Cloudways vs Mochahost: guide for 2024

Final verdict

Looking over Cloudways vs. Mochahost, it’s clear why both hosts are so popular. They have both hosted millions of
websites that run on WordPress for decades, building up a loyal customer base.

• 
  Cloudways (Overall grade: 8.5)
  
  
  offers a managed cloud hosting solution with impressive performance metrics, such as maintaining nearly perfect uptime and fast server response times. Its standout features include built-in caching solutions like Memcached and Redis, advanced security measures with DDoS mitigation, and easy vertical scaling options. Cloudways’ user interface is highly intuitive, providing robust server and application management through a custom control panel. The platform is particularly well-suited for ecommerce, agencies, and high-traffic websites due to its scalability, security, and performance optimization. However, it doesn’t offer shared or dedicated hosting, which might limit its appeal to users seeking those specific services.
  
• 
  Mochahost (Overall grade: 8.2)
  
  
  is recognized for its affordability, reliability, and extensive feature set, making it a solid choice for budget-conscious users and small businesses. It supports a variety of hosting types, including shared, VPS, and dedicated hosting, providing flexibility in plan selection. Mochahost also prioritizes eco-conscious hosting with carbon-neutral options and offers useful perks like unlimited email accounts and free website builders. While Mochahost ensures a commendable uptime and speed, its control panel and user interface are slightly less intuitive compared to Cloudways, which might pose a steeper learning curve for non-technical users. Nonetheless, its comprehensive DNS control, website builders, and more affordable pricing make it an appealing alternative for users looking for a broad spectrum of hosting services.
  

Hosting types offered

Both platforms provide a variety of hosting types, each designed to meet the different needs of users.

Although both offer a variety of hosting plans tailored to different needs, in
certain cases, one platform may prove to be more suitable.

Detailed comparison

🏆 Winner Cloudways: Offers a managed cloud hosting solution with top-tier uptime and performance.

Cloudways stands out due to its impressive uptime statistics, maintaining 100% uptime in 2020 and 2021, and a close 99.99% in 2022. This is complemented by an average server response time of 229ms and a fully loaded time of 0.9 seconds. Cloudways excels in performance optimization with built-in caches and an optimized stack, ensuring that websites run smoothly and quickly.

Mochahost, with a 99.9% uptime guarantee and an industry-leading 99.95% for dedicated environments, offers solid reliability. It boasts eco-conscious carbon-neutral hosting, regular backups, and high-speed NVMe storage. Customer reviews often highlight the prompt and professional support team, making Mochahost a dependable option for hosting needs.

🏆 Winner Cloudways: Superior performance and versatility with advanced caching and seamless scaling.

When it comes to general performance, Cloudways excels with its SSD hosting which promises three times faster speeds than traditional HDDs. With built-in advanced caching solutions like Memcached, Varnish, Nginx, and Redis caches, it ensures lightning-fast load times. Furthermore, Cloudways offers a PHP 8 ready server environment and the ability to switch between different PHP versions easily. Cloudways also integrates Cloudflare Enterprise for enhanced CDN capabilities, offering protection against DDoS attacks and ensuring minimized latency. In contrast, Mochahost also delivers impressive speed with SSD storage and AMD EPYC CPUs. It provides unlimited bandwidth and boasts a 99.95% uptime guarantee. Mochahost offers free SSL certificates and includes multiple global server locations to support a wide range of regions.

Website Speed

For website speed, Cloudways uses SSD drives and has an optimized stack that includes NGINX, Apache, and PHP-FPM, which collectively enhance site performance. Their built-in caches like Redis and Varnish significantly reduce load times. Cloudways also incorporates Breeze, a WordPress cache plugin preinstalled and trusted by over 300,000 users. Mochahost also uses SSD storage, including NVMe SSDs for enhanced speed. Their high-speed 1Gbit/s network connections and cutting-edge CPUs further contribute to faster loading times. Both hosting services offer free SSL certificates, which can improve loading times by enabling HTTP/2.

Scalability

Cloudways offers vertical scaling, enabling you to scale up server resources like RAM, CPU, and storage effortlessly and economically. This scaling happens with just one click, without the need for plan upgrades. Cloudways also supports easy scaling for multiple applications without additional charges. While Mochahost features elastic hosting that dynamically adjusts to traffic demands and supports seamless upgrades, it is unclear whether plan upgrades are required or if scaling costs are specified. Both services offer reliable scalability, but Cloudways provides more straightforward scaling options.

🏆 Winner Mochahost: Offers reliable hosting services with robust security measures.

Technical security measures:

Cloudways and Mochahost both provide SSL certificates, with Cloudways offering free 1-Click SSL and Mochahost also offering free SSL certificates with strong encryption and wildcard capabilities. Cloudways supports up to PHP 8.2, whereas Mochahost supports multiple versions including PHP 8.x, 7.x, and 5.6. Both companies utilize firewalls and automated protection mechanisms. Cloudways has server-level and platform-level firewalls, along with Fail2ban and bot protection, while Mochahost provides comprehensive firewall and malware protection.

