GreenGeeks Review
Written by: Steven Johnson Updated on 2019-11-24 12:33:00
Expert Review: 4.0
User Review: 3.5
Highlights
GreenGeeks is well known as the "Environmental Hosting Option". They do a great job at doing well for the earth and most who use them are very satisfied. They have been hosting websites for over 10 years now.GreenGeeks is a well established (10+ years in business) and reputable hosting company. They provide a solid, fast reliable environment for hosting WordPress sites at competitive prices. In regards to WordPress, they offer one-click installers, free WordPress site transfers, WordPress optimized servers, and 24/7 customer support.
In addition to shared and WP hosting, VPS, Dedicated, and Reseller options are available. For this review, we are be focussing on all things WordPress, hosting features and what it is really like to be a GreenGeek's customer.
Pros and Cons
Pros
GreenGeeks is green hosting at its best, they run fast green servers using green energy.Cons
No Dedicated server plans and support can be slow at timesCustomer Support
GreenGeeks Support
- Phone Support: Yes (24hrs/day)
- Email Support: Yes (24hr/day)
- Support Ticket System: Yes
- Live Support Chat: Yes (24hrs/day)
- Support Forums: Yes
- FAQ & Knowledge base: Yes
- Tutorials : Yes
Hosting Plans & Packages
GreenGeeks has two lines of hosting plans Lite/Pro/Premium and Ecosite Lite/Ecosite Pro/Ecosite Premium. The standard Lite/Pro/Premium seems to be associated with regular hosting while the Eco Versions of the plans are associated with WordPress.
WordPress Hosting
- Ecosite Lite
- Ecosite Pro
- Ecosite Premium
Ecosite Lite for WordPress
This is the entry level plan, so think of it as hosting for one website. This plan includes:
- Hosting for 1 Domain
- WordPress Optimized Servers
- Standard Hosting Performance
- Unlimited SSD Disk Space, Bandwith, and Email Accounts
- Free Domain Registration
- Free Let's Encrypt SSL
- Ability to send 100 emails per hour
- $2.95/month, normally $9.95/month
- Powered by 300% Renewable Energy
Ecosite Pro for WordPress
This is the mid-level plan, but do not think of it as mid-level, there is a good chance this could be the plan for you. Ecosite Pro plan includes:
- Hosting for UNLIMITED Domain
- WordPress Optimized Servers
- 2X Hosting Performance
- Unlimited SSD Disk Space, Bandwith, and Email Accounts
- Free Domain Registration
- Free Let's Encrypt SSL
- Ability to send 300 emails per hour
- $5.95/month (was $14.95/month)
- Powered by 300% Renewable Energy
Ecosite Premium for WordPress
This is top level plan, including unlimited domains hosted, 4X hosting performance, and a premium wildcard SSL The Ecosite Premium plan includes:
- Hosting for UNLIMITED Domain
- WordPress Optimized Servers
- 4X Hosting Performance
- Unlimited SSD Disk Space, Bandwith, and Email Accounts
- Free Domain Registration
- Free Let's Encrypt SSL
- Ability to send 500 emails per hour
- $11.95/month (was $24.95/month)
- Powered by 300% Renewable Energy
Shared Web Hosting
- Lite
- Pro
- Premium
VPS Hosting
VPS Plans are available, starting at $5/month and going up to $80/month. As the plans go up in price, so does, RAM, File Storage, Bandwith and Processor cores.- $5/month: 1GB Ram, 25GB File Storage, 1TB Bandwidth, 1 Processor Core
- $10/month: 2GB Ram, 50GB File Storage, 2TB Bandwidth, 1 Processor Cores
- $20/month: 4GB Ram, 100GB File Storage, 4TB Bandwidth, 2 Processor Cores
- $40/month: 8GB Ram, 150GB File Storage, 5TB Bandwidth, 4 Processor Cores
- $80/month: 16GB Ram, 200GB File Storage, 8TB Bandwidth, 6 Processor Cores
Learn More: https://www.greengeeks.com/vps-hosting
Dedicated Servers
Dedicated Servers are also available. The prices range from $169 - $439/month. As you go up in price you get better hardware. One note the amound a data transfer and IP Adresses remain constant for all plans, which are:
- Entry Server $169/month: Intel Atom 330 Dual Core, 2GB Memory, (1) 500GB Sata Drive, 5 IP Addresses, 10TB Data Transfer
- Standard Server $269/month: Xeon E3-1220 3.1Ghz, 4GB Memory, (2) 500GB Sata Drive, 5 IP Addresses, 10TB Data Transfer
- Elite Server $319/month: Xeon E3-1230 3.2Ghz w/HT, 8GB Memory, (2) 500GB Sata Drive, 5 IP Addresses, 10TB Data Transfer
- Pro Server $439/month: Xeon E5-2620 2.0Ghz w/HT, 16GB Memory, (2) 500GB Sata Drive, 5 IP Addresses, 10TB Data Transfer
Learn More: https://www.greengeeks.com/dedicated-servers
Reseller Hosting
Reseller plans are separated by the number of cPanel accounts hosting in the plan. The plans start at Reseller 10 which has 10 cPanel accounts and goes up to Reseller 50 with (you guessed it) 50 accounts. A quick breakdown of the reseller plans available:
- Reseller 10 – 10 cPanel accounts, all reseller features for $19.95/month.
