FastComet Review: A Beginner’s Choice
If you are looking for an in-depth FastComet Review to help you decide whether it is the perfect web hosting service for your project or not, you landed on the right page.
FastComet is not as popular as its peers in the digital realm given that it is relatively new in the industry. Yet it is known for its budget friendly as well as for its user-oriented and high-performing features—which I will try to discuss in detail in the next sections.
Having said that, let us start?
What is FastComet?
FastComet is a web hosting company that caters specifically to amateur web developers and owners. It mainly provides VPS hosting, WordPress hosting, shared hosting, cloud hosting, and dedicated hosting.
Located in San Francisco, California, it was established way back in 2013 and eventually launched its first website in the following year.
Now, it has over 20, 000 cloud nodes and 50, 000 active users in nearly 100 countries all around the globe. And from a team of four people, it grew into a company of 70 employees. It has servers scattered in 11 countries as well, namely London, Tokyo, Amsterdam, Singapore, Toronto, Sydney, Mumbai, Frankfurt, Dallas, and Newark.
FastComet is also among a few private companies in the web hosting industry, which means a few dozen people are involved in the organization only.
What is it for?
FastComet is one of the top web hosting solutions I recommend that offers affordable yet worthwhile features. It claims to provide quality service as well such as fast servers, nearly 100% uptime performance, and round-the-clock support.
The company offers the standard web hosting trio in the web hosting realm, which are VPS, shared, and dedicated hosting. A classic and categorized web hosting plans to cater to each users’ business demands.
The web hosting company also boasts a wide range of plans with specific target users. Each plan is accompanied by various sets of tools, both basic and advanced.
FastComet also provides several “perks” including exclusive SSD drives—which I will discuss in detail later, among others—that are entirely unique from other web hosting providers
The pros & cons
To get a grasp of what kind of web hosting provider FastComet is, below are a few more the advantages and disadvantages users will find in the software:
Pros
- Amateur-friendly and intuitive interface
- High uptime
- Fast loading time
- Unlimited emails
- SSL certificate for security
- FastComet SiteBuilder
- Easy installation of various content management system (CMS)
- Daily and weekly backups
- Free site migration
Cons
- Limited bandwidth and disk space
- Charges setup fee
- Uptime score is low sometimes
- Technical support is limited
Everything about FastComet
Since you are now familiar with FastComet, let us dig in a little deeper. In this section of the FastComet review, I will explain from top to bottom how each tool’s functions and why they are important.
FastComet’s best features
As mentioned, FastComet offers a large collection of tools particularly built to help web owners achieve their website goals. But out of those tools, a few ones had stood out and taken the interest of website developers and enthusiasts alike.
In other terms, they are FastComet’s best features—which I will explain below.
1. SmartControl panel
SmartControl panel is FastComet’s all-in-one tool that enables users to manage, deploy, optimize websites with just a few clicks. The web hosting company also claims it to be the “most powerful and intuitive control panel out there.”
SmartControl Panel is comprised of three parts: the client area, control panel, and observer. And each segment provides help for different web tasks.
- Client area. The client area is where users can specifically access and handle administrative tasks including accounts and domain management. The segment also allows web owners to manage their billing and orders through simplified tracking.
It also offers 360° control over your hosting plan since you can access it on any devices as long as the SmartControl Panel feature is installed. Client support is also available 24/7, while the area’s interface is optimized for smartphones and tablets too.
- Smart monitoring. Observer Monitoring System or smart monitoring is a segment wherein FastComet users can track all critical data passing through and in between servers and websites.
For instance, users can monitor performance and uptime metrics including disks, network, RAM, CPU, and MySQL. Clients can also oversee how much resources his webpage is consuming, which can help in site optimization as well as cost reduction—if needed.
Together with daily reports, users will also receive in-depth statistics to further understand what makes and breaks the website. It also comes with optimization tips which I find handy especially for beginners.
- cPanel and app installer. While there are a few web hosting services such as Hostinger that developed their own control panel, FastComet still uses the classic and widely-used cPanel.
