control panel. If you know about cPanel, you can probably skip this paragraph. It’s all very standard. You have the same SQL, subdomain, email, etc. features as every other cPanel. There’s a few nice addons such as a domain manager, a sitebuilder, and some options to manage your account (basically, it just logs you into their billing system, but still convenient). BlueHost has Fantastico, which from what I saw, was up-to-date with the latest stable versions of all of the scripts. The cPanel went very fast and did everything it was supposed to do.
Script Installation
Like a lot of cPanel hosts, BlueHost supports addon domains. I set up a few addon domains, and everything worked well, and without any problems. BlueHost doesn’t allow SSH/Shell Access by default, but says it will enable shell access for your account if you fax a copy of your driver’s license, passport, etc. to them. I installed some basic scripts (a blog, a CMS, a forum) without any problems. Speed was about average, and BlueHost seems to keep up in terms of software updates and the like.
BlueHost Support
I called their support department using their toll-free number. I was talking to someone within about 30 seconds after dialing. I asked some basic questions: Do you support mod_rewrite (Yes), do you support mod_security (didn’t know, but checked), and do you keep your Fantastico up-to-date with the latest versions (Yes)? Support was nice enough, and keep to know what they were talking about. The representative obviously wasn’t reading from a prompt (no delay with answers).
I decided to test the BlueHost support out with some more complicated issues that an average webmaster may run across. I was caller #2, and had to wait about a minute or two. I spoke to a different representative (meaning they have more than one tech on duty, always nice) and asked does BlueHost support PHP5 (they have two servers that do, and can move your account if needed), if they support Ruby on Rails (nope), and if I should use ‘localhost’ as my host name with the script I was trying to install (Yes). I reworded the questions slightly and sent them to BlueHost support via email at 4:50 PM on a Monday. By 5:17 PM, I had a helpful response.
All and all, BlueHost seems like a good web host. The company certainly has their act together and by all means can be labelled as a top quality web host with great features and support.
Pros: Good control panel (cPanel) with a few nice extras,
plenty of space and bandwidth, good support, fair pricing
Cons: Semi-shady points in TOS (nothing too major, and clearly outlined), 3 month minimum contract length, pricing is relatively hard to find
Bottomline: BlueHost is a good web host that provides a good hosting experience with a top-of-the-line control panel as well as helpful support for a reasonable price.
Rating:
Review by: Douglas Hanna
Visit BlueHost.com
December 5th, 2007
[...] HostMonster is actually owned by BlueHost, a large web hosting company which we reviewed a while back here at [...]
December 7th, 2007
As a fellow webmaster, i would advice all those registering their domains online to avoid netfirms.com - they are thieves. We had recently registered our domain on their site and with proof of purchase and a receipt later, we realized the domain has been sold to someone else half a day after our official purchase!
I would recommend many other domain providers, but that seem like i’m endorsing them, i merely conclude to beware when dealing with this India based IT institution.
Last word of advice, if they realize the worth of a domain after you have purchased it, they will revoke their claim and purchase it themselves, so that they can later resell it.
December 18th, 2007
Theses people shut my dad’s website down because he wanted them to fix a problem on there end. then kicked us off there server, i would say avoid these people like a plague because if they don’t like you they will kick you off there server. AVOID AVOID AVOID
and still havent refunded us the money that we paid them for the month
December 19th, 2007
I build websites for a living.
I have been using Bluehost for several years now.
They do give a lot of features for a good price.
Tech support had always been good in the past but recently has taken a dive. Dec. 2007
They “upgraded” their email servers and email went down for a day. I would think that an upgrade would be something that is planned so notice should be sent. But no notice was sent and customers email was not delivered.
Ok not a good practice. I was not informed till my customer asked why they where not recieving their email and I contacted Bluehost and got a canned answer that I could hardly give my customer.
I contacted them again for clarification and did not get any answer.
Having to deal with support issues myself I try to always be polite and to the point when dealing with any tech support personnel.
So have I made this assessment from one poor blunder?…no it seems a few of my last support questions have gone totally unanswered.
Which leads me to wonder if they are out growing their support.
I have to be proactive in insuring my current and future customers happiness.So I believe I am going to find a different hosting solution.
So far 1&1 seems to get high marks with some other web designers.
I am here posting just to help other designers not to slander Blue host. But I feel that for about the same money there are more professional hosting companies out there.
December 20th, 2007
I have been using Bluehost for about 2 years. I had to fight every single time I needed support. Every time they kept trying to convince me that the problem was in my applications. Almost every time they were wrong. Bluehost cannot be trusted for a serious business.
January 2nd, 2008
Service is aweful, price great, bandwidth great. I wouldn’t recommend them unless you have bandwidth options. Not reliable at all.
January 4th, 2008
To the poster above…avoid 1and1 internet. Short version story. They sent my account to a collection agency by “accident” and are now requiring me to pay the collection agency before they will unlock my website. I’ve sent proof of payment to 1and1 and the collection agency, and 1and2 still refuses to budge; they also are not willing to refund my money for services paid in advance. Bottom line…if they make a mistake…you pay!
January 11th, 2008
Hi,
Don’t believe any good news about bluehost! Here is my story:
I reserved with them almost a year ago. What i noticed first was that they are very slow and you should always beg to get a reply from them. . . then one day i received an email from them saying that they want to move my account to a new server (because they care about us and about our their service). The website(s) was blocked with 403 error. In the same email they said that the moving will need two or three days, but if the account was not activated within 2 days then contact us just in case.
That’s exactly what i did in two days. There was no reply by email, but a cold email saying that we should open a ticket.
I opened a ticket but again no reply. After a day, i tried to catch one of them on their said-to-be “live chat”, first i got someone from sales, then i got someone from technical who seemed to be working on the issue, but he cut the connection. I tried to connect again several times but with no reply!!!!!
I tried phone several times. I explained my problem, and the person on the other end was kind to look into it. He said that moving between servers take time!!! come on! it’s just 100G that can be moved with 10minutes between two servers!!!! and during all that time the websites and all the business is black! nobody can access the site and everybody is getting 403 error including myself. I can’t even access the control panel!!!!!
Five days passed and nothing, so i opened two other tickets and i was tyring to get more of their attention through live chat, but to no avail.
Now i quite up and i advise anybody NEVER WORK with BLUEHOST . They are not professional, and they are very tight on everything. . . don’t be tempted by the size and space they give. . . everything is tied up!!! you can’t do anything. Everything should be activated manually and after several emails: activate perl, activate ImageMagick, activate some commands. . .etc. Although I asked specifically for these things before i join them in and they said that everything is available to us!!!!!!!!
Try any other server but stay away from bluehost. Otherwise you will be loosing your money, your sites, your investment and your clients!!!
my 2 cents
forgot to add: everything i said here can be checked with me if you want the truth. My domain is free4mob.com and my email is Ramez.Bali (at) gmail (dot) com
January 13th, 2008
Hi I have been with them for 12 months now
And I have not had any trouble
John
Doctors Employment
doctorsemployment.com
January 16th, 2008
I went to the BlueHost website because they came highly recommended by Pandecta Magazine—what a bad experience! In an attempt to obtain clarification on several issues regarding their webhosting promotion, the person I was chatting with came off with a “major” brown-hole attitude before we even got through the first question. They obviously have no regard for customer service, which is a direct indication of poor management and an unprofessional business. I highly recommend anyone considering doing business with BlueHost to think twice—or maybe three times! Find a legitimate, professional hosting business that is geared toward your needs as a paying customer, not one that thinks they are doing you a favor. Bottom line: BlueHost is a joke and will probably be out of business soon due to lack of common sense.
January 21st, 2008
What are you guys on about? Many, many people have horror stories to tell about BlueHost:
1. http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?t=662557&highlight=bluehost
2. http://inetintegrity.com/weblog/?p=1
3. http://mattheaton.com/?p=115
Basically they oversell their servers and take some pretty unprofessional approaches to server upgrades. I’d recommend Site5 or Dreamhost to people looking for cost-effective but highly professional hosting.
