InMotion Hosting Alternative: The Benefits of Choosing Kinsta

How Kinsta Compares to InMotion Hosting in a Nutshell

Before we take a deep dive into the specifics of Kinsta vs InMotion Hosting, we want to give you a brief overview of the biggest differences between the two hosting platforms. 

Kinsta is the highest-rated managed WordPress host on G2, the world’s leading software review and comparison site:

Enjoy a 20% Faster Website Simply by Moving From InMotion to Kinsta

We measured 3,200+ migrations over the course of a three-month span. On average, client sites experienced 20% faster load times just by moving to Kinsta.

How is this possible? Our customers enjoy:

• The latest generation of virtual machines from Google’s Compute Engine general-purpose machine family C3D VMs and The fastest Compute-Optimized C2 VMs, available across all plans in supported regions.
• A stack that’s been fine-tuned for WordPress over the past 8 years.
• Google’s Premium Tier Network to deliver website data faster.
• Free CDN powered by Cloudflare’s global network of 260+ locations.
• Built-in Edge Caching that cuts the time needed to serve cached WordPress HTML by an average of more than 50%!

Migrate from InMotion to Kinsta hassle free with our free expert migration service. With our 30-day money-back guarantee, you can test out the service and improved speeds completely risk-free. You only lose if you don’t give this a try!

Kinsta is powered exclusively by the Google Cloud Platform and Google’s premium-tier network, which enables us to maximize the speed, performance, and security of every website hosted with us. 

Let’s take a look at some of the other major differences between Kinsta vs InMotion Hosting:

• Kinsta is a WordPress-specific host, meaning that we work strictly with WordPress, and our support engineers are all WordPress experts. Unlike InMotion, we don’t offer shared hosting.
• Kinsta utilizes a superior infrastructure that has positioned us as the fastest WordPress host for 5 years in a row (based on Review Signal benchmarks). This includes C3D and C2 Google Cloud machines, LXD managed hosts, and orchestrated LXC software containers for each site. With InMotion plans, all resources are on shared servers, which is why that provider doesn’t participate in web performance benchmark reviews.
• All Kinsta plans include MariaDB, a superior database platform. InMotion only offers this with its higher-cost VPS plans. Also, unlike InMotion, we also include automatic weekly database MySQL optimization.
• Kinsta offers clear, transparent pricing and plans that make it easy to accommodate all of our customers’ needs. InMotion advertises ‘unlimited bandwidth’ for its plans, when in reality it will limit how much you can use it (check out the fine print).
• Kinsta’s scalable infrastructure makes it easy to upgrade or downgrade with ease. We monitor sites 24/7, and if we determine you may need more PHP workers or disk space, we’ll reach out to you to discuss the appropriate plan of action. InMotion suspends accounts for resource abuse, taking your business offline. 
• Kinsta plans and pricing are affordable, easy to understand, and don’t require long-term contracts. InMotion’s plan tiers can be confusing, and its pricing is not entirely transparent or straightforward. For example, the $2.49 per month entry-level plan it advertises requires a three-year commitment.
• Kinsta has a massive global presence with 37 data centers spanning five continents. InMotion only has two locations, both of which are located in the U.S.
• On every plan, Kinsta offers six different types of backups (automatic/daily, optional hourly, manual, system generated, downloadable, and automatic offsite backups to your Amazon S3 or Google Cloud storage). InMotion doesn’t offer any automated or built-in backup tools. The closest thing is a paid Backup Manager plugin, which costs $2 per month and includes extra charges for additional resources over 10 GB. 
• Kinsta uses a custom-built MyKinsta dashboard, which is designed specifically for WordPress site management. InMotion uses the generic cPanel, which isn’t nearly as user-friendly, powerful, or tailored for WordPress.
• Kinsta offers a variety of one-click tools and developer-friendly features directly in the MyKinsta dashboard, including an IP Deny tool, IonCube enabler, one-click WordPress debugging, and more. We also offer SSH access, New Relic (license required), and reverse proxy support with every plan.
• In addition to taking both active and passive security measures, including a secure Cloudflare firewall, Kinsta monitors each site hosted on our platform every three minutes for uptime. That’s 480 times every day. InMotion’s 99.99% uptime guarantee only applies to Pro plans, and your physical uptime check can only be performed once every thirty days.
• All plans at Kinsta include a free Content Delivery Network (CDN) and free premium DNS. 
• Kinsta plans include a handy one-click staging feature. You can easily push sites live or restore backups to staging directly from the MyKinsta dashboard. InMotion, on the other hand, limits you to using the BoldGrid plugin or Softaculous app in cPanel. The WP-1000s plan also limits you to one staging site. 
• Kinsta offers a free, one-click SSL with every plan. With InMotion Hosting plans, you have to add and configure the SSL certificate yourself.
• Kinsta always supports the latest version of PHP available, including 8.1. InMotion currently only supports up to PHP 7.3.
• Kinsta has a superior support team made up of WordPress experts. Our premium, multilingual support is available 24/7, regardless of your plan. InMotion only offers U.S.-based support, and there’s no guarantee that you’ll be speaking with someone who specializes specifically in WordPress.
• Kinsta uses a unique caching system that includes different types of server-level caching designed for the specific type of WordPress site you run. Our platform is optimized for WooCommerce and online stores. InMotion’s infrastructure and WordPress hosting plans are not built for complex or large deployments.
• Kinsta is SOC2 compliant, which provides independent proof that we have established security procedures and adhered to those procedures over time. InMotion is also SOC2 compliant. See Kinsta’s Trust Report for additional information.
• Kinsta provides an SLA-backed 99.9% uptime guarantee on all plans.
• Kinsta offers a 30-day money-back guarantee on all plans. InMotion’s refund policy varies by plan.

