Knowing all the information possible about any hosting company you plan to use is vital. Here are the benefits and downsides of using Digital Ocean Hosting, as well as some alternatives that you can use.
Table of Contents
Is DigitalOcean Good: The Bottom Line Up Front
Pros
This hosting service is packed with high quality, consumer-friendly features. You can set your service to suit your needs. For example, you can set as much block storage space as is necessary for your project needs. There are even factors set in place to reduce downtime risks.
This system offers WordPress as one of its single-click apps, which is something that just about anyone can use. The platform also continues to be far more superior to other companies. This is thanks to its loading time. With the industry’s typical loading time of 890ms, Digital Ocean Hosting beats that with a loading time of 253ms.
Another great
Your traffic and data will always be secured with this providerr. Not only is the site already equipped with encryptions on their Volumes
Cons & Problems
While it comes with a wealth of benefits for customers, there are also some factors that you should look out for when considering this company. The first con to using it is that it is not for beginners.
While it is a great hosting company, its full potential comes for those who possess the knowledge of how to use it. There is a lot of technical data involved, and this is not useful for anyone who does not understand that kind of language.
This tends to make the hosting site seem complex and distant to the average human being. It is clear that this company is marketed directly to developers and not the everyday user. Another great hosting company that does not have this problem is HostGator.
This hosting company puts the same technical terms that are on all hosting websites into layman’s terms so that the average user can understand them. This makes it user-friendly for both beginners and experienced developers. Another con that comes with Digital Ocean Hosting is the fact that it has limited customer service. While most, if not all, hosting companies provide 24/7 customer service, this one does not.
This makes it very difficult for users to get help if their service happens to crash in the middle of the night during a very crucial point in a project. Instead, in order to get help, you would be required to go to their website and “open a support ticket” using their provided online form.
Real Customer Reviews: What People are Actually Saying
Good Things People Are Saying
…provides a great experience for new developers. There is such simplicity in the way they can so easily turn a SSH into a server that I have sovereign control over. Not only do they provide the tools, but they are constantly improving and developing new tools every year. This keeps development fast and on top.
Bad Things People Are Saying
Some customers mention that the the customer service provided was the absolute best at first. However, as the company grew larger, customer service representatives stopped being so helpful, going above and beyond to help. Instead, now there are guides sent on how to do everything. This is definitely not good for someone who is new to using the servers. Customers also do not like how they can only reach customer service through a ticket, while most host services have customer service that you can contact via phone.
Website Set Up and Development
Does DigitalOcean Offer WordPress Hosting Specifically?
They do not offer managed WordPress hosting; however, you are able to use their server to set up and install your own WordPress site.
Do You Get a Free Domain Name When You Sign Up? (Some Hosting Providers Offer This)
It does not offer a free domain name when you sign up. This is something that you will have to purchase on your own.
Do They Have Nameservers or Offer DNS Services?
Digital Ocean Hosting provides a domain name registrar. However, you are able to manage any DNS records you have from DigitalOcean’s control panel. In order to do so, you will need to update any nameservers used previously by your domain registrar’s to DigitalOcean’s nameservers instead.
Migrating a Site To
DigitalOcean (and Transferable Installs): How Easy Is It?
The level of difficulty in migrating a site to Digital Ocean Hosting all lies in the place you are moving from. Unlike other host sites, Digital Ocean is not a shared hosting provider. Any droplets that you move will have to be completely set up by you. Nothing is set up for you. It is advised that you know how to manage and work with CLI and OS to effectively manage your setup.
DigitalOcean Control Panel (Cpanel): Do They Offer One To Manage Your Hosting?
Digital Ocean Hosting offers a control panel that can be easily navigated by developers. Because the API facilities offer such a high level of control, it provides a personalized experience for users. This experience produces excellent results.
FTP & SFTP: How Easy Is It to Connect?
FTP is very simple to install on a private virtual server. After installing FTP, users can connect it through the command line or the browser.
Do They Offer Staging Environments and Temporary Urls?
Digital Ocean Hosting does not offer staging environments and temporary URLs. It is possible to set up one on your own; h
Templates & Blueprints: Do They Offer Site Setup Templates?
You can make your own custom site templates by creating a new Droplet and installing and configuring the software you want. Then, turn off the Droplet, Take a snapshot from the control panel.
Do They Support Git or Command Line Tool Integrations?
If you’re using Git for tracking the development of software and key information, Digital Ocean supports it. With Git, you can create a work area and convert any existing projects to that work area.
SSH Connection: Do They Support It?
