When hundreds of Web hosting companies are ruling the market, it is a tough job to choose one for your new Website. Among all web hosting companies, you might have come across the name Hostgator and GoDaddy.
Well, these two titans of the Internet world are serving thousands of small and large-scale Websites. Though both of them offer web hosting services, Hostgator is a more popular one. GoDaddy is a popular name but in the field of Domain name registration.
The popularity is not always a guarantee for superior services in the market, especially if it’s an Internet market. Sometimes, a not so popular brand outclasses the top brand product.
In fact, this is the way every small name becomes a brand. Which hosting company can give you exceptional services as well as value for money? Perhaps, this is the obvious question that might be arising in your mind if you are looking for a hosting service.
In this article, we will take you out from the dilemma of choosing between GoDaddy and Hostgator. For this, we will be taking reference from our 328 performed tests on almost all popular hosting providers. We have compared them side by side on various aspects such as page load speed, website uptime, interfaces, customer service, and others.
Introduction: Hostgator & GoDaddy Hosting
Both GoDaddy and Hostgator are reputed brands and serving this industry for a long time. They both claims of delivering exceptional services that include 99.9% Website Uptime, Fast page load time, 24×7 customer support, and others.
However, only an insider or an expert can tell you the ground reality. We can make you aware of that ground reality through our periscope of numerous tests on various web hosting companies.
Here are the three factors that we have chosen for measuring performance.
- Uptime Test
- Page Load Speed Test
- Customer Support Response Time Test
Steps To Compare Hostgator v/s Godaddy Hosting:
Here is the step by step procedures of how we performed this test.
Step 1: It started with buying the web hosting plans of Hostgator as well as GoDaddy.
Step 2: On both of the Web hosts, we hosted a dummy website with same files, content, CMS (WordPress), Plugins, etc. Obviously, the domain name was different.
Step 3: Afterwards, we tested various aspects such as page load time of HTML file of 93 KB, JavaScript of 312nKB, CSS of 48 KB, and last but not the least images of 1544 KB through GTMetrix.
Step 4: For measuring their uptime, we created an account on pingdom.com and buzzed both of the websites consistently at every minute.
Step 5: For testing their customer support response time, we raised a complaint ticket. We compared the response time of every web hosting.
Hostgator v/s Godaddy - Page Load Speed Test:
In Hostgator, we find that the average page load speed time for our website was 3.11 seconds. While in Godaddy, it was 4.76 seconds. However, the best load time for Hostgator was 1.88 seconds while 1.49 seconds for Godaddy. The worst load time for Hostgator was 13.8 seconds, while for Godaddy, it was 15.67 seconds.
Similar to the final result of our previous hosting comparison b/w Hostgator and Dreamhost hosting, these results shows the inconsistency of Godaddy web hosting services and the reliability of Hostgator web hosting services.
For calculating average page load time, we performed this test for 20 times on our server. Obviously, Hostgator had upper hand on Godaddy.
Site Hosted At Hostgator Hosting
Site Hosted On Godaddy Hosting
Winner – Hostgator
We have got Hostgator as a clear winner in this round, but it would be too early to come to an overall conclusion. Therefore, we marched for another test.
Hostgator v/s Godaddy hosting - Uptime Test Results:
All hosting provider claims to deliver 100 percent uptime. However, expecting the same from them is like living in a fool’s paradise. In fact, the ground reality is no hosting company provides such hosting no matter what plan have you subscribed.
Here are the results of these two hosting providers that we found in our tests. Just like our previous comparison between Hostgator and Digital Ocean hosting, we used Pingdom service for this test and buzzed our Website for multiple times in a fixed period.
Hostgator had 99.97% average uptime while Godaddy had 99.88% average uptime.
The worst uptime of Hostgator was 96.78% while for Godaddy, it was only 87.34%.
In our tests, Hostgator clearly got an edge on Godaddy. Still, it was not enough for final declaration. So, we head for another mode of comparison.
Winner – Hostgator
Hostgator v/s Godaddy – Customer Support Ticket Response Time Test Results:
We raised complaint tickets for figuring out the response time of customer support. Thereafter, we averaged the times they took for responding our complaint tickets.
Hostgator average response time was 4 hours while Godaddy was nowhere near to it with 12 hours as an average response time. The best time of Hostgator was 1 hour, while it was 3 hours for Godaddy. The worst time of Hostgator was 21 hours, while in the case of Godaddy, it was 39 hours.
Clearly, Hostgator has the upper hand on Godaddy.
Winner – Hostgator
Hostgator v/s Godaddy – User Interface Comparison:
We found these both web hosting providers had user-friendly cPanel. So, there was no winner as both of them are easy to use.
Winner – Tie
Hostgator v/s Godaddy – Hosting Packages & Pricing Comparison:
The price of hosting plans is also a decisive one for many website owners and web developers. It was a throat cutting competition among these two. We found that they both have a similar pricing in their plans with a small rise in Hostgator. However, Hostgator comes with an assurance of refunding your money within 45 days of buying the service.
Winner – Tie
The Final Verdict
Unexpectedly, the comparison came out to be decisive. Almost all of the factors shout Hostgator as an undisputed winner.
You may find slightly cheap plans in Godaddy, but Hostgator outshines it with customer satisfaction and excellent service. Hopefully, this review sorted you queries regarding both of the services. It was an honest and logical approach from my side to find out the best.
