Choosing the right web host is essential to a smooth-running website for your brand or business.
If you choose the wrong host, it’s not only difficult to switch over, but the decision may come with negative effects like site malfunctions and wasted time/money.
As a longtime website builder and tech expert, I’ve had over a decade to analyze the ins and outs of web hosting, including what will make or break the technology.
To help you making a mistake, I want to recommend one of the best web hosting providers currently on the market: DreamHost.
The TYB Team and I all have personal experience using Dreamhost, but we’ve also conducted dedicated lab testing and consulted extensive third-party research to deliver a comprehensive DreamHost review.
So how did we test it?
We set up a staging site at tybtestsite.com and examined the following:
- Hosting Types & Features
- Performance & Speed
- Ease of Use
- Pricing & Value
- Security
- Help & Support
- WordPress Features
- All extras
Let’s get into the details below.
DreamHost Review From Our Experts
DreamHost is a web hosting provider and domain-name-registration service based out of Los Angeles, California.
It’s currently one of the best web hosting services on the market.
DreamHost began hosting customers’ websites in 1997 and has grown since to host over 400,000 client sites.
From domain registration to web hosting to their simple-yet-flexible website builder, DreamHost ranks and rivals other major web hosts like HostGator and Liquid Web.
The Tweak Your Biz team and I are dedicated to thoroughly testing every platform we review.
We’re committed to a variety of test methods, including our own personal experience setting up a staging site and putting it through the wringer.
Through these methods, we concluded that DreamHost is one of our favorite affordable web hosting services on the market.
DreamHost Pros and Cons
Let’s take a look at some of the advantages and disadvantages of using DreamHost.
Spoiler alert: there are more pros than cons.
DreamHost Pros
- Generous inclusions in their packages, such as a free domain name with shared web hosting plans and email hosting
- Great value
- Generous money-back guarantee at 97 days
- Unlimited bandwidth to host mass amounts of web traffic
- Easy to scale up or down with their plans
- Secure web hosting features
- Easy WordPress staging
- Some of the strongest tech support of any web hosting provider, despite not having chat support
DreamHost Cons
- No phone support
- Shared starter plan doesn’t include email hosting
- No Windows-based servers
DreamHost Pricing & Plans
Using the Ubuntu operating system, DreamHost offers the following plans:
- Shared hosting
- Dedicated hosting
- VPS hosting
- WordPress hosting
Here’s an overview of the pricing before we get into the details.
DreamHost offers a range of shared hosting plans, from basic ‘Starter’ to their premium ‘Unlimited’ plan.
In this review, we will be looking at each one and how they performed under pressure.
After launching our staging site (tybtestsite.com) on both of DreamHost’s shared hosting plans, we did a deep dive into speed & performance, uptime, features, and extras.
A great place to start! Shared hosting with an entry level price for new sites, including WordPress.
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1 Website
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Free Domain Included
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Unlimited Traffic
Great for multiple websites, including WordPress, and anyone who wants email hosting @ your domain.
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Unlimited Websites
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Free Domain Included
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Unlimited Email @ Your Domain
DreamHost shared hosting is designed for customers who want to host a website or blog without taking up too many resources. It offers a range of features including unlimited storage, bandwidth, and email accounts.
In terms of speed, DreamHost claims that their servers can handle an average page load time of 1.5 seconds or less. To test this, we used our staging site.
Here are our findings:
- Grade: A
- Performance: 95%
- Largest Content Paint: 1.1s
- Total Blocking Time: 20ms
- Cumulative Layout Shift: 0.01
DreamHost boasts an average uptime of 99.99% and we have to say, they did not disappoint.
There were just a few minutes where the site was down, but we were back up and running in no time.
Plan Features:
- Unlimited storage and bandwidth
- Free domain name registration (for the first year)
- 24/7 customer support
- 1-click installer and automatic WordPress setup
- SSL certificate on all sites for free
- Easy-to-use control panel for website management
- Unlimited email accounts with webmail access
- Free automated daily backups and 1-click restore
- WordPress hosting with automatic updates, caching, and staging environment
DreamHost offers an incredible user experience with an in-house designed control panel (shown below) and expert-level customer support.
