WP Astra is one of the new kids on the block when it comes to WordPress themes, so I was very interested to see how they stack up against some of the big guns.

There theme claims to be a super-lightweight, easy to use theme that is focused on working with page builders. So, instead of trying to do everything, like most themes do, they leave the heavy lifting up to the pros – the page builder plugin creators.

The Astra theme also comes with a super simple free version, as well as a pro version with more bells and whistles, especially for those that want, or need access to more config options.

Let’s take a look at what’s inside and how it looks when used on a new site.

Lightweight And Built For Speed

As someone who is always helping clients speed up their websites, I am excited to see that Astra is built with speed in mind.

A lot of theme developers will say this kind of thing “built for speed” only to put that statement on their homepage. Which is is my nice way of saying, it’s bullshit (excuse my French).

However, when you take a closer look at what the guys & gals who built Astra  promise (and I will put my developers glasses on here) it is great news:

• Loads at under 50kb which is insanely small (most homepages end up being over 1MB in total, so a big theme does not help anyone) without plugins or anything else it loads in under half a second, which is a great start
• They have decided not to bloat the theme with a Jquery library (so an extra file to load for very little benefit). They have coded all they need themselves and included it in the theme! Big thumbs up for that.
• They get high grades in all page speed test tools, which is a plus and something most themes don’t even bother checking, let alone getting a great score on.

All of the above is great news, but I thought I would also run a quick test on a newly installed theme, on a site with a couple of test pages and posts. So, it is not as pure a test as the Astra team did, but it gives us a great idea of how light/fast the raw theme truly is (especially compared to a few others).

So, here is a quick test on Pingdom speed tester of WP Astra versus – Divi, Generate Press, Squared from Thrive Themes and Ocean WP.

WP Astra – 0.68 seconds

Thrive Themes – Squared – 1 second

Generate Press – 0.65 seconds

Divi – 1.27 seconds

As you can see, Astra stacks up pretty well.

It is not exactly the size they claimed (although it is not a a completely empty WordPress installation) but the speed is close to 2/3 of a second! Nice.

Only Generate Press comes in a tad faster, Thrive a bit slower, and Divi a dismally slow and huge load (I like Divi, but seems they have some work to do).

Designed For Page Builders

I used to code things from scratch. In fact, I was a programer for over 2 years. Nowadays though, I think it is a big waste of time to code a website from scratch.

Especially when you have page builders around to help you build a website in hours!

The problem is though, that many themes are not designed with page builders in mind. Astra is exactly the opposite.

They have realised that a Theme cannot design a website completely, so they have built it to work hand in hand with page builders like:

• Elementor
• Beaver Builder
• Visual Composer
• Divi Builder
• Site Origin

Things like page templates to allow for full-width pages (boxed or completely full-width).

Pages without sidebars, headers or footers, so you can make use of those that come from the page builder. And, the removal of the page title, so you can cleanly insert the page builder content.

WP Astra Settings For Page Builders

They have even taken it a step further with their Pro plugin by allowing by allowing you to place Elementor elements in the header.

This may not seem a big deal, but most themes suffer here. They give you lots of options, but you can’t customise what appears in the header. Want to add a “contact us” button, or “buy my course” button. Too bad. Now, with Astra and Elementor, you can do this easy as pie! 

Library Of Pre-Built Websites

To be able to start from a pre-built site which is customizable will not only save you lots of time but, if you are not a graphic designer or developer, will give you an awesome site right out of the box.

Astra comes with all of the following kinds of templates that you can quickly and easily import into the theme as soon as you have uploaded it to WordPress. Just add the Starter Sites plugin, and you will get an additional menu item to see the sites library.

WP Astra Pre-built Sites

These sites are built with either Elementor or Beaver Builder, so you will need to grab one of those plugins to make them work, but look at all the options.

At the time of writing (December 2017) there are 24 Elementor sites, and 22 Beaver Builder.

And just so we are clear, these are not “pages”, they are whole websites!

Here is one just so you can see:

Astra Prebuilt Site Pages

SEO Friendly (Really)

When theme builders say they are SEO friendly, I am often very skeptical, but in this case the Astra creators have included a whole load of Schema to help get your website’s SEO on track.

If you don’t know what Schema are, here’s a quick explanation. They are a small piece of code you can add to specific pages and portions of your site to help search engines know “exactly” what is on the page.

This includes things like products, events, reviews, recipes, your organisation and a whole lot more.​

It may seem a little pointless until you check out search results for things like recipes or reviews and see the extra things Google shows when you use Schema, like this:

Schema.org data displayed for a recipe on Google

They also bake in some specific Schema code to help get a search panel in the sitelinks, which is awesome for when people look up your website on Google. Below is what the code and search panel look like:

Schema Code To Help Add Search Panel To Google Results

Search Panel on Google For The Moz.com website

From an SEO perspective, this can really help sites like Google display your search results better and potentially higher, so any theme that bakes in Schema is on my good side for sure!

