PHP hosting is a critical aspect for businesses, startups, freelancers, and developers. It plays a pivotal role in ensuring the scalability and efficiency of PHP applications. This article provides a comprehensive guide on the best PHP cloud hosting providers for 2024, considering their performance, pricing, and features.
PHP stands for PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor, a scripting language well-suited for creating dynamic websites. PHP hosting allows web developers to rent server space to store and execute their PHP files, making their websites or applications accessible to users on various devices. In this article, we are going to see the different options available that can help with hosting your PHP applications.
I am hosting all my PHP applications on Hetzner with CloudPanel as a server manager panel and I will not change anything so in case you want the quick answer this is it. If you want something that doesn’t need a lot of work and you are willing to pay more I will recommand Cloudways
The Best PHP Cloud Hosting Providers for 2024
PHP Hosting Providers By Price
Below is an overview of the prices that you can have for PHP hosting, be careful to check the exact features before making a decision. Even if some are more expensive like Cloudways they come packed with a lot of features. Don’t just go and choose the cheapest choose the one that suits your needs best. This selection is to cover all the PHP application types.
| Cloud Hosting Provider | Lowest Monthly Price | Is Managed |
|---|---|---|
| Hostinger | $1.99 | Yes |
| Vultr | $2.5 | No |
| Hetzner Cloud | $5 | No |
| DigitalOcean | $5 | No |
| Cloudways | $14 | Yes |
For servers that provides only hosting like Hetzner, Vultr, DigitalOcean or Hostinger VPS you will need an hosting panal to help you manage your PHP projects. The recommandations are CloudPanel or Ploi.io.
#1.Hetzner
Hetzner is a German cloud computing provider that offers high-performance and low-cost cloud servers, storage, and networking solutions. Hetzner does not offer PHP-specific hosting plans, but users can install and run any PHP application on their cloud servers, using their own or third-party server management tools.
Hetzner has ARM, Intel or AMD CPU, you can choose between dedicated or shared and different RAM sizes at very good prices. The performance is very good I am using them for more than 3 years and everything is working fine.
Hetzner in comparison with other providers like Vultr, Linode or DigitalOcean keeps low prices and good performance, a server with similar specs can be half of the price of others or even lower.
Hetzner has also backups, block storage, load balancer, floating IP addresses, DDoS protection, and more.
Givin the fact that the performance is very good and prices are good it is at the top of my list.
#2.Cloudways
Cloudways is a managed cloud hosting platform that allows users to host their PHP applications on various cloud providers, such as DigitalOcean, AWS, and Google Cloud. Cloudways takes care of the server setup, configuration, optimization, and security, and provides users with a simple and intuitive dashboard to manage their PHP applications.
Cloudways is offering integrations with CloudFlare Enterprise for an extra $5 for domain which is pretty good. Cloudways servers and configs can be managed from UI and can make things very easy. The one downside is that you don’t have root access to the VPS.
The price is definitely higher and it starts from $14 but it comes packed with features. Their application makes administrating a server very easy and it comes packed with a lot of functions that’s why it ranks number 2 on my list. I am suing them for clients in special that want to do things on their own and doesn’t have a lot of technical knowledge.
#3.Vultr
Vultr is a cloud hosting provider known for its high-performance SSD VPS servers, powered by the latest AMD and Intel CPUs. These servers can be deployed in under 60 seconds, making them ideal for hosting PHP applications. Vultr has 32 global data centers, which can help reduce latency and improve app performance.
It also offers robust security features, including dedicated IP addresses, DDoS protection, and a built-in firewall. Vultr’s managed databases for MySQL, PostgreSQL, and Redis simplify data management, while its scalable storage solutions can handle large amounts of data. The platform supports a wide range of operating systems and offers a user-friendly control panel for easy server management.
Vultr also provides a range of developer tools and services, including Kubernetes support for containerized PHP applications. However, managing a VPS server on Vultr requires technical expertise, so those unfamiliar with server setup and maintenance may prefer a managed hosting provider.
