None of us like prices increasing do we? You start off paying one thing, over time, you end up paying more. With web hosting this can be A LOT MORE over time. I’m not just talking inflation covering price increases here, I’m talking about it starting off at £35.88 per year, then it increasing to something like £131.88 per year. That’s a 268% increase! We don’t do that here at netnerd.com, because you should be able to plan your costs without nasty surprises.
So what’s going on, why does this happen, and what can you do about it?
There is a need for some web hosting price increases.
In some cases, there are legitimate reasons for an increase in web hosting renewal costs.
Inflation
Money is worth less over time. This is just the way of things.
What I’m referring to here is inflation. Everyone is, to a degree, paddling up some kind of monetary river just to stay in the same place. Hosting providers do have to put their prices up to account for inflation.
Inflation is usually a few percentage points per year, not hundreds.
Increased cost of hardware
Underneath all the GUIs, OS’ and hypervisors there’s a layer of physical hardware.
Hosting providers have to replace pieces of this hardware either when failures occur, or to upgrade, provide an improved service, and remain competitive.
This hardware does have a cost and the cost of hardware has significantly increased over the last few years.
The main thing driving hardware costs up is the proliferation of AI data centers. The amount of hardware being bought for these has made the hardware market a seller’s paradise.
But! Hardware is often shared, so the cost is spread. It’s also not the case that everything is being replaced all the time.
Even with this factored in, that’s still doesn’t cover a 268% cost increase, so what else is there?
Higher operational costs
Hosting companies have to pay their staff. Their staff are affected by inflation as well so they need to be paid more over time. There’s also software licenses, electricity, maybe rack space, the costs of these are all increasing in an ongoing manner.
That’s still not 268%, though.
What’s really going on with web hosting price increases?
There is some need for introductory offers.
Introductory offers do skew the price increases. We currently offer cheap wordpress hosting at £1 per month for the first 6 months, then £4.99 thereafter. That is a 500% increase… why do we do this?
We have to, simply because our competitors offer similar introductory offers. If we don’t do this, we don’t get new customers, our competitors do.
We tend to be transparent about these introductory offers. There’s no use of super small print, and the post offer cost is displayed immediately below the initial offer based cost.
This is how we present this pricing:
It’s quite obvious isn’t it?
This is how one of our competitors is presenting an offer:
Even if you do read the small print, what does that even mean!?!?
It’s usually £11.99, but instead it costs £2.99, and you get 3 months for free (at some point), which works out (somehow) to be £143.52 for 48 months, when it would normally be £575.52, which is actually what it’s going to cost you (per year) after 4 years, when it renews at £10.99 per month which isn’t actually the £11.99 per month which is crossed out (we just put that there to make that even harder to work out).
If you scroll down a bit, it probably says “Crypto only, mate“…. or “comes with 268% increase”.
Why do price hikes exceed inflation, operational costs and the cost of hardware?
There are things like shareholders and board members who need to see a graph that indicates financial growth over time, and part of getting that growth involves putting prices up.
The other thing that’s going on is a bit sneaky, though…
A lot of web hosting companies know that a lot of their customers aren’t that comfortable migrating a website. They use this a a kind of “captive audience” mechanism that allows them to keep putting their prices up over time, without loosing a lot of customers.
Many small business have a website made by someone who sets them up with hosting. That someone does the job, then goes (which you can’t really complain about unless you’re paying them a retainer). Often, when the person who made the website leaves, the company are left with little website know how.
This happens an a lot, and some web hosting companies are taking advantage of this.
What are netnerd.com doing differently?
We try and run hosting like we’d like it to be run if we were using it.
We’ve put our shared hosting prices up once in the last decade. This price increase was £1 on monthly web hosting packages, £10 on annual web hosting packages, it wasn’t a great deal. Definitely not the default 268% that some of our competitors enforce.
We believe in a good product at a price that gives value to the customer and covers our costs.
You won’t get a “surprise bill” that’s more than double your previous costs. If we have to increase our prices, we communicate this change in advance.
Web hosting shouldn’t be prohibitively expensive and it shouldn’t increase in cost over time, at an unreasonable rate.
We try to treat our customers as we like to be treated ourselves. That’s it. Simplicity is best.
Do I really need such expensive hosting?
It depends a bit on how your site has been made, and what it does.
