About GoDaddy
GoDaddy is one of the most famous and largest companies in the field of web hosting and domain registration. The company was founded in 1997 in the United States under the name Jomax Technologies, and the name was changed to GoDaddy in 2006.
GoDaddy’s Success Story
Since its establishment, GoDaddy has proven itself as one of the leading companies in the industry. By 2005, it became the world’s largest domain registrar. In 2018, Amazon announced the migration of the majority of GoDaddy’s infrastructure to its AWS (Amazon Web Services) platform, which addressed a series of criticisms regarding the performance of its servers.
Today, GoDaddy is one of the largest companies in the web hosting industry, serving over 20 million customers worldwide, and employing over 7,000 people. It also manages more than 80 million registered domains through its services.
Services Offered by GoDaddy
GoDaddy offers a variety of services that help individuals and businesses manage their websites, including:
Shared Web Hosting
Popular hosting for small to medium-sized websites that require affordable hosting with limited resources.
WordPress Hosting
Optimized hosting for running WordPress sites faster and more efficiently.
VPS Hosting (Virtual Private Servers)
Provides dedicated resources for clients who need more control over their servers.
Dedicated Servers
Offers high-powered dedicated servers for users who need complete infrastructure control.
Reseller Hosting Accounts
Designed for developers and hosting service providers who wish to sell hosting services under their own brand.
Managed Hosting
GoDaddy also provides managed hosting services for all VPS and dedicated server packages. This service takes care of daily tasks like system updates, backups, security, and other technical tasks, which allows website administrators to focus on content rather than technical aspects.
Challenges Facing GoDaddy
Despite its size and position as a leading company in the industry, GoDaddy faces some challenges related to technological advancement and updating its infrastructure to keep up with competitors. Additionally, the large size of the company may hinder its ability to provide personalized support effectively, as some customers may feel that the technical support doesn’t meet their immediate needs in certain cases.
GoDaddy Hosting Features
GoDaddy hosting offers numerous advantages that make it an ideal choice for many website owners, whether for small or large sites. Here are the key features offered by GoDaddy:
Excellent Uptime
GoDaddy is considered one of the companies that provides excellent uptime. Over the past 24 months, GoDaddy has recorded an uptime rate of 99.97%, meaning your site will be reliably available. This performance translates to about two and a half hours of downtime annually, or 13 minutes of downtime monthly. This rate is much better than the average uptime of most other hosting services, which typically range between 99.60% and 99.70%. GoDaddy offers an uptime guarantee policy, and if uptime drops below 99.9% monthly, they offer compensation (5% of the monthly hosting fee).
Abundant Resources
GoDaddy offers unlimited resources on many of its hosting plans. For example:
- Unlimited storage space on all plans except the economy plan.
- Unlimited bandwidth.
- 50 FTP accounts and 25 subdomains. However, there is a limit to the total number of files (inodes) on the account, which is 250,000 files. This might be a limitation if your site requires a large number of files.
Low-Cost Hosting
GoDaddy offers competitive pricing compared to many other companies in the market. The basic hosting plan starts from $2.99 per month using a discount coupon. Compared to services like SiteGround or Hostinger, GoDaddy is a budget-friendly option that provides many features at affordable prices.
Multiple Resource Options
GoDaddy’s hosting plans vary to cater to different needs, offering packages suitable for small to medium-sized websites, with unlimited storage and bandwidth available on many plans. While it may not offer the highest CPU processing power or RAM in its cheaper plans, it provides adequate standards for general use, making it suitable for medium-sized websites.
Additional Tools and Enhanced Performance
GoDaddy offers a range of extra tools, such as:
- A website builder assistant to simplify website creation.
- Free SSL protection with all plans.
- A free CDN network to improve website load speed.
- 24/7 support via live chat and phone.
Excellent Customer Support
GoDaddy provides 24/7 customer support via live chat and phone. The company is known for providing good technical support and offers educational resources through its help center.
GoDaddy Data Centers
GoDaddy operates multiple data centers around the world, allowing it to provide reliable and high-performance hosting services to its clients. Here are some details about their data centers:
Main Data Center in Arizona:
GoDaddy has a large data center at its headquarters in Arizona, covering an area of 25,000 square meters. However, this center is not enough to host all its servers, which exceed 37,000 servers. As a result, the company rents additional data centers within the same state.
Rented Data Centers within the United States:
In addition to its main center, GoDaddy has rented data centers in Chicago, California, and Virginia. These centers help provide better services to users across various parts of the United States.
International Data Centers:
GoDaddy is not limited to the U.S. market; it also operates data centers in Amsterdam and Singapore, enhancing the user experience for customers in Europe and Asia.
Furthermore, the company is working to expand its presence in Asian markets by planning to build new data centers in India and China in the future.
Choosing a Data Center Location:
GoDaddy allows you to select the closest data center to your target audience. This choice can significantly improve website load speed and user experience. Additionally, GoDaddy gives you the option to change your data center for free once if you select the wrong one.
Performance Speed in GoDaddy Hosting
Speed is one of the key factors affecting user experience and search engine rankings. Here are the highlights of GoDaddy’s performance in speed tests:
Page Load Speed:
GoDaddy performs well in terms of page load speed. The company recorded an average load time of 554 milliseconds, which places it among the fast hosting providers despite the low cost.
This load speed positively impacts user experience, reduces bounce rates, and enhances search engine rankings.
Stress Tests:
When tested under pressure, GoDaddy showed good results, being able to handle 50 virtual visitors with nearly 150 simultaneous connection requests. While the performance fluctuated slightly, the servers demonstrated the ability to handle high pressure.
