Contabo Review

Contabo Review

July 23, 2024

Contabo Review

July 23, 2024
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At a Glance

Contabo is a German company, previously known as Giga-International. They mainly offer advanced VPS, VDS and dedicated server hosting. In this Contabo review. Contabo VPS is simply dedicated resources within a Virtual Environment given to you to have full control of a Server.

Contabo is growing fast, in 2014 they had 2 data centers in Germany and now they have 8 locations worldwide. So if you want to catch Contabo before they become a mainstream provider, now is the time.

Contabo has top notch features that makes it stand out in premium web hosting. Lightning fast servers and latest hardware means unmatched performance and user friendly control panel and 24/7 support means hassle free experience.

As I go through this review, you will see what you can get with Contabo Web Hosting and how you can get started with a very affordable VPS with enough Computing Power.

Bandwidth: Unlimited

Free marketing offer: None

Uptime: 99.9%

Website builder: Yes

Money-back guarantee: 14 days

Price per month: From $5.50

Pros

  • Powerful and affordable VPS servers
  • New fast NVMe storag
  • Affordable object storage solutions
  • Good customer service and uptime
  • Data Centers across 4 continents
  • Seamless integration of Windows with servers
  • Eco-friendly hosting platform
  • Over 19 years in business
  • Strong server and data center security
  • Award-winning provider
  • Self-owned data centers
  • Speedy servers and ports

Cons

  • No one-click installer in its most basic plan
  • Old-fashioned appearance
  • Complex pricing structure

Best Suited For

Contabo is great value because it offers high performance servers for low prices with a 99.996% uptime guarantee. Its cloud VPS packages are perfect for those who have outgrown their shared hosting and need something more. Also its cloud VPS packages are good for more complex projects and can be used for anything. The AMD EPYC 7282 16-core processors Contabo use are great for more workloads and bigger projects etc.

Contabo Hosting Types, Plans and Pricing

Contabo offers the following types of hosting:

Contabo Virtual Private Servers

Independent computing instances optimized for performance equipped with fast NVMe drives.

All plans include NVMe Storage, 32 TB of outgoing traffic and unlimited incoming traffic.

Plan

CPU

RAM

Storage

Monthly Price

Cloud VPS 1

4 vCPU Cores

6 GB

100 GB

$5.50

Details

Cloud VPS 2

6 vCPU Cores

16 GB

200 GB

$12.50

Details

Cloud VPS 3

8 vCPU Cores

24 GB

300 GB

$17.50

Details

Cloud VPS 4

12 vCPU Cores

48 GB

400 GB

$32.50

Details

Cloud VPS 5

16 vCPU Cores

64 GB

500 GB

$42.00

Details

Cloud VPS 6

24 vCPU Cores

120 GB

600 GB

$77.00

Details

Contabo Storage VPS

Contabo provides Storage-optimized VPS for all of your data storage needs.

All plans include SSD Storage, 32 TB of outgoing traffic and unlimited incoming traffic.

Plan

CPU

RAM

Storage

Monthly Price

Storage VPS 1

2 vCPU Cores

3 GB

800 GB

$5.50

Details

Storage VPS 2

4 vCPU Cores

8 GB

800 GB

$14.50

Details

Storage VPS 3

6 vCPU Cores

12 GB

2.4 TB

$19.50

Details

Storage VPS 4

10 vCPU Cores

24 GB

3.2 TB

$34.50

Details

Storage VPS 5

12 vCPU Cores

32 GB

4 TB

$44.00

Details

Storage VPS 6

18 vCPU Cores

60 GB

4.8 TB

$79.00

Details

Contabo Virtual Dedicated Servers

Purchase your own dedicated server to host your website. Dedicated server hosting offers more computing power and disk space compared to shared hosting plans.

All plans include NVMe Storage, 32 TB of outgoing traffic and unlimited incoming traffic.

