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Nexcess Review: Are the Premium Features Worth It? [2024]

Caitlin Greyling Caitlin Greyling Web Hosting Expert

Nexcess’ unique premium shared hosting plans are ideal for SMBs and e-commerce sites. Servers are configured specifically for WordPress, WooCommerce, Adobe Commerce (Magento), and more. Overall, Nexcess makes website creation and management ridiculously easy and affordable. However, you will pay more than standard shared hosting rates for Nexcess’ scalable performance and premium features.

Overview

Nexcess hosting landing page
You might need to enable the Nexcess Performance Monitoring plugin in WordPress

A Solid Host for Small Businesses and E-Commerce Sites

Nexcess specializes in shared cloud hosting that’s more powerful than your standard shared hosting setup. You can also choose from various managed hosting tiers with ample resources, tools, and support.

All of Nexcess’ plans are powerful enough to run most standard informational business sites or e-commerce storefronts – and affordably, as well. Nexcess is one of the lowest-cost premium hosting providers due to its unique shared scalable cloud infrastructure. Typically, hosts only offer scalable resources on pricier VPS and dedicated server plans.

This allows Nexcess to automatically improve site performance and speed during traffic surges. Plus, it offers easy-to-use, exclusive plugins and tools that make monitoring and optimizing site performance straightforward.

4.8

Features

Specialized Features Equal Improved Performance and Easier Site Optimization for Beginners

Backed by cloud infrastructure and the unique features and tools included in its packages, Nexcess’ shared hosting plans really do stand out from the competition. First off, all plans include features to ensure your site’s maintenance, security, and optimizations are covered.

Secondly, you can easily optimize your website because all of these tools are very user-friendly, even for beginners. You can clone your site in a staging area to test changes before they go live, and you can even build an online shop without knowing how to code.

Performance Monitor Plugin

Nexcess WordPress dashboard Performance Monitor plugin setting.
You might need to enable the Nexcess Performance Monitoring plugin in WordPress

The Performance Monitor plugin included with all Nexcess WordPress hosting plans monitors your WordPress site’s performance before and after plugins are installed or updated, giving you valuable insights into potential performance issues and, sometimes, how you can improve or fix these.

Though automatically set up, you may need to toggle the Performance Monitoring plugin on and off in the WordPress dashboard to get it up and running.

Cloud-Based Autoscaling in Times of Heavy Traffic

All Nexcess hosting plans come with 24 hours of free instant autoscaling per month, which allows them to handle surges in traffic so that your site doesn’t slow down when business is booming. This is achieved by increasing the number of allowed “PHP workers” (background processes) to match your site visitors’ demand during surges.

In addition, Nexcess’ hosting plans include the NGINX Accelerator, which improves site speed and security by pre-fetching and caching site content so that it loads more quickly with repeat visits.

Another benefit is that Nexcess doesn’t charge overage fees if your site exceeds its resource limits. The sales team will recommend upgrading to a higher plan if your site is continuously using more than its allocated resources.

Nexcess Visual Comparison Tool

Nexcess dashboard Visual Comparison tool
You can find the Nexcess Visual Comparison Tool on your account dashboard.

Updating your site and its plugins without proper testing can be fraught with risks – even potentially crashing or corrupting it. With the Nexcess Visual Comparison Tool, you don’t need to worry about all that.

Nexcess pre-tests update changes to WordPress or WooCommerce sites in a secure staging environment. Then, it lets you know if there may be issues before making any updates. Of course, there’s still a chance problems will occur. But I appreciate that Nexcess adds an extra safeguard to ensure smoother site updates.

Manage and Design Multiple Sites With a Single Plan

Due to generous website quotas on higher-tier plans, Nexcess is a good choice for website designers and managers, as well as companies with multiple brands or platforms. You can run multiple sites on the higher-tier Nexcess plans (or upgrade to do so) without needing to sign up for another account.

That said, Nexcess’s WordPress website quotas are more generous than its WooCommerce-specific and Magento hosting plans. For example, you can only host a maximum of 30 online stores on Nexcess’ most expensive Enterprise WooCommerce hosting plan, whereas you can host up to 250 sites on the top-end Enterprise WordPress hosting plan.

