If you are looking for the best web host, you have most likely come across Scala Hosting as a possibility. This firm offers several services, including WordPress hosting.
However, you may be seeking a thorough Scala Hosting review to determine whether it’s the best answer for your website.
To assist you, we studied Scala and gathered our results for you. We will examine several elements of the service, such as support, price, and performance, helping you evaluate whether it is the best solution for your requirements and budget.
Let’s start with a high-level overview of its offerings before moving on to a more in-depth study.
Table of Contents
- 1 Scala Hosting Overview
- 2 ScalaHosting Pros and Cons
- 3 Pros
- 4 Why Scala Hosting is best for you?
- 4.1 ScalaHosting VPS is Excellent
- 4.2 SShied to Protect Your Site
- 4.3 Managed AWS Servers and DigitalOcean
- 4.4 HTTP/2 on All Plans
- 4.5 The SPanel Control is Great
- 4.6 Unlimited Email Accounts
- 4.7 Simple Server Configuring
- 4.8 ScalaHosting WordPress Hosting
- 4.9 ScalaHosting Shared Hosting
- 4.10 Excellent Performance
- 4.11 Free SSL, Domain Name, Migration
- 4.12 Customer Support
- 5 Entry Cloud Plan – Our Personal Review
- 6 Dashboard
- 7 ScalaHosting Pricing
- 8 ScalaHosting Review: Verdict
Scala Hosting Overview
Scala Hosting offers a variety of hosting options, including shared hosting, managed VPS hosting plans, dedicated server hosting, and reseller hosting.
It was created in 2007 and has since built a reputation as a dependable and efficient hosting company.
The corporation is based in Dallas, Texas, and operates data centers across the United States, Europe, and Asia.
Scala Hosting’s services are tailored to the needs of businesses of all kinds, making it a popular choice for those seeking an economical and dependable hosting provider.
Scala Hosting distinguishes itself with its own SPanel control panel, which is aimed to provide a simpler, more streamlined user experience than the typical cPanel.
SPanel, when combined with a cloud-based VPS solution, allows consumers complete control over their hosting environment while maintaining a high level of security.
It also offers a unique tool called SShield, which provides real-time cybersecurity protection for your websites, demonstrating its dedication to secure hosting.
ScalaHosting Pros and Cons
Now, let’s talk about the pros and cons of ScalaHosting.
Pros
- Scalahosting boasts high-performance servers that deliver fast loading times for your website.
- They offer a 99.9% uptime guarantee, ensuring your website is almost always accessible to visitors.
- Their plans offer ample storage, bandwidth, and processing power to accommodate your website’s needs.
- SPanel on their managed VPS plans provides a user-friendly interface for managing your hosting environment.
- All plans come with HTTP/2 enabled, which helps optimize website loading times.
- ScalaHosting keeps 7 copies of your site for added security and peace of mind in case of data loss.
- They include a free domain name, SSL certificate, and website migration assistance with their plans.
- For developers and designers, ScalaHosting offers white-label hosting, allowing you to resell their services under your brand.
Cons
- Only VPS plans come with all-SSD storage, which can be faster and more reliable than traditional HDD storage. Shared hosting plans may use a combination of HDD and SSD.
- Depending on your needs, ScalaHosting’s VPS plans might be slightly more expensive than some competitors’ shared hosting plans.
- ScalaHosting may cater more towards VPS users compared to shared hosting users, though they do offer both options.
Why Scala Hosting is best for you?
Now, it all comes down to the features of ScalaHosting. While testing this web hosting platform, we found the features are quite impressive.
Not only ScalaHosting have notable features but also some aspects help it stand apart from its competitors. Eager to know what features ScalaHosting offers? Continue reading the guide to know more.
ScalaHosting VPS is Excellent
Let us start with some general facts. ScalaHosting provides both managed and unmanaged VPS services, with managed plans starting at a slightly cheaper monthly pricing.
Yeah, you read that correctly. The managed plans start out cheaper and are built on CentOS 8, which we really enjoy.
To simplify and evaluate customer support, we chose the lowest managed VPS package, which includes one CPU core, 2GB of RAM, and 20GB of SSD storage. That’s certainly not much, but it’s enough to start a modest website.
If you need more, one of the most appealing features is the ability to scale up your server piece by piece. Individually, you may purchase extra CPU cores, RAM, or storage space. You just pay for what you need.
It’s not as granular as other hosts, who charge by the CPU cycle, but it helps keep expenses low.