As to why the web host chose the classic control management panel, the company said it aims to make users experience easier and lighter compared to the trouble of navigating an “unfamiliar” control panel. So, rather than building a new one, they stuck to what most web creators knew.
Moreover, FastComet’s cPanel comes with fully-featured webmail that allows users to access emails without the need of any third-party software or configurations. It also has a web-based File Manager which you can use to access your files safely on any device.
It also comes with the popular script installer specifically for cPanel, Softaculous. It means users can install hundreds of open-source apps like WordPress and Joomla with just a few clicks.
2. Cloudflare CDN
Another impressive feature of Fastcomet is its Cloudfare CDN.
The said feature is being offered by almost all web hosting companies. The difference is that in FastComet, users can avail of it at a much cheaper price compared to its competitors because all plans—including basic plans—offer a Cloudfare CDN. Unlike other web hosting services wherein clients need to purchase an additional subscription to use it.
Moreover, Content Delivery Network or CDN is a tool that enables users to store static files like JavaScript and CSS stylesheets and hosts data across FastComet’s datacenters scattered worldwide.
Essentially, it helps web owners give their visitors a smooth web viewing experience by storing static files to be shared across different data centers, which then sends data coming from a server nearest to the visitor’s location. In FastComet’s case, the company owns more than 100 data centers scattered all around the globe.
Hence, even if you have international visitors, your website loading speed is still fast and guaranteed hassle-free.
3. Daily and weekly backups and monitoring
FastComet understands that technical issues are inevitable and happens from time to time even if you are using the best web hosting service available today. It is why, to prevent further damage, the company includes a tool that provides daily and weekly backups and is kept offsite.
Depending on the plan, clients can store backups for up to 30 days. Users will be given full access as well. Restoration of the site’s older version can be done in just one click only too using the 1-click Restore Manager, which can be found in cPanel.
4. Free managed migrations
Another remarkable thing about FastComet is that it offers free site migration. It means that if a user wants to use FastComet but has an existing website supported by a different hosting, the client can then transfer all files and data for free.
I find it cost-effective and user-friendly because clients need not do the task manually or hire an expert.
5. Site builder
To make website building easier and more budget friendly, FastComet has also ventured into web designing and developed its own website builder.
A website is composed of two parts: the frontend and the backend. The former involves codes, while the latter is about servers, databases, and other things that work behind a website.
A website builder is a software specifically used for creating the frontend part of a website. And the front-end part of a webpage will require coding programming languages such as JavaScript, HTML, and CSS.
Using a site builder, however, users need not to do that. Neither to hire and pay a professional web designer. Curious? Below are the reasons why:
- Drag-and-drop editor. Being true to its promises, FastComet created a site builder that users—amateur, non-techy, or not—can access and navigate smoothly. It means that rather than typing codes and other technical whatnots, clients can simply drag and drop any elements they want to add to their websites.
Such a feature is common in website builders.
- Customizable web templates. FastComet also boasts its collection of page templates that users can use as-is. The album is comprised of more than 350 templates with themes covering various niches. Each theme is optimized for almost all devices as well, including tablets and smartphones.
All templates are also customizable so no need to worry if you find the collection unfitting for your style. You can alter and retouch some parts of the page. Or if you prefer, you can change the entire design.
- Widgets and sharing buttons. FastComet understands that having other people know what you do is crucial for your business. It is why it added social media buttons like Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and YouTube, which your visitors can use to share your content on the internet.
6. WordPress-optimized hosting
Knowing that WordPress is one of the most widely used content management systems, FastComet had also developed a hosting service dedicated for WordPress users only. Users will get almost the same tools included in other hosting types. The only difference is that it has WordPress-specific tools that, of course, other hostings do not have.
Having said that, below are the tools that set the WordPress hosting apart from others:
- FastGuard. As what its name suggests, Fastguard is a feature particularly built to protect websites from malicious attack and activities. Servers that are secured using the tool also regularly learn and share information from each other every time a threat happened.
It comes with a free SSL certificate too for tighter security. It also has DDoS detection and mitigation as well as WordPress Web Application Firewall for an additional layer of security.
- Speed optimization. Speed matters, whether you are the page owner or a visitor. For that reason, FastComet added a WordPress-specific feature that can enhance website performance.