DigitalOcean also supports SSH Connections. If you wish to connect your Droplets with SSH, you’ll need to make sure you have the following: the IP address of the Droplet, the server’s username, and the password that goes along with that username (only if you don’t have SSH keys).
DigitalOcean Speed & Load Time
In most reviews, Digital Ocean has been ranked highly for its speed. According to a review by Hosting Facts, Digital Ocean is one of the fastest products they had ever reviewed.
Services and Goodies Offered With Hosting
Uptime, Outages & Down Time
With Digital Ocean, you are promised 99.99% uptime. If you experience any downtime, they will issue you a credit.
As far as outages go, this company has only experienced eight outages from January 2018 – July 2018 for a total of just forty-three minutes. Most top services cannot compete with these numbers in uptime.
Do They Offer a CDN With Hosting?
Digital Ocean does not offer a content delivery network with hosting. With a CDN, people from all around the world can take less taxing actions to get static content by getting the content directly from the first source.
Does DigitalOcean Offer Shared Hosting and Dedicated Servers?
Digital Ocean doesn’t offer shared hosting because shared it tends to limit the number of sites you can visit at a time. Digital Ocean allows you to run however many applications you want.
Digital Ocean also doesn’t offer dedicated servers. They only offer VPSs, and though they behave like dedicated servers they’re not the same.
Https: Do They Offer SSL Certificates or Letsencrypt?
Like Shared Hosting and Dedicated Servers, Digital Ocean doesn’t offer SSL certificates. You can get these for free outside of the Digital Ocean’s domain.
How Do Site Backups Work?
Backups are performed once a week with Digital Ocean. By enabling backups, you will be adding 20% to the initial price of your Droplet. Backups are performed in three simple steps: the Droplet takes a snapshot of the live system, that shot is backed up, and then the shot gets deleted after the completion of the backup.
Redirects: Do They Support Server Level Redirects?
Server Level Redirects are supported with Digital Ocean. You can use a temporary redirect if a URL needs to be
Do They Support Multisite & Subdomains?
Subdomains and Multi Sites are supported as long as you have an assigned domain for your Droplet. Without one, your subdomain can’t be enabled.
Does DigitalOcean Offer Email Hosting?
Digital Ocean does not offer email hosting. It is recommended that you set up a mail server through a Droplet, Google, or any other email hosting service of your choice.
Security & Past Hacking Incidents
Digital Ocean’s datacenter has full CCTV coverage externally and internally, battery and generator backup, round-the-clock security guard services, and more.
Their infrastructure security also uses a defense-in-depth layered approach. In order to access the management of the network infrastructure, you must get through multi-factor authentication points which forbid network-level access solely based off of the utilization of the principle of least privilege.
In the past, users of DigitalOcean’s server have said that they have been attacked by hackers on numerous occasions despite the security. Complaints include that customer service takes a long time to respond.
DigitalOcean Pricing, Plans & Money Back
Pricing, Packages & Plans
The following qualities come with all DigitalOcean plans: Team accounts, monitoring & alerts, pre-built open source apps, CLI & API, 99.99% uptime SLA, and more.
For block storage, pricing starts at just 10 cents per GB every month. This means that if you wanted 200GB a month, you would pay $20 every month. Backup pricing is 20% of the cost of your Droplet.
Do They Have a Monthly and Annual Plan Payment Option?
For memory on Droplets, you will be charged $5/mo for every single GB you purchase with 1 vCPU. This number increases starting at $15/mo when you start at 2GB with 2 vCPUs. To learn more about this, visit DigitalOcean’s website and go to the pricing section.
How Does Canceling a Plan Work?
In order to cancel your plan, all you have to do is go to your control panel. There will be an option that says Deactivate Account in red. It will be a permanent decision, so make sure that you are sure.
Promo Codes & Discounts: Do They Have Special Offers?
Digital Ocean comes with plenty of special offers, one of them being the new users deal. As a new user, you will be given a $100, 60-day credit. You can also find a $10 off coupon on RetailMeNot.
Does DigitalOcean Have a Satisfaction or Money-Back Guarantee?
You can get any money spent on DigitalOcean refunded by filing a ticket/contacting the support team at https://www.digitalocean.com/company/contact/.
Customer Service and Support
DigitalOcean Phone Number: Do You Get a Real Person?
There is no phone number for DigitalOcean. In order to get in contact with a customer service specialist, you can fill out a ticket with your name, email, and reason for getting in touch with them. A real person will email you and try their best to solve your issue.
DigitalOcean Alternatives: What We Would Recommend Instead
There are other reputable hosting providers on the market like Fastcomet and Cloudways.
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DigitalOcean is one of the highest performing hosting servers that money can buy, with unbeatable deals, great plugins,