All plans include daily remote backups, additional backups in the form of snapshots covering the past two days, and free site migration. The materials you pay for are guaranteed to remain yours and yours only.
Every VPS also includes a dedicated IP address. For the uninitiated, this means that the internet as a whole regards your server as slightly more trustworthy. That implies emails from your server are less likely to get banned, and your website may actually rank higher on Google.
Oh, and every plan includes free SSL. As they should. In this scenario, Let’s Encrypt provides the SSL, but you may also install a custom certificate.
You can customize all of these using SPanel, ScalaHosting’s proprietary control interface. If SPanel doesn’t suit you and you want the usual functionality of cPanel, you need to pay extra,
There are a few additional items you must pay extra for: If you want to employ the relatively new – and extremely fast – LiteSpeed Web Server technology, it will cost you.
SShied to Protect Your Site
SShield (or SPanel Shield) is a background service that simplifies your life. It’s an automated, AI-powered security suite that continually scans your website for hackers and assaults. In principle, it prevents the majority of them outright (ScalaHosting claims it blocks 99.998% of assaults).
When an attack does get through, the system is meant to inform you right away and tell you what you can do to stop it. And if you’re not sure how to use that information, you can always submit it to tech support.
Managed AWS Servers and DigitalOcean
That’s right: during the last few years, ScalaHosting has done something interesting. The firm has teamed with DigitalOcean and AWS (Amazon Web Services) to provide high-performance, managed cloud hosting.
If you want to make use of a top cloud infrastructure but don’t want to set up and manage the servers yourself, ScalaHosting can do it for you.
Additionally, SPanel will be deployed on all of your AWS and DO server instances. Basically, you can go in and handle various things without having to type every command in a terminal.
The advantage is that you have access to AWS and DigitalOcean server locations. You will also get higher processing power and bandwidth. ScalaHosting benefits from the fact that it is paid to manage servers.
The lowest managed AWS subscription comes with 1 CPU Core, 2GB RAM, 60GB SSD, and 3TB Bandwidth. And on a managed plan, that’s very realistic.
HTTP/2 on All Plans
HTTP/2 was launched years ago and, in my opinion, is one of the most underutilized aspects of hosting. Despite being widely available, several web servers only provide it at expensive rates.
HTTP/2 is faster and more secure than the previous standard, as well as mobile-friendly, and it is available on all ScalaHosting plans, even the lowest. HTTP/2-enabled sites can load some resources in parallel.
Another unsaid risk is that hosts that do not support HTTP/2 may be using outdated servers for those accounts. This is one reason why some hosts only provide HTTP/2 on their most costly plans.
Finally, the inclusion of HTTP/2 access in all ScalaHosting plans is really beneficial. Even while you can obtain this for free by connecting your site to Cloudflare, it appears that ScalaHosting is employing newer equipment in its server boxes.
The SPanel Control is Great
Assuming you don’t want to pay for cPanel, SPanel is an excellent alternative. It’s sleek, simple to use, and has all of the essential functions.
A hint for newbies: When you’re operating a VPS, SPanel comes in two sections.
First, the server control panel functions primarily to WHM, if you’re familiar with it. This is where you set up user accounts and how many websites operate on your server. You may also use it to monitor your server’s resources, reboot it, and do other tasks.
Now, if you want to build a website, first, you must establish an account in SPanel, then specify how much of your server resources it may use, etc.
If you purchase a domain name via ScalaHosting, this should all be done automatically; otherwise, you will need to do it yourself.
Once you’ve created a hosting account on your server, you can log in and use SPanel to configure site email addresses, databases, FTP accounts, and SSL certificates. A file manager is also included, as is customary when hosting control panels.
cPanel is compatible with SPanel. This helped us easily migrate all our data from your cPanel server to a SPanel server. We also got unlimited free migrations.
Similarly, if you run a web hosting business, you should contact the team at SPanel and look into integrating the control panel with your servers. It is a smooth transition from cPanel.
More so, if you have used cPanel for a while, you will easily adapt to the SPanel interface. Its UI is standardized and intuitive, much like one for a server control panel, such as cPanel.
Unlimited Email Accounts
Regardless of the package you select, ScalaHosting allows you to establish an unlimited number of email accounts for each domain.
You may set up automated answers with any of your email accounts. As previously stated, the Advanced shared hosting plan and above include free, high-quality spam protection for all of your inboxes.
While this feature is great, it’s not focused entirely on email marketing. We recommend Pabbly for users looking for the best email marketing software.