LEARN MORE ABOUT ASTRA

Hooks & Filters (Great For Developers)

If you are a developer (or maybe even if you are not :>) you will find the access to hooks and filters in Astra a god-send.

Instead of having to hack your own way into the code to insert specific custom code into the theme, there are lots of intuitive hooks to help you find exactly the right spot.

And, if you really want to see “exactly” where the code will be injected, you can use their hooks visualiser plugin to give you an overview of where these hooks load.

Astra Visual Hooks

Astra Pro Addons

The great things about Astra is that all of the killer features mentioned above are free.

However, if you want to take things to the next level, you can invest in the Pro version and get some very helpful add-ons like these:

• transparent header
• sticky header
• custom header options
• mega menu (coming soon)
• custom footer
• custom page and blog layouts
• page header designer (breadcrumbs, title etc)
• further color options (all website elements)
• further typography options
• scroll to top element
• white label for agencies :>
• woo commerce designer (in Beta)

Some of the handier features include:

Mobile Header

This gives you full control over the mobile header display which we all know can be difficult to customize without full access to all the features.

Sticky Header

Having something stick to the top of your page is great for promotions and conversions. Getting people to click something is hard enough, and even harder when it scrolls away when they move down the page. That is why this kind of feature is a must have for any modern website.

Header Sections

Being able to create a custom header is one thing, but being able to add specific sections just underneath it can be great. Especially if you are using ads (which convert well so high up) and other conversion related elements.

Page Headers

Customizing your website to your needs is killer and being able to specifically create page headers is something I always want to do. Depending on the specific page, you might want a different font or color, or even a full width background image behind the heading. All these options are available with page headers.

Blog Pro

If you have any kind of blog on your website then you know how handy it can be to customize it even further than the basic features. This module allows you to play with your blog or archive pages – including things like author bio box and other design features. Of course, if you already use Elementor Pro then you can customize your blogs with this too.​

So, if you want complete control over how your website looks and the ability to whip up sites for yourself or clients a whole lot faster, this plugin is a no-brainer. It extends all the basic areas of the theme and lets you tweak almost everything I can think of? And they are constantly adding to it. Constantly.

SEE ASTRA PRO

Astra Pro Pricing

Of course, when you go for the Pro version you are going to have to fork out a little cash. But for what you get, in my humble opinion, the Pro version is definitely worth it.

The way the Astra team price things may seem a little strange, but it is kinda geared towards agencies.

For $59 you get Astra Pro and can use it on as many websites as you like. Then from there, it includes other handy add ons for page builders like Elementor, and other plugins you might need. This makes sense, especially when you are building a lot of sites.

The prices shown below are yearly prices, but if you want to just lock it all in you can go “Lifetime” and it costs about 4-5 times the price, but you never have to worry about renewing your subscription again!

SEE ASTRA PRO

What Is SITE123?

If you’re looking to build a website in a quick and easy manner, Site123 may just be the solution! Site123 focuses on making your experience of getting online really simple. Regardless of whether you’ve never built a website before, you’ll still be able to build a professional looking site in a matter of a few hours.

Website builders like Wix allow you to drag and drop elements to create a website. There’s no denying that this process is very simple, however, Site123 have taken simplicity one step further.

Site123’s design assistance creates website templates that are customised to your exact needs. There’s absolutely no need for any technical intervention, making it a great choice for beginners.

Visit SITE123.com

Site123 have an EXCELLENT rating on TrustPilot, with over 80% excellent reviews and only 1% poor. Many of the positive reviews focus on their ease of use and customer service. It’s so nice to hear positive message in terms of support. The poor reviews, of which there are few, appear to comment around Site123’s pricing, which we’ll discuss later in my review.

Even though they are a website builder, Site123 have a good presence on social media. Their Facebook and Twitter pages are always updated and they’re very responsive to messages. It’s extremely refreshing to see GREAT customer feedback in this domain which is making me even more excited to review them myself.

Site123 Uptime & Performance

Not many Site123 reviews seem to look at the website builder’s uptime and performance. As a customer, I always strive to find services that offer great performance. After all, you expect a decent uptime with a web host, so why not a website builder. They too are hosting your website, so it’s important to factor this into your decision.

I signed up to Site123 myself so I could monitor my website’s performance. When you first sign up to Site123, you’ll be asked a few questions. These questions establish the type of website you want to build, and for what purpose. Once you’ve gone through the questions, a template will be created for you containing all of the features you desire on your website.

I kept my website pretty basic to begin with and was REALLY pleased to get an uptime of 99.99% over the space of a few months. During this time I only experienced a total of 2 outages which is brilliant. In fact, this is better that some web hosts I’ve reviewed! Who said website builder hosting wasn’t any good!

