Scala Hosting Review: Will Scala Hosting Be Your New Web Host?

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As you probably already know, your web hosting provider plays a crucial role in maintaining your website’s stability, speed, and cybersecurity. But with so many hosting solutions, it’s hard to know where to get the best deal.

ScalaHosting is one such cloud hosting company aimed at businesses, individuals, and developers alike. It offers various hosting packages, from prices as low as $6.95 a month, inclusive of a wide range of features and a team of experts behind them.

To find out whether ScalaHosting is the right choice for you, stick with us. We’re going to dig into everything they have to offer so that you can make the best decision for your website.

That’s enough preamble; let’s spill the tea!

Scala Hosting Review: About Scala Hosting

scala hosing review - homepage

As we just said in the intro, ScalaHosting is a web hosting service provider. They’ve been operating since 2007 and specialize in virtual private servers, shared hosting, WordPress hosting, and cloud servers. Since then, the company has risen to acclaim with its award-winning customer service, technology, and user experience.

They’re based in Dallas, Texas, and have clients worldwide – supporting websites in more than 150 countries.

Scala Hosting Review: Scala Hosting Features

With the basics covered, let’s get into the nitty-gritty of ScalaHosting’s features.

sPanel (Dashboard)

scala hosting review - spanel

If youโ€™re a website owner familiar with web hosting, you might have heard of a cPanel.

But, for the uninitiated, a cPanel is a web hosting control panel from which you can manage your websites and hosting services. Often, this includes things like your website’s files, databases, email settings, and other settings. It’s also the place where you can install and manage website programs like WordPress or Joomla.

Well, ScalaHosting takes this one step further with its unique sPanel. Not only does it do all the above, but it also gets rid of the license fees typically associated with a cPanel and throws top-notch security features into the mix (more on ScalaHosting’s security functions below). The idea behind the sPanel is that it’s easy for both beginners and experienced developers. All in all, the sPanel is more intuitive, lightweight, and far more straightforward to get started with than the traditional cPanel.

On top of everything mentioned above, with the sPanel, you can also:

  • Benefit from free migration from WordPress, WooCommerce, Magento, Joomla, and more
  • Host websites, email, and databases
  • Check the status, health, and performance of your hosting server.
  • Manage user accounts
  • Backup your site

Domain Names

If youโ€™re in the market for a domain name, there are a few reasons you might look to ScalaHosting.

Like other domain registrars, you can register, renew, or transfer popular domain extensions, including .com,.net, .organizational, and more. But what’s excellent about ScalaHosting is that you can also use the platform to sell your domains. You just need to register for a domain name seller account.

Moreover, you can manage all your domains with a free DNS management system. With ScalaHosting, they provide a DNS server and a management system when you register a domain with them.

ScalaHosting Review: Hosting Options

Of course, we can’t talk about ScalaHosting without discussing web hosting itself.

There are four main hosting options available:

Shared Website Hosting

Shared hosting is the cheapest and most effective option if you’re just starting your website creation journey.

So, how does it work?

Put simply, shared web hosting is when multiple websites are hosted on the same server. It’s usually cheaper than dedicated hosting, but you share the server’s resources with other sites. The main advantage of shared hosting is that it’s easier to install new applications and updates, but this comes at the cost of less control over your website’s server.

ScalaHosting’s cheapest shared hosting plan is $6.95 a month. This permits you to host one website and comes with 20GB of storage space, unlimited bandwidth, a free domain name, and a free SSL certificate for up to one year. In addition, you’ll get daily site backups, free security scans, and a 99% uptime guarantee.

But that’s not all…

ScalaHosting boasts a one-click installer for over 400 web applications, including some of the most popular CMS on the web.

For instance:

  • WordPress
  • Drupal
  • Magento
  • Joomla
  • Prestashop
  • Opencart

If you choose a higher-tier shared hosting plan, you’ll also benefit from premium features like:

  • Malware protection
  • White-labeling
  • The sPanel
  • High-speed site caching

Managed Cloud VPS

Alternatively, there’s managed hosting for those that need more comprehensive web hosting. Managed VPS hosting is a shared web hosting service where you’re provided with a virtual private server that’s preconfigured and managed by ScalaHosting. Here, the critical difference to general shared hosting is that you’ll have your own virtual server that you can maintain remotely. I.e., you benefit from your own web hosting resources while Scala handles the technical stuff for you.

