Bluehost vs. DreamHost: Which Provider Is Better For WordPress Sites?

When you create a self-hosted WordPress website, you’ll get total control over its design and functionality. One of your first decisions will be to choose a web hosting provider, and you might be debating between Bluehost and DreamHost. If you’re a beginner, you might find it difficult to choose the right host.

Therefore, we’ve created a comprehensive guide on Bluehost vs DreamHost. We’ll compare these two hosts in terms of key features, usability, security, and pricing. This way, you’ll be able to decide which would be the better option for your new WordPress website.

In this post, we’ll start by introducing each of these web hosts. Then, we’ll dive into our complete, head-to-head comparison of DreamHost and Bluehost. Finally, we’ll discuss some reasons why you might want to opt for an alternative like NameHero. Let’s dive right in!

An Introduction to Bluehost

Let’s start with Bluehost. Along with DreamHost, it’s one of three hosting providers that are officially recommended by WordPress:

The company powers more than two million websites, which makes it one of the most popular hosting services out there.

Many of Bluehost’s hosting plans are specifically designed for WordPress websites. They include options and features that are optimized for the Content Management System (CMS). For example, if you’re switching hosting providers, you can take advantage of WordPress website migration services.

Bluehost is mainly known for its affordable shared hosting plans. Furthermore, the company provides WooCommerce hosting for online stores.

An Introduction to DreamHost

Next, let’s take a look at DreamHost. This is another major player in the world of WordPress hosting providers:

It offers tons of features that enable you to easily migrate, design, and manage a WordPress website. For instance, you’ll get a one-click WordPress installation, with servers optimized for the CMS.

DreamHost has a custom control panel that makes it easier to manage multiple WordPress websites and servers. Furthermore, when you sign up for a WordPress hosting plan, you’ll get access to a support team trained to serve users of the CMS.

Bluehost vs DreamHost: Which Provider is Better for WordPress Sites?

Now that you know a bit more about Bluehost and DreamHost, let’s compare these two hosting providers so you can choose the right one for your needs and budget.

Bluehost vs DreamHost: Key Features

In order to decide if a hosting provider is a good fit for your WordPress site, you’ll want to make sure you have a good grasp of the main features it offers.

So, let’s compare DreamHost and Bluehost in terms of key features.

Bluehost Key Features:

• Multiple managed WordPress hosting plans
• WooCommerce hosting options for ecommerce stores
• Free domain and professional email for the first year
• Unmetered bandwidth
• Website builder
• Cloudflare Content Delivery Network (CDN) for improved performance
• Chat and phone support for most plans

It’s worth pointing out that all the hosting options Bluehost advertises as “for WordPress” are shared hosting plans. That means that if you want dedicated servers or VPS hosting, your hosting plan won’t be optimized for WordPress.

Now, let’s see how DreamHost compares.

DreamHost Key Features:

• Multiple types of hosting plans
• WooCommerce hosting plans for online stores
• Email @ your domain included in most plans
• Unmetered bandwidth
• WordPress website builder
• Custom control panel
• Free Jetpack plugin with most plans (for improved site performance)
• Chat phone support (callbacks) with most plans

As you can see, DreamHost offers many of the same features as Bluehost.

However, you can choose DreamHost shared hosting, cloud hosting, VPS hosting, and even dedicated server hosting. So, DreamHost wins in terms of variety.

However, while you get free domain privacy with any DreamHost plan, you won’t get a free domain name.

Bluehost vs DreamHost: Usability

Regardless of your skill level, you’ll want a web hosting service that offers user-friendly tools and software. So, let’s look at how Bluehost and DreamHost compare in terms of usability.

Both Bluehost and DreamHost offer ideal features for WordPress. You get automatic WordPress installations, website builders, and access to a support team.

Since both hosting providers offer managed WordPress hosting plans, users don’t have to worry about tedious day-to-day maintenance and security tasks.

DreamHost’s custom control panel is designed to be highly user-friendly. It offers a more visual approach to managing WordPress websites.

DreamHost also has some useful features if you want to experiment with web design. For example, its WordPress cloud hosting plans come with one-click staging. This means you’ll be able to easily try out new plugins, themes, and software on a test site before you add them to your live WordPress site.

Therefore, DreamHost may be the better option if you’re looking for an easy-to-use hosting dashboard and staging environment.

Bluehost vs DreamHost: Security Features

WordPress is one of the most secure CMSs on the market. However, since it’s so popular, it’s somewhat more vulnerable to cyber-attacks.

So, how do Bluehost and DreamHost fare in terms of security features? First of all, they both offer security essentials like free SSL certificates.

As we mentioned earlier, both hosting providers offer managed WordPress plans. A managed service will help ensure that your site is safer, in several ways.

For example, you’ll get automatic updates and daily backups. With the latter, you’ll have an up-to-date copy of your website in case of an emergency.

However, some of the cheapest Bluehost plans don’t include regular backups. Still, Bluehost does offer malware scanning and domain privacy with most plans.

Meanwhile, all DreamHost plans include domain privacy protection, and all cloud plans come with the Jetpack plugin:

This powerful tool gives you tons of extra security features, including brute force protection, downtime monitoring, and other enhancements.

To summarize, Bluehost and DreamHost offer similar security features. However, the cheaper Bluehost plans are missing some essentials, like daily backups.

On the other hand, the higher-tier DreamHost plans give you more advanced security tools.

Bluehost vs DreamHost: Pricing

Finally, let’s put Bluehost and DreamHost head-to-head in terms of pricing. Bluehost’s WordPress plans cost from $2.95 to $13.95 per month:

However, the cheapest plans don’t include features like automatic daily backups.

Now, let’s take a look at the cost of DreamHost plans. Prices start at $4.95 and go up to $53.99 per month:

So, to wrap things up, Bluehost wins in terms of affordability. However, you’ll get more advanced features when you level up to a more expensive plan.

DreamHost also offers VPS hosting plans starting at $10.00 per month and dedicated hosting plans starting at $149.00 per month.

Why Choose an Alternative to Bluehost and DreamHost

As we’ve mentioned, both Bluehost and DreamHost are officially recommended by the developers of WordPress. These recommendations can be useful, but you shouldn’t feel limited to them.

If you’re a total beginner and you’d rather not do any research when choosing a web host, Bluehost or DreamHost may be your best bet. Otherwise, if you’re willing to do just a bit of investigating, you’ll soon discover that you can find alternatives that are of equal (and often superior) quality and similar (or cheaper) prices.

But why should you choose an alternative to Bluehost and DreamHost?

The answer is simple. Each website is highly unique, which means it will need different features and functionality.

Plus, each website owner will have differing levels of skills and interests. There’s a good chance that the hosting plans offered by Bluehost and DreamHost do not suit your needs and preferences.

If that’s the case, you might want to opt for an alternative, such as NameHero:

NameHero offers a variety of managed WordPress hosting plans. All plans give you NVMe storage and servers that are optimized for peak performance.

NameHero also caters to ecommerce sites. With four WooCommerce plans, it offers more options than the other hosting companies featured in this article.

Therefore, if you’re not convinced by Bluehost and DreamHost, you might consider opting for a NameHero hosting plan.

Conclusion

If you want to launch a WordPress website, you’ll need to choose a web hosting provider. Both Bluehost and DreamHost are fantastic options for beginners.

Bluehost offers affordability and specializes in shared hosting plans. Meanwhile, DreamHost lets you choose between shared, cloud, VPS, and dedicated hosting plans. But if you want a hosting solution for online stores with higher web traffic, NameHero can be a powerful alternative.

Do you have any questions about Bluehost and DreamHost? Let us know in the comments section below!