My site’s response time averaged out at just over 800 ms. This is great because it’s below 1 second! The recommendation is around 2-3 seconds so again I was really pleased with this result. Of course, the more videos and images (if unoptimised) you have on your site, the higher your response time will be.

Visit Site123 (£0.00/Month)

Site123 Ease of Use

Site123 is super easy to use. Even from the sign up process; you can register your details by linking your social media accounts. There’s absolutely no need for any coding experience when you create a website with Site123. Setting your website up literally takes around 15 minutes, creating a template that’s fit for your purposes.

Site123 doesn’t complicate things, in fact it makes things even easier than thought possible. As their own website states, you can launch your website or business within 3 simple steps. All you need to do is select the type of website you want to build and upload your own content to it. You can then publish your website which will go live in the space of an hour.

Making things even easier, all of Site123’s templates are mobile friendly and responsive. This means that your website will look great on any device! When 94% of people judge a website by it’s mobile responsiveness, this is definitely a good feature to have! What’s more, you can optimise your website’s SEO to ensure that your site appears on search engine results. The more traffic driven to your website, the better your business will do!

Site123 Features

Although Site123 is a simple website builder, it boats many features. There’s absolutely no reason to shun the simplicity of this website builder. Just check out what they have to offer (remember, one of their services is free)!  There are a few differences between Site123’s free and premium plans, so we’ll cover all the features below. I’ll outline where there are differences, because I’m helpful like that!

 Dashboard: The dashboard is (as expected) very easy to access and get the hang of. You will have an overall view of all the websites you’ve created, allowing you to edit or delete them. You can easily add more websites to your collection, create domain names, and check your balance (we’ll come to that shortly). If your website is set up for them, you can also read messages and comments from blogs and newsletters. It’s great having everything all in one place.

 eCommerce: It’s entirely possible to create a fully functioning eCommerce website with Site123. Their advanced eCommerce features make this process really easy, whilst keeping everything very professional. Once you’ve created your online store, you can manage your products and orders in one place. If you want to customise your online store to fit in with your ideal look, this is of course easy to do as well! You can edit your shopping cart, currency options, design, and more. Site123 integrates flawlessly with PayPal, one of the most popular payment methods on the internet.

 Blog: Lots of websites now make use of a blog. It allows users and customers to interact with you, to share their thoughts and experiences, and potentially increase traffic and revenue. Blogs with Site123 can include your content, posts, videos, photos, and more. You can specify the type of topic you wish to write about which will tailor your blog to your purposes. As I’m sure you can expect by now, creating a blog with Site123 is very easy and can be done within a matter of minutes.

 SSL: When you register with Site123 and build a website, you’ll be entitled to a free SSL certificate. This ensures that your website is securely encrypted, allowing you to maintain a high level of protection. This is also a great sign for your customers (if you run an online store). Some websites charge upwards of £80 for these licences, but Site123 includes it absolutely free.

 Email: To maintain a level of professionalism, you’ll have your own email account. Rather than some website builders who require you to have their website name within your email address, yours will look something like email@websitename.com – best of all, this comes at no extra cost!

Visit Site123 (£0.00/Month)

Site123 Pricing

	FREE	PREMIUM
STORAGE	500 MB	10 GB
BANDWIDTH	1 GB	5 GB
DOMAIN	Subdomain	Free domain & connect
BRANDING	Included	Removed
ECOMMERCE	None	Included
PRICE	$0 /month	$12.80 /month (£10.24)

Site123’s pricing plans are really simple, there’s just two of them! Their free plan is entirely free and allows you to create a website, giving you access to all their templates. You are limited to 500MB storage, but this should be plenty to get you started! Unfortunately you can’t connect your own domain, so you will have a domain that looks something like yoursite.site123.com

If you like what Site123 offers and you want to upgrade your plan, their full pricing plan is just $12.80 per month (around £10.24). You’ll get a free domain that you can connect to your website, making it look professional. Storage increases to 10GB which should be comfortable enough for any website or small online store. Speaking of online stores, their premium plan opens up the option to use their eCommerce features.

Here’s a list of some of the eCommerce features:

 Online store (create and manage an online store)
 Currency selection (over 80 currencies to choose from)
 PayPal (integrate PayPal checkout)
 Products (create and sort products by categories)
 Coupons (create coupons and offer/discount codes)
 Shipping options (multiple shipping options to choose from)
 Order forms (customise and create your own order forms)

Visit Site123 (£0.00/Month)

Pros and Cons

Pros:

 Simple and easy to use (no need to have any coding experience)
 Wide choice of templates (all are mobile responsive)
 Multiple websites all under one account
 Access to plugins (great for improving SEO)

Cons:

 Limitations on free plan
 Maybe too simplistic for eCommerce users

Do I Recommend Site123?