Nexcess Features at a Glance

Free domain name?
Free SSL? (Let’s Encrypt)
Money-back guarantee* 30 days
Uptime guarantee 100%
Managed hosting features?
Data centers The Netherlands, the UK, Australia, and the US (West & East Coast)
4.7

Ease of use

Nexcess dashboard website management tools.
The easy-to-navigate Nexcess dashboard for your site features all the management tools you need.

Very Simple Setup & Management – But It Could Be More Streamlined

Between selecting a domain name and hosting plan, processing payment, and uploading my WordPress test site, the entire Nexcess setup process took around 30 minutes. Overall, it was relatively easy (apart from some minor hiccups, which I’ll discuss later) – and didn’t require too much technical knowledge. The Nexcess portal itself is very easy to navigate, too – I had no issues finding all the tools I’d need to optimize my site.

Creating a New Account with Nexcess

Your Nexcess account is created when you purchase one of its WordPress, WooCommerce-specific, Magento, or StoreBuilder plans, which you can do by clicking the Buy (Plan Name) button under the relevant hosting plan.

The purchasing process is pretty simple from there on out, only featuring one page on which you’ll be asked to answer setup questions.

Nexcess domain registration add-on.
Nexcess won’t upsell you a domain name during the hosting sign-up process.

However, do note that if you want to register a domain name with Nexcess, you should do so in advance, as this option isn’t offered to you while you’re purchasing a hosting plan. You can do so by scrolling down to the bottom of the Nexcess website and selecting Domain Registration from the listed Add On options. Confusing, I know. But rest assured that you’ll be offered a hosting plan after selecting a domain name.

Nexcess’ acceptable payment options include credit cards (Visa, MasterCard, Amex, and Discover) and PayPal, which is convenient. A plus? The only “upsells” you need to decide on during this entire process are domain privacy (if you’re buying a domain name from Nexcess) and whether or not you’re paying for hosting on a monthly or annual basis.

Connecting a Domain and Installing WordPress

Hosting upsells after the Nexcess domain registration name purchase process.
Be sure to add a domain name first to start off your Nexcess hosting plan purchase.

4After paying for your plan, you’ll receive a few emails regarding the status of your purchase and your new account details. You should also receive a request to verify the personal information you provided for domain registration with ICANN (if you purchased a domain). Conveniently, you’ll be logged straight into your Nexcess dashboard after paying, where your WordPress or other site details are also displayed, ready for login.

In my case, WordPress came pre-installed, as I picked a Nexcess WordPress hosting plan (Spark). All I had to do was click Add Website to access the WordPress dashboard and upload my test site.

I only experienced one minor issue with my domain name, whereby my WordPress website didn’t point to it but a placeholder address instead. I found this odd since I purchased my domain name directly from Nexcess. After manually changing this setting myself in the Domains > Modify Master Domain section, I also had to contact support to get my WordPress account reset. In hindsight, I probably could have saved myself the trouble by asking Nexcess support to sort out the issue, but at least it didn’t take long to fix.

Add Team Members

One nifty feature is that you can add team members to your Nexcess account. So, they can edit your site and help with other design, admin, or accounting tasks directly without you needing to share your personal login details.

While logged into your Nexcess dashboard, you can add them by clicking your name in the right-hand corner and selecting Team Members. Then, click the purple Add Member button and configure their user type and details.

Site Stencil Creator

Nexcess dashboard website stencil creation tool.
You can copy or re-populate a site using the Nexcess Site Stencil tool.

On the Nexcess dashboard, you can quickly and easily create a stencil of your site. You can then use this to copy or re-populate it. A useful feature if you happen to manage multiple websites or just want to keep a copy safe. Simply select Plans > your plan > and Stencil from the left-hand menu in the Nexcess dashboard. You can also make as many up-to-date stencil copies of your site as you want and delete outdated versions here.

Automatic Daily Backups

As a managed host, Nexcess handles all your site backups for you. The best part is that you don’t even need to configure any backup settings at all. Backups are set up automatically as soon as you purchase a hosting plan and create a storefront or site. You can view your backups in the Nexcess dashboard under Plans > select your plan > Sites > select your site > Backups.

