When Should You Change Your WordPress Web Hosting (Top 7 Key Indicators)

Are you frustrated with your WordPress hosting provider? Not sure whether you should switch hosts? In this article, we will share 7 key indicators to help you know when it’s time to change your web hosting.

Overcoming The Biggest Fear

Most beginners are afraid to switch hosts.

Why? because it requires technical knowledge to move a website without any downtime.

If you’re somewhat savvy, then you can probably follow our tutorial on how to move WordPress to a new host without any downtime. Even though it doesn’t require any code thanks to BackupBuddy, it is still scary for a lot of beginner users.

Thankfully, most good hosting companies will migrate your site for you (especially if you ask nicely).

How much would they charge? That depends on how big your site is. In most cases, it’s free. Sometimes, you may pay a small fee. But this service is definitely available even if it’s not advertised. You just have to ask.

Now that you are relieved of your biggest fear, let’s take a look at 7 reasons why you should change your web host.

1. Frequent Unexpected Downtimes

Downtimes are bad for your overall reputation (SEO rankings, traffic, etc). Nobody wants to visit a site that doesn’t open half the time.

If your site is down multiple times a week, then it’s a crystal clear indication that you need to switch.

How to tell if your site is down? Since you’re not visiting your site 24/7, it’s hard to know without using a monitoring service. Thankfully there are services like Pingdom available that helps you monitor your site’s uptime for free.

Uptime refers to your server system being online. Downtime is when your server cannot be reached. So if you see 99% uptime, then it means that your site experienced minor outages that month.

You can always ask the hosting support staff about downtimes that occured. If they’re not convincing, then it’s time to move.

2. Error Establishing Database Connection

If you regularly see error establishing database connection on your site, then it means that you’re outgrowing your host servers or have a bad plugin.

In either case, your host support should be able to help you. If they’re unable to help, then you should switch to someone who will help.

3. Bizarre Internal Server Errors

Internal server error is one of the most common WordPress errors and perhaps the most frustrating one as well. The error message itself is unable to point user in the right direction to fix it.

If these internal server errors are becoming too frequent on your site, then that’s a bad sign. Find your self a WordPress hosting provider that knows how to properly configure their servers for WordPress.

4. Site Suspension

Most web hosting providers reserve the right to take down your site especially if there’s illegal activity going on.

However certain hosting companies suspend accounts without notifications for silly things such as overages.

Your host should care about your website because you’re trusting them with your digital real-estate. If a hosting company suspends your site without notification, then you need to have a serious conversation with them.

If that conversation doesn’t go anywhere, then it’s time to switch to a company that cares.

Also it’s important to keep backups because some hosts will hold your data hostage.

5. Poor Customer Support Service

You’ll never find a host with 100% great customer service record. It’s just impossible to keep everyone happy. Not to mention, only the most pissed off users leave web hosting reviews.

Having that said, good customer service is crucial when it comes to web hosting.

You need to ask yourself the following questions: Is your hosting support staff quick to respond? Are they knowledgeable and helpful?

Sometimes the hosts simply deny assisting with WordPress claiming their support policy doesn’t cover software. If you don’t get good support, then it’s time to move.

6. Slow Page Speed

Speed is a really important factor to optimize your site for better user experience and higher search rankings.

Usually slow sites are caused by too many requests or too many users on the server. In either case, your host should be able to help you figure out why your site is running slow.

If the issue is too many requests, then it can be fixed with some tweaking, whether it’s removing a plugin or further optimizing the server. However if the issue is too many users, then the host will ask you to upgrade your plan.

7. Your Site Has Outgrown Your Host

If you have been blogging for a while, then it’s possible that your site has outgrown your host. On a shared hosting platform, your site shares the server resources with many other sites hosted on the same server. While you can control and limit the resources you use by using caching + CDN, you have no control on what other sites are doing.

If your site is much busier than other sites on the same server, then you will be actually slowing down other sites. Many shared hosting providers will then start terminating your resources without any warning.

If you start having issues with slow sites or finding yourself spending more time explaining the problem to customer support, then it’s probably likely that you’ve outgrown your host.

Ready to Switch?

Chances are if you are reading this article, then you have probably considered switching your web host.

Looking for a host that can deal with all the scenarios, provide rock-solid uptime, and top-notch support?

We recommend using Siteground. We recently switched our top site, List25, to their platform.

Their servers are highly optimized to run WordPress, offers built-in caching, CDN support, and the support is truly best in the industry (first-hand experience).

Best of all, it won’t break your bank as they have a plan for users of all levels. WPBeginner users get an exclusive 60% discount on Siteground.

If you want to shop around, then you should consider looking at other managed WordPress hosting providers like Pagely and WPEngine.

We hope this article helped clear any doubts on your mind about when is the right time to change your WordPress host.

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