- Reseller 20 – 20 cPanel accounts, all reseller features for $34.95/month.
- Reseller 30 – 30 cPanel accounts, all reseller features for $44.95/month.
- Reseller 40 – 40 cPanel accounts, all reseller features for $54.95/month.
- Reseller 50 – 50 cPanel accounts, all reseller features for $59.95/month.
Reseller Plan Features
- 24/7 Reseller Support
- Private White Label
- Wholesale Account Pricing
- Wholesale Domains
- WHMCS License
- Advanced Security
Hosting Features
Its hosting plans provide technical features like site builder, nightly backups, 99.9% uptime guarantee, free instant setup, 30-day money-back guarantee, web templates, support for all major programming scripts, easy-to-use control panel, and web statistics.
Along with eCommerce features, GreenGeeks also offers one-click installation for WordPress. These tools are provided in the control panel.
SSD HARD DRIVES
If you are not familiar with SSD hard drives, then all you need to know is that they are fast. The fact that GreenGeeks uses them in their servers is fantastic. Having super quick hard drives really speeds up websites.
LITESPEED & MARIADB
These two servers software will ensure your site is as fast as it can be.
POWERCACHER
This is a GreekGeeks Developed caching service to ensure that your site is fast and available
Additional Hosting Features
- Cloudflare CDN
- HTTP/2 Enabled
- PHP 7 Enabled
WordPress Specific Features
GreenGeeks is a global sponsor of WordCamp's and an active supporter of the WordPress community. They know quite a bit about WordPress.
They have optimized their servers for WordPress, including a 1-click WordPress installer, automatic WP updating, support for WP Staging.
WordPress Optimized Servers
What has been done to optimize the servers?
WordPress Site Transfer
If you have a WordPress hosted somewhere else, then it is super easy to get moved over to GreenGeeks. One of the GreenGeeks Migration WP migration specialists will get it moved over for you.
The migration can happen one of two ways:
- If you are currently on a cPanel server then they can do cPanel to cPanel Migrations. Once you have signed up, log in to your account and click on Support -> Migration Request. Fill in the form with the proper details and your request will be sent to the Migrations department. It can take up to 48 hours to transfer the site (depending on the size of the site), but it's usually much sooner than this for the average site (within a few hours).
- If you are not on a CPanel server, provide your WordPress administrator login details and they will get the site moved over to your new GreenGeeks account. Their migration timing policy is 24-48 hours, however, in most cases, they are completed within the first few hours after submission.
It should also be noted for non-cpanel accounts Emails are not migrated and GG will transfer one non-cpanel domain (web, mysql, etc) per customer for free.
One Click WP Installer
If you are setting up a new WordPress site, then you are in luck. GreenGeeks has a one-click WP installer powered by Softactuolous. This makes installing WP (and other applications) super simple, but it is also just as easy to uninstall them.
Managed WordPress Updates
Are WordPress core and plugins available to be automatically updated?