Vultr like Hetzner can be used with a hosting panel like CloudPanel or Ploi. Vultr starts with plans from $2.5 and it has the fastest shared cloud servers from DigitalOcean and Hetzner, made an article in here: DigitalOcean vs Vultr vs Hetzner
I have used Vultr in the past and the performance was way better than DigitalOcean one as can be seen in the article above. What made me move was Hetzner good prices and performance. Why would you not pay less for the same server with CPU, RAM and Storage and have similar performance :)
If you are in need of a datacenter closer to your visitors Vultr can help you with very good services.
Try Vultr and Get $100 Free to Test Them
#4.Digitalocean
Digitalocean is offering services similar to Vultr and they have even more. They are some of the first that appeared and I remember that more than 5 years ago they were the ones that helped me host all the sites.
Lately I didn’t have a good experience with them as I have seen some slowness in my server and my clients and decided to use Vultr then. This happened years ago and I guess it depends on the datacenter and how loaded it was.
Digitalocean comes with a lot of services and their servers are called droplets, which have a wide range of servers with high performance and so on.
Same as for the others you will need to be a little technical and use a server panel to administrate your applications. DigitalOcean is offering free credits for new comes so you can test and check for yourself the performance.
Try Digitalocean and Get $100 Free to Test Them
#5.Hostinger
Hostinger’s shared hosting service is an affordable and user-friendly solution for hosting PHP applications. It allows multiple websites to share the same server, making it a cost-effective choice for small to medium-sized projects.
Hostinger’s shared hosting comes with a custom-made control panel, hPanel, which simplifies the setup and management of websites. It also provides an Auto Installer tool, making it easy to install PHP and other applications.
Hostinger uses CloudLinux with LVE containers, ensuring each user gets a dedicated container with resource boundaries for smooth operation. It also supports different PHP versions, allowing you to switch between versions as needed.
Hostinger’s shared hosting plans are optimized for performance, using LiteSpeed web server and Non-Volatile Memory Express (NVMe) solid-state drives for fast data storage and retrieval. In addition, Hostinger offers a range of security features, including malware scanning and Cloudflare-protected name servers.
If you are not technical at all and you don’t have a big application you can check Hostinger they have plans that starts from about $2 a month. They are offering also VPS solution in case you are wandering and you don’t like the rest.
Free PHP Hosting: Is It Possible?
If you are looking for a free way to host your PHP applications, you may be wondering if there are any free PHP hosting providers available. The answer is yes, there are some free PHP hosting providers that offer limited resources and features for PHP applications, but they come with many risks and limitations.
Free PHP Hosting and Risks
Free PHP hosting may sound appealing, but it is not recommended for serious or professional PHP applications, as it has many drawbacks, such as:
- Low performance and reliability: Free PHP hosting providers usually have low-quality servers, overcrowded resources, and frequent downtime, which can affect the speed, uptime, and functionality of your PHP applications.
- Limited features and flexibility: Free PHP hosting providers usually have outdated PHP versions, extensions, and frameworks, as well as restricted databases, storage, bandwidth, and domains. You may not be able to customize or optimize your server environment according to your needs.
- Poor security and support: Free PHP hosting providers usually have weak security measures, such as no SSL certificates, firewalls, backups, or malware protection, which can expose your PHP applications to hackers, data loss, or corruption. You may also have no or minimal customer support, documentation, or community resources to help you with your PHP applications.
- Hidden fees and ads: Free PHP hosting providers may not be truly free, as they may charge you for extra resources, features, or services, or display unwanted ads on your PHP applications, which can affect your user experience and reputation
Free PHP Hosting Providers
If you still want to try free PHP hosting, here are some of the free PHP hosting providers that you can check out:
000webhost Free PHP Hosting
000webhost Free offers a comprehensive package for hosting PHP apps without any financial commitment. It provides almost unrestricted PHP support, ensuring compatibility with the latest PHP versions for free, which is crucial for running dynamic PHP-based applications. The service includes 300 MB of disk space and 3 GB of bandwidth, accommodating small to medium-sized projects. Users benefit from a free version of cPanel, facilitating easy management of their hosting environment, and MySQL databases for data storage, essential for PHP applications.