January 21st, 2008
Interesting, MK. From reading those threads, it looks like BlueHost has been having “major problems” since late December because of an apache/php5 upgrade and load times. That, along with the insane number of new customers signing up (850 in one day) explains all the sudden negative comments about BlueHost posted here.
I am not a BlueHost apologist, but since Matt Heaton has publicly admitted the problems and taken responsibility, it seems reasonable to wait out the “growing pains” and see if things return to normal. My .02 worth.
February 6th, 2008
Thank goodness for these forums to release all the stress I have acquired from the poor support, management, and web development. I would have benefited more if I used the money I lost to blue host as toilet paper. If did not design the website and manual insert text and correct all the spelling mistakes, the website would not have gotten aware. It has been 7 months since my initial payment and the blue host website is still not online and has more problem as they pretend to email me saying that they performed work with no action really taken. If there was ever a hell on planet Earth, it would have originated from bluehost. It’s truly embarrassing to even be associated with bh. I wish there was redemption process to get back all the lost time and money and life they took from me.
February 8th, 2008
BH, are you saying that BlueHost was developing your site? I didn’t know that BlueHost offered web development services. In fact, I checked their site and cannot find any such product. To my knowledge, BlueHost only offers one product: a shared web hosting package. Perhaps you would be willing to explain in more detail what happened?
February 9th, 2008
Maybe I missed something (I don’t need tech support too often), but I have nothing but great things to say about BlueHost. The few times I’ve had to contact support they were really helpful AND they’re actually based in the US. No language barriers, no repeating yourself 29 times so some guy in India understands what you’re saying. I have no doubt that there are some issues, especially if they’re taking on new customers in such large volume, but I can honestly say I’d recommend them to anyone.
February 11th, 2008
My wesbite went offline for two hours (off peak time - no huge deal) but then at 11:30AM Sunday 2/10 it went down and is STILL DOWN almost 24 hours later.)
February 23rd, 2008
If Blue Host is such a wonderful web hosting site why is it grandecom.net has cut them off and won’t let them forward e-mail to my or wifes e-mail account?? We have had our web site @ Blue host for 2 years with very little problems except this one. We have not been able to resolve it in the last year. If this is the norm of things to come then the internet is doomed as any isp who takes a notion can cut another off.
February 23rd, 2008
Fred, did you ask grandecom.net why they blacklisted BlueHost?
February 29th, 2008
WOW! It seems, I am not alone. Get ready for this one folks. I am a BH customer with multiple websites being hosted under my main domain. I officially complained about my customer service issues with the BBB of Utah. Now that I have an active complaint online with them, BH has elected to terminate my web services without notice. Is this what you think an internet presence provider should do in response to negative reaction to their inept service department? Take note here and if you are considering using BH for your Internet Presence, take the time to consider it carfully.
February 29th, 2008
Jim, do you mind me asking the official reason that BlueHost gave you for terminating your web hosting account?
March 5th, 2008
I have three words to describe Bluehost. Unreliable, unreliable, unreliable.
Read about my horror with Bluehost at Bluehost Blues!
March 5th, 2008
I have been using Bluehost for awhile now and they have been great. Recently things have started to take a turn for the worst. Their support has been less helpful and certain sites that I have setup have been going down…with no notice or apology from Bluehost. I am now removing all my sites.
STAY AWAY FROM BLUEHOST!!!
March 6th, 2008
You can say what you want about BlueHost’s upgrade issues, but I have to hand it to the guys for sticking to their policy of not hosting pornographic sites. Be it for moral reasons or resource consumption, some people can sleep a little better knowing their files aren’t rubbing up against PeeWee Herman.
March 6th, 2008
Jonny, what was the reason BlueHost gave for your sites going down? Was it related to the problems discussed earlier in this thread? Please give some more details, thanks.
March 10th, 2008
Bluehost was okay for about 1.5 years as I used them. Unfortunately, they have no sense of planning or policy. We noticed this repeatedly with unannounced changes and a many times malfunctioning control panel.
They migrated our sites to a new server without telling us. Unfortunately, the new and the old didn’t match and they broke the sites. They cost us $900 for the developers to go back in and fix things.
Liquidweb is the better bet if you have the budget otherwise hostgator.
Spencer
March 14th, 2008
bluehost SUCKS, STAY AWAY FROM bluehost THE PLANS ARE FAKE, THEY WILL SUSPEND YOUR PAGE if you need even atlease 100mb bandwidth.
Bluehost = FAKEHOST
March 15th, 2008
LOL, BlueHost only offers 1 plan and it’s 15,000 GB bandwidth.
March 16th, 2008
Obviously the plan is fake, common thieves who overselling, 15,000 GB for sure its a fake value, especially in a shared hosting, fooling inexperienced webmasters, No one is going to use even the half of the space, and i bet if a client try to use even the 1/100 of the offered space, they will fix this using ether hidden charges, or limits-CPU usage etc, at the end, this is why there is a TOS/term, probably you will end up with a suspended account begging for refund.
March 16th, 2008
Great Review Douglas. I am amazed by some of these comments that some people still find a way to complain. For such a low price, Bluehost gives you so much with webhosting. My group has had our Bluehost account for 3 years now. And rarely do we have any issues. When we do, we just hop onto the online chat with the techies and they are usually very good at resolving our problems. Seriously, if you complain about Bluehost you are going to end up complaining about any service you have.
March 21st, 2008
Fastdomain also has the same address as that of bluehost. i guess bluehost, fastdomain and hostmonster are the same. why do they have to brand themselves into a lot of names?
March 21st, 2008
Jonee, I have read that BlueHost wanted Fastdomains because it is an official ICANN registrar. It makes sense to me because BlueHost and HostMonster are now able to go through the process of registration faster and easier without having to use a third party registrar.
March 27th, 2008
I am really glad I have found this BH despite all the support WordPress is throwing at them seems almost as bad as Dot5Hosting… 5 minutes to login, 8 to get a post page which only posts half the time after another 5 minutes or more… This was after they “fixed” their upgrade.
April 1st, 2008
@Emory Rowland concerning BHBASTERD comment about Bluehost and web development.
design.bluehost.com/design/
April 1st, 2008
Crazy Penguin, thanks for sharing that design page. It’s interesting that there is no link to that page from the bluehost.com main page. I wonder how they are promoting it?
April 13th, 2008
Personally I’ve been hosting my website (www.thisismyurl.com) with BlueHost for two years now and never had a problem with them, I think as with most aspects of life you get what you give.
April 14th, 2008
Emory, great comeback for Crazy, and notice if you will that BlueHost only recommends this service. It’s by http://www.edynamo.com
With a half a million domains, there are bound to be a few problems. You can’t avoid the statistics.
April 17th, 2008
@Chris I can see why you have “no problems” with Bluehost.
You are selling Bluehost at least through one of your sites. So does [potentially offensive link removed by editor] sound familiar to you. I see Bluehost banners in two places on the site.
What is funny to me is if type in your url thisismyurl.com you provided in the above comment at serverstatus.bluehost.com it tells all kinds of history about what is going on with you at Bluehost.
If you are a shill or an affiliate either way you are biased on what you are promoting from you point of view concerning your comment.
April 19th, 2008
They oversell. If you need more space, they shift you to a new server, resulting in downtime and may be data loss too …
Jacob C [1:15:52 PM]: Welcome to our real-time Sales chat. How can I help you today?
rick [1:18:20 PM]: are you real ?
[1:18:35 PM]: type rick
[1:19:22 PM]: no one ?
Jacob C [1:20:51 PM]: Rick
[1:20:59 PM]: Yes I am real, how may I help you?
rick [1:21:15 PM]: ohh great
[1:21:17 PM]: thanx ..
[1:21:24 PM]: I need hosting ..
[1:21:55 PM]: before i buy your hosting .. i need to know few things
Jacob C [1:22:31 PM]: Ok
rick [1:22:38 PM]: what is your server configuration ?