Plan

CPU

RAM

Storage

Monthly Price

Cloud VDS S

3 Physical Cores

24 GB

180 GB

$46.39

Details

Cloud VDS M

4 Physical Cores

32 GB

240 GB

$55.19

Details

Cloud VDS L

6 Physical Cores

48 GB

360 GB

83.19

Details

Cloud VDS XL

8 Physical Cores

64 GB

480 GB

110.39

Details

Cloud VDS XXL

12 Physical Cores

96 GB

720 GB

$155.99

Details

Contabo Hosting Features

  • cPanel control panel: Contabo offers the cPanel control panel, a widely-used interface that includes one click installers for WordPress, Drupal, and other content management systems.
  • Softaculous: Contabo integrates Softaculous, an auto-installer that simplifies the process of deploying popular web applications with a single click.
  • PHP support: Contabo provides robust PHP support, ensuring compatibility with a wide range of PHP applications and frameworks.
  • Ubuntu and Windows operating system Contabo allows you to choose between Ubuntu and Windows operating systems, catering to diverse server environment preferences.
  • cPanel: Contabo uses the cPanel control panel for all websites. This is a widely used control panel that includes 1-click installers for WordPress, Drupal, and other content management systems.
  • API: Contabo's API offers powerful automation capabilities, enabling seamless integration with your custom applications and management tools.
  • Developer features: Contabo includes a suite of developer features, such as SSH access, Git, and custom cron jobs, to enhance development workflows.
  • IPv4 and IPv6 addresses: Contabo supports both IPv4 and IPv6 addresses, ensuring compatibility with the latest internet protocols.
  • DDoS protection: Contabo provides DDoS protection, safeguarding your servers against malicious attacks and ensuring high availability.
  • Plesk: Contabo offers the Plesk control panel, an alternative to cPanel that provides a user-friendly interface for managing your web hosting environment.
  • SSL certificates: Contabo includes SSL certificates to secure your websites, protecting data and enhancing user trust.
  • MySQL databases: Contabo supports MySQL databases, allowing for efficient management of your data and seamless integration with your web applications.

Uptime and Performance

Contabo is competitive with performance. Testing across 5 locations (Dallas, London, Seattle, Tel Aviv, Hong Kong) Contabo showed response times of 36 ms to 384 ms. Dallas was the fastest, Hong Kong the slowest. Since my server is in the US I think geographical location had an impact on these results. Contabo also delivers good page load times 2-3 seconds. But uptime is a bit below industry average 95% globally.

Old School Look and Feel

The most obvious thing about Contabo is that it has an old look and feel, both on the homepage and in the user admin panel. Sometimes that’s a good thing, as the simple interface is easy to understand. Sometimes it’s a bad thing because the feature you want to use is missing or hard to find.

Ease of Use

Contabo is unmanaged and not for beginners. It’s a service loved by developers and server managers. With affordable rates and no nonsense approach it’s a go to option for those who need advanced server solutions. You can also have Webmin control panel installed for free.

With this service all responsibilities (and benefits) are on you. You get the hardware and the connection to it and can set up and configure everything as you like.

But if ease of use is not your priority and you understand that you are buying an unmanaged server solution along with all its implications then Contabo is a good option. In that case Contabo’s hosting management is relatively simple.

Performance is the key in this Contabo review to see if they deliver in terms of reliability and speed. Contabo VPS performs good for the price. Not industry leading but good overall.

Contabo Support Services

Support wise Contabo offers many options, phone, email, support tickets and knowledge base. But live chat is missing. For phone support Contabo’s technical agents are available from 10 am to 8 pm CET (UTC+1) Monday to Friday. They are helpful and stick to their hours. Contabo doesn’t charge extra for phone support.

Conclusion

From my research and personal experience Contabo is a good web hosting for people whose websites don’t require latest technology and solutions. People who need dedicated servers and VPS in Europe will also find Contabo useful. The main reason website owners and businesses go to Contabo is the cheap pricing. But another good thing is the Windows integration with VPS and VDS plans.

Contabo has its downsides but I would still recommend Contabo because it’s a good web hosting for a price.

Get started now, visit Contabo
Mark Thompson
Writing for esteemed platforms like Mashable and Gizmodo, Mark's expertise lies in digital trends, consumer electronics, and unbiased reviews. He has spent several years critiquing various tech products, services, and web hosting providers, utilizing his academic foundation in computer science to ensure thorough and accurate assessments. His extensive knowledge of web hosting landscapes makes his evaluations particularly valuable for those seeking reliable hosting solutions.