Rocket.net Review: Best Managed WordPress Hosting (2023)

I would recommend Rocket.net to anyone looking for a WordPress host. I’ve been using the service for several months now and I’ve already seen significant improvements in my website’s performance.

Rocket.net Review: Best Managed WordPress Hosting (2023)
Rocket.net Review: Best Managed WordPress Hosting (2023)

Rocket.net is a popular web hosting provider known for its fast, reliable performance and top-notch customer support. They offer some of the best managed WordPress hosting plans featuring Cloudflare Enterprise.

I’m here to share my honest Rocket.net review so you can decide if it’s right for you and your website.

One of the standout features of Rocket.net is its use of advanced caching technology, which helps to ensure that your website loads quickly and efficiently, even during times of high traffic. This is particularly important for businesses that rely on their website to generate leads and sales, as a slow-loading website can lead to lost customers and revenue.

One of the most important parts of your business is your website. There’s no other way around it; if you can’t get traffic to your website, you risk losing out on a huge amount of revenue and prospects.

Rocket.net: Simple, Fast, & Secure WordPress Hosting

Grow your business with lightning fast, secure and fully optimized websites that are easy to set up & manage. Prices start at $30/month when paying yearly.

  • Full Page Caching
  • Image Optimization
  • 200+ CDN PoP’s
  • Finely Tuned for WordPress
Try for $1 for First Month

Rocket.net is a great option for starting an e-commerce store, but it does have some limitations.

The company has an excellent reputation in the market. It offers one-click installs for WordPress and WooCommerce stores. It also provides reasonable prices, reliable customer service that responds to inquiries within 24 hours on weekdays and weekends.

What is Rocket.net?

Rocket.net claims to offer the easiest and most powerful platform for hosting WordPress. The platform offers superb speeds, security and SSL for free, excellent customer support, and many more.

Ben Gabler and Aaron Dewell Phillips founded the company in 2020. Today, the company hosts thousands of websites, has gained trust, and is gradually building its own niche.

an astronaut walking up to a rocket launch
Min. Response Time33 ms (Sydney)
Max. Response Time1226 ms (Beijing)
Global Avg. Response Time629.5 ms
Google PageSpeed Insights99 Mobile/98 Desktop
GTMetrix GradeA
GTMetrix Performance / Structure100% / 96%
Free SSLYes
Free CDNCloudflare Enterprise CDN
One-Click AppYes, WordPress Only

When I used Uptrends’ Free CDN Performance Tool for response times, I got a variety of results, so take them with a grain of salt.

A simple WordPress Control Panel

Rocket.net My Dashboard

99.99% Uptime Guarantee

This is the amount of time per month that we guarantee your WordPress Website is available online. We allow some time for any potential scheduled maintenance we may need to conduct.

Rocket.net guarantees a website will remain online for a certain amount of time each month. Rocket.net has an 99.99% uptime guarantee.

Over a year ago, I started tracking the uptime of the websites I host with Rocket.net using Screpy.

So far, I am observing an average uptime of 100% and an average response time of 0.45s. I have been very pleased with the uptime of Rocket.net. 😄

Rocket.net Uptime via Screpy

98/99 PageSpeed Insights

With Google PageSpeed Insights, website developers can identify problematic areas on desktops and mobile devices, as well as recommend solutions to them.

Here are screenshots of my Google PageSpeed Insight report for both mobile and desktop.

Mobile

PageSpeed Insights

Desktop

PageSpeed Insights

An upcoming blog post will explain how I optimized my WordPress website to get these scores. A mobile score of 99 and a desktop score of 98 on my homepage.

It’s not perfect as you can see I have a 2.9 second First Contentful Paint (FCP) and 3.2 second Largest Contentful Paint (LCP).

GTmetrix

An excellent GTmetrix grade is a score of 90 or higher, combined with a GTmetrix grade A.

GTmetrix is an online tool that helps website owners improve the performance of their websites with actionable recommendations to improve website speed.

