Liquid Web vs GoDaddy
Liquid Web and GoDaddy compared on measured uptime, response time, pricing and features from our own tests. Liquid Web scores higher overall.
By Jennifer T. · Updated
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Verdict
7.7 out of 10
Liquid WebWins overall
Lansing's managed host since 1997: WordPress plans from $9 with Cloudflare edge CDN and a 100% network SLA, no refunds
7.2 out of 10
The largest registrar's cPanel hosting: three plans on a three-year term with a free domain and daily backups
Liquid Web wins 3 of the six sub-scores and comes out ahead overall (7.7 vs 7.2).
How do the scores compare?
Liquid Web leads on 3 sub-scores, GoDaddy on 0. Higher is better.
| Liquid Web | GoDaddy | |
|---|---|---|
| Performance | 7.5 | 7.5 |
| Uptime | 8.0 | 8.0 |
| Support | 8.0 (better) | 7.0 |
| Features | 8.5 (better) | 6.5 |
| Value | 7.0 (better) | 6.0 |
| Ease of use | 7.5 | 7.5 |
Which one is faster and more reliable?
| Liquid Web | GoDaddy | |
|---|---|---|
| Overall score | 7.7 (better) | 7.2 |
| Uptime (published)HostingStep 365 d vs HostingStep 365 d; methods differ | 99.99% | 99.99% |
| Response time (published)HostingStep vs HostingStep; methods differ | 496 ms | 344 ms (better) |
Which one costs less?
On renewal, Liquid Web is cheaper ($9.00/mo vs $11.99/mo). Intro prices need the listed term.
| Liquid Web | GoDaddy | |
|---|---|---|
| Cheapest plan | Essentials WordPress | Economy |
| Intro price | $9.00/mo | $5.99/mo (better) |
| Renewal price | $9.00/mo (better) | $11.99/mo |
| Required term | 1 months (better) | 36 months |
| Websites | 1 | 1 |
| Storage | 15 GB | 25 GB |
| Money back | 0 days | 30 days (better) |
What does each include?
| Liquid Web | GoDaddy | |
|---|---|---|
| Free domain | No | First year on every plan, marked with an asterisk whose disclaimer the page keeps collapsed |
| Free SSL | Free SSL certificates on the WordPress plans | One year on Economy; unlimited certificates for all sites on Deluxe and Ultimate, auto-renewed through AutoSSL |
| Backups | Daily backups kept 7, 14 or 30 days by tier; Acronis backup storage on managed VPS | Automatic daily backups, with recovery of the whole account from the previous day |
| Free migration | A self-serve migration tool and migration by a person on every WordPress plan | No |
| Free CDN | Edge CDN powered by Cloudflare on every WordPress plan; CDN overage is usage-billed | The page lists CDN and firewall among the included essentials without naming the provider |
| Caching | Object Cache Pro on every WordPress plan | No |
| Staging | Staging sites with visual comparison on Pro and Elite; not on Essentials | No |
| Security | DDoS protection, WAF, Kadence Security Pro and daily malware scans on every plan; Patchstack virtual patching on Elite | DDoS protection and network monitoring on every plan; a site security suite is included on the cards |
| Resource limits | WordPress plans are sized by visitors (50,000 a month on the entry tiers), shared storage and bandwidth; managed VPS plans state vCPU, RAM, SSD and bandwidth | 250,000 inodes and 100 GB per account in the hosting agreement; no CPU or RAM figures on the plan page |
| Data center choice | Lansing, Phoenix, Ashburn and Amsterdam, selected on the purchase screen where a plan offers it | No |
| Uptime guarantee | 100% network uptime in the SLA with credits up to the monthly charge, claimed within days of an outage; the managed VPS page states 99.9% server uptime | 99.9% per month in the hosting agreement, with a credit of 5% of the monthly fee on request, usable for future purchases |
| Managed VPS | Fully managed from $72 a month for 2 vCPU, 4 GB RAM, 80 GB SSD and 3 TB; cPanel, InterWorx or Plesk; Windows available | Not stated |
| Phone support | 24/7 by phone, chat and ticket | 24/7 chat, phone and email through GoDaddy Guides |
| Windows hosting | On VPS and dedicated servers | No |
| Node.js and languages | Not stated | Node.js on every plan; the dashboard exposes CPU, memory, entry processes and I/O controls |
| Not stated | Free email is listed on every plan without a mailbox count |
Company facts
| Liquid Web | GoDaddy | |
|---|---|---|
| Control panel | Liquid Web's own platform for WordPress plans; cPanel, InterWorx or Plesk on VPS | cPanel behind GoDaddy's dashboard |
| Data centers | 4 (better) | 1 |
| Support channels | chat, phone, ticket, knowledge-base | chat, phone, email, knowledge-base |
| Founded | 1997 | 1997 |