Cloudways Managed Cloud

Overview

Cloudways is a managed cloud hosting platform that simplifies the deployment and management of cloud infrastructure from top providers like DigitalOcean, AWS, Google Cloud, Vultr, and Linode. Founded in 2011, Cloudways has become a leading choice for agencies, developers, and businesses looking for powerful cloud hosting without the technical complexity of managing servers directly.

What sets Cloudways apart is its managed layer on top of premium cloud infrastructure. While you get the performance and reliability of enterprise-grade cloud providers, Cloudways handles all the technical complexities—server setup, security patches, performance optimization, and 24/7 monitoring—allowing you to focus on growing your business rather than managing servers.

The platform serves 840,000+ hosted websites from over 200 countries and maintains an impressive 4.7-star rating on G2 with a 96% customer satisfaction score and industry-leading 90-second average response time for support.

Two Hosting Solutions for Different Needs

Cloudways offers two distinct hosting products:

• Cloudways Flexible: Traditional managed cloud hosting with full control. Choose your cloud provider, scale resources on-demand, and host unlimited WordPress, WooCommerce, Magento, Laravel, or PHP applications per server. Perfect for agencies and developers managing multiple client sites.
• Cloudways Autonomous: Fully managed WordPress hosting with pre-configured autoscaling. Built for WordPress-powered businesses that need reliable, hands-free hosting with automatic resource scaling and built-in Cloudflare Enterprise CDN.

Choice of Premium Cloud Providers

One of Cloudways' biggest advantages is the ability to choose from five top-tier cloud infrastructure providers:

• DigitalOcean: Best value for money, excellent for startups and small to medium businesses. Pricing starts at $14/month for 1GB RAM, 1 vCPU, 25GB NVMe storage.
• Vultr: Global reach with 58 data centers worldwide, great for international audiences. Similar pricing to DigitalOcean with excellent performance.
• Linode (Akamai): Strong performance and reliability, competitive pricing. Now part of Akamai with enhanced enterprise capabilities.
• Amazon Web Services (AWS): Enterprise-grade infrastructure with unmatched scalability. Higher pricing but maximum reliability and performance.
• Google Cloud Platform (GCP): Premium performance with Google's global network. Excellent for high-traffic sites requiring top-tier infrastructure.

All providers offer access to 50+ global data centers across North America, Europe, Asia, Australia, and South America, allowing you to host closer to your users for optimal performance.

Peak Performance Out of the Box

Every Cloudways server is powered by a fully optimized stack designed for maximum performance:

• Lightning Stack: New performance-optimized stack with enhanced caching and faster page loads
• Built-in Advanced Caching: Integrated Memcached, Varnish, Nginx, and Redis caches with one-click activation
• Free Object Cache Pro: Usually $95/month, included free on 4GB+ servers for WordPress sites
• Breeze WordPress Plugin: Free caching plugin pre-installed, trusted by 300,000+ users
• PHP-FPM Optimization: Pre-tuned PHP FastCGI Process Manager for swift response times
• HTTP/2 Servers: Modern protocol support for faster, more secure connections
• PHP 7.4 to 8.2: Latest PHP versions with seamless free updates
• NVMe SSD Storage: Ultra-fast solid-state drives for database and file operations
• Cloudflare Enterprise CDN: Optional add-on at $4.99/domain/month with edge caching, smart routing, and image optimization

These performance features work together to deliver 200-300% performance improvements compared to traditional shared hosting, as reported by Cloudways customers.

Enterprise-Grade Security

Cloudways takes security seriously with multiple layers of protection:

• Server-Level Firewall (Imunify360): Comprehensive protection against hackers, malicious bots, DoS attacks, and unauthorized access. Automatically detects and blocks threats.
• Web Application Firewall (WAF): Filters malicious traffic before it reaches your applications
• IP & Country Allow/Block: Manually block malicious IPs and entire countries where attacks originate
• DDoS Mitigation: Layer 3 & 4 DDoS protection from cloud providers, plus additional DoS protection for SSH and HTTP
• Brute-Force Protection: Automated defense against credential guessing attacks on SSH and HTTP with Fail2Ban
• Bot Protection: Block harmful bot traffic to prevent server overload
• Web Honeypot: Detect, trap, and block malicious bots automatically
• Vulnerability Scanner: Patchstack-powered scanning for WordPress core, plugins, and themes with instant notifications
• 1-Click Free SSL: Built-in Let's Encrypt SSL certificates for HTTPS security
• Regular Security Patches: Automated OS-level patches to maintain server security
• IP Whitelisting: Restrict SSH and SFTP access to specific IPs or networks
• Malware Protection Add-on: Real-time scanning and automated cleanup with Malware Protection add-on

Exceptional 24/7/365 Support

Cloudways is renowned for its support quality:

• 90-Second Average Response Time: Industry-leading speed for support inquiries
• 96% CSAT Score: Exceptionally high customer satisfaction
• 24/7/365 Live Chat: Always-available expert assistance included in all plans
• Online Ticketing System: Track and manage support requests efficiently
• CloudwaysBot Notifications: Proactive monitoring alerts via Slack, email, and more
• Advanced Support Add-on ($100/month): Application-level troubleshooting, performance optimization, enhanced SLAs
• Premium Support Add-on: Private Slack channel with senior engineers, phone access, priority responses within minutes