Site123’s website builder is great for a lot of users. Whether you’re looking to create a personal website, blog, or online store. The benefits here are that things really are so simple. You don’t need an ounce of coding experience, as the intuitive designer does all the hard work for you. This allows you to focus on the content of your website, without needing to manage the nitty gritty.

If you want to expand your set of features, their premium plan allows the use of plugins. You can use these to your advantage in order to create a professional looking site that can work to your needs. This makes it pretty versatile, so if you are experienced, you’ll probably enjoy this more than the software doing it for you.

In terms of price, Site123 offer a free plan. Free plans, in my opinion, are a great starting point. It gives you a feel of the website builder and allows you to decide whether you’d want to pay for more features and accessibility. Granted, you may get more storage and bandwidth from other website builders at a cheaper price, but you’re paying for complete ease of use here.

Site123’s templates are professional and have a nice modern feel. You won’t need to worry about creating a separate mobile site, because all their templates are responsive. With the amount of people accessing websites via mobile or smart devices, this is an absolute must have feature.

Visit Site123 (£0.00/Month)

Thrive themes are one of the leading theme designers in the WordPress market. With this Thrive themes review, we will help you know about Thrive themes and analyze how good the Thrive Theme products are to create your site. 

Choosing a WordPress theme, or a plugin is often confusing. Since the performance & usability of your WordPress website totally depends on the theme and plugins you choose, it has to be a careful decision.

Here, in this Thrive Themes Review, we will discuss one of the popular theme & plugin providers in the WordPress world – Thrive themes. This is one of a kind WordPress theme company that intends to deliver conversion oriented themes and plugins for your WordPress websites.

Read on to find out what Thrive themes has to offer, it’s pros and cons. Discover the good bad and the ugly before you actually invest for your WordPress products.

Thrive Themes introduction

The products at Thrive themes are built or bloggers or small business owners that are focused on conversions and lead generation. The Thrive themes WordPress templates and plugins are really easy to use. You don’t have to be professionally skilled IT personnel to use their products.

Thrive themes membership gives you access to all their fine plugins. The plugins that can really help you increase user engagement and actions. On reading further, you will discover some of the cleaver plugins by Thrive themes that can really help you optimize your website for better performance and user engagement.

Thrive Themes Review: WordPress Themes

Thrive themes used to house some of the best WordPress themes like Rise, Squared, Pressive, etc. All these themes focused on the one thing Thrive themes are established for – Better conversion. These were thoughtfully & strategically drafted products that would optimize the user engagement and actions on your site.

However, they discontinued their themes and they are no longer available for download. Instead of the separate themes, they are about to launch what they call Thrive Visual Theme builder.

Not to confuse the Thrive Theme builder with Thrive Architect, which is a plugin, a content editor. Thrive theme builder will work at a higher level, it won’t be just about readjusting a page design using the page editor’s tool. The Thrive Theme builder is, in fact, a flexible, easy to use, framework(in the form of a theme) for building your WordPress website.

The Thrive theme builder is not yet released. We hope it turns out to be as awesome as it sounds!

Thrive themes plugins

At Thrive themes, you can expect to find many conversion-focused tools for your WordPress websites. These tools are available in the form of WordPress plugins, that are lightweight and can be easily integrated into your WordPress websites.

The plugins from Thrive themes are about lead generation and content optimization for better conversions. Here’s a glimpse of what are the products at Thrive themes:

Thrive Leads

For building Mailing lists. This plugin is a package of all that you can do to inspire your readers to opt-in. The form can be displayed using different options. For an example: You can opt for a sidebar widget, or a pop up opt in form. Moreover, you get the reports to provides you with insights on how your strategy is working with your audience.

Thrive Ovation

Customer testimonials do play a lead role in persuading your prospect customers. The Thrive Ovation is an automated system to collect the client testimonial and display them on your site/sales pages for better conversion.

Thrive Ultimatum

A smart, customizable and easy to use the WordPress plugin to display a countdown timer on your site. There are many advantages of displaying a timer on your site. It makes things exciting and inspires viewers to take action before the timer expires.

Thrive Headline optimizer

Write appealing headlines on your pages with the Thrive Headline optimizer plugin. Thrive headline optimizer is my favorite plugin of all. You can submit the different versions of your headlines and the Thrive headline optimizer will display different headlines to users and conduct an internal study of which one works best. Based on the result, the best performing headline will be displayed for max user engagement.

Thrive Comments

Comments on your WordPress site can help it in ways you can’t even imagine. It encourages user engagement, helps SEO by adding fresh, relevant content, works as a form of user reviews/testimonials and much more. Thrive comments, as the name suggests is a great way to make user commenting engaging and beautiful.

Thrive Optimize

Let’s you perform AB split testing into your website pages to conclude what page works better. It is a lightweight and conversion oriented

Thrive cleaver widgets

Since Thrive themes are all about conversions, this plugin is undoubtedly one of their best products to boost conversions. As the name dictates, Thrive Cleaver widgets allows you to display different widgets, different content based on the category, post type, pages, categories & tags.

