Cloudways vs. Liquid Web

Last verified 35 days ago · 35 sources · Updated automatically

Cloudways and Liquid Web compared across Company facts, Pricing, Performance & infrastructure, WordPress management, Support & security and Platform & integrations — every fact sourced and re-verified from each vendor's public material.

Cloudways

Managed cloud hosting that runs WordPress on your choice of DigitalOcean, AWS, or Google Cloud. Owned by DigitalOcean.

HQ St. Julian's, Malta

Visit Cloudways Full profile

Liquid Web

Managed WordPress and ecommerce hosting (formerly Nexcess), on Liquid Web's own datacenters with Cloudflare Enterprise and a 100% uptime SLA.

HQ Lansing, MI

Visit Liquid Web Full profile

Attribute

Cloudways

Liquid Web

Company facts

Headquarters

St. Julian's, Malta

Lansing, MI Lansing, Michigan (Liquid Web HQ; Nexcess consolidated under the Liquid Web brand)

Employees

264 Cloudways team (brand); owned by DigitalOcean since 2022

750 Approx. company headcount (LinkedIn 500–1,000 range, midpoint)

Pricing

Starting Monthly Price (USD)

$11 DigitalOcean 1GB/2GB entry plan; unlimited websites and unmetered visits

$6 Spark – Launch plan, the entry managed WordPress tier (1 site, 15 GB), billed monthly

Entry Plan WordPress Sites

—

1 sites 1 WordPress site on the entry Spark – Launch plan

Entry Plan Storage (GB)

50 GB

15 GB 15 GB storage on the entry Spark – Launch plan

Free Trial Length (Days)

3 days 3-day free trial, no credit card required

0 days No free trial offered on managed WordPress plans

Money-Back Guarantee (Days)

0 days No money-back guarantee (pay-as-you-go); 3-day free trial instead

0 days No money-back guarantee; the current Terms of Service state fees are non-refundable

Performance & infrastructure

Underlying Cloud

DigitalOcean, AWS, Google Cloud, Linode, Vultr Customer chooses the cloud provider per server; DigitalOcean is the cheapest entry option

own datacenters Runs on Liquid Web-owned, staffed Tier-4 datacenters

Datacenter Locations

150 150+ data centers in 50+ countries across all five cloud providers

9 9 Liquid Web datacenter locations across the US, UK, EU, and Australia

Free CDN

Cloudflare Enterprise CDN included on every managed WordPress plan

Web Server

NGINX

Apache Apache application server (with a Cloudflare Enterprise / NGINX edge-cache layer in front)

Built-in Object Cache

Redis persistent object cache available at no extra cost

Redis object caching (Object Cache Pro) enabled by default on all new sites

Latest PHP Version

8.4 Up to PHP 8.4 (Debian 11/12 servers); 8.2 default

8.3 PHP 8.3 selectable via the Client Portal (newer releases may also be available)

Free SSL Certificate

Free 1-click Let's Encrypt SSL

Free SSL certificate included on all plans

WordPress management

Automatic WordPress Updates

Host-managed automatic WordPress core (and security) updates

Staging Environments

Free 1-click staging and cloning

Free staging site included on every plan

Automatic Daily Backups

Automated daily by default (adjustable to hourly); off-site storage metered

Automatic daily backups on every plan

Backup Retention (Days)

7 days Default 7-day retention; configurable from 1 to 4 weeks

7 days 7-day backup retention on the entry Spark – Launch plan (30 days on Thrive/Elevate)

Free Site Migration

Free WordPress Migrator plugin (unlimited) plus one free expert-handled migration per account

Free self-serve migration on the entry plan (assisted migration on higher tiers)

SSH & WP-CLI Access

SSH + pre-installed WP-CLI on all servers; SFTP and Git too

SSH (Secure Shell) access with WP-CLI on managed WordPress plans

WordPress Multisite Support

Cloudways Flexible only (not Autonomous)

WordPress Multisite supported (subdomain or subdirectory networks)

Support & security

Uptime SLA (%)

99.99% 99.99% uptime SLA (covers the Cloudways platform/console, not partner cloud providers)

100% 100% uptime SLA (network and power), with service credits

24/7 Support

24/7/365 live chat and ticket support on all plans

24/7/365 support on all plans

Malware Removal / Hack Fix

Malware remediation is a paid one-time service ($200/incident), not an included guarantee

WAF / DDoS Protection

Built-in WAF included free on all Flexible servers (OWASP rules, IP/country blocking, bot + DoS protection)

Web application firewall + DDoS protection (Cloudflare Enterprise) included on every plan

Platform & integrations

Control Panel

custom Cloudways Platform (custom dashboard; no cPanel)

custom Custom Sites & Stores portal (sites-portal.liquidweb.com), not cPanel/Plesk

White-Label / Agency Features

Team roles, project organization, client access control, and automated white-label invoices

Reseller / white-label hosting and client management for partners

Email Hosting Included

No bundled email; optional Rackspace email add-on at $1/mailbox/mo

Email hosting not included; mailboxes require a paid add-on or third-party provider

The verdict

Cloudways

Best for multi-site scale and cloud choice

At $11 the entry plan hosts unlimited sites with 50 GB storage, versus Liquid Web's single site on 15 GB. You pick the underlying cloud (DigitalOcean, AWS, Google Cloud, Linode, Vultr) across 150+ datacenters, against Liquid Web's 9 owned locations, and a 3-day no-card trial lets you test first where Liquid Web offers none.

Full profile

Liquid Web

Best for hands-off managed single-site hosting

Starts at $6 with host-managed automatic WordPress updates and a free Cloudflare Enterprise CDN, both absent on Cloudways. It runs on its own Tier-4 datacenters with a 100% uptime SLA versus Cloudways' 99.99%. The trade-off: the entry plan caps at 1 site and 15 GB with no free trial.

Full profile

Sources · 35 verified references

cbinsights.com liquidweb.com linkedin.com cloudways.com support.cloudways.com

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