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Cloudways Reviews: 4.7/5 — Highly Rated
Cloudways is a managed hosting provider that focuses on performance and simplicity. Whether you need simple server and application launches, or ongoing server maintenance, Couldways is built to simplify the whole process of server management to support business growth thanks to its powerful suite of tools and services that can help manage your eCommerce stores and business sites. It also underscores user options–from cloud providers and hosting.
| Capabilities |
API
CLI
|
|---|---|
| Segment |
Small Business
Mid Market
Enterprise
|
| Deployment | Cloud / SaaS / Web-Based |
| Support | 24/7 (Live rep), Chat, Email/Help Desk, FAQs/Forum, Knowledge Base, Phone Support |
| Training | Documentation |
| Languages | English |
Cloudways Pros and Cons
- Option to add as many website installations as you want
- Server speed is faster than competition
- Pay as you go pricing plan
- Managed app option with database backups
- No root access or server modifications
- Add ons require additional cost
- Inability to use Plesk or cPanel
Cloudways includes unlimited websites and unlimited visits on every plan, starting at $14 a month. That is the whole proposition, and it is a genuine outlier. Kinsta’s entry plan is $35 a month for one WordPress install with 20 GB of bandwidth; Cloudways’ $14 Micro server carries no install cap at all and 1 TB of transfer. You are renting a server rather than buying licensed slots, and the difference in what that gets you is substantial.
- What it is: Managed cloud hosting for WordPress, Magento, Laravel and PHP, on your choice of cloud provider.
- Best for: Agencies and developers hosting many sites who want managed infrastructure without per-site licensing.
- Pricing: From $14 a month for 1 GB RAM, rising to $99 for 8 GB. Verified July 2026.
- The honest catch: Server resources are the real limit — unlimited sites still share one server’s RAM.
What Is Cloudways?
Cloudways is a managed hosting layer that sits on top of cloud providers rather than running its own metal. You choose the provider and the server type — Basic, General Purpose or CPU Optimized; Standard or Premium — and Cloudways manages the stack, now branded Lightning Stack.
Two product lines sit side by side: Cloudways Flexible, the customisable managed hosting reviewed here, and Cloudways Autonomous, a fully managed autoscaling WordPress product for high-traffic ecommerce and LMS sites.
There is a free trial with no credit card required.
How Cloudways Works
- Server size is the meter — RAM, vCPU, storage and bandwidth.
- Websites and visits are unlimited on every plan.
- Billing is hourly, with a monthly figure shown alongside.
- Offsite backup storage costs $0.033 per GB per server.
- You choose the cloud provider and server class.
- All listed prices exclude tax.
Cloudways Pricing
Captured from Cloudways’ pricing page in July 2026 in US dollars, on DigitalOcean Standard servers.
| Plan | Monthly | Hourly | RAM | vCPU | Storage | Bandwidth | Per GB RAM |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Micro | $14 | $0.0208 | 1 GB | 1 | 25 GB NVMe | 1 TB | $14.00 |
| Small | $28 | $0.0417 | 2 GB | 1 | 50 GB NVMe | 2 TB | $14.00 |
| Medium | $54 | $0.0804 | 4 GB | 2 | 80 GB NVMe | 4 TB | $13.50 |
| Large | $99 | $0.1473 | 8 GB | 4 | 160 GB NVMe | 5 TB | $12.38 |
Every plan: Lightning Stack, unlimited visits, unlimited websites.
What actually decides your cost:
- Unlimited websites is the reason to be here. Managed WordPress hosts almost universally meter installs — Kinsta allows one at $35 a month and forty at $450. Cloudways allows as many as your server can run, at $14. For an agency with twenty small client sites, that difference is the entire business case.
- The real constraint moves from licences to resources. Unlimited sites on 1 GB of RAM is unlimited in the licensing sense only. What you are actually buying is a server, and twenty WordPress sites on a Micro will perform accordingly. Size by expected load, not by site count.
- The volume discount is real but modest. Cost per GB of RAM runs $14.00, $14.00, $13.50 and $12.38 across the four sizes — about 12% better at the top than the bottom, and no improvement at all from Micro to Small. Compare that with the flat-rate hosts reviewed here, where the per-unit price never moves at any size.
- Check how the hourly rate resolves against a full month. The published hourly figures correspond to the monthly price divided by 672 hours, a 28-day month — $0.0208 × 672 is $13.98, and the same holds for all four sizes. A 30-day month is 720 hours and a 31-day month 744, so confirm with Cloudways whether the monthly figure is a cap or whether a full month bills above it.
- Backups are an add-on. Offsite backup storage is charged at $0.033 per GB per server. On a 160 GB Large server that is a small but non-zero line, and it is separate from the storage included in the plan.
- Prices exclude tax, which the page states plainly. For EU buyers that is a meaningful addition to compare against gross-quoting competitors.