Thrive Landing Pages

This helps you create beautiful landing pages that focus on conversion. This plugin has it all to brilliantly convert your ideas into a reality for better engagement and actions on your sales pages. You can create sales copies, opt-in forms, registration pages and any other kind of landing pages in your site.

Thrive theme builder: Thrive Architect Review

The thrive theme architect is the page builder from the Thrive themes. It was developed to replace the Thrive content builder and can be used to create conversion-focused pages of your site.

The Thrive Architect is a replacement for the Thrive Content builder, the visual editor. This plugin, the Thrive content builders had some limitations that the Thrive Architect removes. It had a simple concept, it helped people with limited HTML & CSS knowledge to create attractive content with a WYSIWYG editor.

While the Thrive content builders features were limited, the Thrive Architect has the features like that of the popular WordPress page builders like Beaver builder and the Divi builder. The page builder by Thrive Themes is easy to use. You can be creative and develop beautiful designs of your own using the intuitive options. So the thrive Architect is ideal for creating your marketing focused websites too.

Moreover, the Thrive architect is affordable. You have to pay a one time fee of $69 and use it to create any kind of design.

Thrive themes pricing

The beautiful and smart products at Thrive Themes can be purchased individually or through membership as a package of all their themes and plugins.

The WordPress Themes at Thrive themes start from $49 and the individual Thrive themes plugins start at $39. And you can choose what works the best for you. Unlike Elegant Themes, you can buy individual products at Thrive themes. On the other hand, for web design agencies and IT professionals who need access to more than one products, can subscribe to Thrive themes membership plans.

Thrive Themes membership plans

You might want to use more and more Thrive products as they can really help you improve the performance of your site in different ways. Here, purchasing different products individually might not look like a good idea for you. So Thrive themes membership is what can help you.

You can subscribe to the Thrive Themes membership plan at $19/month on the yearly subscription. This allows you to use the Thrive themes & plugins on 25 of your sites. Or you can subscribe to another plan at $49 per month that allows you to use the Thrive themes templates & plugins on 50 of your sites.

Thrive themes discount & Coupon codes

Currently, there is no Thrive Theme Discount code or coupon, or best price deal other than it’s membership plan to access the best, conversion-optimized plugins at a nominal price.

Thrive Architect VS Divi Builder

The Thrive Architect page builder and the Divi Builder from Elegant themes are both professionally crafted page builders with premium features. Both of them can be integrated into your WordPress websites to create designs of your choice.

Since both have nearly the same features, just different options and methods to use, it’s difficult to declare the best from amongst them. However, Elegant Themes has one of the most affordable pricing packages of all. The Elegant themes membership is affordable and provides access to the best plugins and beautiful themes, including their flagship products – The Divi Theme and the Divi builder plugin.

Concluding This Thrive Themes Review

Thrive Themes is a store of the best conversion optimized WordPress plugins. And the soon to arrive Thrive Theme builder sounds great too.

Since there are no themes available at Thrive themes recently, you can still access their smart plugins. These plugins can actually help you make your website more effective and profitable.

The Thrive architect is also a great option for drag and drop content building for marketers and business owners. The Thrive  Landing pages plugin can actually help you create converting and catchy sales pages, sign up/opt-in pages for your site.

With the products as efficient and sharp like that, you are making no mistake if you decide to buy from Thrive themes.

I can conclude this Thrive Themes review with the verdict that their products and Thrive theme conversion focused plugins are for anyone who wants to do more than just launch content with their website.

Get Thrive themes

There’s a lot to consider when choosing a web hosting provider. You need to find one that’s reliable, offers excellent performance, fits into your budget, and much more. However, what if you’re also concerned about the impact of your site on the environment? In our GreenGeeks review for WordPress, we’ll share one potential solution!

GreenGeeks is a hosting platform that prides itself on delivering eco-friendly service at affordable prices and offers a WordPress-specific plan with lots of features. It’s an appealing option for the environmentally conscious, but you may wonder whether its performance is up to par.In this comprehensive GreenGeeks review for WordPress, we’ll go over everything you need to know in order to make an informed decision about whether to sign up.

GreenGeeks review for WordPress – specific features

GreenGeeks offers both standard and WordPress-specific hosting options. As its name suggests, GreenGeeks’ key selling point is that it aims to provide an eco-friendly service. It achieves this both by designing its platform to be extremely energy efficient and by investing heavily in renewable energy.

This is great news for the eco-conscious. However, it’s also important that the hosting itself is top-notch. This means we need to conduct a thorough GreenGeeks review for WordPress.

Fortunately, this service includes a number of useful features for WordPress users, including:

• A one-click install option, to get your site set up quickly.
• Automatic updates, so your site remains secure and stable over time.
• WordPress-optimized security features, such as WordPress Protect.