MyKinsta: A Custom-Built Dashboard for Powerful Site Management

As with the majority of hosting providers, InMotion Hosting uses the generic and outdated cPanel. Kinsta isn’t like every other host. We know our clients deserve a better user portal, which is why we built our own.

The MyKinsta dashboard is built with the sole purpose of making WordPress site management as simple as possible:

Considering that it’s designed specifically for WordPress, it includes a plethora of tools and one-click features and tools that you don’t necessarily get with cPanel. Some of the unique features of the MyKinsta dashboard include:

• Quick phpMyAdmin access.
• A built-in Cloudflare integration with optimized settings to secure and boost the performance of your site without the need for a separate Cloudflare subscription.
• Premium Amazon Route 53 DNS included, so you can manage your DNS records directly in the dashboard. On the InMotion website, there’s no mention of premium DNS for shared and WordPress plans.
• One-click CDN integration. InMotion offers a free CDN, but you have to rely on third-party plugins such as Cloudflare.
• Detailed insights and analytics, including bandwidth and visitor data, performance analysis data, CDN usage and insights, and cache HIT and MISS ratio.
• A search and replace tool to perform bulk updates.
• A debugging tool for quickly resolving errors.
• The ability to toggle between PHP versions with a single click, and restart PHP when needed. With InMotion plans, you need to go through cPanel, which requires more steps and increases your chances of making mistakes.
• IonCube Loader enabler for decoding and running protected PHP scripts.
• A one-click staging feature directly in the MyKinsta dashboard that lets you create a staging site in seconds. You can easily push staging sites live, as well as restore backups to staging. We don’t count staging sites toward your total disk space usage. InMotion Hosting offers a limited amount of staging environments through the Softaculous software in cPanel, with no option to restore backups to staging.
• New Relic integration (license required) for taking a deep dive into performance issues on your site.
• The option to purge site cache within the dashboard.
• Simple password protection for your environment, and the option to heighten login security by adding your SSH keys to the dashboard.
• Quick and easy IP address blocking via an IP Deny tool.
• Automatic Cloudflare SSL certificates with wildcard support, as well as the option to import your own. InMotion Hosting offers free AutoSSL certificates, but you have to manually add and configure them yourself. 
• A multilingual dashboard available in ten languages: English, Spanish, Italian, German, French, Japanese, Swedish, Portuguese, Danish, and Dutch.

We value our clients’ feedback, which is why many of MyKinsta’s features have come directly from their suggestions. We actively listen to all requests. If there’s something that can help make everyone’s life easier and more productive, we’re all ears.

Kinsta is Developer-Friendly

At Kinsta, many of our team members are developers too. This is why everything we create, from the MyKinsta dashboard to our products and tools, is built with developers in mind. Our platform can help you enhance your productivity and workflow efficiency. 