Their plans are beginner friendly as well.
DreamHost provides great value in their 2 shared hosting plans.
The Shared Starter plan is a great option if you only want to host one website. Because it doesn’t come with email, it’s probably the best for users who are running a personal site where they don’t expect too much traffic.
The Shared Unlimited plan is where the serious value lies, though. For less than $2 more a month, you’ll gain access to extra room for unlimited websites, an unlimited email, and a free domain name of your choice.
Everything ran relatively smoothly for the entire time we were working with these plans.
DreamHost VPS Hosting Review
DreamHost offers VPS hosting with a number of features and benefits. They provide virtual private servers for Linux and Windows, as well as various levels of storage space, RAM, processor power, and more.
Their VPS plans are designed to meet the needs of small businesses, developers, or anyone who wants greater control over their server than shared hosting.
VPS Basic
For new and small websites-
1 GB Ram
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30 GB SSD Storage
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Unlimited Websites
VPS Business
Built for small businesses-
2 GB Ram
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60 GB SSD Storage
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Unlimited Websites
VPS Professional
For resource intensive sites-
4 GB Ram
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120 GB SSD Storage
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Unlimited Websites
DreamHost VPS Hosting Speed Review
DreamHost VPS servers are powered by multiple Intel Xeon processors, so you know that your website is performing at its best no matter what time of day it is.
Once again, we tested DreamHosting on our staging site.
We found decent speeds, leaving a bit to be desired for our specific needs:
- Grade: B
- Performance: 89%
- Largest Content Paint: 1.4s
- Total Blocking Time: 32ms
- Cumulative Layout Shift: 0.01
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DreamHost VPS Hosting Uptime Review
DreamHost is well-known for their reliable VPS hosting services. DreamHost guarantees an uptime of 99.9%.
In our testing, we found that DreamHost had an average uptime of 99.97%. There were a few times when we had to reach out to support, but our issues were quickly resolved.
DreamHost VPS Hosting Features
DreamHost offers a variety of VPS hosting features, including:
- Unlimited storage and bandwidth
- Multiple PHP versions available
- Choice between Linux or Windows operating systems
- Full root access for increased control over the server environment
- Easy to use panel for creating multiple hosted websites on the same account
- SSH access for secure access to the server
- Automated backups for added security
- Flexible scalability options for increased storage and bandwidth as your business needs grow
- An easy to use control panel to manage the various aspects of the hosting, including creating databases and managing domains
How Easy Is DreamHost VPS Hosting To Use
DreamHost’s VPS hosting is designed to be easy to use, regardless of your technical knowledge. You can easily manage and configure your server with their in-house control panel or through SSH access.
The control panel has all the features you need to customize and manage your server, allowing you to set up multiple sites, use databases, monitor usage and more.
The setup process is also streamlined, so you can be up and running quickly.
DreamHost VPS Hosting Our Final Take
Whether it’s dependable performance or scalability you’re seeking, Dreamhost has got it covered.
You’ll also gain access to a generous amount of features, including unlimited sites and emails on any plan.
DreamHost’s VPS costs are also highly affordable compared to other web hosting services.
We will note, however — the base storage is pretty low for these plans. This is the only limiting feature when it comes to DreamHost’s VPS plans.
DreamHost Dedicated Hosting Review
DreamHost’s Dedicated Hosting solution is designed to provide the highest level of control and customization for users who require large amounts of power and resources.
With their managed hosting package, customers can access unlimited data storage, unmetered bandwidth, and a range of powerful features to host web applications or complex websites with extreme reliability.
Their dedicated server plans also include high-performance hardware, private networking, and virtualization technology to ensure maximum performance and scalability.
For these reasons, we recommend their dedicated hosting for larger businesses or enterprises.
DreamHost Dedicated Hosting Speed Review
DreamHost dedicated hosting offers some of the fastest speeds available in dedicated hosting.
The servers are equipped with SSD storage, allowing for faster file access, and they offer up to 12 cores and 16GB of RAM per processor.
DreamHost also has an advanced caching system to ensure that your website loads rapidly without interruptions or slowdowns.