Overall, GreenGeeks has covered all the necessary bases when it comes to general and WordPress-specific features.

Support options

GreenGeeks offers three primary support channels:

• Email
• Phone
• Live chat

Phone support is available throughout the week and on weekends, and email tickets boast a fast resolution time. As for the live chat, it’s available every day of the year, 24/7.

We tested out the live chat personally:

The support staff were friendly and helpful and seemed able to answer our WordPress questions easily. Even better, we got a response within a few seconds each time.

If you prefer to figure things out on your own, GreenGeeks also offers a variety of support documentation. There’s a knowledge base with some helpful articles, although it’s admittedly a bit sparse. The detailed website tutorials are more helpful, however, and there’s also a blog you can check out with both informative and instructional content.

Performance

Now, we come to perhaps the most important section in our GreenGeeks review for WordPress. Excellent performance is essential if you want to provide a quality user experience on your site. Your hosting provider has a huge impact in this area, so let’s see how GreenGeeks stacks up.

It offers a number of features designed to keep your site fast. For example:

• All of its servers use Solid State Drives (SSDs), which has a positive impact on loading speeds.
• Its service includes customized caching technology, so pages can be served more quickly.
• If you really want to improve your site’s performance, you can integrate with Cloudflare easily and for free.

Finally, GreenGeeks offers several data centers, which are based in the following locations:

• Chicago, US
• Pheonix, US
• Toronto, CA
• Amsterdam, NL

As you can see, this provider doesn’t offer much in the way of global data centers. You can offset this downside by using Cloudflare or another Content Delivery Network (CDN), but it still means that GreenGeeks is most applicable for sites with a largely North American audience.

Page speed tests with Pingdom

Of course, excellent performance in theory doesn’t always translate to reality. So we tried GreenGeeks ourselves, setting up a basic website and testing its loading times.

We got the following results by using Pingdom to run tests from three different servers:

• San Jose: 2.70 seconds
• New York: 1.60 seconds
• Stockholm: 0.87 seconds

As you can see, the results were mostly good, although there’s a lot of variation between locations. The Stockholm time was excellent, for example, but the San Jose test was surprisingly slow.

Page speed tests with Load Impact

To get a closer look at our GreenGeeks site’s performance, we also tested it on Load Impact. This tool puts more stress on the site, simulating the impact of many concurrent users. Our results were as follows:

Load Generator: Frankfurt, DE
Test Server: Amsterdam, Netherlands
Minimum Response Time: 0.16 seconds
Maximum Response Time: 111 seconds

These response times are very inconsistent, and in some cases very high. Ideally, you want the green line to remain flat (and low) as the number of visitors (the blue line) increases. As you can see, this wasn’t the case in our test.

However, keep in mind that this test is a simulation, meaning that while it does attempt to replicate a real use case scenario, it’s not entirely accurate. The huge times reported by Load Impact might be a result of GreenGeeks’ mechanisms for spam protection or other such measures. Still, we’re hesitant to recommend GreenGeeks in regards to performance.

Pricing

GreenGeeks keeps things simple in terms of pricing. There’s a single WordPress hosting plan, which will cost you $9.95 per month (or as low as $3.95 per month, if you sign up for three years’ worth of service). When it comes to WordPress hosting, there are cheaper options, but this is still on the affordable end.

Fortunately, GreenGeeks is fairly generous about what it provides with this plan. You’ll get space for unlimited data, domains, and databases, access to a free Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) certificate, and quite a bit more. This makes GreenGeeks a flexible service that provides you with everything you need to get started, and offers more than enough resources for small to medium-sized sites.

Overall pros and cons

At this point, let’s take a moment to sum up the most important advantages and drawbacks of this service:

Pros

• Offers an eco-friendly service that offsets your website’s footprint by investing in renewable energy.
• Includes plenty of WordPress-specific features.
• Provides a lot of options and resources for a reasonable price.

Cons

• Performance appears to be inconsistent.
• Is less suited to sites based internationally because most of its data centers are in North America.

Conclusion

Overall, GreenGeeks is an intriguing option if you’re looking for a hosting provider offering something unique. Its WordPress plan is fairly cheap, provides plenty of resources and features, and comes with lots of helpful support. Your mileage may vary when it comes to performance, however, which is worth bearing in mind.

Within the past 5 years, the number of domain registrars and website hosting companies have grown exponentially. As a result of this explosive growth, it can be challenging to select a domain registrar among the many companies that provide domain registry services.

Some registrars specialize in selling domain names. While others sell additional features such as web hosting, security, email marketing solutions and cloud services. With some domain registrars, the list of services they offer are endless.

Two of the most well known domain registrars are Namecheap and GoDaddy. Before we take a look at the features of each of these services, let’s explore some features that you should look for in a great domain registrar.