Who Should Use Cloudways
- Agencies hosting client sites. The clearest case — one server, many sites, no per-install licence.
- Developers running multiple projects. Laravel, Magento and PHP alongside WordPress on the same platform.
- Businesses wanting cloud choice. Pick the provider and server class rather than accepting one stack.
- Anyone testing before committing. A free trial with no credit card.
It fits poorly for people who want one high-performance site with dedicated support, where Kinsta or WP Engine invest more per site; for teams wanting a fully hands-off product, which is what Cloudways Autonomous exists for; and for buyers who need certainty on monthly cost before understanding hourly billing.
Honest Pros and Cons
Strengths
- Unlimited websites and unlimited visits on every plan, from $14.
- 1 TB of transfer bandwidth even on the entry server.
- Choice of cloud provider and server class.
- NVMe storage across the range.
- A free trial with no credit card.
- A real, if modest, volume discount — 12% better per GB at the top.
Limitations
- Unlimited sites still share one server’s RAM.
- No per-GB improvement from Micro to Small.
- Offsite backups cost $0.033 per GB on top.
- Hourly rates imply a 28-day month — confirm whether monthly is a cap.
- Prices exclude tax.
- Support and tuning are lighter than dedicated managed-WordPress hosts.
Cloudways Alternatives and How It Compares
- Kinsta and WP Engine are the premium managed-WordPress hosts, metering installs but investing more per site.
- Flywheel targets designers and agencies with a similar philosophy to Kinsta.
- SiteGround and A2 Hosting sit in the mid-market with simpler shared plans.
- Hostinger and DreamHost compete at the budget end.
- Liquid Web offers managed VPS and dedicated infrastructure.
- DigitalOcean directly, if you are willing to manage the stack yourself.
For a broader survey, browse our cloud hosting directory.
The Verdict
Cloudways answers a question the managed-WordPress market mostly refuses to: what if you just rented a server and put as many sites on it as it could handle? Unlimited websites and unlimited visits on every plan, starting at $14 a month with 1 TB of transfer, is a fundamentally different proposition from hosts that license installs. Against Kinsta’s $35 entry plan for a single WordPress site with 20 GB of bandwidth, the contrast is stark — and for an agency carrying twenty small client sites, it is the whole argument.
The honest counterweight is that “unlimited” describes licensing, not physics. Twenty sites on a 1 GB Micro server will perform like twenty sites on a 1 GB server, and the skill Cloudways asks of you is sizing by real load rather than by site count. That is a fair trade for the price, but it does move a responsibility onto you that premium managed hosts absorb — which is also why their per-site investment, support depth and tuning tend to be greater.
Two commercial details to settle before you commit. The published hourly rates work out to the monthly price divided by 672 hours — a 28-day month — so $0.0208 × 672 gives $13.98 against the $14 headline, and the same relationship holds at every size. Real months run 720 to 744 hours, so ask Cloudways directly whether the monthly figure is a cap or whether a full month bills above it. And offsite backup storage is $0.033 per GB per server, separate from the NVMe storage in the plan, with all prices excluding tax. The volume discount, meanwhile, is modest but genuine: $14.00 per GB of RAM at Micro and Small, falling to $12.38 at Large — roughly 12%, which is more than several flat-rate competitors offer at any size.
FAQ
How much does Cloudways cost?
Captured in July 2026 in US dollars on DigitalOcean Standard servers, excluding tax: Micro $14 a month for 1 GB RAM, 1 vCPU, 25 GB NVMe storage and 1 TB bandwidth; Small $28 for 2 GB; Medium $54 for 4 GB; and Large $99 for 8 GB. Every plan includes unlimited websites and unlimited visits. Offsite backup storage costs an additional $0.033 per GB per server.
Does Cloudways limit how many websites I can host?
No. Unlimited websites and unlimited visits appear on every plan, including the $14 Micro server. The practical limit is server resources rather than licensing — the sites you host share the RAM, CPU and storage of the plan you buy — so size the server by expected traffic and application load rather than by how many sites you intend to run.
Is Cloudways billed hourly or monthly?
Both figures appear. Each plan shows a monthly price and an hourly rate, and the hourly rate corresponds to the monthly price divided by 672 hours — a 28-day month. Since real months run 720 to 744 hours, it is worth confirming with Cloudways whether the monthly figure acts as a cap or whether a full month of hourly billing can exceed it.
Cloudways or Kinsta?
They solve different problems. Cloudways rents you a managed server with unlimited sites from $14 a month, putting resource-sizing in your hands. Kinsta licenses WordPress installs — one at $35, forty at $450 — with more per-site tuning, support and infrastructure investment. Choose Cloudways for many small sites at low cost, and Kinsta for fewer sites where performance and support matter more than price per site.
Does Cloudways include backups?
