StormWeb.ca review

First impression

StormWeb is a Canadian web hosting company that was founded way back in 1998, the year when the iMac was about to be unveiled for the first time and 56K dial-up internet modems were still a thing. This pioneer was one of the very first web hosting providers in Canada and has since grown to be one of Canada’s household names when it comes to hosting, providing Shared Hosting, VPS Hosting, Dedicated Server Hosting, and Cloud Storage, as well as being a Cira accredited domain registrar.

This 100% privately owned company, made up of a team of highly trained hosting professionals, runs its day-to-day operations out of its main office located in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada. 

Trial Period

StormWeb doesn’t offer a free trial period for you to try them out, but they do have a 30-day money-back guarantee on all their hosting plans. This guarantee typically means that if you're not satisfied with their services, and still fall within the first 30 days of signing up, you can request a full refund for the hosting fees you've paid.

However, keep in mind that domain registrations do not fall within this policy, and no refund for it applies. 

Billing Cycle

While VPS and Dedicated Server Hosting packages offer customers the option of signing up on a monthly or annual basis, their Shared Hosting only offers an annual subscription.

They currently accept MasterCard, Visa, American Express, and Interac (a Canadian funds transfer service) as valid payment methods.

It's worth noting that renewal notices on annual subscriptions are emailed to customers 30 days before the actual renewal date on their account, and if payments are not received within 7 days, a $5 fee will be added.

Control Panel

Both their Shared Hosting and VPS plans make use of DirectAdmin as the control panel. This graphical web-based, web hosting control panel, allows users to manage their websites, email accounts, domains, users, payments, and more, from one convenient location.

Limits

Their Shared Hosting, running on Apache Web Servers, offers users 3 plans to choose from, namely Basic, Pro, and Enterprise. The entry-level plan comes bundled with 10GB NVMe SSD storage space, 10 POP/IMAP email accounts, and 1GB RAM, and limits you to a maximum of 2 websites. Pro offers 250GB NVMe SSD space, 100 POP/IMAP email accounts with 2GB RAM, and the ability to host up to 5 websites, whilst Enterprise boasts unlimited sites, disc space, and email accounts.

All Shared Hosting plans come standard with a Free SSL certificate by Let’s Encrypt, as well as no limits on traffic or MySQL/MariaDB 10.4 databases. PHP versions 5.6, 7.3, 7.4, 8.0, and Perl 5.6 are supported by their support agents.

VPS plans also come in 3 options and have dedicated IPv4 and IPv6 addresses included. The VPS80 plan comes with 80GB SSD NVMe space, 2 Core CPUs, and 4GB RAM, VPS160 has 160GB SSD NVMe space, 4 Core CPUs, and 8GB RAM, and their flagship VPS plan, the VPS640 features 640GB SSD NVMe space, 8 Core CPUs with 16GB RAM.

As with the Shared plans, VPS also comes standard with a Free SSL certificate and unlimited traffic.

Website Builder

StormWeb hosting plans come bundled with the SitePad website builder as standard. This popular WYSIWYG (an acronym for "What You See Is What You Get") website-building software, is ideal for creating any kind of website, including eCommerce sites, with an easy-to-use, drag-and-drop interface.

With over 500 responsive themes and 40+ widgets, SitePad has just about everything you need to create a professional website quickly and aesthetically pleasing.

Security

StormWeb security comes in the form of a Free SSL certificate by Let’s Encrypt, 24/7 Server Monitoring, and Automated Daily Backups. Their Dedicated Server and VPS plans also feature DDoS Mitigation, the process of successfully protecting a targeted server or network from a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack. Unfortunately, their security lacks advanced malware protection, and these will come at an additional cost.

OS

They make use of the CloudLinux OS on all their plans. This popular and Lightweight Virtual Environment (LVE) OS, is based on the CentOS operating system and makes use of the OpenVZ kernel and the rpm package manager. 

Support

StormWeb support comes in the form of an 24/7 Email Ticketing System, and Phone Support, which is only available 9 AM – 5 PM on weekdays (Canadian Eastern Time). To my disappointment they don’t offer a Live Chat option, making it difficult for anyone looking for assistance while being based outside their time zone, and to make matters worse, the average email response time I got when putting them to the test was a bleak 2 hours.

They do however provide a real-time Network Status on their website and an adequate knowledge base to assist you with common issues.

Conclusion

StormWeb offers decent Shared Hosting plans, but their VPS and Dedicated Server plans are expensive, don't offer as many features and add-ons as most of their competitors, and their support is average at best. The free website and email migration, and excellent server uptime however stands out for me personally, and this could make it an attractive option for users looking for decent Shared Hosting plans. If you are looking for VPS or Dedicated plans, shop around first maybe, as there are better options out there.