Jacob C [1:23:24 PM]: Linux servers running Apache 2.2.8, CentOS 4.6, OC-48 backbone, PHP 5.2.5, Python 2.4.3, Ruby 2.0.1(Rails 2.0.2), Perl 5.8.8
rick [1:23:48 PM]: hardware configuration ?
Jacob C [1:26:20 PM]: OUr servers have dual Quad Core CPUs with 8GBs of RAM and RAID Redundency.
rick [1:27:01 PM]: and what is the HDD capacity and how many HDD’s to 1 server ?
Jacob C [1:28:39 PM]: I am not sure, I believe that the servers have 8 HDDs per server.
rick [1:28:58 PM]: Do you oversell ?
Jacob C [1:30:26 PM]: We do not allot the 1.5TBs upfront, but if you need the space then we will give it to you.
[1:30:37 PM]: So no, we do not oversell.
rick [1:32:03 PM]: So if i signup now and in 6 months i start using the actual space .. i.e 1.5 TB or less … what will happen ?
[1:32:16 PM]: Will I be shifted to new servers ?
Jacob C [1:32:42 PM]: Yes you could be migrated to a different server.
rick [1:33:05 PM]: so there will be downtime .. and may be data loss …
Jacob C [1:33:46 PM]: Yes there could be downtime, but we will try to schedule the migration with you.
rick [1:34:09 PM]: so initially how much space do you allot?
Jacob C [1:35:42 PM]: I am not sure, but the space would dynamically expand.
rick [1:36:07 PM]: Can you find out ?
Jacob C [1:36:46 PM]: No I can not.
rick [1:38:06 PM]: You mean to say … you have no idea how much space will be provided ?
Jacob C [1:39:10 PM]: I mean to say that you will not have to worry about the space, we are building brand new servers everyday and so you will not have to worry about aging hardware or cramped servers.
rick [1:41:19 PM]: the reason to ask for the space details is that I currently host a video blog website. I needed to know how much space would be provided to me. My current website is about 750 GB
Jacob C [1:42:36 PM]: You will be given 1500GBs. You will not need to worry about the space on the server.
[1:43:16 PM]: If the idea of the disk space dynamically expanding worries you then you may need to look into VPS or a dedicated server.
[1:46:57 PM]: Is there anything else I may assist you with?
[1:47:52 PM]: It appears you are having difficulty responding, please feel free to open another chat anytime if you have further questions. Have a great day!
April 23rd, 2008
I dont recomend blue host. about 2 weeks after buying the 2 year package i was contacted by my building socity (Bank) Fraud sqad and was told that the company tried to put a compromise on my account, not sure what it ment i asked, they told me if Bluehost had lifted any money after taking just £1:00 they would be able to clear out my accound without a trace, so i give bluehost 2 stars, Why you ask, because my bank has closed my account and created me a new one with full money back and i still have my account at bluehost :) they must have overlooked it, What a bunch of ejits :D
April 29th, 2008
Despite plenty of reviews suggesting I should look elsewhere for a webhost, I plumped for Bluehost.
So far, I am very impressed with the service. After updating my DNS settings with my old Lycos package, my website was up and running within a couple of hours, with excellent download speeds.
Good stats and logging facilities too.
June 6th, 2008
We’ve been with Bluehost for over a year now, and I’ve had accounts with them dating back 3 years. I’ve really run the gambit with this lot. At first Bluehost was a fairly responsive and quality host, however those days are long gone. As it began to grow it fell apart? Especially in customer service, which Bluehost fails so miserably at, they don’t even have a customer service department. You end up dealing with their hit or miss tech support or sales, which love you when you sign up, see you as a burden there after. They’re the kind of company that leaves you for 30 minutes on hold if you call looking for someone to talk to that even remotely cares that their mistakes and poor management cost you money. Particular mistakes include unannounced changes to the backend hosting software which rendered the site unusable for over a week, frequent slowdown or flat out downtime and failure to notify us of payment for essential services that crippled the site and sent customers elsewhere. They can send me a dozen emails through out the year trying to trick me into renewing my domains through them, however they fail to properly notify us that one of the entire accounts was up for renewal and shut it down until the issue was straightened out.
It sounds like a bad case of poor management and excessive cost-cutting.
If you have a cheap website that isn’t reliant on backend scripting, or uptime, then Bluehost is for you. It’s cheap and has all the basic features, with a few frills as well. Otherwise, don’t say you haven’t been warned. In our case we have easily lost more money tenfold than it would have cost to get a superior hosting service.
June 14th, 2008
Bluehost are the best webhost I have ever used.
I have used 1&1, nativespace, fasthosts and easyspace.
They are superb in everything. Right now one of the support guys is sorting some php that is playing about for me.
There technical support is very good. Servers are very fast and price is amazing.
Bluehost is the best!
July 7th, 2008
I also have used bluehost for several years and have had relatively no problems. I have had some recently, but they have been resolved rather quickly.
Yes, Crazy penguin, I also advertise bh on my site. Hey, they pay a nice referral, so why not. But your logic is interesting: If you like bluehost, then you are obviously lying, if you hate them or have lots of problems, you are telling the truth. According to you, the only way my recommendation can be taken seriously is if I admit to having lots of problems and decry their horrible services. Sounds like a poisoning of the wells fallacy to me.
So the truth: I have had problems (none as bad as some claim), and for the price I am willing to put up with the growing pains. For me, two years of service, to only now have some issues, still works for me.
July 7th, 2008
I have been many years with bluehost. I’ve had a few problems, but they’ve been resolved. If you want cheap hosting, you truly get more than you pay for, for Bluehost. However, if you run a business and consider that you’re only paying $84/year for all the features listed, it’s likely that you’re not understanding the importance of your website. If you need “don’t screw around” service, you’ll want to go to something that charges more and guarantees more.
If you’re a business, and the difference between $8/month and $80/month is a dealbreaker for your web based business, you’re in the wrong business, and even if Bluehost makes monetary sense for you, you shouldn’t expect world class technical support for a year’s worth of BH for a month’s charge at another provider, though you might get it.
OTOH, it’s a lot of space to host your stuff. It certainly is a lot cheaper than S3 for backing up.
July 7th, 2008
Gerald, exactly my point (except you said it a lot better).
It seems that from what I have seen, even paying $20-$25 per month gets you…well…about $13 poorer when compared to bluehost. If you want a lot of space and bandwidth, and are willing to put up with some headaches here and there, then a host like bluehost is the way to go. But if you want guaranteed no problems (whatever that means) you better be ready to fork out the dough. Honestly, for me, I would probably buy a server and pay to collocated it. But that’s just me.
July 10th, 2008
I was a very early user of Bluehost, and back then it seemed like they were totally dedicated to good service.
But several weeks ago, my site’s SQL database simply disappeared from their server (I’d heard they were having database issue.)
Worse still, when I put in a support ticket, I got told that none of the “daily, weekly, and monthly” backups promised by their sales pages actually existed!
Oh, and the Level 3 tech told me that the missing backups were not actual features of their hosting service, but were merely a “courtesy” provided by Bluehost!
Needless to say, an email to owner Matt Heaton — who used to be involved with the actual operation of the company — went unreplied-to.
Be afraid. Be very, very afraid.
July 10th, 2008
Joel, I am really sorry to hear that happened. Perhaps you can retrieve your content from the Google cache while it is still there?
The BlueHost.com site states that “courtesy backups” are part of “features included” in all accounts. Perhaps someone from BlueHost could respond?
July 11th, 2008
Joel, that’s a real bummer! I asked them once about backups because I thought, like you, they did regular backups and could restore if needed. From what I understood, they backup the system, but not individual user accounts. I am not sure what “Courtesy Site Backups” is suppose to mean. I didn’t pursue it, mostly because the c-panel offers a backup feature. For the company sites I run, I have perl scripts I have written to do backups of the web directory and the databases automatically using cron.