InfinityFree
InfinityFree is a free web hosting platform that offers a range of features suitable for hosting PHP applications. It provides 5 GB of disk space and unlimited bandwidth, supporting PHP 8.2 and MySQL 5.7 / MariaDB 10.4, which are essential for running PHP-based websites and applications.
If you are testing something or you don’t have the budget you can give them a look.
Free Hosting Alternatives to PHP
If you are looking for a free way to host your websites, but you do not want to use PHP or deal with the risks and limitations of free PHP hosting, you may want to consider some free hosting alternatives to PHP. One of the most popular and easy-to-use alternatives is static websites.
Static Websites (HTML, CSS, and JavaScript)
Static websites are websites that consist of only HTML, CSS, and JavaScript files, without any server-side scripting or database interaction. Static websites are simple, fast, secure, and easy to maintain, as they do not require any server configuration, installation, or processing. Static websites are also suitable for many types of websites, such as blogs, portfolios, landing pages, documentation, etc.
Best Free Hostings for Static Websites
If you want to create and host static websites for free, you can use some of the best free hostings for static websites, such as:
Cloudflare Pages
Cloudflare Pages’ free tier offers a comprehensive set of features for hosting websites, making it an attractive option for developers and teams. With the ability to deploy up to 500 times per month, it caters to active development environments. Each build has a maximum duration of 20 minutes, ensuring efficient use of resources. The platform supports up to 20,000 files per site, with a maximum file size limit of 25 MiB, accommodating a wide range of web projects. Users can assign up to 100 custom domains per project, providing flexibility in branding and accessibility.
A standout feature is the unlimited collaborators option, which encourages teamwork and project sharing without additional costs. Cloudflare Pages integrates seamlessly with Git, automating deployments and providing preview links for every commit and pull request, which simplifies the review and collaboration process. Additionally, the free tier includes essential security features like SSL, CDN, and DDoS protection, highlighting Cloudflare’s commitment to secure and performant web hosting. This plan is designed to meet the needs of individual developers to small teams by offering a robust platform for efficiently deploying and managing web projects.
You can check: How To Deploy An Astro.JS Blog On Cloudflare
Netlify
Netlify’s free tier offers a generous package for hosting websites, making it an attractive option for personal projects, hobby sites, or experiments. Users can deploy unlimited websites with a bandwidth limit of 100GB per month and are allocated 300 build minutes. This should suffice for websites with moderate traffic. Additionally, the free tier includes serverless functions with a limit of 125k requests per site per month, with additional usage incurring a fee. Forms can be integrated into websites by adding a simple attribute to any HTML form, although the free tier has limitations on the number of form submissions and large media storage.
Vercel
Vercel’s free tier, known as the Hobby plan, caters to personal projects, developers, and small-scale applications with a suite of features for web hosting.The plan ensures secure connections with automatic HTTPS/SSL and offers previews for every git push, enabling users to visualize changes before they go live. Notably, the Hobby plan is free and designed for non-commercial, personal use only, with no billing cycles. However, exceeding usage limits requires waiting until 30 days have passed for feature reuse.
GitHub Pages
GitHub Pages Free Tier offers a static site hosting service that allows you to host websites directly from a GitHub repository. It supports HTML, CSS, and JavaScript files, and can optionally run these files through a build process before publishing. You can host your site on GitHub’s github.io domain or your own custom domain.
There are three types of GitHub Pages sites: project, user, and organization. You can create publicly available sites, and organizations using GitHub Enterprise Cloud can also publish sites privately. The service is available in public repositories only with the Free tier, although Free tier users can set up an unlimited number of public and private repositories. However, private repositories can’t be used with GitHub Pages in the Free tier.
Conclusions
In this article, we have discussed the best PHP cloud hosting providers for 2024, the free PHP hosting providers and their risks, and the free hosting alternatives to PHP. We hope this article has helped you find the best hosting solution for your PHP applications or static websites. Thank you for reading.