How to Select a Reliable Domain Registrar

When you are researching domain registrars, you must remember that each registrar has access to the same domain names and URLs. This means that no company can provide you with better URL names than other companies.

Here are a few questions you should ask yourself before you select a domain registrar. What features are being offered with the domain registry package? Is the price competitive with other domain registrars? If not, what features are being offered to compensate for the price difference? Has the company created processes that make it easy for you to manage your services without assistance?

This is a list of things you should pay attention to as you conduct your research.

1. Additional or hidden fees associated with transferring your domain name
2. History and reputation of providing quality services
3. Reasonably-priced services
4. Accredited by the Internet Corporation for Assigned of Names and Numbers(ICANN)
5. Easy domain transfer and forwarding services
6. 24/7 customer support
7. Private WhoIs registration
8. Manual and automatic renewal features

There are plenty of domain registrars that come and go. It is important to pay close attention to the terms and conditions of your service provider.

When you visit your prospective domain registrar’s websites, you should stay focused on your immediate needs. With all of the services that are provided, it can be easy for you to get distracted by the numerous specials and offerings on the website.

Competitive pricing should be a factor as you select your domain registrar, but it should not be the only factor. Make your final decision by considering all of the features that were mentioned earlier in this review.

Many experts recommend that customers use a different domain registrar and website hosting service. If you decide to change to another website hosting service, having your domain name with the same registrar can complicate the matter. You should ask the customer representative of your prospective domain registrars if switching your domain registry to another website host will cause any disruptions.

Namecheap vs GoDaddy – Which Domain Registrar is the Best?

If you have been contemplating whether to subscribe to Namecheap or GoDaddy, this review will help you sort out the details associated with each domain registrar. Our primary goal is to help you make an informed decision after you read this comparison of Namecheap and GoDaddy.

Namecheap

As a leading domain registrar that is accredited by ICANN, Namecheap has developed a strong market share since it was founded in 2000. Namecheap has provided over 4 million domain names to customers throughout the world. Although Namecheap’s core business is domain registry services, it provides additional services including web hosting, email hosting, security and cloud-based services.

Godaddy

In terms of size and market domination, GoDaddy is the largest domain registrar. In fact, GoDaddy has over 30 percent of the domain registry market share.

This company has provided more than 59 million domain names registered throughout the world. GoDaddy provides a wide array of services including email aliases, online marketing tools, search engine optimization, privacy protection and sub domains.

Price

Both Namecheap and GoDaddy offer various advertisement promotion codes that are available on several websites on the internet. Since both sites offer so many services to customers, it would be difficult to compare the prices of each service. For the purposes of this review, we will compare the prices of a 1-year renewal rate for domain names of each site.

Namecheap

$10.69 each year to purchase a .com domain
and $8.88 + ICANN fee, for new domain name registrations.

GoDaddy

$11.99 each year to purchase a .com domain

Namecheap and GoDaddy offer various prices on .net, .org, .info, .co, .biz .io and .us domains. On both sites, you can receive additional discounts if you pay in full for service for multiple years. GoDaddy and Namecheap allow you to register your domain name for up to 10 years. There are also several Godaddy alternatives.

Overall, prices are cheaper on Namecheap + they offer you Privacy Protection for FREE, where as on GoDaddy this is a premium addon.

Namecheap and GoDaddy – Pros and Cons

When you are looking for a domain registry service, you must keep in mind that the perfect domain registrar does not exist. Every domain registrar has good and bad aspects.

With that said, there are pros and cons associated with Namecheap and GoDaddy.

Pros – Namecheap

• Good service and security features
• ICANN Accreditation
• Domains are simple to transfer
• Minimal upsell tactics
• Knowledgeable help desk
• 24/7 customer support via help desk
• Competitive price points for all services

Cons – Namecheap

• Some new domain extensions can be very expensive.
• Customer support needs improving

Pros – GoDaddy

• Large, trusted brand in the domain name registry industry
• Easy to purchase and select a domain name
• Website seems easy to navigate and understand the offerings
• 24/7 customer support
• A wide range of services with GoDaddyPro
• Customer support representatives are helpful and knowledgeable
• Accredited ICANN

Cons – GoDaddy

• Check-out process can cause confusion
• Domain manager is not integrated into same window as other features
• Difficult domain transfer process
• Too many instances of upsell
• Long customer support wait times
• Due to promotions and upsell tactics, there are a lot of pop-up specials on the screen. This can be annoying when you are trying to navigate quickly around the site.

As you compare Namecheap and GoDaddy, be mindful that GoDaddy is a larger company. There some problems that large companies experience. For example, GoDaddy may not have as many personal touches as Namecheap.

Namecheap is a smaller company. As a result, it can provide more personalized attention and services for its customers.

Overall User Experience

Your time is limited. So your domain registrar should provide an easy-to-navigate user experience for you. Managing your domain name should not consume a large amount of your time during the day. This section of the review will explore the overall user experience including point of purchase, use and navigation.