Honestly, even if a company doing virtual hosting does say they make backups, I have learned in the past that when it comes to volatile data, you can never have enough backups.
I’m writing bluehost to ask about their backup policies.
b–
July 11th, 2008
O.k., found this in the knowledge base:
BlueHost does not offer redundant or mirrored backups. BlueHost will run courtesy backups at our discretion. Any backups that BlueHost runs are in addition to our Terms of Service and are not guaranteed. Customers are encouraged to run periodic backups through the provided cPanel. BlueHost reccomends that you store such backups off site on your local sysetm.
If you need help creating an account backup; please see our article on How do I use the Backup utility?
*Important: Bluehost.com assumes no responsibility for failed backups, lost data, or data integrity. Bluehost.com is unable to provide copies or create automatic backups for sites above 4 gigabytes in size. You may create your own copies using SSH/Shell Access. If you need help using SSH/Shell Access please see our article on SSH Commands
To learn how to enable shell access on your account please consult this knowledge base article: How can I get SSH/Shell access on my account?.
By courtesy backup I believe they are saying that they will do a backup if you ask them to or if they are moving you to another server, etc. They need to word that on the front page differently. But in all fairness, if they were talking about “nightly backups of user accounts”, they would have said that.
In the end, I guess it pays to read the TOS…which I never did. Ooops.
July 20th, 2008
Well this is all a surprise to me. I’ve read the majority of comments, and I’m shocked by a lot of the responses. I’ve been with BlueHost for several months; no problems yet.
Since I’ve only been with them for a small period of time I’m not going to jump to conclusions and slap them with a poorly though out opinion.
What I can say is: so far, so good, everything has been great.
July 23rd, 2008
i like bluehost. but their is one problem that is they dont provide catch-all account & ffmpeg … you cant even install on it coz the dont even give access to shell to. :(
July 24th, 2008
@Emory (comment #34):
Looks like they promote it within their control panel; see the sample cPanel site under the “Partners” section: http://69.89.30.141:2082/frontend/bluehost/index.html.
July 28th, 2008
I have been with Bluehost for over two years and have 3 accounts with them. I have never had any problems with them. I get great tech support. Yesterday they even worked on a script for me that they don’t support. I have another account with Godaddy and have had problems with them so I am moving my sites from there over to Bluehost. I have had web sites for over 10 years hosted with various companies and so far Bluehost has been the best.
July 31st, 2008
I must say I’m a little surprised at how many people there are in the world that expect 100% from a web host. Granted it would be even more surprising if people took time to say something they liked about a company versus what they despise…
After all that’s what the internet is for, flaming & venting. You’d be hard pressed to find a person who wants to take 5 mins out of their life to write something they like about a company.
However… I’m going to say what I like about the service because I’m apposed to whiny people:
-Tech Support is based in the US (Hmmm, an American company providing jobs to American Citizens) and this means I will understand what the tech is telling me.
-Their cPanel is easier to use then any other company I’ve done business with.
-Even though it’s not their job to help with my script they have taken the time to look at mine time and time again.
-Every person I have talked with has been very kind and patient with me. (Then again I don’t start the conversation like a hot headed 4 year old)
….Just a side note, it’s shared hosting (and the best from what I’ve seen). You are paying very little for what they provide. Yes they may experience some downtime, here’s a newsflash though for some of you who still remember changing the tv stations with a dial on the tv: It’s Technology! Nothing created yet has lasted forever without some kind of maintenance!….
I see a lot of reviews from people flaming Bluehost because they don’t send out emails informing their clients of server maintenance… ARE YOU SERIOUS!? They are to just send 500,000+ emails out to clients for 1-2 hour maintenance? Yeah I’m sure that would be great on a mail server (insert sarcastic expression here).
“Boo hoo my business was down for 3 hours” <— I’m sorry that your office in your mom’s basement had to stop for 3 hours. If you are paying $8 a month for web hosting then there is no way you are a corporation that’s going to be hit hard for the missed time. If you want to have some control over that then fork out the several thousand dollars for your own server and get yourself a T3 line… Option 2 would be for you to realize how good you’ve got it for the amount you are paying. Go ahead and ask MTV how much it costs to keep their site up per month and then get on some random review page to betch about your hosting.
Overall the 2 years I have been with Bluehost have been a rewarding experience and I will be with them for a long time.
August 1st, 2008
I would recommend Bluehost to those who know what they are doing. I’ve been using them for the last few years now and they’ve been great. I’m a web designer and I’ve been through a few other hosting companies so I know what I’m talking about. But then again, every other hosting companies has their complaints. You win some… you lose some!!!
Good Luck To all!!!
August 10th, 2008
Signed up with Bluehost, I’m already dissapointed. Site constantly lags. It was down last weekend for over an hour. Customer support so far has been good as far as the live chat goes. Site was lagging real bad just a bit ago and that’s when i decided to do a search for bluehost reviews and I found this. Wish i’d a done this before i bought the years hosting…. Bad so far.
August 10th, 2008
I must ad, just because you pay little for a service doesn’t mean you shouldn’t expect good service….
August 10th, 2008
I checked all my sites on Bluehost when I got the message about a site lagging. I had no trouble at all. Also, someone mentioned that if someone used 1/100 amount of space they would probably try to charge you extra. Well I use several GIGs of space and I have yet to have any problems no extra costs, etc and again they still have great support on the phone and with live chat.
August 12th, 2008
Grim performance. Page loads at night >> 30 seconds.
User support dreadful and unresponsive. Avoid these
clowns at all costs. They were a big mistake and now
I’m stuck.
August 14th, 2008
I’ve been happy with Bluehost for the most part until recently. The tech support has been pretty knowledgeable and helpful. About a month ago, their mail server went down so we lost a whole day of email communication. The mails seem to come back the next day. However, yesterday, the mail server went down again but this time despite my calls to their tech support, they said all mails from yesterday were lost and there was nothing they could do about it! The only thing they could say is if you need a dedicated server, you may want to consider another service. Also, I filed a ticket with them to take a look at my Awstat for my main domain a month ago because it ceased doing updates. It also never got taken care of. So while the service is generally okay, there are pitfalls going with them. I encourage you to consider other services.
August 29th, 2008
This is by far the worst hosting company ive dealt with in 15 years. The support is a 0 on a scale of 1-10.. Yes they are that bad, ive called 3 times in the last 2 days and I get hung up on? Ive emailed there support many times trying to resolve a problem and no response or I get an email saying to look at the forum and I should find the answer?? What kind of business does this, absolutely horrible customer support I would not recommend them to anyone! There are many more hosting companys that will actually do something to help.
Bottom line there the worst hosting and have the worst support on the net.
August 29th, 2008
Hoss, that’s surprising that a host would hang up on you. Was it during a heated discussion or more of a got disconnected type of thing?
August 31st, 2008
I’m sorry. What part of this article is a review? You did a fine job listing the service’s features, but one could have read that for themselves at Bluehost. I did notice that the Bluehost.com link tracks clicks… good job advertising.
September 1st, 2008
Mark, I think you stopped reading after the feature list and hurried to lump us in with the many so called review sites that exist only to make affiliate revenue. If I wanted, Clickfire could be nothing but a promotional showcase for web hosting affiliates and I’d be a lot richer. We’ve chosen a contrary route, one which sometimes annoys the hosting companies, but one that I feel adds value for the readers.
Here is the methodology and process of how web host reviews typically work here:
http://www.clickfire.com/how-web-host-reviews-work-at-clickfire/
September 4th, 2008
And i was really about to pay for a few years for hosting to bluehost… thanks for the reviews guys!
@MK: Thanks for the recommendation! I think i will go with Site5. :-) Cheers!
September 5th, 2008
Well, I did have some problems with one of our sites going down. It only seemed to happen on one server, the rest never seem to have a problem. I filled out a ticket and got a response. I wrote back and forth with the tech people, even into the weekend, trying to figure out what was going on. Frankly, shared hosting makes it extremely difficult to track this stuff down.
