Heart Internet Review
Heart Internet are one of the UK’s most establishing hosting providers, having started supplying hosting services way back in 1998. They offer shared hosting, VPS and dedicated servers, but these days, I would suggest it’s their VPS and dedicated server that really stand out.
Overall, they are able to deliver great hosting solutions, with the kind of support and reliability you should demand from your hosting provider. They have been selected as the uk’s best hosting provider for 3 years consecutively by PC Pros.
When it comes to reliability and support, reviews would suggest it’s been a little inconsistent but if you’re looking for a VPS or dedicated server solution, at a reasonable price point, you have to consider Heart Internet and in this review we’re going to outline how they measure up.
- 100Performance
- 100Accessibility
- 100Reliability
- 85Cost
- 50Service
- 4.355.08087Overall
Detailed Review of Heart Internet Hosting
Heart Internet have been around a long time. Since 2004, they have been part of the same corporate group as 123-Reg, Host Europe and Webfusion. They are now owned by the hosting giant, GoDaddy.
However, they run the services independently maintaining their own data centers and networks. They have their own products and their own pricing.They offer the complete range of services. It includes shared hosting, VPS and dedicated servers packages. To be honest, their shared hosting is ok, it’s certainly not bad, but it’s such a competitive area of the business, there are service providers that offer a much better shared hosting package.
It’s with their VPS and dedicated hosting packages that they really make their mark. Both are worthy candidates and worth your attention. They have been doing this a long and it shows in the quality of their more complex packages. It’s these services that have made Heart Internet award winning and I would recommend this solutions to you.
Heart Internet Hosting Features
Speed
Their shared hosting package hits the benchmark of 3 seconds for the average page load time. Not great but definitely respectable. Their VPS was excellent in the speed test, with a registered speed of 1.38 seconds, blink and you’ll miss it. There dedicated server can boast sub 1 second page loads. I’ve witnessed faster but really, it’s a luxury, Heart Internet’s speed is as good as you need.
Heart Internet’s packages range from adequate to outstanding, they clearly appreciate that these days website visitors are jittery and impatient. Generally speaking, you can expect to lose up to 40% of your website traffic if you ask them to wait 3 or more seconds. That drop off rate decreases the quicker your pages load.
Reliability
This is an area where Heart Internet could improve. They boast of having 99.9% uptime but when you look at the customer reviews that are online it’s clear to see some inconsistency.
There are lot of online reviews, because Heart Internet have been successful and popular and therefore have a large customer base. When looking at online reviews you need to take any negative feedback with a pinch of salt because human nature means people are more likely to complain that compliment. But having made that caveat, it’s clear to see that more than an acceptable number of customers have had the an issue with down time.
As a customer of Heart Internet, using a dedicated server, I also experienced downtime of a few hours at a time, pretty regularly. More than I have experienced with other dedicated servers from other suppliers. At the end of the day, a few hours here or there might not make a lot of difference to your business, but be aware it’s a possibility.
At the time, I used the server to host an online course with students around the world. 4 hours of down time would results in customers going through the support channels, making complaints, which would ultimately cost me money. Enough extra cost that it caused me change provider.
Customer Support
You can say many things about GoDaddy, love them or hate them, their customer support is excellent. It’s quick and, well, it’s supportive. Just like some of the reliability issues Heart Internet used to have, customers have complained in the past of having inconsistent customer support. Initial support was often on the button. It was easy to get in touch with Heart Internet, it just took some time to get anything done.
So, the speed in which the problem was resolved was often a little hit and miss. However, being bought by GoDaddy has meant that issue has been resolved and you’ll find less and less complaints about customer support. Their standards have gone through the roof.
They have an excellent Support base for those customers who like to find their own answers and solutions. They are contactable by ticket and phone and these days you’ll find their support efficient. They still wouldn’t be my go to hosting provider if you’re looking for a managed VPS or dedicated server, I’d expect more from my support, but for a shared hosting package that generally has less technical support needs, then I think Heart’s support hits the spot.
Conclusion
“Heart internet have all the power of GoDaddy behind them, and it’s starting to show”
Heart Internet have a pretty solid reputation and have a strong customer base.They’ve won numerous awards over the last 5 years and have recently been bought by GoDaddy, but have kept their independence, with their own network and data centers. They are particularly worth your attention if you’re looking at hosting for a UK audience.
They offer all the hosting solutions you’d need from a hosting provider, but I would strongly suggest that you consider their VPS or dedicated server. Their shared hosting is perfectly fine, it’s a solid option, but I would consider either WPEngine or SiteGround, they offer so much more for the same price point.
WIth their VPS and dedicated server you’re in safe hands. They have the odd reliability issue from time to time but it’s a few hours only and it will be an issue for a select few of their customers. In terms of customer support, they have been guilty of being a little inconsistent in the past but in the last few years, that have put a stop to that. There customer support is on a par with some of the top hosting providers on our top 10 list.
All in all, Heart Internet delivers. They are a solid option for shared hosting and one of the better choices you can make with their VPS and dedicated server.