Namecheap
The overall check-out process for this domain registrar is quick and seamless. The process is straightforward, and there are not a lot of upselling tactics to disrupt your experience.

Namecheap provides a good search engine for domain name suggestions. When you enter this site, you will notice that Namecheap does not have all of the bells and whistles like its larger competitor. Namecheap offers a quick live chat feature, but it lacks telephone support services.

GoDaddy
The GoDaddy website experience is lively and colorful. At first glance, you can the company has a lot of offerings. However, the hustle and bustle associated with this website can be confusing.

First of all, GoDaddy is the epicenter of upsells. With each click of your mouse, you will be bombarded with an advertisement for a different special. If you want to get a domain name quick, fast and in a hurry, the constant upsells can stall your progress.

GoDaddy offers both telephone and live chat support options. This feature is good for you if you need a solution to a problem that you cannot figure out on your own.

GoDaddy offers a domain management feature. However, the domain manager opens in another window. This feature makes the user experience feel segmented and disjointed.

DNS Management Interface

The DNS management window is the sections that enables you to make changes. Unless you have a technology manager, you will be making all of your DNS changes manually. You may have to reroute your DNS to your web host, configure sub domains and set up emails related to your domain. The DNS management interface needs to be user-friendly.

Namecheap’s DNS Management Interface
Namecheap offers a streamlined DNS management interface. It is free from clutter and unnecessary upsell offers. Namecheap’s layout is straightforward. It is constructed in a way that minimizes the time it takes for you to quickly make changes and leave the site.

GoDaddy’s DNS Management Interface
GoDaddy has a more cluttered DNS management interface. There are additional features on the management interface that do not add value to the customer experience.

For example, you may notice features on your DNS management interface that you did not purchase. This part of the site features extra settings for GoDaddy’s upsell subscriptions. These features get in the way of functionality and make the user experience burdensome.

Domain Name Extras

It is not uncommon for domain registrars to provide extra services that are included in the price of your subscription price. After all, there is so much competition that they need to do make an extra effort to differentiate their services from the other companies in the domain registry industry.

Namecheap Extras

• 100 percent free email forwarding services
• Reliable DNS (no history of company being hacked)
• WhoIs privacy feature is bundled
• Namecheap charges $3 for photo storage and limited hosting package
• Free custom name servers

GoDaddy Extras

• GoDaddy charges an additional fee for custom name servers
• GoDaddy provides a limited hosted package and photo storage for free for 1 year
• GoDaddy charges an additional fee for WHOIS guard
• GoDaddy offers email as an upsell package
• GoDaddy offers a reliable DNS, but the site has been hacked

Namecheap and GoDaddy Upsell Tactics

The internet has evolved so much during the past 20 years that it is hardly recognizable. As technology improves, the need for specialized services grow.

As a result of the internet’s continuous growth, it is not unusual for both Namecheap and GoDaddy to provide customers with the opportunity to take advantage of other offers. This tactic is actually a valuable service for customers, and a lucrative marketing opportunity for domain registrars.

When it comes to using upsell tactics, the GoDaddy website seems to be aggressive and pushy. It seems as if the annoying upsells advertisements do not give you time to make a conscious decision about whether you need to purchase the additional service. If you do not like pushy marketing strategies, visiting the GoDaddy website can frustrate you.

In terms of upsells, Namecheap and GoDaddy offer some of the same packages for hosting and storage. Some of the most common upsells for each of the domain registrars include SSL certificates.

Company Values

If you are like most people, you like to support companies that have admirable company values. When you support any company, you are providing them with the means to further their messages and position in the marketplace.

Namecheap publicly opposes the Stop Internet Piracy Act (SOPA). The purpose of this legislation was to limit the freedom of internet users. Namecheap believes that every person should have the right to use the internet as they desire in a responsible manner without legislative restraints.

GoDaddy actively supports the SOPA legislation. They also support marketing practices that attempt to lock their customers into extended agreements. Another practice they have is using sexual exploitation to market their services.

Although many of these practices may not offend you, it is good to be aware of the values of each of the companies.

Namecheap vs. GoDaddy – Conclusion

The purpose of this review is to provide you with enough information to help you select a domain registrar that meets your needs. Our goal for this review is to tell you whether Namecheap or GoDaddy is the best domain registrar, in our opinion.

Our opinion is that NameCheap is the the best.

Namecheap and GoDaddy are both good domain registrars in their own right. Both of the registrars provide domain names at reasonable prices. They have solid security features, flexible domain management services, around the clock customer support and dynamic DNS performance. Another positive feature associated with Namecheap and GoDaddy is they provide freebies when you get services.

If you like domain registrars that offer a few services, provide a user-friendly interface and minimizes upsell tactics, Namecheap might be a clear choice for you.