In the end they said they would try a few things and keep an eye on it, requesting I do the same and let them know as soon as the problem happens again.
Yeah, I know what some of you are thinking, “They just couldn’t flip a switch and fix it? What a bunch of losers!” But as someone who manages a network and does a lot of software development, sometimes those stupid switches are hard to find.
Some of the stories I am hearing I cannot even begin to identify with. After almost three years, I have always gotten responses, I have always gotten through on the phone, and I have always gotten treated kindly and with respect. Of course, I usually treat the techs the same way…maybe that’s where the difference is?
September 5th, 2008
In response to Mark,
It is obviously a review. I am not exactly sure how you missed it. There are even stars indicating the final opinion of the reviewer.
I find it extremely helpful to have someone walk through the process, letting me know what their professional opinions are as well as their “feelings” during the process. I would call that a “review”.
The only draw back is that you can never get a clear long-term picture of the service. That is where some of the user comments come in handy. But then, they aren’t usually as professional as the review.
September 5th, 2008
To DreadKnight,
webhostingjury.com/reviews/Site5
You are still going to get what you paid for. You want super reliable, never down, fast service, then you want dedicated servers and that is going to cost you a lot more then $5 a month.
Honestly, I would only recommend shared hosting to people who either want to host personal sites, blogs or (perhaps) small businesses, or who have a high level of expertise and patience and are willing and able to work through the bumps in the road.
If you have a business site that you absolutely MUST have up all the time, then either you need to know what you are doing, or you need to rent space on a dedicated server.
For the average user and small business, shared hosting should work fine (and bluehost is better then most).
September 5th, 2008
Bluehost tech support is lazy and uninformed, and they constantly try to upsell you services.
Their SpamAssassin doesn’t work, they admit it, but they won’t troubleshoot the problem (I don’t think they know how to look at a server log, or rather, don’t give a damn).
They only offer SSL on the top-level domain (fraud on their homepage). And then they lie and say you need to buy the cert from them (others are cheaper). Etc, blah, blah.
Good for basic hosting, but anything fancy, they are stupid and really annoying. They spend more time arguing about things they clearly don’t understand in an apparent effort to avoid doing work, when just shutting up and doing the work in the first place would take less time.
September 6th, 2008
Sorry, but I’m just with the objectivity of this review. Granted, my own experience was bad, and the problems I experienced may have been limited to the server I was assigned to (shared hosting), but there just isn’t a lot of depth to this review. Downtime is a significant issue.
September 6th, 2008
I’m definitely up for adding depth if you want to recommend something specific. I do agree that more uptime/downtime stats could help. If there was any downtime, it would have been mentioned and certainly BlueHost would not have received a rare 5 star rating.
September 6th, 2008
I have a monitoring service that monitors some of my web sites on bluehost and the last notice I got was on 12/13/07. They went down at 4:13 am and came back up at 5:14 am. The last time before that was in August 2006. I think that is pretty good.
September 12th, 2008
Well, I found this site while trying to find any kind of notice of what’s going on at Bluehost today. (Friday, 9/12/08 at 1:30 PM CST) Seems they’re down for the count right now. Can’t access my websites or my account. I used BH in the past and they were always great; that’s why I went back to them when I decided to start developing once more. Now I’m wondering if I made the right choice. Will see….
September 12th, 2008
Just to warn everyone: I just went through a terrible experience with Bluehost.
I used only 200 Gb of their promised ‘unlimited storage’. But still they deactivated my account in a crude fashion. After whole a day of tiresome mailing with customer support, they gave short and unfriendly answers, using any reason to hide that they wouldn’t give me the storage i paid for.
Eventually I convinced them to do the right thing and activate my account again. In no time of course i got a 2nd blunt, short mail saying “your account has outgrown us”. What a difference with my current host (DH), where they contact people first to find a solution/upgrade together, instead of immediately kicking out a customer.
- Please, do NOT believe Bluehost’s unlimited storage promise!!
- And please do NOT expect customer support to treat you as a human being either… You’re just a number to them, and they’ll shoot first and ask questions later.
September 13th, 2008
I was about to move my websites to Bluehost because I have nothing but trouble with Superbhosting (shared hosting server down for more than 24 hours - the second times this happens this year!). Thanks for the reviews. I was about to make a mistake again. In short: avoid Bluehost and avoid Superbosting.
September 13th, 2008
Chris, what turned you off about BlueHost, reviews or perhaps something else?
September 13th, 2008
Y,
Mind me asking “What” you were storing that took up 200gb? I do remember the EULA mentioning something about “legitimate” use of the space. Not really sure what that means. But you are correct, “unlimited” = gimmick. Perhaps that is one of those areas of advertisement that should be investigated. More and more companies are using that line and, like a politician promising tax reform and lower job outsourcing to overseas, I have a hard time believing the hype.
b–
September 23rd, 2008
Run and don’t look back. This host has gone to the dumps. I have had a site that has been down for 90% of the time for 14 days straight and they will not move me to a new server or fix the problem. This is ridiculous and I hope everyone reads this and pays attention.
There are to many hosts out there and this one is turning into nothing but a money machine and they have forgotten all about the customers who got them to where they are. Hopefully the same customers will bring them back down.
September 28th, 2008
BlueHost, FastDomain, and HostMonster are three companies that belong to the same owners. They all provide the same services, are maintained by the same personnel, and share the same infrastructure. However, their marketing strategies are separate. BlueHost and HostMonster are web hosting companies only, while FastDomain is a web hosting and a registrar company.
October 1st, 2008
AVOID BLUEHOST LIKE THE PLAGUE
My service with them was reasonable up until recently when decided to consolidate the server hosting my sites with another server. Since then, email and web for all my sites has gone offline daily, for hours at a time.
Tech support takes hours to a full day to respond, if they respond.
I’ve now been told the 99.9% SLA does not apply to individual servers or accounts, but only to the entire infrastructure of BlueHost.
STAY AWAY
Go to another host. You get what you pay for.
October 7th, 2008
I think Bluehost is a very proficient web hosting provider in the shared web hosting world. And the cost is very affordable as well.
October 14th, 2008
Works OK but if you have problem they are robots. We had backup files saved there, for long time. When they found out that they were “PERSONAL FILES” not WEB files they shut us down instantly and were impossible to deal with to fix the problem. We begged for 12 hours to fix the problem but would not budge. Took us 24 hours to download and delete. I even tried to pay 1000 bucks offer to give us the time. NOPE.. I am moving to GoDaddy,, GoDaddy laughed at what they did to us.
October 15th, 2008
I’ve had my own sites for quite a while and been through many experiences hosting my sites with various hosing companies. By and large you get what you pay for. Many are very cheap, and if you can do it yourself, they provide a very inexpensive way to maintain your little piece of the Internet.
About a year or two ago I started hosting my site on Bluehost. They had a great reputation as being cheap but very reliable. They were considered by many to be the best under ten bucks a month hosting on the Internet. My experience was pretty good for a long time. I never needed to contact support. Everything pretty much just worked out of the box. That is until the past few weeks.
I was used to getting emails from Bluehost from time to time. The owner himself would even send emails after some event occurred that had affected service or after an upgrade. I always thought that was a nice touch. I’m not running a business. Although my email is important to me I can almost always tolerate a few hours of downtime in an emergency. Bluehost’s guarantee is triple nines, or 99.9% up time. That means about ten minutes per week downtime at most.
I received an email that maintenance was to be performed on the server hosting my account. The email stated that the maintenance would be performed on a Sunday night and the outage would be about two hours. No problem - and thanks for the head’s up, right? What followed was that my account was on and offline at random for nearly two weeks. I was pretty patient in the beginning. Things happen. I work in IT. I can give a brother a break. But the outage went on, and on, and on…
The original notification said that they were doing an “upgrade” to consolidate servers and provide better service to their customers. I manage a server farm, including a virtual server infrastructure. The main motivation in ‘consolidating’ servers is ease of management for IT. It reduces operating costs. It isn’t an upgrade - other than perhaps enabling IT to provide better management or resources to the end user.