You’ll benefit from all the security features mentioned above, but with increased speeds, the ability to host multiple sites, and access to the sPanel.

Best of all, you only pay for the resources you use. In other words, you pay less if you don’t need as much processing power or memory.

WordPress

If you’re a WordPress user, you were probably keen on the one-click installer we mentioned above โ€“ But there’s more! ScalaHosting also sells plans specifically for WordPress hosting. Starting at $6.95 a month, these plans provide everything we covered in the shared hosting plan, plus staging functionality for you to test your site before launch.

Moreover, suppose you need a helping hand with website migration or installing your WordPress site. In that case, ScalaHosting offers 24/7 WordPress support to help you get up and running.

Email

Lastly, if you’re looking to create a professional business email, Scala also provides email hosting that matches your website domain name. On the lowest of Scala’s pricing plans (from $4.95 a month), you can set up ten email accounts, access a domain name for free for one year, and benefit from 50GB of email storage.

ScalaHosting also provides the following email security features:

  • Spam protection
  • Automatic daily backups
  • IP address white-listing (to help ensure your emails don’t get blocklisted).

ScalaHosting Review: Website Security

We promised to provide an overview of ScalaHosting’s security features, so here it is:

Standard security:

All of the features listed below are available as standard on each of ScalaHosting’s pricing plans:

  • Protection against viruses and spam
  • Protection against brute force attacks
  • Free SSL certification
  • Daily automated backups
  • Free security scanning (on request)

For more advanced security, ScalaHosting offers several premium features with its managed VPS hosting plans and its shared WordPress and web hosting plans (on the higher tier offerings). Below we’ve listed the most notable features:

  • SShield Security: This is a security system designed by ScalaHosting. An AI code inspector can detect and catch malware in its tracks.
  • Dedicated firewall: This feature blocks malicious IP addresses and entire IP ranges from breaching your server.
  • Pro spam protection: This prevents junk mail from reaching your email inbox.

ScalaHosting Review: Customer Support

One of the first things we mentioned was how well-liked ScalaHosting is for its customer service – and for a good reason. Firstly, you get instant technical support from an actual human via its 24/7 live chat on ScalaHosting’s website.

Alternatively, you can submit a ticket to their support team. Response times average around 15 minutes. Their in-house experts can help you with all issues related to hosting and servers.

Lastly, you can also find help and advice from their online knowledge base, which covers frequently asked questions, tutorials, and guides on managing your site.

At this point, it’s also worth noting that ScalaHosting is accredited by Better Business Bureau with an A + rating for its quality of customer support.

ScalaHosting Review: ScalaHosting Pros and Cons

With all these features in mind, letโ€™s summarize the highs and lows of ScalaHosting:

Pros ๐Ÿ‘

  • Great customer service and support
  • The sPanel dashboard is intuitive to use
  • Many of its pricing plans come with a free one-year SSL certificate and domain name
  • Free domain comes with all plans
  • Affordable pricing structure
  • White-labeled hosting is available

ScalaHosting Review: ScalaHosting Pricing

Now we’ve covered ScalaHosting’s main features, let’s talk pricing. We’ll cover the cost of each hosting package and break down the components included in each:

Web Hosting Plans

Every plan is billed annually or for a three-year subscription at a 43% discount (except for the Cloud plan, where you can choose monthly billing for $49.95 a month).

But to keep things simple, we’ll just cover the monthly cost of annual billing below:

Mini – $6.95 a month

  • Hosting for one website
  • Standard security (as covered above)
  • 20 GB of storage
  • 1-year free domain and SSL certificate
  • Access to the one-click installer
  • Daily site backups
  • 24/7 customer support via live chat and support tickets

Start – $8.95 a month

You get everything above, plus:

  • Hosting for unlimited websites
  • 50 GB of storage
  • SShield

Advanced – $11.95 a month

You get everything above, plus:

  • 100 GB storage
  • Priority customer support – you skip the queue when you submit an inquiry.

