After 3 years of testing, let’s compare A2 Hosting vs HostGator and find out how they’ve performed so far…
A2 Hosting vs HostGator – Testing Method
- Prior to testing, I have setup identical content on all 8 Live Test Sites
- Each week over 80,000 speed & uptime tests are run using independent tools, GTmetrix & Pingdom
- Test results below are from 04 Apr 2016 to 22 Dec 2018
Test #1: Speed
The GTmetrix Speed Test checks how long it takes for a website to fully load using a desktop internet browser. This test is then repeated every hour throughout the week (1,340 times).
- A2 Hosting’s speed was impressive in 2016, and they typically found themselves in the top 2 of our 8 hosts. Unfortunately, their extremely poor uptime performance led to their removal on 28th Jan 2017. Read below for more details.
- HostGator’s speed has typically been around the mid pack of our hosts across 2016 to 2018. Their best performance was in H1 2017 where they were 3rd fastest, but H1 & H2 2018 has seen a dropoff to 7th fastest.
- HostGator is currently 6th and A2 is 9th in our Speed Rankings.
H2 2018 Results
H1 2018 Results
H2 2017 Results
H1 2017 Results
Test #2: Uptime
The Pingdom Uptime Test confirms that the website is actually accessible to visitors. This test is then repeated every minute throughout the week (80,640 times).
- A2 Hosting performed extremely poorly when it came to Uptime. This was especially evident in Q4 2016, where downtime was a whopping 575 minutes, which is almost 10 hours. This continued into 2017, with a further 939 minutes downtime in just 3 weeks. This unbelievably bad performance resulted in A2 Hosting being replaced by Namecheap for future testing.
- HostGator’s uptime has been let down by 1 horrendous week (Week 43), where they recorded 425 minutes of downtime. Across 2018, they avoided any one off poor weeks, and a result have been the 5th best performer.
- HostGator is currently ranked 5th and A2 Hosting 10th in our Uptime Rankings.
View the Weekly Uptime Tests
A2 Hosting vs HostGator – Overall Test Results
The Overall Ranking accumulates the results from the speed & uptime tests to determine the #1 Host.
- Even though A2 Hosting were able to perform impressively when it came to loading times in 2016, their weakness was always poor uptime. This became a serious problem in Q4 2016 and continued into 2017. Unfortunately, this led to A2 being unable to compete with our other hosts, and ultimately requiring them to be replaced.
- While HostGator’s speed has shown promise at times, it has fallen into the bottom 2 hosts in 2018. When this is combined with the disastrous week of uptime, where they experienced a ridiculous 425 minutes of outages, HostGator has struggled to compete with the best hosts.
- HostGator is currently 6th and A2 is 10th in our Overall Rankings.
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