Global Presence of Data Centers:
With servers located across three continents, GoDaddy helps reduce latency and achieve faster loading speeds, which is a significant advantage for users targeting a global audience.
GoDaddy Control Panels
GoDaddy uses the cPanel control panel for most of its servers to provide a user-friendly and flexible experience. Here are the main details:
cPanel Control Panel:
GoDaddy offers cPanel to users with shared hosting. cPanel is one of the most popular control panels in the hosting industry. It provides a flexible and easy-to-use interface for managing various aspects of hosting, such as domain management, application installation, database management, email setup, and other tasks.
Plesk Control Panel (for Windows Servers):
If you’re using Windows servers with GoDaddy, you’ll receive the Plesk control panel instead of cPanel. Plesk is one of the most popular control panels for Windows systems and offers powerful management features similar to cPanel.
GoDaddy’s Free Website Builder: GoCentral
GoDaddy offers a free website builder tool called GoCentral, which comes included with all of its hosting plans. This tool is ideal for users who need to create responsive websites quickly and easily, without needing advanced technical skills. Here are some key points about GoCentral:
- Easy-to-use interface: The tool is based on a drag-and-drop system, allowing users to easily arrange elements and create pages without needing coding knowledge.
- Limited customization options: While the tool offers certain customization capabilities, it doesn’t provide the same level of control and flexibility as other website builders like WordPress or Wix.
- Better than some alternatives: Despite its limitations, GoCentral is still a cost-effective option and often better than many other page-building tools in terms of affordability.
Windows Hosting with GoDaddy
GoDaddy offers Windows Hosting as an option, primarily targeting users who work with ASP.NET and Microsoft SQL Server technologies. Here are the main benefits of this service:
- Windows Servers: GoDaddy provides servers running Windows® Server 2012 R2, making it ideal for websites built on Microsoft technologies.
- High compatibility: Windows hosting offers excellent compatibility with the Microsoft tools and applications widely used by developers for building and programming websites.
- Affordable pricing: Windows hosting starts at $5.99 per month, which makes it a reasonable choice compared to some alternatives.
GoDaddy Customer Support
GoDaddy provides customer support across multiple channels to ensure clients receive assistance whenever needed. These support channels include:
- Phone support: Clients can contact the support team directly for immediate assistance.
- Email support: Email communication with the support team is available for more detailed responses.
- Live chat: Live chat is the most commonly used support channel, offering fast and efficient assistance. It starts with an automated system that guides you to the appropriate department and then connects you to a support technician if necessary.
- Working hours: Live chat is available during business hours (13 hours daily), excluding weekends.
Significant improvements: Although GoDaddy’s customer support has received some criticism in the past, the company has made significant improvements to enhance the customer experience.
GoDaddy Hosting Disadvantages
Although GoDaddy is considered one of the largest hosting companies in the world, there are several disadvantages that make it less competitive compared to some other hosting providers. Here are the main drawbacks:
Lack of Free Basic Features
Many competing hosting services offer free basic features within their shared hosting plans, such as SSL certificates, CDN (Content Delivery Network), free backups, or security tools.
GoDaddy lacks these features in its basic plans, meaning you’ll need to pay additional fees to obtain these services or upgrade to higher plans.
Update: GoDaddy now provides a free SSL certificate for one year with the small plan, but after that, renewal requires high fees. You can also use Cloudflare CDN for free through the control panel.
High-Priced Paid Add-ons
To obtain features such as an SSL certificate or CDN service, customers must pay additional fees, which can reach up to $63.99 annually.
Security services like malware protection and data backups cost $5.59 per month.
This significantly increases the overall cost of hosting a website with GoDaddy if you need these basic services, making it less competitive in terms of cost.
No Free Site Migration Service
GoDaddy does not offer free site migration, unlike many of its competitors who provide this service to new users.
Migrating a site to GoDaddy’s servers requires paying $99.99 per site, and it typically takes 7 to 10 days.
This service is not only expensive but also slow, adding an extra burden for users.
High Renewal Prices
While GoDaddy may be attractive in terms of initial prices, starting at $2.99 per month for small plans, renewal prices can go up to $8.99 per month for the same plan.
This significant price difference between the initial subscription and renewal is one of the biggest disadvantages of GoDaddy hosting compared to its competitors.
Outdated and Unorganized Knowledge Base
Although GoDaddy has a knowledge base to help resolve issues, it suffers from disorganization in content arrangement, making it difficult to find specific information.
Many articles and guides contain outdated or inaccurate information, which makes it hard to benefit from them.
GoDaddy Hosting Plans and Prices
GoDaddy offers four shared hosting plans as follows:
| Plan | Economy | Deluxe | Ultimate |
|---|---|---|---|
| Number of Sites | 1 | 10 | 25 |
| Storage Space | 25 GB | 50 GB | 75 GB |
| Number of Databases | 10 | 25 | 50 |
| Bandwidth | Unlimited | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Number of Files | 250,000 | 250,000 | 250,000 |
| CPU Power | 1 Core | 1 Core | 2 Cores |
| RAM | 512 MB | 1 GB | 1.5 GB |
| CDN and SSL | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Regular Price | $9.99 | $13.99 | $17.99 |
| Discount Price | $2.99 | $7.99 | $12.99 |
Conclusion
GoDaddy offers hosting at low initial prices, but the disadvantages such as high renewal costs, lack of many basic free features, and additional paid services like site migration or security, make it less competitive compared to other hosting providers.
Although it is a large and well-known company, it is important to consider the overall costs and missing features before making a hosting decision.