Backups are kept for 30 days, and you can even manually back up your site on occasion if need be. However, unlike automatic backups, manual backups are stored locally, meaning they use and count towards your plan’s storage limit. If you’ve used more than 50% of your allocated disk space, you cannot perform manual backups, either. To do so, you’ll need to upgrade.

4.8

Performance

Stellar Performance – Backed-Up By a Generous 100% Uptime Guarantee

Nexcess proprietary CDN tool.
Nexcess’ proprietary CDN can improve your site’s global performance.

After being put through our rigorous testing process, it’s clear to me that Nexcess has earned its spot among our top-ranked hosts. In a number of tests, it scored above average, which is likely thanks to the aforementioned NGINX Accelerator tool.

However, on top of all this, you can enable Nexcess’ proprietary content delivery network (CDN), which is included with all plans. Our tests were done without it, but I’d certainly recommend setting it up if your site’s customer base is global.

Not only does Nexcess promise 100% uptime, but it delivers – our Nexcess-hosted site didn’t suffer any downtime during the entire testing period.

As far as loading speed goes, 1-1.5 seconds at peak times and 0.5-1 second during quieter times were typical.

GTmetrix

Nexcess' GTmetrix test results for 10 days of monitoring.
Our Nexcess-hosted website performed impressively.

GTmetrix scores tested websites on a scale, with “A” being the top GTmetrix score – and the value our Nexcess test site typically achieved. Besides caching, the only other recommendation from GTmetrix to improve this score was to use a CDN.

As you can see, the loading times didn’t fluctuate too much over peak and non-peak times, either. Our test site’s loading time remained relatively stable and was often under 1 second throughout the week.

Detailed Nexcess GTmetrix site loading time test results for 10 days of monitoring
At peak times, the typical load time for our Nexcess-hosted test site was still fast.

Sucuri Load Time Tester

Nexcess' Sucuri Load Time Tester test results for East Coast server.
Performance was best in the US, but still acceptable as far away as Tokyo and Brazil, even without a CDN.

Nexcess has 10 data centers located around the globe, including in Australia, the UK (2), the Netherlands, and the US (6).

In our Sucuri Load Time Tester tests, loading times were best for servers located near the Eastern Seaboard, as our site was hosted in this location (Lansing, MI). Surprisingly, our Nexcess-hosted test site loaded quite fast further afield, even without enabling the CDN.

UptimeRobot

Nexcess' UptimeRobot test results for 10 days of monitoring.
Nexcess goes one step above, guaranteeing and providing 100% uptime.

Potentially catastrophic downtime is kept to a zero with Nexcess hosting, which is backed by a 100% uptime guarantee. True to form, our test site on the Nexcess Spark WordPress hosting plan endured no incidents of downtime whatsoever.

Nexcess' UptimeRobot incident and event logs for 10 days of monitoring.
We recorded no downtime or negative incidents through the testing period on Nexcess’ servers.
4.8

Support

Very Quick & Efficient Support – But With Some Minor Security Concerns

Nexcess support landing page.
Nexcess’ support team is on 24/7/365 via toll-free phone lines, live chat, and ticket.

Nexcess offers customer support 24/7, 365 days of the year. Its support channels include:

  • Live chat
  • Phone (toll-free – Australia, the UK, and the US)
  • Ticket (via Nexcess control panel only).

Upon contacting Nexcess support via live chat, I was connected to an agent immediately. I submitted questions regarding my aforementioned issues with my Nexcess domain name and my WordPress site not loading correctly. The agent was quick to suggest the remedy (a reset of my WordPress site password). After sending me a new password, everything was in order, and my site was connected to and loading on the correct domain name.

However, I would advise resetting your WordPress site password if this happens to you. The agent was able to view my entire password, which he relayed to me via live chat. While I was a bit concerned about this from a security standpoint, the agent did ask for permission before they reset the password.

Nexcess' live chat support.
Nexcess’ live chat support is fast, reliable, and efficient.

Nexcess’ ticket support was also quite pleasant, as it’s both easy to submit a ticket and track it thereafter. Within two minutes, I received a presumably automated response to say my ticket had been received and was currently being reviewed.