What I discovered was that the ‘new’ server hosting my account had a CPU that was maxed and it was out of disk space. This was my upgrade. I was only intermittently able to access my email or websites throughout the day. This continued for two weeks.
At no time did I receive notification that there was a problem. Bluehost’s network status paged showed green lights. I was never notified.
After many fruitless emails to support I was finally responded to by a level three engineer who explained the “upgrade” had gone badly and they realized there was a problem with the RAID controller on the new server. He explained that they were over-nighting a new one and it would be fixed the next day.
Ok, great. Here is a professional server farm, hosting hundreds of accounts, and it takes twenty four hours to put a customer back online because of a dead RAID card? What happened to the magic of virtualization? What happened to having homogeneous hardware and a stock of parts? What about reversing the migration and putting my whopping one GB of content back on the original server?
When I asked Bluehost if they planned to make any compensation to their customers they said no. I asked about the 99.9% guarantee. Do you know what they told me? They told me the 99.9% guarantee only applied to their entire infrastructure as a whole. The only 99.9% percent guarantee was that their entire operation would never go offline. It had nothing to do with the service provided to an individual customer.
The response from level 3, although appreciated, was a day late and a dollar short. I had recently paid up with Bluehost for an entire year. I didn’t care. I had to move my account on a matter of principle.
The best I can say is that they gave me a prompt refund.
October 24th, 2008
@ Emory Rowland
You said,”If there was any downtime, it would have been mentioned and certainly BlueHost would not have received a rare 5 star rating.”
I encountered excessive downtime on the three accounts I had when I was with Bluehost.
One of the major complaints of the user reviews here (webhostinggeeks.com) is downtime.
And I don’t believe Bluehost should be rated 5/5 stars. Perhaps a 2/5 star rating would be more appropriate.
October 24th, 2008
@Crazy Penguin
You don’t have to go any further than this thread to see people reporting BlueHost downtime (the webhosting geeks link wasn’t working). Most, if not all of the hosts reviewed here have had some users who mention downtime in the comments. What host hasn’t had downtime?
The reviewer here didn’t encounter any downtime or serious problems during the testing period, so it would be wrong for him to give BlueHost a poor rating. I think it is a good idea to check several sources when shopping for a host.
November 1st, 2008
BlueHost just launched a website bluehostlearning.com to give their clients one hour of free internet marketing training. Not many hosting companies are willing to invest money to educate their clients on how to succeed. Kudos to bluehost for being the first.
November 10th, 2008
Bluehost Web Hosting probably offers one of the most solid web hosting plans out there. Every host has its problems, but Bluehost has numerous features and great server uptime.
November 11th, 2008
I bust my butt to provide my users with a high level of service and performance. When there are unforeseen problems I provide them with accurate and timely information as to what is going on and when I expect it to be resolved.
I expect nothing less from the folks providing service to me, regardless of price.
Bluehost failed.
November 19th, 2008
I have been with Bluehost from the beginning - when the owner used to e-mail us various news clippings based on his growth of the business and upgrades. That time has come and gone - believe me.
This last year, my service has gone from stellar to dismal, at best. Our server has been down almost everyday for a month now with three months prior to that of nothing but aggravation, lies, server changes without notice (upgrades and changes to php and scripts), and various other website killing moves. Tech support level one basically says this line when the server is down - “we are working on it, we don’t know when it will be done.” And that’s about all the help you will get. Even worse, I have found dozens of times when their server status report in c-panel reports everything is A-OK when in fact both site, blog, and e-mail has been down and stays down for hours upon hours.
Yesterdays classic report was that “we are doing file maintenance” when in fact an entire server swap was happening with customers left in the dark for 12 hours or more - no e-mail, no blog, no website, no error messages for customers or my clients to see.
When my site is down for 12 hours or more, on a daily basis for months on end and when tech support says “we don’t care” and customer service personell say “we can’t help you” and level 2 AND 3 support say “its not our responsibility” even though I have lost tens of thousands of dollars in contracts because customers have gone to our competitors after trying my site for several times without access (and told me so on the phone) - it’s all I can do to find something nice to say about this company in any way shape or form.
Having worked my fair share of tech support jobs as level 1, 2, 3 support, I know the deal already before I call. Unforetuneately my business now is as unforgiving as Bluehost is to it’s customers - if there is nothing to see then I lose - it’s that fast and that plain and simple!
It’s funny since I know that I am not the only one affected here but people at Bluehost keep repeating that they are not repsonsible for my loss of business (even though i am paying them for service)????
Hmmmm…what does this really mean? Obviously Matt is not holding anyone accountable since they feel that it’s ok to just throw away loyal customers and say whatever comes to mind on the phone.
Overall the people at bluehost need to understand that they are dealing with real people and real consequences - I have customers that I have to deal with too that are SCREAMING at me when their sites are down (at bluehost). I guess I am not responsible either, right?
Here’s the bottom line Bluehost - we (your loyal, soon to be ex customers) are looking to for reassurance, help, and most of all, RELIABILITY, ACCOUNTABILITY, and quality SERVICE!
I for one (that represents many) will be pulling my personal websites, several school districts accounts, and several clients to a new host) because I can’t afford to keep absorbing the losses incurred by waiting for support to get the picture here.
My advice to readers: AVOID Bluehost at all costs - your $99 is better to be doubled or tripled and then spent elsewhere.
WANTED: Contact me directly and I will pay you 4 times Bluehost’s best deal for peace of mind!
November 19th, 2008
Let me add my thoughts here as well. Hostmonster (Bluehost) screwed me recently. With no warning, they completely shut down my website, citing CPU overage. No heads up, no offer to let me fix whatever issue was causing it. The abuse department was cold and unapologetic. They would not even give me a transition period. Messed up. Stay away from this unprofessional webhost!
November 20th, 2008
Been loyal customer for many many years. Be very careful and read every little note in your agreement. They have no heart. Killed me this year with all my customers. Ended up spending 2 Grand and moved 98% of our stuff to Go Daddy.. Blue host, cheap price, your cheap to them. Even if you offer them more money. I begged for a few days to move files that were NOT pictures. You can not store or have text files on space they promise you. They have read you files. So don’t think of it as real rented space. They shut down our website and didn’t care.
November 20th, 2008
I host six websites with Bluehost for two years now. And they’re reliable. The only issue I find uncomfortable now is their CPU quota limitation clauses.
November 21st, 2008
I had the same problem with Bluehost aka Matt Heaton. And yes, he runs it out of a trailer truck in Utah under different customer service names. At least thats how it seems so.
I had my sites shut down without any explanation, they were down for a week, nobody to talk to on phone, and rude replies from the tech retarded technical support.
Matt Heaton himself told me to take my sites and get out… So much for his evangelism on Bluehost/Hostmonster. This man is a blue monster — avoid him and his retarded hosting at any cost. Try Dreamhost or Site5, they are much better alternatives.
ciao.
November 21st, 2008
Been with them for a while. Very good webhost
November 21st, 2008
@former bluehost guy - That’s pretty amazing. Why do you think Matt Heaton told you to take your sites and get out? Please tell us more. Thanks.
November 30th, 2008
i used to encounter this cpu limit thing but that was during the development of http://www.bookdealspy.com, my test version of the site http://www.bookdealfinder.com. my problem was i’m hosting dozens of other sites and they all go down when this problem happens. now i don’t do a lot of programming anymore and my joomla/wordpress sites don’t give me problems on bluehost.
December 9th, 2008
…ironic, Jacob’s name on the copied chat above was the same person I talk to about Front Page Extension problems. Said it was a Microsoft problem, not theirs.
Do not host with Host Monster if you or your clients want to use Microsoft Front Page. Very disappointed on how many times I have to re-install the extensions.