ScalaHosting offers two entry-level virtual private server plans as well:

Entry Cloud – $14.95/mo (when billed triennially) or $19.95/mo (when billed yearly)

Premium Cloud – $29.95/mo (when billed triennially) or $39.95/mo (when billed yearly)

Each VPS plan comes with guaranteed resources, upgradeable SSD space, and full customization control. The wide variety of in-built features include:

  • SPanel hosting management platform
  • Host unlimited websites
  • Free domain name
  • Advanced server and site security
  • Free SSL certificates
  • Daily offsite backups
  • Dedicated IP address
  • White-label branding

Those VPS plans are fully managed, meaning you can count on Scala to help you out with anything hosting related – server and OS configuration, software installation, monitoring, and maintenance, just to name a few. 

The packages work great for small to medium websites, allowing them to make a transition from Shared hosting to a Cloud VPS without breaking the bank. 

WordPress Hosting Plans

The WordPress hosting plans are the same as the shared hosting plans, but they add staging for SSH, GIT, and WP-CLI.

As with the shared hosting plans, you can choose a 36-month (at a 43% discount) or a 12-month billing cycle. Alternatively, the Cloud plan gives you a monthly billing option at $49.95.

Managed VPS Plans

On each of these plans, you can choose between 36 months (for a 36% discount), 12 months (for a 20% discount), and monthly billing cycles. We’ll cover the monthly billing below.

They all come with a dedicated VPS server with scalability that meets your needs. In other words, though we’ll show the standard prices below, you can reduce or increase the amount of CPU and memory your server uses.

All Cloud VPS plans also come with access to the sPanel, but you can use the cPanel for an additional cost starting at $19.95 per month. If you choose the sPanel option, you’ll get access to the following:

  • The one-click installer
  • Unlimited website hosting
  • Advanced security
  • High-speed caching
  • All staging tools

These are the set Managed Cloud VPS plans:

Build #1 for $49.95 a month:

Here you get:

  • Two virtual CPU cores
  • Four GB virtual RAM
  • 50 GB of storage
  • Unmetered bandwidth

Build #2 for $83.95 a month:

Here you get everything above, plus:

  • Four virtual CPU cores
  • Eight GB virtual RAM
  • 100 GB of storage

Build #3 for 141.95 a month:

Here, you get everything above, plus:

  • Eight virtual CPU cores
  • 16 GB virtual ram
  • 150 GB of storage

Build #4 for $199.95 a month

Lastly, you get all the above, plus:

  • 12 virtual CPU cores
  • 24 GB virtual ram
  • 200 GB of storage

Email Hosting Plans

You can choose a 36-month (at a 43% discount) or 12-month billing cycle for these plans. Again, except for the Cloud Email hosting plan, which allows you to bill monthly.

Again, we’ll cover the monthly cost of annual billing here:

Startup – $4.95 a month

This grants you the following:

  • Ten email accounts
  • One email domain
  • 50GB of email storage
  • One-year free domain name
  • Daily backups
  • Standard security and spam protection

SmallBiz – $5.95 a month

Everything above, plus:

  • 50 email accounts
  • Five email domains
  • 100GB email storage

Medium – $7.95 a month

Everything above, plus:

  • 100 email accounts
  • Ten email domains
  • 150GB email storage

Cloud – $39.95 a month (annual billing) / $49.95 a month (monthly billing)

This unlocks cloud-based VPS email hosting:

  • 50 GB of upgradeable storage
  • Advanced security
  • Unlimited email accounts
  • Unlimited email domains
  • Priority customer support

Is ScalaHosting The Best Web Hosting Service for You?

So what do we think? For the price, we think that ScalaHosting offers lots of valuable web hosting features. In particular, they make it easy to install the most popular CMSs with just one click. We also like the level of security and customer service they provide. But more than that, its remarkably intuitive control panel makes it easy to scale and manage a virtual web server at a relatively affordable price.

But what did you think? Will you plump for ScalaHosting, or are you considering one of its competitors, like Bluehost or Hostgator? Tell us in the comments box below!

Rosie Greaves

Rosie Greaves is a professional content strategist who specializes in all things digital marketing, B2B, and lifestyle. She has over three years of experience crafting high-quality content. Check out her website Blog with Rosie for more information.

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