Having tested a few hosts’ ticketing systems, I was quite impressed by Nexcess ticket support. Not only did the Nexcess team get back to me just 15 minutes later, but they answered each and every question in detail.

Nexcess' ticket support.
You can create support tickets via your Nexcess dashboard when logged in.

If you have any queries, it’s also worth checking the Nexcess Knowledge Base. With tons of FAQs and in-depth articles (including written and video tutorials), you may just be able to solve a problem yourself without getting in contact with support.

That said, if you’re strapped for time or confused, feel free to ask the support team to handle the issue for you. You’re paying for fully managed hosting, including 24/7 technical support, after all.

4.7

Pricing

Pricey Shared Hosting – But It Is Cloud-Based

If you know a thing or two about shared hosting, Nexcess’ prices may seem a bit higher than average. However, there are a few factors to take into consideration. Firstly, Nexcess includes some ramped-up performance features and premium plugins that typical shared hosting doesn’t. Secondly, the host’s plan pricing (for more basic packages, at least) is quoted in full – not discounted.

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Nexcess packages are worthwhile if you want premium hosting for one or more busy websites, especially e-commerce sites. The real decision comes down to your ideal platform and specs, which would usually be WordPress (with or without WooCommerce). You can also use Magento (Adobe Commerce) if you prefer. All of these plans have Agency versions as well, which allow you to resell hosting to your clients if you’re a developer.

There is also the StoreBuilder plan, which allows you to use easy-to-use, drag-and-drop tools to build a WordPress/WooCommerce-based website – premium Nexcess hosting included.

If you want total control of your server, you can also select one of Nexcess’ flexible cloud hosting plans, which aren’t limited to one specific website or e-commerce store builder. These are geared towards advanced users.

You can also ask the Nexcess team about their custom enterprise solutions, which can be ramped up to suit heavy-traffic sites or online storefronts if need be.

Comparison

How does Nexcess match up to the competition?

KamateraCompareOur Score4.8Compare
Liquid WebCompareOur Score4.8Compare
NexcessCompareOur Score4.8Compare
Tailor Made ServersCompareOur Score2.9Compare

Nexcess REVIEW: BOTTOM LINE

Nexcess is one of the few hosts that scores really well across the board – from the quality of support to useful, value-for-money features, plenty of plan tiers, and more. So, it’s no surprise Nexcess has climbed the ranks to become one of our favorites.

While it’s a bit more expensive than some providers, Nexcess’ cloud-based shared hosting plans are a very good choice if you’re looking to upgrade from standard shared hosting. With managed services bundled in and plenty of beginner-friendly tools, you won’t need to stress if you’re not too tech-savvy, either. Nexcess has you covered.

FAQ

What type of hosting does Nexcess offer?

Nexcess sells managed shared cloud hosting, which offers more power and flexibility than typical shared hosting. Its infrastructure is fully managed and geared for WordPress/WooCommerce, Magento, Craft CMS, and ExpressionEngine – from basic up to enterprise-level e-ecommerce sites. They also include 24 hours of instant autoscaling per month, which ensures smooth performance during short-term traffic surges.

Does Nexcess offer WordPress hosting?

Yes, Nexcess sells shared cloud hosting for WordPress, as well as WooCommerce, Magento, and other content management systems (CMSs). Nexcess even has its own proprietary StoreBuilder for creating e-commerce sites. Nexcess’ WordPress hosting plans come in various tiers, which vary in features and specifications – but all are managed.

What customer support channels does Nexcess offer?

Nexcess customer support is available via live chat, phone, or ticket 24/7/365. You can contact the team for free via their toll-free 1-866 (US), 0-808 (UK), and 1-800 (Australia) numbers. Live chat is available when logged in or out of your account. It’s just faster when logged in, as the necessary fields are pre-populated with your details. Ticket response is also a very reliable and fast way to access Nexcess support.

How do I point my domain to Nexcess nameservers?

