Looking at the overwhelming pool of web hosting providers will make you want to defer that task (of having to pick a provider to partner with) till some other time.
Too many choices can overwhelm us and cause us to not choose at all. For businesses, this means that if they offer us too many choices, we may not buy anything. – Sheena Iyengar
Our eyes caught another web hosting provider this week – Smartweb, and we have created this review to help you determine if the web hosting provider is an ideal pick for powering your websites and applications.
Table of Contents
What is Smartweb Nigeria?
Smartweb is a popular web hosting service provider with affordable web hosting plans. The web hosting service offers customer service that attends to customers round the clock with flexible web hosting options including cloud hosting, reseller web hosting, and managed WordPress web hosting plans.
Smartweb is an ideal choice for anyone who is building their website for the first time, when you need to create an online presence for your business, or anyone looking to host their web applications online. Smartweb offers one of the most pocket-friendly web hosting plans in the Nigerian web hosting market today plus you stand the chance to get a free domain name when you purchase an annual hosting plan.
First off, Smartweb has some distinguishing factors out of all the web hosting providers in Nigeria.
This is due to her impressive offers for shared hosting customers, they also have a very competitive pricing and some other amazing standout features when compared to other hosting providers in the country.
Smart web has been around since 2004 offering its customers affordable web hosting services, helping to power their ideas on the www space.
The company prides itself to be hosting well over 100k sites, having up to 90k customers, and registering well over 150k domains, servicing small business websites, blogs, web and mobile applications, etc.
Looking at the range of extensive web hosting features offered by Smartweb, it’s not so difficult to come to the conclusion that Smarweb offers a beginner-friendly web hosting solution.
What do they offer?
- Shared hosting plans
- Reseller hosting plans
- WordPress hosting
- Cloud hosting
- Sitelock
- Codeguard backups
Pros
- Varieties of plans to accommodate all types of budget
- Still Affordable compared to a provider like Web4Africa
- One-click WordPress installation for popular solutions like WordPress
- Cpanel
- Free SSL
- Free .com.ng domain name
- Email services
- Intuitive Website Builder
- Timely support
Cons
As it is with other web hosting providers, there are some benefits and shortcomings of signing up to Smartweb, and it’s important to do your due diligence to be sure, it’s something you can cope with after you commit to using the provider. A few of these cons include;
- Extra cost for domain privacy
- Pricier .com domain
- Pricier web hosting plans when compared to providers such as Truehost
- Upsell for add-on services
- SSL is not free
Smartweb Hosting Services and Pricing
Smartweb Nigeria has an impressive list of web hosting solutions needed for anyone to power their digital campaigns on the internet. We looked through their hosting options as seen on their website and we could establish that they offer shared hosting plans, reseller hosting plans, as well as dedicated server hosting plans.
Coming to the web hosting options, we’ve earlier noted that Smartweb has a plethora of packages to accommodate all irrespective of their budget, You can get the shared hosting plans in both Linux and Windows plans.
Linux-shared hosting plans
The basic Linux plan comes with 10 GB of storage, and 30 GB of bandwidth to handle traffic, and you can create unlimited email accounts for yourself or your client. You’d also get up to 5 MySQL databases.
They also have a perkier Linux plan with better perks, on the top-tier Linux hosting plan You’d have access to unlimited storage, which means you can host multiple websites, unlimited bandwidth to handle some volume of traffic, create multiple email accounts, and MySQL databases (until terms and conditions).
This plan is especially great for digital marketers and web designers who need to create landing pages for their clients to run their business campaigns.
Windows shared hosting plans
The minimum plan for entry-level users on Windows comes with a meager 2 GB of storage to house website files, 10 GB of bandwidth to handle traffic, 15 email accounts, and the Plesk control panel to administer your web hosting plan.
There’s also a shared Windows plan that gives a massive 60 GB of storage, 200 GB of bandwidth to handle traffic, unlimited email accounts, subdomains, add-on domains, and MS SQL databases.
However, we can establish that all the shared hosting plans from Smartweb come either several user-friendly features as we have mentioned above. You’d also have the chance to get a free .com.ng domain name when you opt for a year or longer hosting plan.
There are several optional add-on solutions such as sitelock, Codeguard for automatic data backups, and Free and paid SSL; offered by the provider.
VPS Hosting
The High-performance VPS hosting at Smartweb is designed for websites that need a lot more flexibility, customizability, and resources, A VPS will offer its users more freedom to do things like stream media resources, send private and confidential emails, and install specific apps and bare metal software install with full root access making way for total and absolute control over your server infrastructure. The VPS packages are divided into 4 plans, Linux VPS1, Linux VPS2, Linux VPS3, and Linux VPS4 with VPS 1 starting at N40K per month and VPS 4 for N64K per month. You can check on their website to see the full plans available.
Other Web Hosting Plans on Smartweb include;
- Cloud Hosting
- Dedicated Server
- Email Hosting
- WordPress Hosting
In conclusion, Smartweb Nigeria is a Nigerian hosting provider that is popular for its budget-friendly shared hosting plans.
Final Verdict
It’s also worth mentioning that the company has received a mixed range of reviews and backlash from perceived clients and users across various online review platforms many of which are dated back to around 2019 and 2020, we hope they’ve really improved their service delivery and many of those critics addresses.
Overall, Smartweb Nigeria provides accessible hosting options, and it’s a potential choice for anyone looking for a cost-effective hosting service to power-launch their projects on a string budget.