Simple Server Configuring
For the sake of this article, we’ll assume that if you require a VPS, you’re either familiar with what you’re doing or eager to learn. To utilize a VPS, you do not need to be a coder, although understanding how hosting and servers function in general is beneficial.
So long as you have the bare minimum of information, you’re OK. Signing up was so straightforward that it required no additional explanation. When you truly design your own plan by selecting the resources you desire, there is no true misunderstanding regarding “which plan is better”.
When you initially sign in, you are given a brief tour of the site, indicating where everything is located.
ScalaHosting WordPress Hosting
ScalaHosting’s servers are geared for WordPress speed, with specific security measures that prevent ‘99.9% of online threats.’
The support staff goes beyond the typical server problem-solving to assist you with WordPress-specific concerns, such as plugin debugging.
All plans include daily backups for the last 7 days (which is not often the case with low-cost WordPress hosting), as well as malware scans and removal to keep your site and visitors secure.
The firm claims that it would move as many sites as you request for free. Many providers limit you to one, and a few do not give free migration at all.
If you want to study WordPress or utilize it to create a modest personal or company site, ScalaHosting’s offerings go beyond the fundamentals at a moderate cost.
If you choose features over low pricing, WordPress, IONOS, and A2Hosting provide robust specialty plans that include more sophisticated WordPress capabilities as well as important business and other extras.
ScalaHosting’s beginner shared hosting plan appears to be rather basic, with only 20GB of storage and support for a single site. Otherwise, it provides everything we’d expect, including a free SSL, a free domain, unlimited bandwidth, free site migration, a 1-click WordPress installer, and some pleasant extras such as remote backups of your sites from the previous seven days.
ScalaHosting only provides 16 hosting locations, including Amsterdam and Singapore, which is identical to A2 Hosting. Adaxially, all ScalaHosting shared hosting plans include NVMe storage (which many of its competitors do not). These kinds of drives are at least ten times quicker than standard SSDs.
If you’re looking for a cheap web hosting service over features, then Hostinger, should be your choice. Check here the Best Shared hosting services of 2024
Excellent Performance
ScalaHosting offers a choice of OpenLiteSpeed, Apache, or NGINX web server software. You can also access the Cloudflare content delivery network (CDN), which improves site performance worldwide.
Though ScalaHosting only has three native data server locations (two in the United States and one in the United Kingdom), you may also pick from the aforementioned DigitalOcean and AWS Servers throughout the world.
To determine the genuine quality of ScalaHosting’s speed, we decided to create a WordPress-based website. We also included everything you’d expect to see on a modern landing page, such as HD images, bespoke CSS, and scroll effects.
We should mention that for our testing website, we used the OpenLiteSpeed web server software and installed the LiteSpeed Cache for WordPress (LSCWP) plugin. The plugin is not pre-installed, however we highly suggest it for anyone wishing to establish a WordPress site on a LiteSpeed server.
What’s the verdict? On a personal note, the VPS felt quite fulfilling and responsive. But, let’s look at the hard statistics.
The average page load time was 0.7 seconds, with results seldom reaching one second and just once exceeding three seconds throughout the testing period. ScalaHosting achieved 99.982% uptime throughout two weeks of testing. While anything less than 100% is unsatisfactory, 99.982% is far higher than typical uptime guarantees.
We utilized GTmetrix to evaluate the whole loading speed of our website over a two-week period, running continuous, hourly tests. The findings varied from 0.6 to 1.4 seconds for a fully loaded webpage. The spike in the graph below may not appear significant, but a single spike over two weeks is totally typical and not reflective of the overall findings.
Some of the statistics we found from GTMetrix are:
Performance: 100%
Structure: 94%
LCP: 756 ms
TBT: 0
CLS: 0.03
ScalaHosting’s VPS offered overall great speeds. Given that many leading web gurus urge that a website load in under 2 seconds to maintain bounce rates as low as possible, we believe ScalaHosting delivers what a VPS should be.
UptimeRobot
We utilized UptimeRobot to monitor my site for any outage, and ScalaHosting delivered on their 99.9% uptime claim. ScalaHosting provides near-perfect uptime, but near-perfect doesn’t mean flawless.
Throughout the testing period, my site was only unavailable for roughly 3 minutes, yielding a 99.983% uptime. Though the result is wonderful, we’d be lying if we claimed we didn’t like a nice round result of 100% in my testing, especially since ScalaHosting’s servers are designed with built-in redundancies to eliminate downtime.
