With over 8,000,000 customers and 12,000,000 domains registered, 1&1 IONOS is clearly a leading web host. The company offers all-inclusive web hosting packages that are beginner-friendly and attractively-priced (at least for the initial period).
This article is going to take you step-by-step through the process of creating an account. If you’d like to learn more about 1&1 IONOS, I’d recommend reading the in-depth review.
Creating a New Account
First, you need to select a plan. There are three tiers of shared hosting (Business, Pro, and Expert) and three tiers of managed WordPress hosting (Essential, Business, and Pro).
I chose the Business shared hosting plan, as the 100 GB of storage it offers was more than enough for me.
All plans come with a free domain, so unless you’ve already purchased one elsewhere, simply enter the domain you’d like. If it’s available, you can add it to your cart.
The next page will offer you the choice of a one-month or one-year term. As the month-to-month price was several times higher, I opted for an annual term. Plus, I could see that there’s a 30-day money-back guarantee, so there was no risk in taking the longer contract.
On the next page, there were a few upsells. I decided not to purchase any of them, but the options included a search engine optimization coach (dubbed rankingCoach Essential) and managed WordPress hosting, which can both be useful for beginners.
I then had to create an account and pay by direct debit, one of the major credit cards, or PayPal.
Once I’d paid, I was told to wait for a confirmation email that would contain my login information. This email came immediately; however, it didn’t include the login details. It took me a couple of minutes to remember that I’d set up a password when I created my account, so I used that to log in successfully.
Once I was logged in, the interface prompted me to connect the domain I’d purchased and install WordPress. I cover this process in-depth in my how-to guide.
A Quick and Painless Sign-Up Process
Creating an account with 1&1 IONOS was easy and straightforward. I completed it within a couple of minutes. If you do run into issues, the only downside is that you’ll need to phone support, as there’s no option to hop on live chat or send an email.
If you’re looking for a company that offers live chat support throughout the sign-up process, I’d recommend reading about SiteGround. Alternatively, if that’s not an issue for you, read my in-depth review of 1&1 IONOS.
