Cloudways Review 2026 — 8.3 / 10
8.3
/ 10
$11/mo from
5Cloud providers
3-dayFree trial
DigitalOceanParent company
The good and the bad
+ Choose your cloud provider: DigitalOcean, AWS, or Google Cloud — real infrastructure, not shared hosting
+ Pay-as-you-go billing — no annual lock-in, charged hourly or monthly
+ Host unlimited applications on a single server — no per-site pricing
+ Staging environments, free SSL, automated backups, Cloudflare Enterprise included
− No root/SSH access — power users will feel restricted
− No email hosting — you’ll need a separate service like Google Workspace
− Some users report billing issues after cancellation — monitor your statements
− Learning curve is steeper than Hostinger or SiteGround — this isn’t beginner hosting
Pricing
$111GB DO (Micro)
$242GB DO (Small)
$464GB DO (Medium) — RECOMMENDED
$888GB DO (Large)
DigitalOcean prices shown. AWS and Google Cloud plans start higher. 3-day free trial — no card required. Pay-as-you-go billing.
The verdict
Cloudways sits in the sweet spot between budget shared hosting and premium managed hosting. You get real cloud infrastructure (DigitalOcean, AWS, or Google Cloud) with a managed control panel on top — without the complexity of setting up a VPS yourself. The $46/mo Medium plan gives you more raw power than a Kinsta starter plan at $35/mo, plus unlimited sites on the same server. The trade-off? You manage more yourself, there’s no email hosting, and the interface isn’t as polished as Kinsta’s. It’s the best option for growing sites that have outgrown Hostinger but aren’t ready for Kinsta pricing.