Cloudways

What it is

Cloudways is a hosting company. You sign up, they spin up a virtual server (on DigitalOcean, Vultr, AWS, GCP, or Linode, your pick), and they handle everything underneath: OS patches, security, backups, SSL, server-level caching. You manage WordPress, they manage the box.

The shorthand: this is not shared hosting (where you share a server with 200 strangers and your site slows down when theirs gets traffic). This is not raw cloud (where you need to be a sysadmin). It is the middle ground. Your own server, with someone else's expertise underneath.

How we use it

DigitalOcean underneath

Most of our sites run on Cloudways' DigitalOcean infrastructure. AWS and Google Cloud options exist but cost noticeably more for marginal real-world benefit on the kind of WordPress site we ship. We size the server to the site, not the other way around. A brochure site does not need the same box a busy WooCommerce store does.

Caching that actually works

Cloudways ships their own caching plugin called Breeze. Free, effective, plays nice with their server-level cache stack. For high-traffic WooCommerce, we add Object Cache Pro, the one external plugin we routinely recommend paying for. Redis-backed object cache that cuts admin-AJAX queries by 80%+ on heavy WC dashboards.

Staging environments for every app

Every Cloudways app gets a one-click staging environment. Clone production to staging, make changes, push back to live in a click. Database sync included. This is the feature that makes Cloudways worth paying for over self-managed hosting. Without staging, "let me try this on the live site" becomes a Friday-afternoon habit, and Friday-afternoon habits are how sites break.

CDN and DNS layer in front

We put a CDN plus security layer in front of every site. The built-in CloudwaysCDN is an option for clients who already have their DNS elsewhere. Either way, static assets get edge-cached close to the visitor and the origin server only sees real dynamic requests.

Deploy from git, not SFTP

Every Outerwave site pulls in code through a CI pipeline rather than a manual file upload. SFTP is the wrong shape for a site that is supposed to look the same on every developer's machine. See the GitHub Actions stack page for the philosophy.

What we lock down on day one

Each site goes live with a modern PHP and database version, server-level caching enabled, automated SSL renewal, off-site backups on a regular schedule, and a managed firewall plus bot-protection layer. Specifics get adjusted per site (a WooCommerce store has different needs than a Milwaukee plumber's brochure site). The general principle is that the boring security work is done before launch, not the week after the first incident.

What you get

• A site that loads in under a second. Properly-configured Cloudways routinely scores 95+ on Lighthouse without much tuning.
• Predictable monthly cost. No surprise overage bills the way you get on AWS.
• Staging environment on every site. Change theme, plugin, content, test on staging, push to live when it is ready.
• Regular off-site backups, retained long enough that you can roll back from a real problem.
• 24/7 chat support that actually understands WordPress (not a tier-1 tech reading a script).
• Geographic flexibility. Move the site from US to Europe to Asia in a few clicks if your audience shifts.

Where we don't use it

For very high-traffic sites (500k+ pageviews/month) where revenue depends on uptime, we'd consider Kinsta or WP Engine at the higher tier. The 4x price premium buys 24/7 phone support, enterprise SLAs, and dedicated account managers, all of which matter when downtime costs more per minute than the hosting bill costs per month.

For pure static sites (Astro, Hugo, plain HTML), Cloudflare Pages and Netlify are free and faster. WordPress is the wrong tool for those, and Cloudways is therefore the wrong host.

For shared hosting (Bluehost, GoDaddy, SiteGround starter plans), the answer is to leave. We don't recommend shared hosting for any business site, period. The $5/month savings cost you 4x the page weight and inconsistent uptime.