While Hostinger’s hosting services are meant for all – from tech novices and beginners to developers and pros, DigitalOcean focuses on offering developer-friendly plans. Though their cloud hosting plans may seem similar, they are not. I evaluated both these providers on features, performance, pricing, security, and support. I find Hostinger to be slightly ahead of DigitalOcean in this Hostinger vs. DigitalOcean competition.
You can click here to see Hostinger’s latest deals or continue reading to know what makes Hostinger take the winner’s crown.
1. Plans and Pricing
Hostinger delivers better value for money for beginners
From shared and WordPress hosting to email hosting, managed cloud hosting, and VPS, you’ll get them all at Hostinger.
DigitalOcean offers cloud VMs (virtual machines) that it calls Droplets. DigitalOcean’s Standard Droplets are available at cheap monthly rates, which are lower than Hostinger’s cloud hosting plans. You can even opt for hourly billing with DigitalOcean.
Hostinger offers the most affordable pricing for cloud plans when opting for the 48-month term. While the monthly rates are comparatively higher, the lowest plan cost is nearly six times that of DigitalOcean’s starting plan. Renewal prices also exhibit a steeper increase (up to 2X). Nonetheless, if you require beginner-friendly features, Hostinger provides enhanced value for your investment.
With Hostinger, you’ll get a 30-day money-back guarantee. DigitalOcean offers no refund.
Though Hostinger compels you to make a long-term commitment to get the cheapest rates, it scores over DigitalOcean due to its user-friendly features that offer better value for money.
2. Features
More plan variety and user-friendly features give Hostinger the upper hand
With Hostinger’s fully managed cloud hosting plans, you’ll get 200GB SSD-300GB SSD storage, 3GB-16GB RAM, 2-8 CPU cores, and unlimited bandwidth. Other features on offer include CloudLinux with LVE containers, Cloudflare CDN integration, cache manager, daily backups, 1X-4X speed boost, 1-click auto-installer, and multiple freebies such as domain (for the first year), dedicated IP address, and SSL certificate.
DigitalOcean hosting with Standard Droplets comes with 25GB SSD-3.75TB SSD, 1TB-12TB transfer, 1-32 vCPUs, and 1GB-192GB memory. DigitalOcean’s VMs come with floating IP addresses, cloud firewalls, load balancers, API, CLI, and client libraries, multiple pre-installed software (Debian, Ubuntu, CentOS, etc.), isolated networks, 100+ pre-configured 1-click apps (Docker, WordPress, LAMP, Plesk, etc.), Let’s Encrypt SSL certificate (paid), and automated weekly backups (paid) as well as snapshots for backing up your hosting environment.
To compare the key features of both these providers, you can take a look at this feature comparison table.
| Hostinger | DigitalOcean | |
|---|---|---|
| Hosting Types | Shared, WordPress, and email hosting plus managed cloud hosting and VPS | Developer-friendly cloud VMs (virtual machines) |
| Free Domain | ✓(for the first year) | × |
| Free SSL Certificate | ✓ | × |
| Disk Space | 200GB SSD-300GB SSD (cloud hosting) | 25GB SSD-3.75TB SSD |
| Bandwidth | Unlimited | 1TB-12TB |
| Automatic Backups | Daily | Weekly |
| Control Panel | hPanel | Plesk, CyberPanel, and VPSrobots |
| Email accounts | Unlimited | No email service provided |
| Free CDN | ✓ | ✓(with Spaces) |
| Free Site Migration | × | × |
| Money-Back Guarantee | 30 days | × |
Despite tough competition, Hostinger wins, thanks to its wider range of hosting plans along with user-friendly features.
3. Performance
Hostinger outshines DigitalOcean with its credit-backed uptime guarantee and better performance
Hostinger’s datacenters are located across 7 different regions while DigitalOcean has 12 global datacenters. However, not all locations are available for DigitalOcean’s Droplet plans.
Hostinger utilizes a range of tools and technologies to deliver enhanced performance. These include LSCache plugins, SSDs, RAID-10, optional Cloudflare CDN, Smart Purge technology for easy cache management, an in-built cache manager, HTTP/2, and GZIP compression.
DigitalOcean uses SSDs, CDN, Block Storage (to give you more storage space that can be expanded without powering down the Droplet they are attached to), load balancers, and RAID.
4. Security
It’s a tie
Hostinger’s robust security measures include SSL certificate, CDN, data redundancy with RAID-10, daily backups, LVE containers (to facilitate account isolation), Wanguard anti-DDoS protection, use of advanced security modules on servers (like Suhosin PHP hardening, Apache mod_security, etc.), predictive server monitoring, and Bitninja/Imunify360 (WAF).
DigitalOcean also takes several steps to tighten security including disabling the directory indexes and using service auditing, firewall, SSH keys, VPC (Virtual Private Cloud) networks, regular backups, ECC (Error Correction Code) RAM, and unattended updates.
Comparable security features of both these providers make it difficult to pick a clear winner.
5. Support
A competent customer support desk helps Hostinger beat its competitor
Hostinger offers 24/7 email, live chat, and ticket support (for logged-in users). If waiting times (no matter how small they are) irritate you, you could even choose its paid “Priority Support” that positions you at #1 in the queue whenever you need support. I got speedy replies when I used Hostinger’s live chat. For self-help duties, Hostinger has tutorials, a blog, and a well-stocked knowledgebase.
Though DigitalOcean offers ticket support, submitting a ticket could be troublesome (as I experienced). For self-support, DigitalOcean maintains an online community and provides documentation, resources, articles, and tutorials.
Thanks to its superb support managed by its competent staff, Hostinger races miles ahead of DigitalOcean.
Hostinger Beats DigitalOcean to Emerge the Winner
Except for the security category where both these providers fight neck-and-neck, Hostinger convincingly beats DigitalOcean in all the remaining categories including features, pricing, performance, and support. So, I recommend Hostinger if you want to get optimal value for money while meeting your hosting requirements. If you’re still unsure, knowing that it features on our list of the best web hosting services would help.
Comparison Table
FAQ
Is Hostinger better than DigitalOcean?
Yes. With its user-friendly features along with better pricing, performance, and support, Hostinger is definitely the better choice. It even features on our list of the best web hosting services.
Does Hostinger offer WordPress hosting?
Yes, it offers 3 unmanaged WordPress plans. If you prefer having managed WordPress plans, I suggest you take a look at the best managed WordPress hosting providers.
Does DigitalOcean offer VPS hosting?
No, it doesn’t offer traditional VPS. However, you can get VMs in the cloud (Droplets) from it. If you think they don’t suit you, don’t worry because there are many other VPS providers in the market. You can check our list of the best cheap VPS hosting services to get a reliable and affordable VPS.