Help Desk is not any better, they say it is a Microsoft issue. Well hello, I have sites on three other providers and maybe once a year, if, have to reset them.
So, again avoid host monster for front page hosting and don’t believe their line it is Microsoft’s fault.
Oh, I have more than a dozen of sites with Host Monster, so it isn’t just this one.
December 10th, 2008
As a webmaster I have had the opportunity to use a number of hosting companies. I have been with with Bluehost for a few years now and have had no inclination to switch. I now maintain a hosting review site and Bluehost ranks number two out of ten (beaten out only by Hostmonster, and then marginally in customer service).
I have no problem recommending Bluehost to anyone. I’m perfectly happy with their services.
December 15th, 2008
the first months, all is ok
after that, the mysql server is down continuously, the site is many times at day down due tu “cpu excess” and so on.
if you want to kill your site, this is your isp.
if your site is not a homemade web site, you will kill with this people.
December 23rd, 2008
I moved to Bluehost 6mo ago and it was a mistake. The performance is poor, reliability is very poor and customer service is terrible. You get what you pay for I guess, the price is low.
The sponsor a lot of ‘best of the web’ sites like Top-10-Web-Hosts.com where there are glowing reviews of bluehost. But whois Top-10-Web-Hosts and look at there name servers and you can see they are pointing at BlueHost. Why does a company have to try to trick people into doing business with them? Because it’s easier than running an honest business.
I’m a small business man and my relationship with Bluehost has cost me a lot of money. I urge you to stay away from them. They are simply not good people to deal with.
-
December 24th, 2008
Well, I’m kinda surprised that my first comment didn’t make it. Bluehost did not finish helping me fix my site after a disastrous DDOS attack, which they admitted to me they made a lot of mistakes dealing with. One person gave me her name and said call me back if you have further problems. I called back a little while later and they are closed for the holidays… leaving their customers “high and dry”. I tried to “open a ticket” as the phone message said. They did not respond. Now the help page is not opening so I guess they are somehow blocking it… Merry Christmas from Bluehost… huh?!
December 24th, 2008
Bob, your earlier comment appeared under a different post (on my blog) here: http://blog.clickfire.com/bluehost-update/#comment-61489
Out of curiosity, I dialed the BlueHost support number and yes, to my suprise, the message stated that they are closed for the holidays. Hopefully you can get a resolution through the ticket soon.
January 7th, 2009
bluehost? first its ok.. after 2 month use it they will start a problem.. its been 5 month now.. 2 month no problem.. third month till today server lagg & always down.. it seems they put our sites to the bad server after 2 month… this provided is really bad!! dont waste your money! go find another hosting provided!
January 9th, 2009
I was thinking to purchase bluehost service but many said that bluehost is not good.
January 10th, 2009
I have had them for 9 months and my websites have been hacked 2 times. I have moved everything to my hostgator host with the rest of my domains. Never a problem with them!
January 23rd, 2009
DO NOT PLACE YOUR WEBSITE ON BLUEHOST
If you do not want to have your website deleted for reasons that nobody has mentioned to you about (even after spending more than 5 years with them without any problem) then do not join bluehost
If you would like to be warned before your website is deleted, in case your scripts or databases are causing problems you are not aware of and that could have been easily corrected, do not join bluehost
If you do not wish to be treated like a piece of garbage by arrogant staff, find another hosting service
If you are already with bluehost.com, make sure you start thinking about moving, unless you are absolutely sure that your site is in perfect shape based on bluehost standard. They will not give you a chance to correct the problem.
To the reasons I made the above statements:
I have been with bluehost for many years. At the time I joined them they were still a smaller company. I joined them from ipowerweb. They were nice, polite, the best customer support ever. I recommended them to tons of people and I built many websites for other people that I hosted with them.
In the course of the last years, they have become increasingly arrogant. The backups they promise to do have become a favor at their discretion and they will remind you that if you happen to need to restore a backup. Most likely they won’t have any by the way as they used to. That was still fine with me if the latest that forced me to move to another host did not happen.
I just received bad news regarding the death of my mother. I wanted to use my email and I found out that I had an email from bluehost telling me that my website has been suspended due to unexplained reasons in that email, I will paste it below. I was given a short time to remove all my files within a few days as they are going to be deleted. I received to warning about any problem but I was being treated like a criminal. Over the phone, they told me that it was standard procedure. They “do not have time to warn or inform people” all they do is they take down your site, your visitors get a ‘website suspended’ message served and when you call then and finally get them over the phone after a very very long time, they will arrogantly give you a lecture about everything, but nothing that makes sense. I asked for a short extension of the dateline I had given, considering the special circumstances I mentioned above, that was agreed, but then on 1/23/09 as I called them back to have information about how to access my panel without using my domain name (which was already transferred to another - better- host) I was told by yet a very arrogant female ‘abuse’ specialist that the extension abuse actually never happened and that my dateline was that very same day ‘david’ should have told me that ( he did not of course). Nobody updated me on that information and if I would not have called I would not have known anything about it. Anyway, I told them to go ahead and delete the account and I had to ask specifically about refunding what they still owed me, for them to say anything about it. I believe that information should have been listed on the email I received.
In my opinion, they have grown faster than they can handle, their servers are overwhelmed and they have seriously limited the quota of each shared account in a way it is very likely there will be a lot of victims like me. When you have a almost 10 year old website taken down without any warning or compassion and you have to recreate it from scratch, it is not fun, but at bluehost they do not care.
The email:
Dear ***:
Your web hosting account has been deactivated (reason: site causing performance problems).
Although your web site has been disabled, your data may still be available for up to 15 days, after which it will be deleted.
If you feel this deactivation is in error, please contact customer support as
soon as possible.
Thank you,
BlueHost Support
wide.
January 24th, 2009
@Justin, your story is moving, especially your family tragedy and that it coincided with all the hosting craziness you described. From reading your comment, I could not get what exactly it was that caused BlueHost to so aggressively disable your account. I’ve had similar issues in the past and the host usually disables just the script or offending files, never the entire site. Can you be more specific?
January 31st, 2009
Thank you for your review of BlueHost. We appreciate you sharing your opinion and doing the research needed to fairly evaluate Bluehost. We have seen fit to link to this article in our independent Bluehost reviews section. However, our MoneyStance editorial review focuses more on the affiliate program than the web service itself. Anyhow, Keep up the good work spreading truth.
February 2nd, 2009
First off, the web site advertises $6.95/month, no setup fees, no hidden fees. If you believe this, read ’till the end…
Without any confirmation on my part, just after filling in my information to sign up, they went ahead and charged me for an entire year, about $90. I tried to hit the back button once I saw the charges going through but it was too late. There was no “please confirm the charges we are about to place on your credit card”. It was just, fill out your info, click next, charges are being applied.
This was after speaking to a customer service rep. about technical questions. He was pretty dry and under trained, no questions for me like “what can I help you with?” or “is there anything else I can help you with?”. Just quick, seemingly intolerant answers. I had to lead the conversation.
1 minute after the payment went through, I called billing. They are now not able to refund the credit back to my card for 3 - 5 business days. I asked the billing rep if there was a monthly plan available. She said yes, for around $9/month with a setup and domain fee, totaling between $30 and $40 for the first payment.
February 3rd, 2009
O.k., my site went down the other day. I only found out because my email wasn’t working. I submitted a support ticket. As has been my experience in the past, I got a response in about fifteen minutes. They were working on it. Shortly after they let me know my site was back up. I checked, but my mail was still down. I let them know. Again, about fifteen minutes later they had it fixed and let me know.
I renewed my contract for another year.
In reference to the above comment, I agree, register your own domain through another company. It is just safer that way.
b–
February 8th, 2009
Bluehost is a complete Rip OFF! Avoid Like the plague.
My site is always down. Always database error message.
Always very long loading time.
Never reliable. Today up and running, tomorrow down, yesterday down, 1 week ago down, 1month ago down. It’s been 9 months I’m with them and I slowly but surely experience downtime EVERYDAY. Today, yesterday, tomorrow. I can already predict that tomorrow, it will be down again. Then in 1 week or in 1 month from now, it will be down again.
