Editor's opinion
Sean Thompson
I am a full-time web developer & IT professional with more than 18 years experience. I have been working with numerous hosting companies over the years.
First impression
TimeWeb, a prominent hosting provider in Russia, was established in 2006 in St. Petersburg. Their dedicated team comprises over 325 hosting professionals, and they manage multiple Tier 3 data centers located in Russia, Kazakhstan, and Poland. From these centers, they cater to an expanding customer base, which now exceeds 200,000 clients and encompasses over 700,000 websites. Their clientele primarily includes customers from Russia and neighboring countries.
TimeWeb offers a range of services, including Shared Hosting, VDS (Virtual Dedicated Server), Dedicated Server, and VPS hosting solutions, in addition to Domain Registrations.
Trial Period
When you order Shared Hosting or a Website Builder from TimeWeb, you will automatically receive a 10-day trial period, allowing you to test their service, and make sure they are the right fit, before making a payment, a refreshing change to the norm.
As for VDS (Virtual Dedicated Server) and Dedicated Servers, they offer a trial period lasting from 3 to 5 days depending on the product.
Billing Cycle
TimeWeb customers have the flexibility to opt for either monthly or annual subscriptions for Shared Hosting plans. For their VDS (Virtual Dedicated Server), Dedicated Server, and VPS (Virtual Private Server) plans, users can choose from monthly, quarterly, biannually, or annual payment intervals. Decent discounts are applied to longer-term commitments.
They accept payments through various methods, including all major Credit Cards (processed via Stripe), YuMoney, Qiwi, CloudPayments (suitable primarily for their clients from Kazakhstan), and SberPay.
Control Panel
To manage your hosting environment, TimeWeb offers its own, purpose-built panel simply named the TimeWeb Control Panel. This Intuitive and user-friendly control panel includes everything you could possibly need to manage all aspects of your hosting plan with ease. For connoisseurs, there’s even a dark theme.
Additionally, there are pre-configured assemblies such as ISPmanager, BitrixVM, or Fastpanel to name just a few, granting you complete server access to install any necessary software.
It is important to note that although cPanel is not included in their builds, you can still install it manually if necessary.
Limits
Their Shared Hosting plans offer four distinct options: Year+, Optimo+, Century+, and Millennium+.
The Year+ plan includes 10GB storage space on lightning-fast NVMe SSD drives, and 1 MySQL database, and is limited to a single website. Optimo+ provides 30GB NVMe SSD space, unlimited MySQL databases, and allows hosting for up to 10 websites. Tailored for businesses, Century+ features 40GB NVMe SSD space, unlimited MySQL databases, and supports 25 websites. Meanwhile, Millennium+ boasts 50GB NVMe SSD space, unlimited MySQL databases, and accommodates 50 websites, making it ideal for large-scale e-commerce projects. All plans come with unlimited traffic, POP/IMAP email accounts, and free SSH, sFTP/FTP, and SCP access.
In their VPS plans, powered by Intel Xeon Gold 6230R, AMD EPYC 7502, or Intel i9-9900KF processors, users can choose from three scalable plans or customize their own. The Cloud15 plan offers a 3.3 GHz CPU, 1GB RAM, 15GB NVMe SSD disk space, 200 Mbit/s connection, and a dedicated IP address. On the other hand, the Cloud40 plan features 2x 3.3GHz CPUs, 2GB RAM, 40GB NVMe SSD space, 200 Mbit/s connection, and a dedicated IP address.
All sites include a free SSL certificate by Let's Encrypt.
Website Builder
For individuals without coding expertise, TimeWeb provides its own website builder, the Configurator, at an additional monthly cost. This user-friendly tool offers a wide array of premium templates and pre-made blocks, enabling you to effortlessly create a professional and responsive website.
The builder is available in three options: Base, Premium, and Ultra. The Base package includes 150 templates and 170 blocks, limited to one website. The Premium option encompasses everything in Base, along with SEO settings, an analytics system, online store capabilities, applications in Telegram, designer tools, and the ability to create up to five websites. The Ultra package includes all the aforementioned features, API access, and the capability to use it for up to 20 websites.
Security
TimeWeb operates Tier 3 certified data centers in Russia and Europe, featuring multiple power and cooling pathways and seamless maintenance processes without downtime. With an impressive expected uptime of 99.982%, translating to only 1.6 hours of annual downtime, these sites are safeguarded by armed guards, access control measures, and round-the-clock video surveillance.
Their hosting plans come with robust DDoS protection (L3, L4, and L7), and guards against viruses, technical failures, and malicious code. TimeWeb employs sophisticated software programs to counter spam and other threats. Additionally, they offer free SSL certificates by Let’s Encrypt, with options for advanced certificates like RapidSSL and RapidSSL Wildcard (for securing domains and subdomains) available at an extra cost. These advanced certificates provide encryption of 128 or 256 bits and support TLS 1.2 and X.509v3 standards.
Furthermore, TimeWeb includes Firewall as a Service (FWaaS), a cloud-based solution that allows users to manage incoming and outgoing traffic to their cloud servers and services through user-defined rules. No alterations are needed at the operating system level; users can set rules and designate servers and services via the control panel. Each account supports up to 50 rule groups and allows the addition of up to 100 rules per group for both incoming and outgoing traffic, encompassing up to 200 services.
For enhanced security, users can opt for additional services like Website Defender, which provides reliable protection against hacking and infections, and Advanced Antivirus Protection, which scans sites for infections and removes detected malicious codes. These services are available for an additional monthly fee.
For an additional layer of protection, 2FA (2-factor Authentication) can also be enabled on all accounts.
OS
The majority of Timeweb's shared hosting servers currently run on Ubuntu 18.04, but they are actively upgrading these servers to Ubuntu 22.04 (version 18.04 will soon be retired).
In contrast, Timeweb's VPS and Dedicated Server plans provide a wide selection of Operating Systems, including Ubuntu 22.04, CentOs 7, Debian 10, Windows Server 2012, Arch Linux 1, Astra Linux CE 1.12, and AlmaLinux 8.5.
Support
TimeWeb’s technical support team is available 24/7 via a toll-free Russian telephone number, a Ticketing System accessed through the dashboard in your personal account, Live Chat, or Social Networks with a response guarantee of 20 minutes or less. I was pleasantly surprised by the level of support I received and was assisted within 5 minutes on email and less than 30 seconds on their Live Chat. The agents were not only friendly and knowledgeable but also followed up within a few hours to ensure my issues were resolved. Despite my initial concerns about a language barrier, the agents I interacted with communicated in perfect English.
Conclusion
Pros |
Cons |
- 99.99 Uptime Guarantee;
- Scalable plans;
- Excellent Support;
- Affordable Plans;
- Trial Period.
|
- No Money-Back Guarantee;
- cPanel is not included as standard.
|
TimeWeb provides hosting plans at surprisingly affordable rates without compromising on support or infrastructure quality. Their plans are scalable, ensuring flexibility, and they maintain excellent uptime. I found their customer support to be faultless, without a language barrier - that was probably my biggest concern. If you're seeking a hosting provider based in Russia, TimeWeb is an excellent choice.