GreenGeeks is the World’s #1 green energy web hosting provider. As a brand, GreenGeeks emphasizes their commitment to the environment. Based out of Los Angeles, California, they have a global workforce that provides a better web hosting experience to customers spanning over 150 nations.
Most data centers consume large amounts of energy and more than half of that energy is utilized for cooling and air conditioning. To reduce their carbon footprint, GreenGeeks puts back 3 times the power they consume into the grid in the form of renewable energy.
GreenGeeks is also committed to providing super fast web experience to their customers. Regardless of your plan, you’ll only get SSD storage, which is proven to improve the performance of your site. You’ll also get some of the best speed technologies such as PowerCacher – an inbuilt caching technology to serve your application efficiently and free CloudFlare CDN integration – one of the best CDN networks built to speed up your site.
With GreenGeeks, your satisfaction is guaranteed or you’ll get a full refund. You can try out their hosting risk-free for 30 days. If you’re not fully satisfied with their service, you can request a full refund within 30 days of your hosting subscription. You will own your domain name even after your hosting account cancellation.
Features
As a hosting provider, the vision of GreenGeeks is to deliver the best eco-friendly hosting experience to customers. After trying their hosting plans, here’s what we liked about GreenGeeks:
SSD Storage
The hardware used for data storage can have an impact on the performance of your website. Most hosting providers offer old spinning Hard Disk Drive, GreenGeeks offers SSD storage. Since SSD doesn’t have any moving parts, it’s proven to improve your site’s performance.
Free Domain
You don’t necessarily need to register a domain name separately since they offer a free domain when signing up.
Eco-friendly data center
Most data centers consume large amounts of energy and more than half of that energy is utilized for cooling and air conditioning. To reduce the carbon footprint, GreenGeeks puts back 3 times the power they consume into the grid in the form of renewable energy.
No Hidden Fees
GreenGeeks doesn’t upsell any hosting addons when purchasing a hosting account. With their shared hosting plan, you can host unlimited domains. You can also utilize PowerCacher, an in-house caching technology built for serving your applications efficiently.
GreenGeeks Speed Tests and Uptime Guarantee
Choosing a reliable web hosting provider is one of the first things you should do to make your site blazing fast.
To test the performance of their hosting servers for our GreenGeeks review, we created a test site on top of WordPress, using the default Twenty Seventeen theme and dummy content for theme development, including images.
We used 3 different testing tools – Pingdom, Load Impact and Bitcatcha – to see whether GreenGeeks lived up to their promises.
According to our Pingdom’s website speed test, we found that our test site loads in just under a second for our user based in San Jose. That means the site is faster than 94% of all tested sites.
We also wanted to analyze how GreenGeeks handles a traffic surge during peak hours.
For our traffic surge test, we used a popular testing tool, Load Impact, and sent some virtual users (VU) to our site. They gradually built up to 100 visitors at a time to see how the server managed it.
In the chart below, you can find blue (VUs active) and green lines (VU load time) which represent the number of virtual visitors sent to the testing site and the time it took to load the web page for the respective number of users on the site.
Our test site performed almost consistently regardless of the load. No downtime was recorded throughout the test.
GreenGeeks Server Response Time
From the above two tests, we’ve analyzed how our site performed and also recorded the uptime and response time. In those tests, we loaded all the content of our web page, including images, which can also have an impact on page load time. This makes those tests slightly inaccurate when measuring a server’s response time.
To test the server response time, we’d have to conduct a more accurate test by ignoring the content of our site.
We decided to run a test using a tool called Bitcatcha, which works a bit differently from other website speed testing tools. With Bitcatcha, you can analyze server response time around the globe by ignoring the content of the site.
It averages the loading speed from eight different global locations: New York, LA, London, Brazil, India, Singapore, Japan, and Australia. The speed for each location is measured three separate times, and then the results are averaged.
With this test, we’d get a broader overview of how our server responded globally to the page requests.
Here are the results:
The response time was particularly great in the United States. However, it was comparatively slower in India and Asia Pacific but loaded still under a second.
GreenGeeks Customer Support
GreenGeeks provides 24/7/365 US-based technical support via phone, live chat, and email/tickets.
After subscribing to any of their hosting plans, you’ll get access to GreenGeeks’s dedicated support center from which you can manage all of your support tickets.
GreenGeeks has been well-known for their rapid response times. For ticket-based support, the average resolution time is around 15 to 20 minutes.
Their extensive knowledge base helps walk you through every aspect of building a website on your own, without having to spend your time on the live chat. They also have a separate Website Tutorials section where you can find detailed step-by-step tutorials on hundreds of topics about building a website.
Ease of Use
Built on cPanel, GreenGeeks has a custom interface that lets you easily manage your website and server without hassle.
