How we test web hosting

Most hosting roundups are ranked by commission. The tell is easy to spot once you know it: the provider at number one is usually the one with the highest affiliate payout, and the renewal price is nowhere on the page.

This page exists so you can check our work instead of taking our word for it.

Every host on our list gets the identical question through pre-sales chat, asked in the same window of the day. We record time to first human reply, time to a complete answer, whether each part of the question was actually addressed, and — the part that matters — whether the renewal price was disclosed honestly when asked directly.

Transcripts are kept. The notable ones get published, host named, with timestamps.

See the current round →

For each host we record the advertised introductory price and the actual renewal price in INR, the term each applies to, and where the renewal price is disclosed: on the pricing page, in the cart, in the terms, or nowhere at all.

Renewal pricing is the most common complaint we see from Indian hosting customers and the least covered fact in hosting reviews.

See the current index →

Under the Reserve Bank of India's e-mandate framework, a recurring card charge needs a mandate registered with additional factor authentication, the customer must get a pre-debit notification at least 24 hours ahead, and any charge above ₹15,000 needs fresh authentication every single time. Annual hosting renewals routinely land above that threshold.

When a hosting renewal declines, the website goes offline. So for each host we record: billing currency, whether the tax invoice carries your GSTIN, UPI and NetBanking support, whether renewals are attempted against a properly registered mandate, whether a reminder arrives before the charge, and whether there is a manual payment link to fall back on.

See the compliance table → · Read the explainer →

Where we hold an account we deploy an identical WordPress install — same theme, same plugins, same content, same page tested — so the comparison means something. We then measure:

• Time to first byte from Kolkata, Mumbai, Delhi, Bengaluru and Chennai
• Largest Contentful Paint on a standard page
• Behaviour under simulated concurrent load
• Uptime, checked continuously at five-minute intervals

Every page states plainly whether the numbers come from a live account or from research. We do not imply testing we have not done.

We log measured uptime for hosts we run sites on, and separately track every incident a host declares on its own public status page. A host's own admissions are difficult to argue with.

We do not publish a single overall score out of ten. A number like that hides the trade-off you are actually making, and it is trivially gameable.

Instead each host gets named for what it is best at, and each data page ranks on one measured dimension. A host can top the support benchmark and sit at the bottom of the renewal price index. That is useful information; an averaged score would erase it.

• We don't accept payment for placement, ranking, or a link.
• We don't remove a negative finding because a host asked. We will publish their response next to it.
• We don't rank hosts we haven't researched, or review hosts we haven't used.
• We don't generate reviews of products nobody here has touched.

If self-funded: We buy every account with our own money, out of affiliate revenue. No host has been asked for free access.

If any account was provided: Some hosts provide a complimentary account for testing. Each review names which. A free account buys testing access, not a favourable verdict — and our published data includes hosts that gave us free accounts and scored badly anyway.

If something here is wrong, tell us at editor@bestwebhostinghub.com. We correct it, date the correction, and leave a note saying what changed. Hosts are welcome to send data disputing a finding and we will publish it alongside ours.