WordPress Staging Tool
Is a staging site available? If so how does it work?
Company Details
Green Geeks was founded in 2008 with the goal to be the most eco-friendly web host. Over a decade later, they continue to be one of the greenest hosting options out there for 40,000+ customers and 500,000+ websites.
If you were not aware, the Internet is the fastest-growing carbon polluting industries. Soon, it may eclipse all other industries in terms of worldwide pollution. GreenGeeks is committed to be the most eco-friendly web hosting company in the world and give a voice this huge problem.
GreenGeek employees put take pride in working for a company that uses wind energy to put back into the grid 3 times the amount of energy they consume. From top to bottom, their entire team is well trained, knowledgeable and friendly.
The web hosting industry can be a very challenging place to work, but at GreenGeeks they all put in the effort to keep customers happy - plain and simple. It is a collaborative effort with everybody on the team playing their own part in the process.
GreenGeeks is always seeking new ways to stay a step ahead of the industry too, with their overall hosting platform. They find it a very rewarding and challenging experience.
Data Center Details
GreenGeeks has five data centers located in three different countries:
- Amsterdam, Netherlands
- Chicago, Illinois, United States
- Montreal, Quebec, Canada
- Phoenix, Arizona, United States
- Toronto, Ontario, Canada
The data centers are located in SAS 70 Type 1 colocations. They have implemented fully redundant Juniper and Cisco switches along with Juniper edge routers. Along with the best in class each data center features dual city grid power feeds with automatic on-site generators.
If all the above technical jargon does not mean much to you, your take away should be: "GreenGeeks has super-smart engineers that have architected always available server solutions and spared no expense doing so." Their data centers, network, and servers are truly best in class.
Refund Policy
GreenGeeks fully stands behind their service with an unconditional 30-day money-back guarantee.
They offer a 99.9% uptime guarantee and want you to know you should expect nothing but the best. Along with the uptime you can expect fast email support, live phone and chat support.
We do not have any first-hand experience trying to get money back and have not heard of any complaints from unhappy customers trying to get their money back. We feel pretty confident, should you become dissatisfied with GreenGeeks they will do the right thing and refund your money.
Summary
WordPress Hosting Expert
What you need to know about GreenGeeks:
If you are looking for Green Hosting GreenGeeks is worth checking out. While other providers offer Green plans GreenGeeks has dedicated themselves to Green Energy and is one of the best at it.
4.0 / 5.0
Editor review
1 reviews
Customer Support
Our sites on GreenGeeks do not require much maintenance and they just continue to work Periodically we get emails about network upgrades and happenings, such as a new Facebook page. On the few occasions we have needed to contact tech support they were available, helpful and responsive.
Prices
The prices remain competitive even though they are spending additional money to purchase green energy. The plans can be as low as $4.95/month with a 3 year commitment, while the two year plans cost $6.95/month. In web hosting 3 years is pretty long but you do get a pretty significant savings. We opted for the two year sign up. The choice of contract length is up to you and really will depend on your situation.
Reseller Plans
We have not tried out the reseller service but we do know that they offer 5 plans ranging from $20/month to $100/month. Would love to hear from someone who has experience with the GreenGeeks reseller plans.
Conclusion
If you are looking for Green Hosting GreenGeeks is worth checking out. While other providers offer Green plans GreenGeeks has dedicated themselves to Green Energy and is one of the best at it.
Reviewer Info
User reviews
3 reviews
- -Initially, They assume you are a level 3 programmer.
- -My Site was constantly down on their number 4 server. They blamed by site. -I had constant time outs, they blamed by site.
- -My site was overloaded they blamed my site.
- -My site was slow, they blamed by site. I did some research and found that their crappy No.4 server was the problem. They changed me to no.10 and it was 10 times faster…
Though now I cannot receive any email. I sent them my mail passwords to fix my mail and then no answer… I waited and NOTHING.
I contacted Sales, Support even TREY the CEO with no Balls and NOTHING. I sent from GMAIL and NOTHING. I concluded that they must have read my email with an offer from BLUE HOST. this company is pure Green Trash. AVOID at all cost…
greengeeks.com = Expensive, KGB Support, Bad Service and a lot of Down Time…