IONOS
Hosting, cloud, and dedicated servers for Europe
IONOS is the largest Hosting Provider in Europe, founded in 1988, part of the United Internet group, with over 100.000 servers across 10 ISO 27001 in-house data centers, serving 6,5+ million customers with a free dedicated personal consultant.
IONOS is the largest Hosting Provider in Europe, founded in 1988, part of the United Internet group, with over 100.000 servers across 10 ISO 27001 in-house data centers, serving 6,5+ million customers with a free dedicated personal consultant.
- Shared Hosting from 1,00 USD
- WordPress Hosting from 1,00 USD
- VPS Hosting from 2,00 USD
- Dedicated Hosting from 70,00 USD
- E-mail Hosting from 1,00 USD
Detailed Rating
IONOS is Europe’s largest Provider of Hosting services and domain registration, headquartered in Montabaur, Germany. The company is part of the United Internet AG group and serves over 6,5 million customers through active contracts across 18 markets. The legal entity is IONOS Group SE, listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange since February 2023.
The story starts in 1988, when it was founded as 1&1 EDV-Marketing GmbH by Ralph Dommermuth and Wendelin Abresch. In 2018, 1&1 merges with ProfitBricks (cloud solutions), creating 1&1 IONOS. In January 2020, the company becomes IONOS. The IPO on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange (February 8, 2023) and joining the SDAX index (September 2023) mark a new chapter.
IONOS runs over 100,000 servers across 10 in-house data centers, all ISO 27001 certified: Frankfurt (x2), Berlin (Germany), Paris (France), London and Worcester (UK), Logroño (Spain), Las Vegas, Newark, and Lenexa (USA). All are geo-redundant — data is replicated across different locations.
The lineup covers: shared web hosting (from $1/month), managed WordPress (from $1/month), VPS with Plesk included (from $2/month), enterprise dedicated servers (from $70/month), professional email (from $1/account/month), domains, SSL, eCommerce, and a full cloud platform with Compute Engine, Kubernetes, and managed databases.
A standout feature is the dedicated personal consultant, included free for every customer, no matter the plan. This specialist is available 24/7 by phone, chat, and email, with tailored support. This approach sets IONOS apart from most competitors that only offer generic support.
On the tech side, IONOS uses NVMe SSD storage, Apache and NGINX servers, PHP 8.x, MariaDB, MySQL, PostgreSQL, and Node.js. All plans include unlimited traffic, DDoS protection, free Wildcard SSL certificates, and daily backups. VPS plans include Plesk Web Host Edition for free.
IONOS guarantees 99.99% uptime, one of the highest guarantees in the industry. 30-day money-back guarantee on all plans. ISO 27001 certification across all data centers ensures strong security standards.
The team has around 4,200 employees across 70 countries, managing over 22 million domains. The company serves everyone from freelancers and startups to large enterprises, and recently added AI services too: AI Model Hub, GPU servers, and a 24/7 AI receptionist.
Promo prices are very competitive ($1/month for Hosting and WordPress), but renewals are significantly higher. The company focuses on the US and Western Europe, with no data centers in Asia-Pacific or Eastern Europe.
For users in Romania, IONOS is a solid pick thanks to competitive pricing, robust infrastructure in Europe, and a 99.99% uptime guarantee. The data centers in Frankfurt and Berlin deliver low latency for Central and Eastern Europe.
Company Info
Pricing
Shared Hosting
- Unlimited storage
- Unlimited websites
- Unlimited databases
- Free domain (1 year)
- Free Wildcard SSL
- Email included
- Daily backup
- Unlimited traffic
WordPress Hosting
- 25 GB SSD storage
- 9 GB RAM shared
- 1 WordPress site
- Free SSL
- Free domain (1 year)
- Daily backup
VPS Hosting
- 1 vCore
- 1 GB RAM
- 10 GB NVMe SSD
- Unlimited traffic (1 Gbit/s)
- Plesk Web Host included
- Full root access
- DDoS protection
Dedicated Hosting
- AMD Ryzen Pro / EPYC / Intel Xeon
- Up to 128+ GB DDR5 ECC
- Up to 48 TB storage
- Unlimited traffic
- Root access + Plesk
- DDoS protection + SSL
E-mail Hosting
- 2 GB storage per account
- Custom domain
- Spam filter
- IONOS Webmail
- IMAP/POP3
Pros
- Very competitive pricing — hosting from $1/month, VPS from $2/month
- Enterprise infrastructure — 100,000+ servers across 10 ISO 27001 in-house data centers
- Free dedicated personal consultant for every client, available 24/7
- NVMe and unlimited traffic on all plans, no extra costs
- 35+ years of experience — Europe’s biggest hosting provider and domain registrar
Cons
- Much higher renewal prices — from $1 to $10/month
- Limited managed WordPress — fewer customization options for complex projects
- Data centers only in the US and Western Europe — no Asia-Pacific or Eastern Europe
Technologies, Features & Services
Customer Reviews
Room to improve
Mixed feelings. Hosting itself is fine but response times on support vary wildly depending on what time you open a ticket.
Worth every cent
Four stars because everything works but the onboarding flow felt a bit dated. Once you are through it, the hosting itself is fine. performance is where it should be. Documentation could be more detailed for advanced setups.
Exactly what I needed
Good host overall. Uptime has been great and support is responsive, but the admin panel could use a small refresh.
The email setup is the smoothest i have seen. DKIM, SPF and DMARC were all pre-configured.
Pleasantly surprised
honestly one of the better hosting decisions ive made. pages load quickly even without a cdn in front, and billing has never surprised me.
SSL, backups, caching, all handled without me needing to look them up... That is what managed hosting is supposed to mean...
Five stars from me
Came from a much more expensive host and saw zero drop in performance. Only my bill went down. SSL, backups, caching, all handled without me needing to look them up. That is what managed hosting is supposed to mean.
Works well for my WordPress site. i wish the server-side caching was more aggressive by default.
Avoid
Unusable. My site took eight seconds to load before I migrated away. Performance tests with other hosts showed under two seconds on the same code.
Rock solid
Honestly one of the better hosting decisions I've made. Pages load quickly even without a CDN in front, and billing has never surprised me.
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