Free SSL, Domain Name, Migration
Who doesn’t enjoy freebies? ScalaHosting, like their generosity in other areas, gives amazing gifts for new sign-on. Your hosting bundle includes a free domain name, Lets Encrypt SSL, and CDN integration.
The free domain name offer is even included in their beginning plan, which obviously increases the value significantly. The top grade of shared hosting plans includes live cybersecurity protection.
Remember that if these services aren’t included in your plan for free, you’ll have to pay substantially more for them separately. For example, a domain name may cost an additional $10, and certain security plugins might cost hundreds of dollars.
Customer Support
Scala Hosting provides live chat and email support 24 hours a day, seven days a week. In fact, they claim a live chat response in 30 seconds and an email ticket answer in 15 minutes!
In addition, if you are on the Advanced hosting plan or higher (which applies to both shared and WordPress hosting), you will receive priority ticket assistance. Scala Hosting’s technical support staff will instantly handle any server or backend hosting difficulties.
Entry Cloud Plan – Our Personal Review
We took the demo plan of ScalaHosting’s Entry Cloud to test out its features. What we saw was that the dashboard is super intuitive and navigational. We didn’t have any problem going through its features.
Are you eager to know what ScalaHosting’s plan looks like? Let’s start with the dashboard first.
Dashboard
As mentioned above, the dashboard is free of any technical jargon. There wasn’t anything confusing. While non-technical readers may take some time to understand it, technical users like you won’t be facing any problems.
The dashboard will give you numerous pieces of information. These include the system load, disk usage, memory usage, and IP reputation. If you have your website connected, you will also find the same information here.
Server Management – Next comes the server management part. This is where you will find all the relevant information related to your server. It has a couple of helpful sub-parts. We tested them, and let us help you understand them thoroughly.
Server Information – ScalaHosting offers a range of server options designed to meet various needs, from individual bloggers to large enterprises. Their servers are equipped with cutting-edge hardware to ensure optimal performance and reliability.
This server is built with robust hardware specifications to deliver high performance, reliability, and scalability for a wide range of hosting needs. Whether you’re hosting a small personal blog or managing a complex e-commerce platform, ScalaHosting’s servers provide the resources needed to ensure optimal performance and uptime.
Server Status – As the name implies, the Server Status option will help you know the overall status of your server. For instance, we wanted to know the system load and the memory usage.
When we opened this, we found the relevant information regarding the server. It helped us know that everything was up and running smoothly.
Server Settings – The Server Settings option will help you customize different aspects of your server. From the IP address to the server time zone, you can change many important things. What we liked is its security features. It has 2FA, login captcha, etc.
Branding – You have the option to customize the interface by uploading your logo and inputting your brand name. Additionally, you can modify the login URL for the control panel.
Packages
Streamline resource allocation for each of your accounts effortlessly by crafting packages with predefined limits for disk space, inodes, email accounts, databases, and additional domain names.
Resource Usage – This dashboard provides information on the average CPU and RAM usage for each account on the server for a given day. Additionally, there’s a feature to display a list of currently active user processes, along with details about each process and the option to terminate them if necessary.
Manage Backups- As the name implies, this will help you manage your backups properly. As backups are one of the most important aspects of your web hosting, make sure you pay close attention to this step.
As you can see, we have the option to enable the local and remote backups. We have turned this off due to low storage and we’re using a demo plan.
Restart Service – We have the ability to restart any of the services running on our server if needed. Generally, we don’t need to restart services.
Restart Server – We have the option to restart the server, but it’s important to note that our websites will be inaccessible until the server is back online. Typically, this process takes less than three minutes.
Accounts Management
Manage Accounts – It presents a comprehensive list of your accounts along with basic details for each. Adjacent to each account, you’ll find the Actions button, offering various management options such as password alteration, domain name modification, SSH access toggling, and account suspension or termination.
Opting for the Manage function within the Actions menu directs you to the control panel’s User Interface tailored to that specific account. Returning to the Admin Interface is easily achieved with just one click.
Create a New Account – If you want to build a new website, this option would come in handy. We tested it by creating a demo website. In a matter of seconds, we had a new account up and running. And the best part? You can create unlimited accounts on your server.
List Suspended Accounts – View a compilation of all suspended accounts currently in an inactive state. Suspending an account doesn’t erase its data; however, all associated services, such as the website, emails, databases, and FTP, cease to function. Reactivating the account instantly restores its functionality, allowing all services to resume.
Manage SSH Access – Toggle the SSH access for each account you’ve established, with SSH being disabled as the default setting.
