InMotion Review
This InMotion hosting review provides an unbiased assessment of the InMotion web hosting service. It is directed to individuals and small businesses new to web hosting or who want to move to another service from their existing web host.
It is not easy to choose the most appropriate service for your needs, particularly in view of the large number of web hosting services currently available. InMotion web hosting has been in existence since 2001, and although the company is well known for its professional business plans, it also offers some excellent options for individual personal websites. Let’s first summarize the types of web hosting service that InMotion has to offer.
InMotion Review: Web Hosting Plans
InMotion web hosting offers three ordinary business plans suitable for personal use, three VPS hosting plans and five professional dedicated server options. These are suitable for larger companies that wish to avoid sharing a server with other InMotion clients. VPS (Virtual Private server) offers the nearest thing to having your own private server.
With VPS, a server is partitioned into a number of virtual servers, each with its own reserved amount of storage and CPU resources. They run virtually as if you had your own private server. These plans are suitable for small businesses expecting rapid growth, or those with large amounts of online traffic. InMotion VPS plans offer from 40GB to 160GB storage, 750 – 2500GB/month bandwidth and 2 – 10 IP addresses.
If you’re a whole server, rather than just part of one, the professional dedicated servers offer you your own private server with all the bandwidth, burstable RAM and storage you need. These 5 plans are for large businesses with professional websites. However, we shall restrict ourselves here to the small Business options which are suitable for internet marketing and personal use, including blogging and blog marketing.
Web Hosting Prices
The price of the hosted service they use is very important to many people, particularly those just starting out with their own website or blog. Maybe you have been using a hosted blog, such as Blogger or WordPress run from the WordPress site, and you are ready to run your blog from your own website or domain. You don’t want to spend a fortune doing this, but still want a degree of flexibility in how you design your site.
As mentioned, InMotion web hosting offers three regular Business hosting plans: Launch ($4.19/month,) Power ($5.39/month), and Pro ($13.99/month.) These are current reduced offer prices, the originals being $6.99, $8.99 and $14.99 respectively.
However, like many online hosting services, there is a catch. In order get these Launch and Power plan prices you must purchase hosting in advance. Here are the actual costs to you for each plan at the reduced offer prices:
| Launch | Power | Pro |
|---|---|---|
| 24 Months advance: $143.76 ($5.99/month) | 24 Months advance: $191.76 ($7.99/month) | 12 Months advance: $167.88 ($13.99/month) |
| 12 Months advance: $83.88 ($6.99/month) | 12 Months advance: $107.88 ($8.99/month) | 6 Months advance: $89.94 ($14.99/month) |
| – | – | Monthly: $17.99/month + $40 setup |
Only the Pro plan allows you to pay monthly, plus you pay $40 setup. Setup is free for all the advance payment options.
InMotion Coupon
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Web Hosting Business Plans
The difference between the three plans is primarily in the number of domains and databases that can be used with each. The Launch plan offers only two MySQL databases and two websites on each account. With an additional 6 parked domains and 25 sub domains, this is adequate for a simple blog or beginner’s website.
If you want more flexibility, the Power option offers 50 databases and 6 websites, with 26 parked domains and 100 subdomains. It is highly unlikely that you will use all of this, although if you do you can go to the Pro option where you are allowed 25 websites and unlimited domains. Each of these hosting business plans also provides unlimited storage, unlimited file transfers and unlimited email addresses.
It is easy to switch plans. This is often necessary as your website grows. It is not unusual for a website to grow too large for a basic web hosting plan. It is very easy to make the switch when that day comes, even if you decide to promote your system to VPS or a dedicated server.
The cPanel control panel is very easy to use, and enables you to install WordPress without any specialist knowledge. It comes with traffic analysis software, and HTML and text editors. Creating and modifying your web pages is made simple using cPanel. You also get free data backups and up to $300 advertising credits. Add to that over 280 one-click installation software applications, and InMotion offers you a lot for what you pay.
InMotion Support Services
The company offers a comprehensive support service. You can use email, a ticket-based support system, a 24/7 toll-free telephone service and online chat support, although I was #28 in the chat queue when I tried it. Nevertheless, InMotion web hosting gets top reviews online for its support services, so they must be responsive. This is one of those services that you hope never to have to use, but when you do you want it to be quick and simple.
It is very easy to find training on the use of your website and the various components of cPanel. There are many training manuals and educational resources available from the company’s support pages. There is separate online chat support for technical issues, web design, billing problems and hosting services. This is encouraging, and better than a one person does all approach.
Guarantee and Reliability
You also get a 90 day guarantee with all Business hosting plans, including those offered at reduced offer prices. You have 90 days to decide if your prepaid InMotion hosting suits you, and 30 days for the monthly paid VPS and dedicated server plans. You get everything you paid up to 90 days returned, and a proportioned amount of your fee after the 90 days.
Uptime of 99.9% is claimed, and the company claims to use peering exchanges that ensure high speed data connections. Speed and performance are tested regularly, although the firm does stress that individual speeds will depend upon local broadband speed. In order to reduce speed issues with individual data centers, InMotion hosting makes use of multiple datacenters, so your website will run at the maximum possible speed for your area.
InMotion Hosting Review: Summary
InMotion hosting is a high quality cPanel-based web hosting service. They give you enough guarantee time to give each element of the service an adequate test, and your data is as secure here as it would be with more expensive professional services.
The need for prepayment might put some people off, although the service is well worth the outlay. Once paid, you have no other expense associated with your web hosting service since everything you need is included. You have a good choice of hosting plans, and while the Power plan appears to offer more flexibility, Launch would also be good for those starting out with their first website and self-hosted blog.
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