Operational security measures:

Cloudways leverages automated protection with features like Fail2ban and DDoS mitigation via Cloudflare Enterprise, as well as two-factor authentication and IP whitelisting. Mochahost offers regular automated backups, anti-virus and anti-spam measures, and two-factor authentication. Both providers prioritize secure access with SSH and SFTP; Cloudways includes enhanced caching mechanisms, whereas Mochahost supports HTTP/2 and HTTP/3 with LiteSpeed webserver.

Compliance and certifications:

Cloudways uses PCI-DSS compliant hardware through its cloud providers, but is not itself PCI-DSS compliant. Mochahost mentions GDPR and PCI compliance with emphasis on robust security measures but lacks explicit details. Cloudways focuses on GDPR-aligned security practices, while Mochahost complies with the EU – US Privacy Shield for data protection standards.

🏆 Winner Mochahost: Mochahost stands out by offering free domain names with annual plans, as well as managed Linux VPS and dedicated hosting options.

Cloudways and Mochahost both offer robust hosting solutions that cater to a variety of user requirements. Cloudways is highly regarded for its strong performance features, leveraging SSD hosting, optimized stacks, and built-in caches such as Memcached and Redis to ensure fast and reliable service. It also supports PHP 8 and integrates seamlessly with Cloudflare. On the other hand, Mochahost stands out by offering free domain names with annual plans, as well as managed Linux VPS and dedicated hosting options, providing a tailored environment for different levels of expertise. One notable distinction is the availability of website builders. Mochahost offers a free website builder, making it a more user-friendly choice for those with less technical experience, whereas Cloudways does not specify the inclusion of a website builder in their features.

In terms of usability, both hosting providers shine but in different ways. Cloudways offers ease of use with 1-click actions like backup/restore and server cloning, plus advanced collaboration tools with user roles and Git integration. This makes it ideal for development teams and those who require a lot of control over their hosting environment. Mochahost, however, provides comprehensive DNS control and an industry-leading uptime guarantee of 99.95%, appealing to users who prioritize stability and reliability. Both offer free SSL certificates, but Mochahost includes these with self-restorable backups, enhancing its appeal for users seeking added security without additional costs. Cloudways supports staging environments and scalable resources without a long-term contract, aligning more with developers and business users who need flexibility.

Both providers support a range of users from beginners to experts with user-friendly website builders and WordPress staging areas. However, in terms of developer tools, both Cloudways and Mochahost offer robust options including SSH access, support for multiple programming languages, and Git for version control, thus appealing to developers looking for advanced capabilities.

Email services:

Cloudways and Mochahost both offer robust email services but differ slightly in their approach. Cloudways provides email hosting through Rackspace & Elastic Email, integrating transactional email capabilities into its stack, facilitating efficient email management even for large campaigns. Mochahost offers unlimited email accounts, anti-spam, and anti-virus features, appealing to users who require extensive email functionality for routine correspondence or marketing campaigns. Both hosting providers ensure secure webmail login, but Cloudways stands out with Rackspace, a trusted name in email solutions, providing an edge in reliability and integration capabilities for business users.

🏆 Winner
Cloudways: Offering extensive plan options across different hosting needs.

Evaluating the pricing of plans among various hosting providers can be complex due to their differing pricing and renewal strategies. Additionally, certain plans require annual commitments, which adds to the difficulty of making comparisons. The prices listed are based on monthly commitments; plans requiring annual commitments are indicated. Additionally, although some providers offer identical plans for WordPress and shared hosting, we have created separate tables for each to enhance clarity.

Cloudways delivers a broad spectrum of hosting plans including WordPress, Ecommerce, AWS, GCE, Vultr, and Linode hosting with detailed specs and competitive pricing. In contrast, Mochahost offers more simplified plans focusing on WordPress and shared hosting with a few pricing tiers. Mochahost’s WordPress plans start lower, providing more storage and bandwidth at competitive prices but lack the flexibility and variety present in Cloudways. Cloudways, on the other hand, provides expansive choices and configurations, catering to diverse hosting needs with a more scalable approach.

Enterprise plans

Cloudways offers robust enterprise-grade plans with options reaching up to 192GB RAM and 32 Core processors, providing expansive storage and bandwidth, suited for significant web traffic and resource-intensive applications. Mochahost’s offerings cap at 5GB RAM and 3 vCPU cores under their WordPress and shared hosting plans, which may not meet the demands of larger enterprise-level needs, thus making Cloudways a more fitting choice for such requirements.

🏆 Winner Cloudways: Cloudways provides a user-friendly and feature-rich hosting experience.