Software
Web Server Manager – The web server manager let’s you know which web server you’re currently running. We noticed that ScalaHosting provides four different types of web servers. You can know their overview and status from this panel. You can also restart them if necessary.
Database Server Manager – The database server manager allows you to manage your database properly. Let’s say you’re using MySQL database. From this section itself, you can make necessary changes to the database server.
ScalaHosting Pricing
Let’s talk about the pricing. ScalaHosting pricing structure may look confusing, given that they offer different types of features. We will break it down for simple navigation.
While there are cheaper VPS solutions available, ScalaHosting is relatively economical, and you are not limited to the predetermined server plans. Even with the managed plans, you have a lot of freedom to tailor your server’s resources independently. This can make a significant impact in cost, reducing the likelihood that you’ll pay for items you don’t require.
If you love getting super-in-depth, ScalaHosting also provides entirely unmanaged VPS options, giving you complete control over your virtual machine. The unmanaged plans are a little more expensive, at least at the start, which is really rather unusual considering that most other hosting companies charge more for server management.
Managed Cloud VPS
Managed Cloud VPS of ScalaHosting comes with 4 different pricing plans.
Build #1: $46.95/montth (for 36 months)
Build #2: $80.95/montth (for 36 months)
Build #3: $138.95/montth (for 36 months)
Build #4: $196.95/montth (for 36 months)
Keep in mind that the pricing will fluctuate depending on the duration. For example, If you choose a 12-month subscription, the cost will automatically increase.
Web Hosting
ScalaHosting provides 4 different types of web hosting plans. Let’s talk about them.
Mini: $2.95/month (for 36 months)
Start: $5.95/month (for 36 months)
Advanced: $9.95/month (for 36 months)
Entry Cloud: $14.95/month (for 36 months)
Just like Managed VPS Hosting, the Web Hosting plans will also depend on the duration.
WordPress Hosting
Here are the WordPress Hosting plans:
WordPress Mini: $2.95/month (for 36 months)
WordPress Start: $5.95/month (for 36 months)
WordPress Advanced: $9.95/month (for 36 months)
Entry Cloud: $14.95/month (for 36 months)
Email Hosting
Last but not least, let’s talk about the Email Hosting features of ScalaHosting
StartUp: $2.95/month (for 36 months)
SmallBiz: $5.95/month (for 36 months)
Medium: $9.95/month (for 36 months)
Cloud: $14.95/month (for 36 months)
SPanel
ScalaHosting SPanel has three different pricing plans:
SPanel One: Starts at $19.95/month
SPanel Pro: Starts at $24.95/month
SPanel Agency: Starts at $39.95/month
The longer your commitment, the more you save – it’s like putting money back in your pocket. ScalaHosting wants to make sure you get the best value for your money, so they offer options to suit your budget.
You may pay for your servers with a credit card (Visa, MasterCard, and American Express), PayPal, or a direct bank transfer. You also have the option of upgrading your plan or adding additional resources at any time.
If you decide that ScalaHosting isn’t for you within 30 days, you’re OK. You may receive a refund by clicking on the tiny menu next to your server and then selecting Request Cancellation.
So, the features and the pricing seem intriguing right? We wouldn’t have covered ScalaHosting if it hadn’t captured our attention.
Want to try ScalaHosting yourself? Make sure you visit the official page of ScalaHosting and choose the perfect plan.
ScalaHosting Review: Verdict
While we cannot claim that Scala Hosting is the greatest hosting company available for everyone, there is a suitable web host for everyone. Scala Hosting may be the appropriate choice for you if you’re a new business trying to get online inexpensively but securely, owing to its low starting costs and trustworthy security measures.
Though it primarily focuses on VPS hosting services, Scala Hosting’s managed WordPress hosting plans were the finest it had to offer, earning a 4.2 out of 5 for the hosting type overall.
It provides adequate security measures, such as a free SSL certificate and anti-spam protection, and its low introductory rates (including an anytime money-back guarantee) make it simple to test the company out for yourself.
However, Scala Hosting’s high renewal fees disappointed us. We also found an absence of dedicated hosting choices, and a lack of phone support, which may hinder some clients from receiving the assistance they require. If you want greater value or dedicated hosting, we recommend Bluehost instead. If excellent assistance is crucial to you, look into HostGator.
With an overall rating of 4.2 out of 5, Scala Hosting can compete with the finest on the market, but is it the ideal match for your website? Let us know in the comments.
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