So, I’m moving to another reliable hosting company.
BLUEHOST IS A COMPLETE BS RIP OFF!
AVOID AVOID AVOID!
Or go at your risk.
Their favorite answer?: “This is a shared hosting company. Your website is hosted with other websites on the same server. So downtime is NORMAL. WHAT?” And if you want reliable hosting, go and find a dedicated server at another company. WHAT?”
So clearly, come to our bluehost and cheap hosting but expect downtime, we cannot guarantee 99% uptime. We guarantee downtime everyday of the month, of the year.
From a pissed off user of bluehost.
February 10th, 2009
Well, I already posted once here. I was pretty upset then. Blue host technicians were supposed to fix my email. They told me to call back in two hours. It was Xmas (and difficult for me since I recently lost the love of my life…). They left for Xmas vacation before I called back (in one hour and 45 min.). That is what we call sleazy where I come from… So, I was upset naturally. Since then they did seem to finally get the email stuff all fixed. It took quite awhile. My site they did get back up quick. Of course no one could contact me… but hey…(?)
Anyway, I’ve checked and the up time lately (for quite awhile has been 100% and as I said the email is working too. I think where Blue host has trouble is with email, recovering from a problem once it has occurred, and internal communication (tech support personnel to tech support personnel). Even so, I think I may well renew myself since the price is good and they are OK (with some glaring problems from time to time…).
Today, though I am writing about a problem here on this post. Doesn’t it strike anyone but me as odd that twice within two weeks a poster called “BlueHost Review” (yes I did look at the web site…) puts these glowing posts. I can’t help being suspicious. I just can’t…
February 10th, 2009
Bob, thanks for the update. I think you are right, that “BlueHost Review” guy was someone promoting his affiliate sites, so I removed the comments. I normally catch SPAM comments before they make it through. Thanks for pointing that out and please come back and post any further experiences you have with BlueHost.
February 11th, 2009
Thank you Emory!
I appreciate these occasional reminders that someone else also notices what goes on (trickery…). Bluehost is working well now. Actually it is working quite well. The experience I had with their support and the fact that they lied (even to the Better Business Bureau) is a bit hard to swallow. I dropped the BBB case since they had fixed the problems (eventually…), but they also pretended that most of them never happened and tried to paint it like I had just been being hysterical. I may well continue doing business with them (convenience, uptime, and price) but I don’t like them (management) much. I wonder about people who say Bluehost has such good support. I think for the most part people have forgotten what good customer support is. I mean about the part where it is like any situation where one treats others properly. I do realize that it is hard to deal with people when they are angry. I think Bluehost management does not give their support personnel the tools they need to pull that one off… I hope I don’t have to use Bluehost Support again for a long time, although the individual persons doing the phone support for the most part, I think really try; but they work for “bosses” who’s main concern is “the smoke screen” when there is a problem, so to a great extent their hands end up partly tied… Maybe I’ll send the management a package of Pampers next Xmas… with a note saying “thanks for the BBB comments”.
February 16th, 2009
I would say that BlueHost has been a very good hosting company for me until recently. I have been with them for almost 4 years and everything was great. In the beginning I had about 50 GB of storage space that I could use to anything of my choice, as long as it was not for something illegal. Then, they increased that amount as time went by to match all their competitors. No complains from me as I never used more than 20-30 GB of storage space. A few months ago I noticed that my account was suspended. I was surprised and went in there to check. I found out that they had changed the hosting policy to not allow the disk space to be used as private storage. I also noticed that they had increase it to unlimited. What the…, I said to myself. This is NOT an increase but a decrease. How can they say they give you unlimited and still don’t allow more than what your website actually uses? A typical website doesn’t use a lot. I will give it max 500 mb and that’s including the databases. So, they actually decrease my storage space from the original 50 GB to less than 1 GB and call it unlimited. The price is still the same.
February 16th, 2009
I forgot to say that I asked them to open the FTP connection so I could see my account or at least could get what I had on the server. They said wait, I waited and waited until nothing happened. 2 months later I got an email that said “Your account has been deleted!”
April 19th, 2009
just thought i should put in my two cents since i’m currently quite fed up with this host. i’ve had some issues with them taking down my entire website without warning because of cpu overloads. Ok, that is reasonable except for the fact that they did not even contact or warn me first. and today, it is 12p-2p in the middle of the day on saturday and i just find out the SERVER that my webpage is hosted on is completly down. no wonder i couldn’t go into ftp this morning, god knows when it was down, there were no notices, and all i get from customer support is that they are working on it and it wasn’t voluntary, it was necessary. very unacceptable i’m not sure how many other hosts run this way but i’m ready to change hosts.
April 27th, 2009
im new to webhosting and bluehost was recommended to me as am looking for a webhosting server for a large website and and came across all these comments which has put me off bluehost.
I dont want to take a risk of my website been taken down for cpu overload, why do they advertise unlimited if its not really unlimited?
anyone recommend a good cheap site to a newby?
April 27th, 2009
axiom, It does seem like a contradiction, unlimited with limits. I’d love to hear some web hosts try and answer that. My guess is that they would explain it in terms of the much debated practice of “overselling.”
One thing you could do is write down exactly what you think you would need in terms bandwidth, space, number of requests, ram or anything else and ask the presale people at Bluehost or some of the others reviewed here or elsewhere:
http://www.clickfire.com/viewpoints/reviews/webhosts/
I would expect most all web hosts to respond quickly to presale questions. They always get back to me the same day when I ask a sales question. Good luck and please share if you find some good info.
April 28th, 2009
axiom,
I agree with Emory, get your wish list together and compare. Two things to keep in mind: you get what you paid for and, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. I have had bluehost for three years now and hardly had any problems. And from this list you would think I am in the minority. But that is really impossible to tell. Bluehost, like many of the other inexpensive hosting solutions out there, have a HUGE client base. So I am afraid you are going to be playing a game of Russian Roulette when looking for an inexpensive host that offers the greatest number of services. If I were going to offer any advice for managed hosting, it would be to look for one that isn’t afraid to charge a higher price for less services. Sounds backwards from the “I’ll deliver you the world for pennies” mentality, but it probably is your best option. $20-30/month for just what you need will most likely get you further than $7 for unlimited everything. The last thing you want is to loose customers because you wanted to impress them with something they probably aren’t going to care about anyway. If the server goes down, that’s all you will hear about.
April 28th, 2009
Bluehost rocks. Any technical issue I’ve had they’ve had knowledgable people to help me out. From htaccess to php. Unlike some other hosts who say “We don’t offer scripting support”.
Somebody mentioned something about having to activate imagemagick. Not true at all (or at least anymore). It’s there automatically.
May 11th, 2009
Bluehost has *several times* cut my service without asking first. One because I had too many files stored there–they don’t ask first, they just cut your service. The tech support was friendly but the policies were not.
first time: when I was doing an svn download of the ruby svn repository. svn checkout. They didn’t ask, they silently killed the site.
second time–I had to go after tech support to learn the reason–I had “too many files” (a million I think). Their answer? They cut my site, requiring me to wonder what was going on.
third time–they said I was “violating terms of agreement” because I had stored some backup files there (ok, I created a 69GB file, they noticed it and cut my site). Is this support?
Avoid them.
-=r
May 13th, 2009
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May 20th, 2009
I am currently hosting about 10 websites with Bluehost. As with any company you are going to have some problems. I have only had a couple of times where I have had to threaten to take my business else where for them to get their act together. I would recommend them to people that want to host a fun site. All my “mission critical” sites are hosted on dedicated servers.
May 30th, 2009
I’ve used bluehost for 3 years with 2 accounts. No problems yet.
June 5th, 2009
I have used Bluehost as well for many sites. I think they are great and forward thinking and are always looking to push the envelope. And for only $3.95 per month for shared hosting is pretty sweet!