Cloudways features an intuitive and custom control panel designed to simplify server and application management. It allows for easy navigation, ensuring that both technical and non-technical users can efficiently handle their websites. Key features include 1-click actions for multiple tasks such as launching applications, backups, and server or website cloning. Additionally, Cloudways integrates pre-installed Git for effortless code deployments and offers both SSH and SFTP access, enhancing flexibility and security.

Mochahost, by contrast, uses standard control panels such as cPanel, which is familiar and reliable but may come with a steeper learning curve for novices. The platform supports one-click installations via Softaculous for over 300 applications, making initial setup straightforward. Mochahost’s custom website builder aims to cater to users of all technical levels, helping them create websites without needing to code. Nonetheless, the overall user-friendliness of Mochahost’s admin panel could be less accessible to non-technical users in comparison to Cloudways’ custom dashboard.

Both Cloudways and Mochahost offer free migration services. Cloudways provides free migration for the first website from any web host, making it easier for new users to get started. Mochahost offers unlimited, hassle-free migrations that include email transfers, ensuring a seamless transition. Both provide expert-led migration assistance, offering valuable support during the process. However, Cloudways’ single, free migration may be limiting for those looking to transfer multiple sites without incurring additional costs.

The platforms provide extensive knowledge bases filled with guides, how-to articles, and instructional content. Cloudways’ help center includes a comprehensive knowledge base with articles and guides on various topics, complemented by a 24/7 live chat support system and a ticketing system for prompt query resolution. An engaged community of WooCommerce experts further enriches the learning experience. Mochahost offers a detailed knowledge base, abundant tutorials, guides, and a well-organized FAQ section covering diverse hosting plans. Their support team is available 24/7 via live chat, phone, and a ticketing system. Both providers have robust support systems, but Cloudways’ active expert community and extensive documentation offer an edge.

🏆 Winner Mochahost: Offers extensive user management features with customizable control.

In comparing user management features, Cloudways utilizes the WordPress Admin Panel for detailed management of user roles and permissions. Users can access, add, edit, delete, and change roles through a simple interface, allowing specific delegation of tasks such as posting or managing the site. Mochahost, on the other hand, provides complete control over cPanel access and features. Administrators can customize web spaces, manage bandwidth and disk space, and even brand cPanels for clients. While both offer extensive customization, the detailed cPanel controls and flexibility provided by Mochahost offer an edge in managing multiple users and resources.

The user interface for managing users differs between the two platforms. Cloudways leverages the familiar WordPress Admin Panel, accessible directly or through the Cloudways platform, making it seamless for WordPress users to manage roles and permissions. This interface is intuitive, designed with simplicity in mind. Mochahost provides a more traditional cPanel interface with WHM integration, allowing for extensive customization and control over individual cPanels. The comprehensive tools and ease of access through the cPanel make it suitable for users who require more control and customization options in their hosting environment.

When assessing access control measures, Cloudways offers role-based access within WordPress, enabling administrators to restrict access efficiently based on user roles. This method ensures that specific responsibilities are delegated without compromising overall site security. Mochahost’s cPanel, combined with WHM, offers robust access control through individual cPanel accounts within a single hosting package. This makes it easy to manage a growing number of users, as administrators can set distinct parameters and restrictions for each user, ensuring scalable and efficient management of resources.

Cloudways user roles table:

Mochahost user roles table:

🏆 Winner
Cloudways: Cloudways excels with top-tier customer support options, featuring round-the-clock availability, multiple communication channels, and premium add-ons for advanced needs.

Cloudways and Mochahost both offer 24/7 customer support with live chat, phone, and email/ticket options. Cloudways stands out with advanced and premium support levels that include a private Slack channel and dedicated account manager. In contrast, Mochahost does not provide these specialized services but does offer free migrations and a money-back guarantee.

Mochahost provides a solid suite of support options and is praised for its quick response times and approachable support team. However, Cloudways offers a more extensive range of high-tier support add-ons like proactive monitoring and customization assistance, catering better to clients needing more intensive support. With a higher score, Cloudways proves to be the more reliable choice for customer service.

User feedback

Cloudways consistently receives high praise for its ease of use, robust performance, and excellent customer support. Many reviewers highlight the platform’s intuitive interface, effective server management features, and the ability to choose from top-tier cloud providers like AWS and DigitalOcean. Users appreciate the scalable hosting options and reliable customer service, which often includes quick response times and helpful assistance. However, some customers note areas for improvement, such as the absence of email hosting, limitations on server vendor choices, and discrepancies in pricing transparency. Overall, Cloudways is deemed a solid hosting provider, especially valued for its managed hosting features and performance enhancement capabilities.

Mochahost is generally praised for its reliable uptime, affordability, and wide range of features, making it a strong choice for small businesses and budget-conscious users. The platform excels in cloud hosting for high-traffic websites and offers free SSL certificates, which are particularly beneficial for e-commerce sites. However, some users found it challenging to manage multiple WordPress blogs and mentioned that the pricing could be expensive depending on the plan. Customer support is noted as generally responsive, though there are occasional reports of slower service.

FAQ