What’s the difference between Managed WordPress Hosting and Shared Hosting?

Nowadays, the two most popular hosting options for WordPress websites are Managed Hosting Services and Shared Hosting. Though similar in some ways, these hosting types have their principal differences.

Managed WordPress Hosting is a hosting environment that is typically built on top of a Cloud Platform. Specifically fine-tuned to deliver the best performance to WordPress websites, Managed WordPress allows for less-complex installation and management. These platforms also offer customized dashboards with all the features you need to manage your website.

Shared Hosting, as the name suggests, is a type of hosting where multiple hosting accounts are located on a single server with a web-based control panel (e.g., cPanel at Namecheap) that allows the user to manage files, databases, email accounts, etc. Here, the server’s specific resources (e.g., disk space, CPU/RAM, bandwidth) are all shared between the websites. This is why, during periods of heavy traffic, your website may run slower or become unresponsive.

As a general rule, the cost of Managed WordPress Hosting is usually higher than that of Shared Hosting; therefore, in terms of affordability, Shared Hosting is the preferred option.

At Namecheap, we offer both Shared Hosting and Managed WordPress Hosting. Both are competitively-priced, let’s take a look at the main features of each to help you make the right choice for your website.

Managed Hosting	Shared hosting
The EasyWP platform is solely designed to run WordPress websites.	With Shared Hosting you can install other CMS (e.g., Joomla, Drupal, etc.) and host custom websites (e.g., PHP, HTML) Provides quick WordPress installation through the Softaculous App Installer.
Built on a Cloud-Based Platform. Any server failures will not affect your website and your resources will not be shared with other customers.)	The resources are allocated among all users of a server.
A setup time that takes less than 30 seconds.	There is an option to create addons and subdomains within one package.
All server-side configurations are managed by Namecheap, eliminating the need to choose a PHP version, configure limits or manually upload files. Be aware that custom server-side modifications (e.g. implementing rules in NGINX, adjusting PHP limits, etc) are not permanent and may be reverted back later. NOTE: Cron Jobs are not supported on EasyWP due to its infrastructure.	The possibility to choose a different PHP version, set cron jobs, manage email accounts, and more using cPanel menus.
SFTP and database access that grants you full control over your website files.	SFTP, SSH and database access that grants you full control over your website files.
Support for Namecheap-registered domains pointed to our FreeDNS, BasicDNS or PremiumDNS and third-party ones pointed to our FreeDNS or PremiumDNS.	The possibility to install a different version of WordPress, including subdomains, and have "multi-site" WordPress installations.
3 levels of advanced caching to ensure Namecheap delivers your website as fast as possible, without the need for caching plugins.	A modern network infrastructure and server hardware with fast SSD storage.

While there’s no exact recipe to choosing the right hosting option for your website, whatever you choose should depend entirely on your needs and how comfortable you are with managing a website on your own.

If you’re just starting out and prefer an easy-to-use interface, EasyWP Managed WordPress Hosting is perfect for you. Here we’ll take care of all the micromanagement so you can concentrate on building your website.

If you have highly specific, advanced needs, or require a wider variety of options when it comes to setting up and customizing your website, we suggest Shared WordPress Hosting.

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Updated

4/29/2024

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