WordPress hosting offers an extra tool that will allow users to boost their pages’ speed further through its RocketBooster WordPress Optimization. It is based on Varnish Cachewall with LiteSpeed LSPHP Technology and SSL support.
- Dedicated support team. Users need not worry about sudden technical problems as well. WordPress hosting has its dedicated support team that will assist clients 24/7. The team is also comprised of WordPress experts, hence FastComet guarantees quick solutions.
- Website monitoring. Users can also monitor their accounts using Observer Monitoring. What it does is that it lets clients see how much resources the page is consuming as well as provides daily optimization reports with detailed statistics—a typical solution to enhance web performance and reduce unnecessary spending.
Performance
When it comes to its performance, FastComet guarantees satisfying results. From your webpage’s speed to security, the web hosting company provides tools to help you keep with the demand.
To give you an overview, I enumerated below what makes FastComet’s performance impressive.
1. Fast loading time
A website’s speed is one of the crucial aspects when it comes to SEO. It means your site’s ranking is dependent on your page’s speed. In fact, it also affects your conversion rate.
A study from Google shows that slow loading time—a one second delay, to be specific—could affect a business’ ability to convert prospects into real customers by 20%.
FastComet, on a good note, would not let you and its users experience such trouble. The web hosting provider uses Solid State Drives or SSD, which is an efficient tool to boost a site’s loading speed. [1]
According to FastComet, its SSD can help enhance a page’s performance for up to 300%. It also claims that an average loading time of a website supported by FastComet is about 200 milliseconds, relatively better than its peers with an average loading time of 500 to 600 milliseconds only.
Apart from that, users need not additional caching plugins or cache manager because it is by default included in FastComet already. Its support team will continue to aid clients to improve their website’s loading time by boosting GTMetrix as well as Google Pagespeed Insight scores too.
2. 99.9% uptime
Just like any other web hosting solutions, FastComet assures its customers of 99.99% uptime commitment not only for websites but also for emails and other core services.
For websites, a high uptime score of 99% means the site is always available and visitors would not have trouble accessing it. A 99.99% uptime is equivalent to a downtime of one minute and 0.5 seconds. Hence, if it goes down the said benchmark, the downtime would be longer and that would be a big problem for your visitors and, of course, you. [2]
Does FastComet’s uptime performance show impressive results?
All I can say is that a lot of webmasters have recognized FastComet’s uptime performance. It often gives a score not lower than 99.99%. But of course, a few downtimes here and there is unavoidable and at times hit an average of 99.67%. [3] [4]
All in all, FastComet’s uptime score is decent enough to keep your page online and accessible 24/7.
3. Site and server security
When it comes to security, FastComet takes the matter seriously.
The web hosting service has several features that particularly take care of malicious attacks from, say, hackers. For instance, it has special firewall applications that are optimized for all types of content management systems like WordPress and Joomla.
Aside from that, FastComet has a tool that blocks nearly 99% of security threats. Each shared hosting accounts come with an isolated environment too, which keeps your page and files safe even if you are sharing with someone whose site is infected.
The web hosting provider also offers an SSL certificate just like its competitors to further improve clients’ website’s security.
But what makes it different from other hosting’s SSL is that these certificates are encrypted by 2048-bit RSA keys and SHA-256. These type of SSL certificates is said to provide up to eight times faster connection than the standard ones. All web owners who bought the said certificate is insured for $10, 000 as well.
Plans & pricing
FastComet provides several hosting types including the classic trio which are shared hosting, cloud hosting, and dedicated CPU servers. And for that very reason, the web hosting company also offers multiple plans across all hosting types.
As to its price, each plan varies depending on the length and type of subscription. But many enthusiasts find FastComet’s price relatively affordable.
Here is a quick overview of each hosting type’s basic plan:
- Shared hosting’s FastCloud starts at $3.95 per month.
- Cloud VPS hosting’s basic plan starts at $44.95 per month.
- Dedicated hosting’s basic plan starts at $111.19 per month.
On the other hand, I find it worth-a-try since it gives users flexible payment options.