Not offsite ones at no charge. The pricing page notes that “$0.033/GB per server will be applied for offsite backup storage”, so backup retention is a separate usage-based line on top of the plan. The NVMe storage listed against each plan — 25 GB to 160 GB — is the server’s own disk rather than backup capacity.
Compare Cloudways with other popular tools in the same category.
Very happy with the speed and performance. Much easier to use than other alternatives.
Have had some issues with email and file backups filling up disk space, and I have to email support every time to get it cleared.
Hosting a large and well-used client website. We had to move from the old server as it was running super slow. As soon as I set it up on Cloudways it ran super fast and smooth.
This is the best user interface I have ever seen to manage website/application hosting. It's intuitive, modern and stable. Various servers to choose from with best performance from Google, Amazon & Co.
The only thing I dislike: No IPv6 is the only thing missing.
Great support team – no matter what issue I came up so far.
I love the way hundreds of websites can be managed, the speed, scalability and ease of configuration; They also add functionalities that users need to improve the administration and configuration of the sites.
I would like them to add UPCloud Also the prices are a bit high for instances greater than 2 Gb, when you need a cloud with 4 Gb of Ram the cost of administration increases to scale, for example: The cost of the 1 Gb instance buying direct without administration is 5 USD, using Cloudways the cost is 10 USD (okay, it is 5 USD extra for the excellent administration) when you need to scale to 2 Gb the administration cost is 12 USD, for 4 Gb it is 22 USD, for 8 Gb it is 40 USD, for 16 Gb is 55 USD ...
centralize the management of all customer sites in one place without the need for resellers with individual accounts.
Cloudways takes care of all the technical aspects, and provide a clean and easy to use backed for us to do the work we need.
Things took a bit to get used to as it is unlike cpanel or other backends we have used before.
With Couldways we found a solution to power a Google Server, but have them manage it.
amazing support. they resolve issues in minutes
you cannot manage DNSby yourself, you have to ask them to do that for you. It's not that important because it's done in minutes
Moved 6 sites to my server. Already improved my page speed ad overall feeling of the sites
Their fast service and support, they always go above and beyond to answer a question.
It'd be cool if they had an option to have free emails and buy a domain, like Siteground.
Hosting fast websites for clients.
How simple it is to set up applications and manage server settings etc.
The UI can be a bit slow at times, and would like to be able to edit other applications while application changes are happening (they do seem to be quite slow as well)
Hosting my clients website, saving lots of time (and increasing revenue)
Bilal N. Thank you so much buddy I have been bothering him to solve a problem of mine. He had the same passion i used to have at the beginning of my job. It was more like a partner.
This is not "plug and play". Take your time, evaluate, and let the team guide you through
Making a hosting client base
There are many benefits: Price, Speed, Backup/Restore etc. You get *unlimited* applications, even with the most basic plan, which is a w e s o m e ! You can even set a staging environment, to make your changes/test "in the background" (without affecting online site)
I would like to see more Wordpress specific features (controlled from Cloudways dashboard)
Easily and efficiently maintain our small Wordpress Site+Shop
the interface makes it easy to do complicated things from a simple interface. Support is excellent
markup on droplets is quite high. Some of the time you are paying double what you normally would for an otherwise automated system. It would be nice to get discounts on multiple servers for high volume users.
managing many clients websites from one panel. Makes it very easy to deploy and manage servers.
I appreciated step by step, hands on guidance from a Cloudways engineer!
Online tutorials are a little difficult for me to follow
Host migration
The support staff is knowledgeable and friendly.
Nothing to dislike really at this point.
Fast hosting was needed and they delivered.
I was recommended to Cloudways by a business contact and was originally uncertain, as I already have a reseller account with another provider. However, once signing up and adding my first server I was blown away by the speed in which servers are deployed, and the excellent performance. My website grade shot up from C to A just by moving the site across.
Nothing really. The control panel probably isn't as user friendly as some others, but it's functional and does exactly what it needs to do so why complicate it.
It's mostly about website performance for me. There has been such an increase in speed since moving and I will now benefit from moving my shared hosting accounts across to a Cloudways server for a fraction of the price I currently pay.
their support team is on hand, helpful, considerate and not rushing you to just get a job done at all. Even though, I pay for the lowest price plan, the support team treat me very well.
three months in and still cannot find any dislike to Cloudways yet.
Affiliate request, taking my site live, server checking, guide to support articles.
Easy, good value and support is brilliant. I looked at 8 other providers and cloudways by far the best value.
It would be great to get more of a breakdown of my invoice. There are so many variables with hosting I would love to understand the finer details.
easy migration with great support
The load time of the servers, the support and the interface
The pricing of the hosting is a bit higher as compared to the same hosting from oem like gcloud or aws
My website loads now blazzing fast and it helped me in gaing more customers
Servers speed and fast support via chat.