Here’s what we found in terms of data:
- Grade: A
- Performance: 95%
- Largest Contentful Paint: 1.1s
- Total Blocking Time: 0ms
- Cumulative Layout Shift: 0.01
DreamHost Dedicated Hosting Uptime Review
When it comes to DreamHost’s Dedicated Hosting, you can expect excellent uptime and impressive speeds.
The company offers powerful Intel core i7 processors, 100 Mbps network connections, and SSD storage for lightning-fast performance.
We experienced near-perfect uptime with an average of 99.98%.
DreamHost Dedicated Hosting Features
Some of the features of DreamHost’s dedicated hosting plans include:
- High performance servers and unlimited bandwidth
- 24/7 support with knowledgeable technicians
- Unlimited domain and website hosting
- SSL, SSH, and FTP access
- Fully managed and controlled service
- Ability to customize server configuration for custom applications
How Easy Is DreamHost Dedicated Hosting To Use
Setting up DreamHost Dedicated Hosting is a simple process. You can choose from different server configurations, and the setup is quick and easy.
The control panel allows you to manage your hosting with ease, making it suitable for beginners.
We’ve included a screenshot of the cPanel to give you a better idea of what we’re referencing.
DreamHost Dedicated Hosting Our Final Take
As discussed previously, DreamHost offers 2 affordable plans that both offer unlimited monthly data transfers and root access.
Their dedicated servers are highly reliable — no complaints from team TYB.
That is, unless you’re trying to build a Microsoft-operated website — DreamHost only offers hosting on Linux servers.
DreamHost WordPress Hosting Review
DreamHost presents WordPress hosting in three ways:
- DreamPress
- DreamPress Plus
- DreamPress Pro
The standard option of the bunch is DreamPress, which provides superior website care with automatic updates, daily backups, and high-level security protection.
In this section of the review, we’ll be taking a closer look at DreamHost’s WordPress hosting, evaluating it on five factors: speed, uptime, features, ease of use, and our overall impression.
DreamPress
Enter your description-
1 WordPress Website
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Free Domain Included
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~100k Monthly Visitors
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30GB SSD Storage
DreamPress Plus
Enter your description-
1 WordPress Website
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Free Domain Included
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~300k Monthly Visitors
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60GB SSD Storage
Enter your title
Enter your description-
1 WordPress Website
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Free Domain Included
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~1M Monthly Visitors
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120GB SSD Storage
DreamHost WordPress Hosting Speed Review
DreamHost’s WordPress hosting is speedy, but not as fast as their dedicated hosting solutions.
It has caching and performance improvements built specifically for WordPress that help to speed up loading times.
Here are the results from giving it all it could handle on our staging site:
- Grade: B
- Performance: 81%
- Largest Contentful Paint: 1.9s
- Total Blocking Time: 0ms
- Cumulative Layout Shift: 0.01
DreamHost WordPress Hosting Uptime Review
DreamHost offers a 100% uptime guarantee, and they have been known to keep that promise in the past.
Similarly, our staging site only went down for a couple of minutes during our 30 days of testing. While this wasn’t 100%, it was still impressive.
DreamHost WordPress Hosting Features
DreamHost WordPress Hosting Features:
- Automated WordPress setup and installation with a few easy clicks
- 24/7 support from experienced WordPress developers
- High-performance, scalable hosting environment that can grow with your website’s traffic
- Security features like built-in firewalls and virus scanning to protect your website from malicious activity
- Daily backups of site data for added peace of mind when making changes or updates to your website content
- Support for multiple versions of WordPress, so you can choose the one best suited for your website’s needs
- Pre-installed themes and plugins for a hassle-free customization experience, as well as automatic updates whenever new versions become available
- Access to DreamHost’s panel of advanced customization tools, so you can fine-tune your site’s performance without any coding knowledge required
How Easy Is DreamHost WordPress Hosting To Use
DreamHost WordPress hosting is incredibly easy to use and provides a comprehensive suite of features that make website management simple, even for beginners.
With their intuitive control panel, users can access all the features they need in one place and set up their site with just a few clicks.