Developer-Friendly Features

Cloudways is built with developers in mind:

• Git Integration: Auto-deployment when changes occur in remote repositories
• SSH & SFTP Access: Full command-line access to your servers
• Pre-installed WP-CLI: Powerful WordPress command-line interface
• Staging Environments: One-click staging with push-to-live functionality—saves $20/month, included free
• Server & App Cloning: Duplicate servers or applications instantly
• Multiple PHP Versions: Switch PHP versions at server level with one click (7.4, 8.1, 8.2)
• Cloudways API: Build custom solutions and automations
• Custom Varnish Settings: Configure cache rules through the platform UI
• Supervisord Queue Management: Integrated process manager for Laravel applications
• Cron Job Manager: Simplified scheduling with visual interface
• Flexible Webroot: Change document root location easily

Seamless Scaling & Flexibility

Cloudways offers unmatched flexibility for growing businesses:

• Vertical Scaling: Increase RAM, CPU, and storage with one click while preserving configurations—no downtime
• Pay-as-You-Go Pricing: Only pay for what you use. Scale up temporarily and get charged only for additional usage
• Unlimited Applications: Deploy as many apps as your server can support without restrictions
• 1-Click App Deployment: Launch WordPress, WooCommerce, Magento, Laravel, or PHP apps instantly
• Dedicated Environments: Break free from shared hosting with isolated resources
• Auto Scaling (Autonomous): Pre-configured automatic resource scaling for WordPress sites

Team Collaboration & Agency Tools

Perfect for agencies managing multiple client sites:

• Teams & Projects: Organize apps into projects and assign team members with granular permissions
• One Account, Multiple Teams: Team members can belong to different teams for efficient project distribution
• Server Transfer: Easily transfer server ownership to clients or other parties
• Client Billing & Reporting: Built-in tools for invoicing and client management
• White-Label Options: Manage client sites under your own brand

Automated Backups & Disaster Recovery

Your data is always protected:

• 1-Click Backup & Restore: Create on-demand backups or schedule automated backups
• Offsite Storage: Backups stored separately from your server ($0.033/GB per server)
• One-Click Restoration: Restore or revert to previous versions instantly
• Automated Backup Schedules: Set it and forget it with scheduled backups

Advanced Monitoring & Insights

Stay informed about your server and application health:

• 24/7 Real-Time Monitoring: Continuous surveillance of 16+ server metrics
• CloudwaysBot Notifications: Smart alerts for uptime, performance, and security issues
• New Relic Integration: Enhanced application performance insights for troubleshooting
• Server Health Dashboard: Visual representation of CPU, RAM, disk, bandwidth usage
• Application-Level Monitoring: Track individual app performance and resource consumption

Premium Add-Ons & Integrations

Extend functionality with flexible add-ons:

• Cloudflare Enterprise CDN ($4.99/domain/month): Edge caching, Argo smart routing, image optimization
• SafeUpdates ($3/app/month): Automated WordPress update testing and deployment workflow
• Malware Protection ($4/app/month): Real-time malware scanning and automated cleanup
• Rackspace Email ($1/mailbox/month): Professional email hosting with 99.9% uptime
• DNS Made Easy ($0.50/domain/month): Instant DNS propagation with managed DNS
• Elastic Email: High-volume transactional email sending
• Managed Migration Add-on: Expert-assisted site migrations with minimal downtime
• Application Upgrade Add-on: Professional assistance for major app upgrades

Free Migration Service

Cloudways offers free expert-assisted migration for your first website from any hosting provider. Their migration team handles the entire process with minimal downtime, ensuring a smooth transition to the cloud.

Pricing & Value

Cloudways offers transparent, flexible pricing with no hidden costs:

• 3-Day Free Trial: No credit card required, full access to features
• Pay-as-You-Go: Hourly billing means you only pay for what you use
• Flexible Plans: Start from $14/month (DigitalOcean Micro: 1GB RAM, 1 vCPU, 25GB NVMe)
• Included Free: Staging, Object Cache Pro (4GB+), Lightning Stack, AI Copilot credits, server firewall, advanced staging, vulnerability scanner, SSL certificates, 24/7 support
• No Lock-In: Cancel anytime, no long-term contracts required

Popular plans include:

• Micro ($14/month): 1GB RAM, suitable for personal websites and simple blogs
• Small ($28/month): 2GB RAM, growing businesses and moderate traffic
• Medium ($54/month): 4GB RAM, most popular for demanding websites
• Large ($99/month): 8GB RAM, ideal for e-commerce and resource-intensive applications

Who Should Use Cloudways

Cloudways is ideal for:

• Web Agencies: Manage multiple client sites with team collaboration, white-label options, and client billing
• Developers: Full SSH access, Git integration, staging environments, and API access
• E-commerce Stores: High performance for WooCommerce and Magento with dedicated resources
• Growing Businesses: Seamless scaling without downtime as traffic increases
• WordPress Publishers: Optimized WordPress hosting with advanced caching and security
• SaaS Applications: Reliable infrastructure for Laravel and PHP applications

With its combination of premium cloud infrastructure, managed services, exceptional support, and developer-friendly features, Cloudways provides the perfect balance between power, ease of use, and value for businesses serious about their online presence.