Something like WordPress will need a bit more power than a flat HTML site, but we’re not talking about anything excessive. A portfolio type website will easily run in our WordPress hosting (£1 plus VAT per month for 6 months then £4.99 plus VAT per month thereafter).
If you’re running an e-commerce site, you start getting into the territory of needing more power. This can range from high resource web hosting to a managed VPS service depending on things like how many products you’re selling and how much traffic your site gets.
The general gist of things is that if you have a static informational website, you simply don’t need expensive hosting.
What you can do about web hosting price hikes
Migrate your website away from expensive providers. Unless there’s a cheaper package you can use, that’s all you can really do.
Netnerd.com provides a free migration service upon the purchase of a hosting account, as we know that migrating a website isn’t everyone’s cup of tea. All we need is you to purchase hosting with us, and your existing hosting logins, and your domain registrar logins should they differ.
We’ll migrate your website, repoint your DNS, and help you through anything else you need help with.
You shouldn’t be held to ransom by your existing hosting provider!
A real world example of how to deal with web hosting renewal price increases
One of our staff took a call from Sarah at Philip Sleep Flooring and Carpets Cornwall. She was being asked for £219.99 to renew her hosting, which was being used to host a portfolio style WordPress website with static content, and asked us what costs would be with us.
£49.99 plus VAT, £59.99 including VAT. That’s a saving of £160 per year.
The following conversation then took place:
Will netnerd.com’s web hosting prices go up?
They will at some point, but not by much, and not in the immediate future. You’ll be looking at maybe an initial cost of £59.99 which would go up to around £69.99 per year in 2027 or thereabouts.
Can netnerd.com move the website? How much will this cost?
We can, it won’t cost anything in addition.
Can I transfer my domain to netnerd.com?
You can, it won’t cost to transfer, renewals are £6.99 plus VAT (£8.39 including VAT), because it’s a .co.uk domain.
Amazing, that’s an additional saving of £6.60 per year! When can you get started?
I can do this now if you’d like to make a payment over the phone and provide logins.
Half an hour later…
Sarah’s website had been moved, her DNS repointed and her domain transfer completed. She needed to wait 24 hours before cancelling with her old provider, but that was all.
- Time: 36 minutes
- Effort: Dealing a phone number, asking the questions above, reading card details and logins over the phone
- Costs saved per year: £166.60
- Additional differences: None
FAQ: Web Hosting Renewal Cost Increases
Why does my web hosting price go up so much at renewal?
In many cases, it’s due to low introductory offers that increase significantly after the first term. While small increases for inflation and costs are normal, large jumps (like 200%+) are usually down to pricing strategy rather than actual cost increases.
Is it normal for hosting to increase by 200%+?
No, not really. Inflation, hardware, and operational costs might justify small increases over time—but not massive jumps. When you see increases of this size, it’s often because the initial price was heavily discounted.
Are introductory offers a bad thing?
Not necessarily. They help customers get started at a low cost. The issue is when the renewal price isn’t made clear upfront. Transparent pricing should show both the intro price and the ongoing cost clearly.
Why don’t people just switch providers when prices go up?
Because moving a website can feel complicated. Many hosting companies rely on this; customers stay put because they’re unsure how to migrate or worry about breaking their site.
Can I actually move my website easily?
Yes. In most cases, it’s straightforward; especially if your new host offers migration support. For example, we handle the full migration, DNS changes, and setup for you.
What’s a real example of saving money by switching?
One customer, Sarah from Philip Sleep Flooring and Carpets Cornwall, was quoted £219.99 to renew hosting for a simple portfolio WordPress website with static content.
With us, the cost was £59.99 including VAT.
That’s a saving of £160 per year.
Her follow-up questions were simple:
Will prices go up? Yes, slightly over time, but not drastically.
Can you move the site? Yes, for free.
Can I transfer my domain? Yes, no transfer fee (for .uk ddomains)
Total time: 36 minutes
Effort: Minimal
Savings: £166.60 per year (including domain)
Do I really need expensive hosting?
Usually not.
- A simple website: low-cost hosting is fine
- WordPress: slightly more resources, but still affordable
- E-commerce: may need more power depending on traffic
Most small business websites are massively overpaying.
What should I look for in a hosting provider?
Clear renewal pricing (no surprises)
Reasonable long-term costs
Migration support
Honest communication about price changes
What makes netnerd.com’s pricing different?
We don’t rely on big renewal jumps.
Prices increase occasionally, but modestly and transparently.
No “£35 to £130” surprises!
