If you are considering purchasing the Stellar plan from Namecheap, you must first introduce yourself to the advantages it will offer. This detailed Namecheap Stellar hosting review will make you aware of the features, pros, cons, pricing, and alternatives to the Stellar plan.
We will also cover the feedback on the Namecheap Stellar plan given by the existing customers. Lastly, all your frequent queries related to this plan will be resolved herewith to help you know whether Stellar is the right choice for your hosting needs or not.
But first, here’s a little introduction to the Namecheap Stellar plan:
What is Stellar Namecheap?
Stellar is the entry-level shared hosting plan from Namecheap. It is the cheapest plan offered by the host that is suitable for beginners and small website owners.
Pros & Cons of Stellar plan
Before diving deeper into the detailed features, let’s look at the pros and cons of the Namecheap Stellar plan here:
Pros of Stellar plan
- At under $2 per month, it is extremely affordable for all website owners.
- The plan comes with 1 free website migration.
- The host offers a free domain name with the Stellar plan.
- The Stellar plan comes from the Namecheap brand which has an experience of over 20 years.
- The host performs free internal backups twice a week for its Stellar customers.
- You can expect to receive prompt and efficient support 24/7 with Namecheap.
- Namecheap has kept 100% transparent pricing for the plan by clearly mentioning the term lengths.
- You will also receive free domain privacy for your free domain.
Cons of Stellar plan
- Namecheap Stellar cannot be hosted from Asia since the company does not have any data centers in the region.
- You will receive fewer server resources with Stellar compared to the price you pay for it.
- The host does not offer phone support to its customers, the 24/7 support is only available via live chat.
- The server speed of Namecheap’s shared plan is quite questionable.
- The free SSL certificate is valid only for the first year, so you will have to pay for it later.
Features & benefits of Namecheap Stellar plan
After going through the pros and cons of the Stellar plan, let’s look at its features here:
Disk space
Namecheap offers 20 GB SSD space with its Stellar plan to store your website data, including files, emails, and databases.
Popular control panel
The Namecheap Stellar plan comes with the popular control panel, cPanel, that makes it easy for you to manage your hosting account.
Number of websites
The Stellar plan allows you to host 3 websites under the same cPanel account.
Bandwidth
You will receive unmetered bandwidth with this entry-level shared hosting plan.
Free Supersonic CDN
The Namecheap Stellar plan comes with a free Content Delivery Network (CDN) that includes custom SSL upload, basic DDoS protection, and a monthly traffic limit of 50 GB.
One-click installations
Namecheap allows you to install over 100 applications in a single click, including WordPress and Drupal.
Free domain name
You will receive a free domain name with this plan when you pay for it at least a year in advance.
100% uptime
Namecheap promises a 100% uptime with its Stellar hosting plan, so you can be sure of your website being online at all times.
Money-back guarantee
The Stellar plan comes with a 30-day money-back guarantee that allows you to test Namecheap services for a month.
Easy-to-use builder
The host offers a beginner-friendly website builder that allows you to drag and drop website elements without using any code.
Performance – Is Namecheap Fast?
Namecheap includes LiteSpeed with all its stellar plans. You can expect to receive excellent speed when activating LSCache for your website.
Consider checking this useful guide provided by Namecheap to activate LiteSpeed from your cPanel.
Since Namecheap promises 100% uptime with its Stellar plan, let’s look at the results of uptime tests conducted for 2 weeks:
As seen in the screenshot above, Namecheap fails to stand by its uptime promise and delivers less uptime than 100%. However, looking at it individually, an uptime of 99.82% is satisfactory.
Also, the average response time of 1.05 seconds means that your website will run fast by responding quickly to all the server queries.
Now let’s look at the results of a speed test conducted on GTmetrix for different Namecheap server locations:
From the above screenshot, it is clear that the Namecheap Stellar plan delivers the best performance for the US server location followed by the UK one. It performs the worst in India.
So, from these speed test results, we can conclude that it is better to use the Stellar plan only when the majority of your audience is located in the US.
Customer support – Are they any good?
Namecheap offers 24/7 support via live chat and ticketing system. You can expect a fast and prompt response from the Namecheap customer care executives.
The live chat agents usually get connected in under a minute to solve your queries quickly. The online ticketing system is also very helpful and fast since you will receive a reply to your query within a few hours.
Additionally, it is worthwhile to mention here that the Namecheap customer care agents are friendly, polite, and ready to help you at all times.
Namecheap Stellar Pricing
The Namecheap Stellar is one of the cheapest shared hosting plans in the industry. You can grab it for as low as $1.88 per month.
