Founded in 2004, Hostinger has seven years more experience than DO as a hosting company. Although the primary service of the two companies is web hosting, DigitalOcean offers some services that it doesn’t provide. Hostinger lets users buy subscription for services that DO doesn’t sell. Below, we’ve compared its services and plans with that of DO. Find out which company among the two has more value for money plans.
Datacenters
Most of the data centers of leading shared hosting companies are in the US only. Hostinger is one of the few companies with data centers on multiple continents. It has data centers in North/South America, Asia, Europe, etc. DigitalOcean has a data center in each continent (excluding Antarctica) and several countries.
The two companies have introduced cheap hosting plans for small businesses, solopreneurs, etc, and also have plans for large companies. DO has infrastructure for very large internet businesses, but Hostinger doesn’t. The most powerful server offered by the company has 16GB RAM, while that of DO can have 100+ GB RAM.
User interface
DigitalOcean users can install popular apps such as WordPress with a GUI, as in shared hosting companies. If you use this tool but the server runs into an error, and the error is related to software, you will have to fix the problem yourself. HS users can talk or chat with their support team to get an issue resolved.
DigitalOcean offers a single service – cloud hosting. HS provides many services. You can transfer a domain, buy a shared hosting, SSL certificate, etc on it.
Email hosting
DigitalOcean doesn’t sell email plans, but Hostinger does. You must either buy an email subscription from Zoho Mail or a similar company or host your email server if you’re using DO. Hostinger users can purchase an email subscription from the company for $0.99 or more.
Cloud plans
DO has introduced over two dozen hosting plans. HS has introduced just three. The number of sites you can host on its cloud servers is 300, and the resources the server is allocated are different from one server to another. The Cloud Startup server has 3GB RAM and a dual-core processor. The Cloud Enterprise servers have a hexacore processor and 12GB RAM. The Cloud Professional server comes with a quad-core processor and 6GB RAM. As in cloud hosting, the shared hosting packs of HS let you host limited websites. The single plan supports only one website. The Business and Premium shared packs of Hostinger support 100 websites.
DigitalOcean hosting packages belong to these categories – droplets, managed Kubernetes, app platform, managed database, spaces object storage, volumes, load balancers, and container registry. The pricing of the same starts at $5, $10, or $15. Each of these categories is further sub-categorized. Thus, it is not possible to cover all the details here.
Here are some of the features of the Hostinger Cloud hosting VPS:
Caching: The cloud VPSes are powered by a custom-built caching system. DigitalOcean doesn’t have a built-in caching module, but you can use any of the available caching modules on the internet on the server. For instance, you can use Redis, Varnish, Nginx FastCGI, etc.
PHP version control: DO users must run Linux commands to update/downgrade PHP versions. HS offers a GUI to do so.
Daily backups: When a site is hacked, backups can be site-saving for website owners. DigitalOcean offers a paid daily backup service. Daily backup is one of the features of Hostinger cloud hosting plans.
Cloudflare integration
Like dozens of top shared hosting companies, HS lets you enable Cloudflare CDN with a click of a button. You can also activate an SSL certificate with the help of GUI. To enable CDN for a website hosted on a DigitalOcean server, you must change the nameservers manually or buy the DO Spaces CDN plans. The easiest and quickest way of enabling an SSL certificate for a website is to use Cloudflare SSL. If you want to use an SSL certificate other than Cloudflare SSL, you must set up the certificate on the server manually.
Free domain
You don’t get a free domain from DO even if you add an entire year’s hosting credit to your DO account. Hostinger 12/24/48 months hosting subscription plans come with a free domain. After buying a plan, you can register a .com, .net, .xyz, .me, etc domain at no additional cost.
Sale
You can buy hosting and other services from HS at a discounted price once a month during the sale. DigitalOcean has never held a sale yet. However, new users of DO are given $20 to $100 credit if they sign up with a special URL (like this one). The credit expires on the 30th or 60th day from the day you create an account with DO. You can consider the credit as a discount.
Refund policy
A few days after buying a hosting plan, people may feel that hosting is not a great fit for their sites. DO has a pay-as-you-go policy i.e. You’ll be billed every hour/minute/second you use their server. You won’t get a refund for the time for which you have used the DO server. Hostinger’s billing policy is different. You can ask for and get a refund if you’re unhappy with their service. The refund request must be made within 30 days of signing up.
Migration and staging
Hostinger offers a website migration service, whereas DigitalOcean doesn’t offer this service. You can use its staging solution to test your website before making it available for everyone on the internet. DO doesn’t provide a staging tool/module for its users.
Closing words: Hostinger is a beginner-friendly hosting company. DigitalOcean is ideal for advanced users i.e. users with knowledge of Linux commands. Why is Linux knowledge required? You may never know when you’ll have to use commands, as DO staff won’t help you with issues that aren’t related to servers or networks. Although Hostinger has introduced just three cloud plans, each plan of the company is cheaper than the droplets with similar hardware specifications.
