A customer for years now pays $30 a month for a plan that was under $10, with new domain and MySQL limits.
48signal
137reviewsi
A score out of 100. Negative and mixed reviews take points off, and so does having only a few reviews, so a handful of glowing reviews can’t beat a product many people like.
11%85% Negative
Opinion is split, but the main complaint is poor support, with several long-time customers saying it declined over the years.
What customers love, and what they don’tWhat customers noticed
Customer reviews (137)
Add your reviewShowing 42 reviews mentioning renewal price hike Show all
After ten years HostGator now charges $36 a year extra for a third mailbox with only three weeks notice.
HostGator moved their seven tiny mailboxes to an email plan costing an extra $38 a month, after years of unannounced price hikes.
Shared plans shrank from 960GB to 10GB and HostGator moved them to a Pro plan with a $1000 renewal.
After about 20 years with HostGator they are leaving because overseas support is bad, their plan now has space limits and prices have gone up.
The renewal for a tiny personal site jumped to $395 and the best offer was $335, plus a sudden disk limit.
After 15 years a three-year plan that was never over $150 is now quoted at $713.
Same plan for 20 years; price doubled but still cheap, and nothing new compares.
Ten years on the Hatchling plan, price crept from $100 to $175 and then HostGator auto-upgraded them to a $466 Pro plan.
After six years HostGator raised the renewal and would not let them downgrade without a new account.
After ten years switched away because HostGator turned to price gouging every customer.
Prices crept, malware returned the same day after cleaning, and HostGator's SiteLock was useless, so they left.
The June renewal notice did not mention the new email plan or 20GB limit, then it autorenewed with extra charges.
After 14 years with web and email on HostGator, the cost became unsustainable, so they moved email to Purelymail.
HostGator wants $450 for three years and charges extra for HTTPS, with menus that are confusing and prices hidden until checkout.
Found a 56% price increase on the invoice, shrinking inode limits and a year of server performance problems.
Renewal after a three-year plan from 2018 jumped about 65%.
Four years with an okay experience, but a significant price rise and sluggish sites made them look elsewhere.
After 20 years HostGator wanted $600 for three years, so they are moving to a host at about $170.
HostGator removed their domain and DNS, taking site and email down, then said 24-48 hours; they also found the monthly fee more than doubled without notice.
HostGator's prices climbed to triple for a single domain over ten years, then they moved to another host.
After 21 years on a $35 reseller plan, HostGator suspended and deleted the account when a card expired, offering a $100 a month VPS to restore.
Customer since 2006 on a reseller plan; staff were inept about a blacklist and an unannounced rate rise from $35 to $44 made them migrate away.
At the end of a three-year plan HostGator wanted a 430% price increase.
A professor hosting short-lived class sites found HostGator now limits them to one site for a high fee.
Left HostGator after the first 3 years because the renewal price jumped so high, and would not go back.
After about 13 years, renewal came in $50 higher than the year before with no notice, and the card could not be removed from the account.
Customer since 2009 whose shared plan went from $11.99 to $29.99 with no notice; support just said rates increased.
Price jumped from 17.95 to 27.99 with no notice and support could no longer tell them anything.
HostGator almost doubled their plan price without warning, from 11.99 to 12.95 then 21.99.
On a grandfathered plan since 2007, HostGator forced a plan upgrade to get PHP 8 and a rep changed their plan without permission; price rose from $12.95 to $17.95.
Since 2009, found the renewal price needs a support chat to see and the annual plan costs more than monthly, with a huge jump from the new customer discount.
They received notice of a price hike on their Hatchling plan, a $24 a month increase since August 2023, and are considering self-hosting.
HostGator doubled hosting fees last year and raised them again from 30.31 to 33.35 with little notice.
With HostGator since 2009, the price doubled without notice and chat support could not state the new price.
After about 20 years they cancelled when a service advertised at $3.50 was billed at $35 with no notice.
Customer since 2001 says HostGator raised prices twice in one year and moved to another host.
HostGator raised prices without notice; they only saw a $30 charge on a card statement.
Discovered HostGator's price increase only on their card statement after being with them since 2014.
HostGator raised their price from $12.99 to $21.99, so they cancelled and disputed the charge.
Common questions about HostGator
What do customers say about HostGator?
Opinion is split, but the main complaint is poor support, with several long-time customers saying it declined over the years. Others report price rises, upselling and a few outages. Some customers have had stable hosting for years and found support helpful.
Is HostGator worth it?
Of the 47 reviews with a clear verdict, 4% are positive, 11% mixed and 85% negative. The praise mentioned most is helpful support. The most common complaint is poor support.
What do people like about HostGator?
The praise reviewers mention most: helpful support (3 reviews), reliable (2 reviews) and easy to use (1 review). For example: A PHP 8 500 error was fixed when HostGator reviewed the error log and found a wp-config misconfiguration.
What are the most common complaints about HostGator?
The complaints reviewers mention most: poor support (15 reviews), renewal price hike (15 reviews) and hidden fees (11 reviews). For example: A long-time HostGator customer says it was great 10 years ago but is now the worst, with inexperienced support.
What does the signal score of 48 mean?
It's how well reviewed HostGator is, out of 100. Negative and mixed reviews take points off, and so does having only a few reviews: a service needs plenty of them, compared with the most-reviewed services here, to reach the high 80s and 90s. It's worked out from reviews only, needs at least 5 of them, and updates as new ones come in.
What are the specs of HostGator?
Category: Shared hosting.
Where do these HostGator reviews come from?
137 are quotes from Reddit, each linked to the original. Customer reviews are checked for spam before they appear. Every review, written here or quoted, is read as positive, mixed or negative.