The length of subscription, for instance, is divided into four terms: one month, twelve months, twenty-four months, and thirty-six months. It means customers can opt for how long they want to subscribe to FastComet. If, say, you are a newbie and you want to test how FastComet performs, you can then choose a 1-month plan.
All subscriptions come with a 45-day money-back guarantee assurance. For payment options, users can use PayPal or credit card.
The only downside in FastComet’s plans is that no program offers a free domain, which means users need to register and buy a domain separately.
Customer support
If there is one more thing that sets FastComet apart from other web hosting services, I believe it is its customer support.
Just like its competitors, FastComet gives 24/7 support and can be contacted through phone, email, tickets, and even live chat. But unlike some web hosting services, many enthusiasts find that FastComet provides “real” 24/7 support since almost all representatives are responsive and quick to offer well-detailed explanations.
FastComet calls its support team a “premium support” as well. As to why, I enumerated the reasons below:
- Additional layer of security. To prevent malicious attacks, FastComet added an extra layer of security in all its plans by adding a free firewall that is optimized and configured specifically to any CMS—WordPress, for instance—a client is using.
- 24/7 monitoring. Unlike its peers, FastComet offers a proactive approach when it comes to solving problems. The web hosting company provides a monitoring approach to detect problems that work 24/7, rather than waiting for clients to report an issue.
Once an issue is detected, the support team will then fix it as soon as possible to prevent it from becoming a nuance that users and their visitors could encounter.
- Provides full support. The team does not only offer solutions concerning “server” problems. But it also tries to give full support and solutions to other issues outside the topic.
- Tutorials. FastComet heavily encourages its clients to use its 24/7 support when a problem arises. And for that same reason, the company does not have a knowledgebase guide for users to sift through when they encounter a problem on their site and servers.
On the one hand, FastComet created a collection of tutorials about all types of hostings they offer. It might be a bit of a burden reading how-to articles compared to simply asking a representative to fix your site’s problem. Still, it is a great way to learn and prevent future issues and damage.
Things to take note of
FastComet is not just about the good stuff. It has a few downsides as well that although they are not much of a problem, users still need to be aware to prevent confusion and other unwanted scenarios.
Having said that, below are a few things I believe FastComet users need to consider before signing up.
- Technical support policy. I know most folks today prefer not reading company policies and often skip that part. That hobby, however, can backfire sooner or later.
In Fastcomet’s Technical Support Policy, for instance, there are a few clauses that limit clients’ privileges.
One clause says that the web hosting’s support team “may refuse” a request for a technical issue that “demands an excessive amount of time” to be fixed. Another clause says that if a request is submitted multiple times, the web host company is allowed to deny it.
- Limited disk space. Unfortunately, all plans of FastComet offer a “limited” amount of disk space. Its premium plan, for example, offers 35GB of disk space only. Quite a downside if you compare it to its competitors that often provide “unlimited disk space.”
- Limited bandwidth. Like disk space, FastComet’s bandwidth is capped to a minimum number of visitors only. In its shared hosting plans, for instance, FastCloud provides a bandwidth of up to 25, 000 visitors a month only. FastCloud Plus and FastCloud Extra, on the other hand, is capped 50, 000 and 100, 000 visitors per month, respectively.
Again, while that does not seem like a threat to your website, other web hosting services offer unlimited bandwidth on most of their plans.
- Setup fee. Another thing that might surprise you after signing is FastComet’s setup fee. It is because if you are looking to avail of a shorter subscription plan, say, one month, FastComet will charge you $19.95 for the setup fee.
The fee, however, is waived if you are going to opt for longer payment terms. Quite a hurdle for newbies who want to try and test FastComet’s features.
The Verdict
FastComet is generally a decent web host for beginners like you to try. And although I could not say that it is “jam-packed with features,” it is still relatively low-cost and has all the features a newbie needs to launch a website, whether it is for personal use or business.
I recommend it too particularly for non-technical folks not only because of its beginner-friendly and intuitive interface but also because it has a great team of customer support. Guaranteed, all users’ concerns—be it about the server, email, and other services they offer—will be given solutions immediately.
All in all, it is an impressive web hosting service and is worth-a-try.