The lowest price mentioned above is only available for the US data center location. Namecheap offers two more data center locations, one in the UK and the other in the Netherlands. If you choose any of these instead of the US location, you will have to pay a dollar extra per month, i.e., $2.88.
Now, let’s have a look at the billing periods you can choose along with their respective prices:
Stellar introductory price chart for all data center locations
| 1 Month (price per month) | 1 Year (price per month) | 2 Years (price per month) | |
| US | $4.48 | $2.18 | $1.88 |
| UK | $5.48 | $3.18 | $2.88 |
| EU | $5.48 | $3.18 | $2.88 |
Namecheap Stellar renewal cost
The introductory prices of the Stellar plan include special discounts that are available only to the new customers. The renewal cost of the Stellar plan is $4.48 per month for the US data center location and $5.48 per month for the UK and EU data center locations.
Here’s an overview of the Stellar’s renewal price for different term lengths:
Stellar renewal price chart for all data center locations
| 1 Month | 1 Year | 2 Years | |
| US | $4.48 | $49.88 | $98.88 |
| UK | $5.48 | $61.88 | $122.88 |
| EU | $5.48 | $61.88 | $122.88 |
Payment methods
Namecheap accepts payments via all major debit and credit cards, including:
- MasterCard
- Visa
- American Express
- Discover
Additionally, you can also pay via:
- PayPal
- Cryptocurrency
What do people say about the Namecheap Stellar plan on Trustpilot?
Now that you are aware of the features, pros, cons, and pricing of the Stellar plan, let’s consider the namecheap stellar reviews from the real users of this Namecheap shared hosting plan. Here are some screenshots of the existing Stellar customers from Trustpilot:
3 Alternatives to Stellar hosting plan
Though the Namecheap Stellar plan is a good choice for your website, there are some alternatives out there in the market that might be more suitable for your needs:
The Shared Starter plan offered by DreamHost comes with almost all the features included in the Namecheap Stellar plan. DreamHost, however, offers a 97-day money-back guarantee with its shared hosting plans.
The biggest benefit provided by this entry-level shared hosting plan from DreamHost is its pricing. It is available for just $1.99 per month when signing up for a single month, so you don’t have to commit for a long term to get the biggest discount as is the case with Namecheap Stellar.
2. Bluehost Basic plan
The Bluehost Basic plan provides you with similar server resources as are available with the Stellar plan.
As an added advantage, all the Bluehost shared hosting plans are backed by 24/7 customer support via chat and call. So you can talk to a Bluehost personnel any time to solve your query faster.
The Single Shared Hosting plan from Hostinger is a good alternative to the Namecheap Stellar plan because of its price and the features it offers. When compared to Namecheap, Hostinger’s support is of superior quality with its staff being more knowledgeable.
You will also receive more SSD storage with Hostinger’s entry-level plan than Stellar. Hostinger nameservers are protected by Cloudflare DNS Firewall to prevent your website from DDoS attacks, so you will receive a better security deal with Hostinger.
Final Verdict: Is Namecheap Stellar good?
Yes, Namecheap Stellar is a good shared hosting plan and it can serve the needs of many different website owners. If you are a beginner in the hosting world, it is best to start small with a plan like Stellar, assess your needs on the go and then upgrade accordingly.
Who is it for?
The Namecheap Stellar hosting plan is best suitable for:
- A small startup with a very limited budget.
- Lightweight websites like blogs, portfolio sites, and small business websites.
- Websites not expecting much traffic.
Overall, Namecheap Stellar is a good option for the benefits it offers. The problem arises when you have a WordPress site with plenty of plugins and you start receiving a decent amount of monthly traffic.
In such a case, your website speed will slow down and, hence, its performance will start declining.
So, our recommendation for domain purchase is NameSilo since it offers cheaper domain prices and will help you keep your domain and hosting separate when choosing the Stellar plan.
FAQ (frequently asked questions)
Why is Namecheap hosting so cheap?
Namecheap receives bulk discounts by purchasing its servers in large quantities, so it can pass on this discount to its customers. Additionally, the host keeps lower mark-ups to offer hosting at cheaper prices to attract more customers.
Who owns Namecheap?
Namecheap is owned by Los Angeles-based Richard Kirkendall who studied at Harvard Business school and founded Namecheap in 2000.
Is email free with Namecheap Stellar hosting?
Yes, the Namecheap Stellar plan includes free email hosting.
What’s the difference between Namecheap EasyWP and Stellar hosting?
Namecheap’s EasyWP hosting plans are specifically built for WordPress websites while the Stellar hosting plans are suitable for both WordPress and non-WordPress sites. All EasyWP plans are managed WordPress plans while Namecheap Stellar package plans are unmanaged.