Affiliate support. They don't reply emails, no support.
I have no problems with Cloudways services.
I really enjoy using cloudways. They are great and from day one my website went from 5 seconds to 1,2 seconds speed!
So far nothing. Everything is great and hope to continue.
Speed of my website, CDN problem, cache plugin that works great.
As the owner o an agency, I don't often need support, but when I do, I need it fast. There support is first rate.
There really is nothing that I dislike enough to mention. issues are more personal preference.
Fast reliable application hosting.
The speed of my website is 3-5 times faster than on shared hosting. Also the speed is more reliable on shared hosting I had times when it would be very slow-presumably the server had a heavy load from other sites at the time. Also I have never been able to edit a wordpress site so quickly which makes quite a difference. Migrating a site was as simple as installing a Cloudways plugin and waiting until the plugin had finished. I have found the cloudways site straightforward and technical support very helpful. Basically it is a revolution-I will never go back to shared hosting.
Nothing .
Speed of our websites and deploying new sites
Besides the instant and huge speed improvement without lifting a finger, it's having the full visibility of what's going on with my websites when I want to see it and control it. I never imagined I would be able to pile all 12 of my websites onto servers and move them around freely as needed between servers and levels of service as I learn how to do it.
Honestly I've yet to encounter anything undesirable. I moved 12 websites into Cloudways and never once needed to contact support. It's not really because of any expertise, it's more about having the right attitude - working on a need-to-know basis and incrementally assembling things until done.
Cloudways affords me the detailed visibility of what's actually happening with my websites that's just not possible with managed wordpress hosting at, say, GoDaddy, Bluehost, Siteground, Hostgator, etc. The significant increase in speed happens just because it's cloud-based, but I have the ability to then go in and both see and tweak my way to even bigger speed increases.
Help centre is good and support from team is awesome
So far I can't really pick a hole in it - keep up the good work.
Secure hosting.
In 30 minutes I had all my hosting and web pages migrated and working, everything is very easy to setup and now my pages run faster than ever
Not a dealbreaker buy maybe the db management
Hosting my web pages, SSL certificate, migrating and setting up landing pages
Everything at Cloudways Platform is tailored to give us what we need: full management of the servers, simple and intuitive yet powerfull console, with one of the best support teams I've ever found on the market.
I couldn't say I dislike something. It's all so well made and taking in account the customers, that it's hard to find something to criticize. I've been suggesting a few (mostly UI/UX) things, and most of them are acutally being implemented.
It has changed my Server Deployment time from 5 days to a couple hours, and my Problem-Solving Timeframe from days or weeks, to a few minutes. With the Cloudways Support Team I also learn to solve issues on my own, with their help, and this makes me a better Hostmaster using the Cloudways Platform.
The customer service is great and you get a lot of effective help . The speed of my site became excellent
i did not face any issue and they did not help me with
The main problem was the speed of the site and now it is solved with cloudways hosting
Cloudways is my go-to Cloud Hosting Provider. They provide managed virtual servers with a lot of freedom in choosing configuration options and addons. It is really easy to add SSL certificates for your domains, deploy apps with a few clicks and the performance is really best-in-class. The support team is very helpful and is always available to help you with questions. And last but not least: the pricing is very competitive!
No direct root access to the servers, but this is not really a problem due to the many configuration options.
I hosted a Prestashop-based webshop on Cloudways. Cloudways gave me really great website performance for a small price.
I really love Cloudways support. Always there to answer my questions in regards to almost any topic. Love also the performance of their server. My website pagespeed has increased drastically since I move to Cloudways.
Nothing much to dislike about Cloudways.
-Pagespeed improved tremendously -Security is much better -Ability to have staging environment with a one click push and pull from or to you staging/live environment
Cloudways very quickly allows me to put a new website or test instance online - with the development STACK of my choosing. What I appreciate most is the ability to start up a new project very quickly, without having to handle the configuration myself. This saves a great deal of time, spares me needless complexity, and lets me get to work with less friction. As the usage of a project grows, it's also easy to scale up to meet the new performance needs. And it's affordable. It's also very reliable and has helpful and responsive support. With Cloudways, a new project environment is ready to go for me in just a few minutes.
I have no immediate dislikes that come to mind. Although I had once incurred an issue with log files growing too large, the technical support team resolved it.
Web application prototyping. The key benefit is the immediate deployment of a droplet with the development STACK of my choosing ready to go. Skipping the configuration steps saves a great deal of time and frustration.
Fast, inexpensive, easy to manage and the best is their support services, Recommended 100%
Only service in english, I would like that they have spanish language option
Improve the speed of my website
The ease of use of a managed host but with knowledgeable, fast and efficient support and the flexibility to get close to dedicated hosting capabilities and options.
I honestly cannot say there is anything I dislike.
Web hosting for small to medium sized business clients.