Bluehost vs IONOS
Both are credible choices — here's where they genuinely differ.
Some links on this page are affiliate links. They never affect our verdict.
Pricing — including renewal
| Bluehost | IONOS | |
|---|---|---|
| Intro price | ~£2.30/mo intro | £1/mo intro offers common |
| Intro requires | 12–36 month term | 12 months, then standard rate |
| Renewal | Substantial renewal increase — typically 2–3× intro | Standard rates several times the intro — check before you buy |
| Money-back | 30 days | 30 days |
Features compared
| Bluehost | IONOS | |
|---|---|---|
| Unlimited websites | — No | — No |
| Multiple websites | — No | — No |
| Free SSL | ✔ Yes | ✔ Yes |
| Unmetered bandwidth | ✔ Yes | ✔ Yes |
| Email included | — No | ✔ Yes |
| Free daily backups | — No | — No |
| Free domain (1st yr) | ✔ Yes | ✔ Yes |
| CDN included | ✔ Yes | — No |
| Staging environment | ✔ Yes | — No |
| NVMe/SSD storage | — No | — No |
| UK data centre | — No | ✔ Yes |
| No long contract | — No | — No |
| Support | 24/7 chat & phone | 24/7 phone + a named personal consultant |
Plan details — what you actually get
Bluehost
Websites: 1 on Basic; 10+ on higher plans
Storage: 10 GB SSD (Basic)
Bandwidth: Unmetered
Email: Paid add-on on entry plans
SSL: Free
Backups: Paid add-on (CodeGuard) on entry plans
CDN: Free Cloudflare integration
Staging: WordPress staging included
IONOS
Websites: 1 on entry plans
Storage: 10–50 GB (plan-dependent)
Bandwidth: Unmetered
Email: Included (1–10 mailboxes by plan)
SSL: Free (wildcard on higher tiers)
Backups: Recovery options; full backups plan-dependent
CDN: On higher tiers
Staging: Limited
The verdict
Both Bluehost and IONOS are credible for beginner-friendly. For those needs you won't go far wrong either way.
Choose Bluehost if your priority is best for wordpress.
Choose IONOS if you care more about cheapest to run.