You’ll also get access to Softaculous, a leading 1-click website script installation wizard for WordPress, Joomla, and Drupal.
GreenGeeks Plans and Pricing
No matter which GreenGeeks plan you’re choosing, you’ll get SSD storage, unlimited bandwidth, and a free domain name
When you’re starting out, we recommend going with the starter plans in the respective categories. You can always upgrade your hosting account as you grow.
| PLAN | DISK SPACE | BANDWIDTH | PRICE |
| Shared Web Hosting | Unlimited | Unlimited | $3.49 / mo. |
| WordPress Hosting | Unlimited | Unlimited | $3.49 / mo. |
| VPS 2 GB RAM | 50 GB | 10 TB | $39.95 / mo. |
| Dedicated Entry Server | 500 GB | 10,000 GB | $169 / mo. |
| Reseller 25 | 60 GB | 600 GB | $19.95 / mo. |
FAQs
Having helped thousands of users choose a web hosting plan and start their websites, we’ve answered just about every question you can think of. Here are some of the most frequently asked questions about GreenGeeks:
Why should I choose GreenGeeks to host my site?
GreenGeeks is engineered to perform while being environmentally friendly. They offer multiple hosting options that perfectly match your needs and budget. For fast page loads and maximum redundancy, they use Solid State RAID-10 Storage Arrays and the latest speed technologies like PowerCache, free CDN, etc.
Which GreenGeeks plan should I get?
It depends on your hosting needs. GreenGeeks offers a wide variety of hosting plans ranging from shared hosting and dedicated servers. When you’re starting out, you can choose their shared hosting plan. As your needs evolve, you can switch over to a higher plan.
Where are GreenGeeks’ servers located?
GreenGeeks is a US-based company. Their data centers are located in Chicago, Phoenix, Toronto, and Amsterdam.
Can GreenGeeks handle high traffic?
Yes, GreenGeeks can handle high traffic around the clock. However, make sure to choose the right hosting plan that meets your goals. If you’re found to consume more resources than you’re allowed to, they’ll request you upgrade to a higher plan.
Can I upgrade my GreenGeeks plan later?
Of course! The shared hosting plans provide you with unlimited web space and data transfer. But you’re allowed to use the resources only for operating a small business website. If your site is found to consume more resources than usual, you’ll be asked to upgrade your hosting plan.
Does GreenGeeks offer a month-to-month payment option?
Yes. GreenGeeks offer month-to-month payment options for their shared plans. The downside is that you’ll have to pay a $15 setup fee if you choose the month-to-month billing. You can waive the setup fee by choosing an annual or a higher plan.
Do I really get unlimited resources with GreenGeeks?
Just like any other hosting providers, GreenGeeks provides you with unlimited disk space and bandwidth. Keep in mind that you’re allowed to consume resources only for operating a small website.
If you’re running a small website or blog, there’s nothing to be concerned about because you’ll have enough system resources to operate it. If you exceed usage, you’ll be politely asked to reduce the usage or upgrade to a higher plan.
Do I have to register my domain name with GreenGeeks?
GreenGeeks waives off the domain registration fee when subscribing to a hosting plan. However, you’re not obligated to register a domain name with them. You can use Godaddy, NameCheap, or any of your preferred domain name registrars for domain registration.
Does GreenGeeks offer a free website builder?
Yes! You get a free drag and drop builder to quickly launch a website on your GreenGeeks account. Alternatively, you can also use a website builder platform like WordPress to launch your site.
Does GreenGeeks sell any hosting addons?
No, GreenGeeks doesn’t upsell any hosting addons when purchasing GreenGeek’s hosting plan.
How good is GreenGeeks’ support?
GreenGeeks offers 24/7 support via 3 modes: Live chat, phone, and email ticket. The average resolution time for an issue is 15-20 minutes for ticket-based support. They also have an extensive documentation that helps walk you through every aspect of web hosting.
Final Recap
GreenGeeks is the world’s #1 green energy web hosting provider. Their vision is to provide blazing fast web experience to their customers and they emphasize their commitment to the environment as well. If you’re not fully satisfied with their service, you can request a full refund within 30 days of your hosting subscription.
GreenGeeks provides a wide variety of hosting options from shared hosting to fully managed dedicated servers. GreenGeeks is also a PCI compliant hosting provider, so you can securely accept payments on your website.
If you’re looking for an eco-friendly web host that offers all the features you need to build and host your websites, GreenGeeks is the best choice.
- SSD storage for all plans
- Free domain registration
- Eco-friendly data centers
- No hidden fees
- Regular price $9.95 / mo. but our users pay $2.95 / mo!
- Get started with GreenGeeks today!