Installation of plugins is also straightforward, and the built-in staging environment allows for testing before pushing updates live.
DreamHost WordPress Hosting Our Final Take
With DreamPress you can truly benefit from a one-of-a-kind white glove treatment for your website.Â
You can’t go wrong with DreamHost’s managed WordPress hosting plans. You’ll receive the utmost care and priority attention, for half the price of other competitors.
If you’re not interested in managed hosting, you can also access regular WordPress packages from DreamHost for lower prices.
DreamHost Customer Support Review
DreamHost has a highly responsive and patient customer service team that is beginner-friendly and always available.
While they don’t offer phone support, they make up for it in their availability via live, email, or ticket-based support.
We had a few issues with their VPS hosting, but they were resolved almost immediately.
Because of that, we have to say that DreamHost has some great customer service.
DreamHost Security
In terms of overall security, we weren’t overly impressed with DreamHost. Their plans include a basic firewall, malware scanning and removal, two-factor authentication and automated backups.
However, these features are fairly basic at best and don’t provide the same level of protection as other hosts like WP Engine or Flywheel.
Overall, our staging site remained safe, but we hope they can add a little extra protection in the future.
DreamHost SSL
Yes, DreamHost offers free SSL certificates with all of their plans except dedicated hosting.
DreamHost Professional Email
 Hosting is a great choice for businesses who want reliable and secure storage solutions.
It includes all the features necessary to keep your emails safe and backed up, including virus protection and spam filtering.
This service also offers unlimited storage, so you can store as many emails as needed without having to worry about running out of space.
Plans start at $1.67/month per mailbox.
DreamHost Website Builder
DreamHost has WordPress website building plans starting at $2.59/month. They offer a variety of hosting plans and the website building feature makes setting up a website easy.
We found that DreamHost’s builder is quite intuitive and easy to use. It offers a variety of templates and hosting options, perfect for any DIY website builder.
The drag-and-drop editor is user friendly, allowing you to customize the look of your site with ease.
Is DreamHost Good for Business?
Yes, DreamHost is a great choice for businesses.
DreamHost offers a wide range of hosting plans for businesses of all sizes, and many of them are designed specifically to meet the needs of business websites.
Their hosting plans include the ability to host multiple domains under one account, as well as access to an advanced control panel with a suite of tools and resources to help you manage your website.
DreamHost Final Verdict
Like all web hosting software, DreamHost has pros and cons — however, their benefits far outweigh any minor inconveniences, such as a lack of phone support.
DreamHost really stands out with its efficient website-building software, top-notch security options, and insanely affordable prices.
Not to mention, they provide a stellar money-back guarantee for shared hosting services.
DreamHost comes highly recommended by the Tweak Your Biz team.
DreamHost Alternatives
If DreamHost doesn’t quite meet what you need, here are some other options.
Hostinger
Like DreamHost, Hostinger offers considerable bang for your buck with its amazing combination of features and affordability.
Not only do they offer a free domain name for one year with nearly any plan — more so than DreamHost — but also unlimited disk space and great uptime too.
Hostinger also offers more types of web hosting than DreamHost, including CyberPanel hosting and Cloud hosting.
However, they limit the number of websites on their plans to 300. DreamHost has no limits at all.
DreamHost also tops them when it comes to storage space and speed because they host from more databases.
A2 Hosting
if you want to use WordPress as the foundation of your website A2 Hosting will help you get the job done.
A2 Hosting offers more WordPress-driven features than DreamHost.
A2 Hosting also triumphs over DreamHost is with their loading times.
As I said earlier, DreamHost is simply not the absolute best when it comes to quick loading speed.
Though DreamHost tops Hostinger, A2 offers 20x faster page loads.
However, A2 Hosting falls short of DreamHost’s impressive SSD storage amounts.
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DreamHost FAQ
Thanks to its unique tools, such as an intuitive site builder, as well as powerful security protections, affordability, and generous features, DreamHost is a top-tier TYB pick when it comes to web hosting.
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DreamHost is extremely easy to use and was designed with beginners in mind.
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We’d recommend DreamHost over GoDaddy, because it offers similar features for a more affordable price.
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