NameHero Review 2024 – Why I Love It
NameHero is a unique web host. The main difference is that all of their plans come with LiteSpeed servers. It’s not the cheapest, but it’s pretty competitive. The value-added features that NameHero has make it stand out.
Pros of NameHero:
- Use the LiteSpeed webserver, which is faster than Apache.
- Free automatic backups and restore
- Inbuilt server-side caching for dynamic pages
- Free malware scanning and removal
- NVMe drives – “Turbo Cloud” plans and above
Cons of NameHero:
- No free domain name till “Turbo Cloud” plan
- Only one day daily backup retention
- No Patchman add-on
Contents
Why NameHero such a good choice?
In my opinion, NameHero is the best web host, as they offer all the essential features. What makes it stand out from the competition is:
1. NameHero uses LiteSpeed, not Apache.
Most web hosts use the Linux, Apache, MySQL, and PHP (LAMP) stack. NameHero uses LiteSpeed instead of Apache, which is faster due to a paid license.
LiteSpeed offers built-in server-side caching, so you don’t have to use WP Super Cacher, W3TC, or WP Rocket, It can compete with or even better than an NGINX reverse proxy for static content like images and JS files. In contrast to HostArmada and A2 Hosting, which reserve it for the higher-tier plans, NameHero makes it available on all its plans.
Because of its high price, LiteSpeed is not included in the most basic plans offered by other web hosts. But NameHero does.
2. NameHero uses MariaDB, not MySQL.
MariaDB is a “drop-in replacement” for MySQL. Replace one with the other operate the same in terms of APIs or interfaces. MySQL and MariaDB have many differences, including speed-related improvements.
NameHero uses MariaDB for faster replication speed and redundancy. NameHero chose quality over money by using some premium features in the free MariaDB license.
3. NameHero’s top-notch security features
With NameHero, you get three layers of security with all its packages:
- An AI-driven WAF
- Patches for out-of-date software
- Real-time file monitoring
Your website will be much safer with this three-pronged approach. On its own, the NameHero WAF adds lots of value. Companies that offer security services, like Sucuri, charge hundreds of dollars annually.
Due to the low-cost prices, many web hosts don’t have the money to implement security measures like real-time file monitoring and sophisticated intrusion detection systems. Providers like Bluehost and Hostgator outsource security to third-party add-ons like SiteLock. Likewise for backups. In the end, you end up spending as much as you would have if you purchased higher-quality hosting in the first place.
4. NameHero NVMe Drives for Turbo and Business
Not long ago, NameHero made a large investment in NVMe SSD disks. For heavy database sites, this more than doubled the performance.
The latest generation of server storage is NVMe SSDs. In comparison to solid-state drives (SSDs), NVMe disks may transport data 25 times faster. This benefits database-driven websites like WordPress, but it also dramatically improves the performance of disk-intensive operations tasks, like local backups, much faster. Two other web hosting that have NVMe drives are InMotion and A2 Hosting.
NameHero’s Turbo and Business Cloud users will see significantly improved performance.
5. NameHero offers free offsite backups.
While most web providers offer in-built backups, NameHero uses a remote server on a separate network to store all of your backups. Your backups remain secure regardless of what happens to the local server. Because NameHero’s backups are so robust, you can rest easy knowing that you will never lose your data.
NameHero is using JetBackup 5 for both paid and free backups. It is a backup solution designed for cPanel, a popular web hosting control panel. It is a tool that allows hosting providers and website owners to easily manage and automate backups of their website data, files, databases, and configurations.
NameHero provide free jetbackup option for all web hosting and reseller hosting accounts. Free Jetbackup provides total 2 backups at a time. 1 – nightly backup and 1 – weekly backup. This means if it’s a Tuesday, you’ll have a backup that was taken late Monday night as well as a weekly backup taken sometime around the weekend (Friday, Saturday, or Sunday). You can also order premium backups, which give you the ability to store up to 30 days of backups.
Prior to testing a potentially disruptive update, you can take snapshots of your account. The Jetbackup cPanel plugin makes it easy to restore these backups with only a button click. No need to contact customer service.
The best thing is that backup plans are available in all packages for free. The most remarkable thing about NameHero is that they don’t restrict any of this functionality to their higher-tier plans, unlike others like SiteGround or A2 Hosting.
No other web host offers this for all plans. More: Offsite Backups by NameHero, and Should You Buy Backup Storage From NameHero?
What Makes NameHero Bad?
However, NameHero isn’t without its faults. Unfortunately, there are a few disadvantages that you should consider before buying.
1. NameHero isn’t the Most Affordable Host
As a web hosting provider, NameHero isn’t aiming to be cheap. There’re many cheaper web servers than Namehero, and they all use LiteSpeed, offer free backups, malware scanning, and more.
NameHero doesn’t give a free domain on all its plans, you can’t get a free domain till you sign up for the “Turbo” plan and pay for 2 years or more. You must sign up for 3 years to get the cheapest price.
2. NameHero Daily Backups Expire After 24 Hours
Though NameHero’s backup service is top-notch, their daily backups only last for 24 hours, after which a new backup replaces them. Each daily backup erases the previous one. You can purchase more retention with add-ons.
However, other web hosting providers like SiteGround will keep your daily backups for 30 days on their higher plans, so you can restore your website to any point during the last 30 days, but SiteGround’s renewal price is ridiculously expensive.
You can purchase additional backup space when you sign up, and then you can retain your backups for 30 days instead.
I recommend using DropMySite or another similar service for daily backups due to the lack of persistent daily backups. Thanks to a partnership with DropMySite, NameHero can offer cheaper rates than usual. So that mitigates the disadvantages somewhat.
3. US + NE data centers only, NVMe only in the US.
Compared to some other web-hosting providers, one disadvantage of NameHero is the lack of a data center in Asia. They have one in the Netherlands and two in the US, so if your customers are located on the other side of the planet, you won’t have servers close to them.
Comparison of NameHero to Other Web Hosts
Here’s how NameHero stacks up compared to SiteGround, Bluehost, A2 Hosting, and Hostgator.
NameHero vs SiteGround
Choosing between SiteGround and NameHero is pretty challenging as both are very similar features. An in-depth comparison of NameHero and SiteGround is here:
Feature Name | NameHero | SiteGround |
Discount Price | $4.48/m | $2.99/m |
Renewal Price | $8.95/m | $17.99/mo |
Fast Webserver | ✅ LiteSpeed | ✅ NGINX reverse proxy |
Free Backups | ✅ | ✅ |
Free Security and Malware Removal | ✅ | ❌ |
SSD Drives | ✅ | ✅ |
Global Datacenters | US, NL | US, |
Free Domain | ❌ (2-year plan only) | ❌ |
Storage | Unlimited | 10 GB |
However, SiteGround is significantly more expensive and does not use cPanel. While it offers considerable discounts, SiteGround’s renewal prices are ridiculously exorbitant, starting at $14.99. SiteGround charges extra for virus scanning, but NameHero offers it for free.
Additionally, SiteGround doesn’t use LiteSpeed servers, so there’s no native integration with QUIC.cloud – though you can always use Cloudflare.