Cloudways vs GoDaddy
Cloudways and GoDaddy compared on measured uptime, response time, pricing and features from our own tests. Cloudways scores higher overall.
By Jennifer T. · Updated
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Verdict
CloudwaysWins overall
DigitalOcean's managed cloud layer: servers from $11 a month on five clouds, billed hourly, staging and caching included
The largest registrar's cPanel hosting: three plans on a three-year term with a free domain and daily backups
Cloudways wins 5 of the six sub-scores and comes out ahead overall (7.8 vs 7.2).
How do the scores compare?
Cloudways leads on 5 sub-scores, GoDaddy on 1. Higher is better.
Which one is faster and more reliable?
Which one costs less?
On renewal, GoDaddy is cheaper ($11.99/mo vs $14.00/mo). Intro prices need the listed term.
| Cloudways | GoDaddy | |
|---|---|---|
| Cheapest plan | DigitalOcean Premium Micro | Economy |
| Intro price | $14.00/mo | $5.99/mo (better) |
| Renewal price | $14.00/mo | $11.99/mo (better) |
| Required term | 1 months (better) | 36 months |
| Websites | unlimited | 1 |
| Storage | 25 GB | 25 GB |
| Money back | 0 days | 30 days (better) |
What does each include?
| Cloudways | GoDaddy | |
|---|---|---|
| Free domain | No | First year on every plan, marked with an asterisk whose disclaimer the page keeps collapsed |
| Free SSL | Let's Encrypt certificates on every application | One year on Economy; unlimited certificates for all sites on Deluxe and Ultimate, auto-renewed through AutoSSL |
| Backups | On-demand and scheduled server backups with one-click restore; offsite storage billed at $0.033 per GB per server | Automatic daily backups, with recovery of the whole account from the previous day |
| Free migration | Free migration of existing sites | No |
| Free CDN | No | The page lists CDN and firewall among the included essentials without naming the provider |
| Caching | Lightning Stack (NGINX), Object Cache Pro and Redis included on every plan | No |
| Staging | Advanced staging and cloning on every plan | No |
| No | Free email is listed on every plan without a mailbox count | |
| Resource limits | A whole server per customer: 1 to 8 GB RAM and 1 to 4 vCPU on the listed sizes, larger sizes and other providers available | 250,000 inodes and 100 GB per account in the hosting agreement; no CPU or RAM figures on the plan page |
| Data center choice | The provider's regions, chosen per server: DigitalOcean 9, Vultr 30, Linode 25, AWS 28, Google Cloud 28 | No |
| Uptime guarantee | No | 99.9% per month in the hosting agreement, with a credit of 5% of the monthly fee on request, usable for future purchases |
| Security | Built-in firewall with IP blocking, WordPress vulnerability scanner, bot protection and dedicated firewalls per the pricing page | DDoS protection and network monitoring on every plan; a site security suite is included on the cards |
| Free trial | 3 days without a credit card | Not stated |
| Phone support | No | 24/7 chat, phone and email through GoDaddy Guides |
| Windows hosting | No | No |
| Node.js and languages | Not stated | Node.js on every plan; the dashboard exposes CPU, memory, entry processes and I/O controls |