When you use Kinsta as your managed WordPress host, you’ll have access to a wide variety of developer-friendly features and tools that you wouldn’t necessarily get with a host like InMotion. Some of them include:

• Unrestricted access to your site’s critical files regardless of your plan, including access to Git, WP-CLI, and SSH. InMotion also includes standard SSH access on all plans.
• Free one-click staging environments that you can quickly create through your MyKinsta dashboard. InMotion Hosting limits how many staging environments you can have. For example, the entry-level WordPress plan limits you to one website and one staging site.
• Six types of backups: free automatic/daily, optional hourly, manual, system generated, downloadable, and automatic offsite backups to your Amazon S3 or Google Cloud storage. InMotion only offers automated backups as a premium add-on called Backup Manager. While one-click restore is available, you cannot restore a production backup to a staging website. 
• Quicker database performance through the Redis add-on. InMotion Hosting only offers support for Redis on VPS and dedicated plans.
• The ability to load your site over reverse proxy on all plans. This isn’t available on the entry-level InMotion plans.
• Kinsta lets you run a different version of PHP for every live and staging site, as well as switch your PHP version with the one-click feature directly from your MyKinsta dashboard. To change your PHP version with an InMotion hosting plan, you have to go through the cPanel MultiPHP Manager tool, which isn’t as easy.
• Post and page revisions enabled by default. 

At Kinsta, we offer automatic SSLs with wildcard support via our free Cloudflare integration. Although InMotion plans include a free AutoSSL certificate, adding it to your site takes more time and effort.

Develop Locally with DevKinsta

For developers and agencies, Kinsta offers a simple to use (but powerful) local development tool called DevKinsta. With DevKinsta, you can launch WordPress sites with a full hosting stack and SSL support on your local computer with just a few clicks.

DevKinsta is fully integrated with MyKinsta and Kinsta’s hosting platform, which means you can develop locally and push updates directly to a staging environment on Kinsta! InMotion Hosting doesn’t have an integration with a local WordPress development tool, which means there is no way to clone and push WordPress sites for their customers. If you’re a busy freelance or agency developer, DevKinsta’s advanced features and MyKinsta integration can be a huge time saver.

Free WordPress Migrations

Kinsta provides unlimited free migrations with all of our hosting plans. Our experienced and skilled experts take care of the entire migration process for you, so you won’t have to deal with any of the complex technology or worry about losing critical data. 

To get started, the only thing you need is to do is complete our site migration request form. From there, our team will contact you to let you know the migration is starting, depending on your chosen scheduling option. You can also easily track the migration status via your MyKinsta dashboard. 

Technically, migrations are also a free feature available for InMotion Hosting users. However, this only applies to accounts with up to three databases and/or websites. If you want to transfer more, there’s a $10 per item charge.

Expert Support for WordPress

Kinsta offers 24/7 premium support on all plans. It doesn’t matter if you have a personal blog or run a Fortune 500 company site, you’re always treated as a critical priority. 

InMotion includes free, 24/7 support on its plans. However, they also use a multitude of different hosting platforms. Typically, this results in subpar support agents and simply less knowledge when it comes to handling complex issues.

Our support team is made up of WordPress experts and engineers who are always ready to help you. No problem is too big or too small. 

To make support as quick and convenient as possible, we use the Intercom customer messaging platform. All conversations are logged, so you never have to repeat yourself. 

Our average initial ticket response time is under two minutes! For further proof, check out our customer support ratings for the past two years. More than 97% of our customers left a chat support session happy or satisfied:

InMotion’s support is U.S. based. At Kinsta, we offer multilingual customer support and a knowledge base with resources available in 10 languages.

Kinsta Has a Global Presence

One of the advantages of choosing Kinsta as your managed WordPress host, and something that distinguishes us from other providers such as InMotion, is our massive global footprint. Kinsta has 37 data centers (and counting) around the world, with our presence spanning five continents.

Starting at just $35 per month, Kinsta plans let you choose a different data center for each of your sites, with no hidden charges or extra costs. Our current locations include:

InMotion Hosting only has two data center locations, both of which are based in the U.S. One is in Los Angeles, C.A. and the other is in Washington D.C.

Best Affiliate Program in the Industry

At Kinsta, we always aim to exceed our customers’ expectations, which is why we have many happy clients who are eager to spread the word about our products and services. This show of dedication and appreciation has helped us become one of the fastest-growing managed WordPress hosts.

This is why we’re proud to offer true profit sharing with our affiliate program — which is among the highest-paying in the hosting industry. From freelancers to agencies, we’re excited to partner with our customers so you can share in our earnings and take advantage of the opportunity to earn a passive income.

With our affiliate program, you can earn between $50 and $500 (depending on the plan) for every signup you refer to us. On top of that, you will receive a 10% monthly recurring commission for the lifetime of the customers referred to us by you. 

We also created our own unique WordPress hosting affiliate dashboard. Therefore, you won’t have to deal with complicated third-party platforms.

InMotion hosting also has an affiliate program. However, participants can only earn up to $50 per sale.