You can point your domain name to the Nexcess nameservers yourself via the Nexcess dashboard while logged in. Simply navigate to Plans > select your plan > Sites > select your site > Domains > Pointer Domains > and click the “+” symbol. Alternatively, buy your domain name from Nexcess directly and ask their support team to point your domain name to its servers for you.
Caitlin Greyling Caitlin Greyling
A freelance author, graphic designer, and photographer, Caitlin Greyling writes about web hosting, web builder software, graphic design, tech, and electronics, and has published hundreds of product reviews and comparisons for Website Planet, The Daily Mail, and Durability Matters. Her creative and technical knowledge has been showcased at PictureCorrect, Photutorial, and others. She is currently studying for an NCTJ diploma in journalism. When Caitlin’s not working, she’s exploring nature with her son and dog or relaxing at home with her cat.
3.2
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Nexcess Has Fallen Apart – Buyer Beware

After being a customer since 2017 my service has been some of the worst I have ever experienced in nearly 15 years of digital business and working with web hosts. They have outsourced all levels of support making it truly some of the worst that exists in the industry. They are unwilling and unable to assist with fixes that previously they were very helpful with. I am unsure if this is worse because of their acquisition by Liquid Web but something definitely changed at Nexcess and for the worse. Do yourself a favor and just keep doing a bit more research to find a better web host, you will be glad you did.

avatar
Jordan M, USA
August 23, 2022
1
Nexcess Shambolic Service

Nexcess toke over Future Hosting has been a catastrophe firstly their migration did not include the Support Tickets thus, no record of previous issues. But those issue on FH is nothing compare to the few months dealing with incompetent support staff at Nexcess. The worse is that you need to repeat the whole issue again and again each time someone takes over a ticket. Moreover, the support system fail keeping previous posts within a ticket, which they did acknowledge but still having not figure out fixing. It have cost me more in my and staff time, in the last two months, dealing with them, that the month cost of a dedicated server for the past six month. I could give so many examples of failure in fixing server issues that they link to devices, IP addresses, applications, OS, third party service provider such as cPanel ...... But it is no longer worth my time.

avatar
Hans Kevin Koborg, Mauritius
June 22, 2022
1
Best WooCommerce Hosting

Currently, I have purchased WooCommerce hosting from Nexcess. Their services are quite good & interesting. But I want a VPS Hosting to host my other website but Nexcess is not providing the facility of VPS hosting. Then I did a lot of research & I came to know that BlueHost, Domain Racer & Dedicated Core are providing the best VPS hosting services.

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Robert Smith, Poland
April 08, 2022
4
Excellent support

Best support out there. Fast responses and issues always resolved in a timely manner. Dependable service and excellent uptime. Highly recommend Nexcess for your website hosting and the domain registrar. Great price and packages to select from.

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Christopher Ewing, USA
June 30, 2021
5
Responsive, Reliable, Real…

As an account manager at a Magento site development agency, it is always a pleasure working with Nexcess on client projects! The team at Nexcess is consistently reliable, responsive, and customer success-oriented! They excel at the technical and human level of their workday in and out. - Nicole P -

avatar
Nicole Peters, USA
June 17, 2021
5
Always Improving

I've been with Nexcess for about a year. They have made progress over the last several months and are continuing to improve. The backend admin panel lacks some features common at other hosts (like the ability to manage domain redirects or access a file manager). Reliability has been strong. Support is good most of the time, though out of the couple dozen times I have contacted them, on 2 or 3 occasions I didn't hear from them until I sent another email to remind them of the issue. When they do respond, the support team is helpful and friendly.

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Jacob S, USA
August 21, 2020
4
Exceptional Partner for our ecommerce business

Nothing but the highest praise for the entire Nexcess platform + support personnel. We've been with them for 8+ years. Every hosting provider will have hiccups. Where Nexcess excels is in helping resolve issues with us when we need them most.

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K Song, USA
August 20, 2020
5
Best Magento host out there

I have been with Nexcess for several years and they have been fantastic to work with. Magento really requires specialized knowledge and they have it. Their support understands Magento and has bailed me out of quite a few situations. I would highly recommend.

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Tyler Jensen, USA
August 20, 2020
5
Family sharingMulti User SharingExpert SupportBackupSmart syncPersonal SolutionBusiness SolutionTeams optionsOffline foldersFile history and recovery Read more reviews
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