It provides an in-depth analysis of a website’s page speed and offers recommendations for optimization. GTmetrix evaluates a website’s overall performance, including page load time, page size, number of requests, and other factors.

It also provides a detailed breakdown of each component, allowing website owners to identify what is causing the slow performance and take steps to improve it.

GTmetrix also offers additional features, such as a browser-based testing tool, a mobile testing tool, and a WordPress plugin. GTmetrix is a powerful tool for website owners looking to optimize their websites for better performance.

Vancouver, Canada

GTmetrix

Sydney, Australia

GTmetrix

On my first GTmetrix test, I received a B because I don’t expect to receive much traffic from Australia to keep that cache fresh.

In the second run, some impressive results were obtained.

Sydney and Vancouver have matched performance and structure by 100% and 96%, respectively.

Rocket.net Features

Cloudflare Enterprise CDN

Rocket.net promises to speed up your site in a blink because they are using the Cloudflare network, which is very fast.

CDN is a technology that optimizes the site loading time. The required files are requested from the nearest CDN server rather than directly from the host’s location.

The nearest CDN server delivers content whenever required. Thus improves the site speed significantly.

Let’s keep it simple!

If you are in Sydney, Australia and your server is located in Chicago, rather than redirect you there, the server will connect you to the nearby Cloudflare CDN server that has a copy of what you need. In essence, you can save time and data traveling thousands of miles!

As a partner of Cloudflare, Rocket.net distributes their best services to small businesses and solopreneurs. Cloudflare is one of the most renowned CDN brands worldwide.

You may have already used CloudFlare’s free plan, but its Enterprise plan, starting at more than $6000 a month, is unrivaled. Before I learned about Rocket, I couldn’t do that.

It’s even cheaper when combined with Rocket.net’s managed WordPress hosting, which starts at just $25/mo for one website.

Cloudflare Free vs Cloudflare Enterprise: Compare Features and Pricing | Graydon Schwartz
I recently shared that this website was Now Powered by ❤️ with Cloudflare Enterprise and now that I have had it setup for a month I wanted to share more information on how Rocket.net Cloudflare Enterprise compares to Cloudflare Free (Cloudflare Free vs Cloudflare Enterprise).

Cloudflare’s popular Free and lower-tier Paid plans do not include premium Cloudflare PoP’s such as Australia, India, and more. The biggest benefit is definitely the routing and connectivity on all Cloudflare PoP’s.

Premium Routing on all 200+ PoP’s

Priority Routing of all requests on Cloudflare’s Platform

Larger Upload Size limits

Argo Smart Routing with Tiered Caching to ensure maximum cache hits

Full Page Caching with Cookie Bypass to support dynamic sites like WooCommerce

Cloudflare Polish to compress images and convert to webp on the fly

Detailed CDN and WAF Reportinghttps://support.rocket.net/hc/en-us/articles/4404414172443-What-does-Cloudflare-Enterprise-do-

With these technologies, Rocket.net provides a global TTFB of 50 to 70 ms.

Cloudflare CDN

My content is replicated and provided by Cloudflare 55.7% of the time, while only 18% of content is retrieved from the web server directly (or origin).

You will have to rebuild your site every time you clear the cache of your website.

Cloudflare CDN

HTML is the most missed format, followed by jpeg.

Built-in Security

Due to Rocket.net’s built-in security features, third-party software is not required, and since these components are installed directly on the server, site security is enhanced.

Therefore, even if you have concerns about the security of your website, you will not be required to install security plugins for your WordPress installation. This will certainly reduce the cost of running your website.

Let’s take a look at some of Rocket.net’s built-in security features.

Web Application Firewall

The worst thing that can happen to a site is to get hacked. If you’re hacked, you’ll lose control of your site and the search engines will eventually scrape it from their index. The WAF from Cloudflare greatly reduces the possibilities of this happening.

Ensure your business is compliant with the latest PCI standards with Cloudflare’s WAF and Modern TLS Only mode.

Cloudflare WAF
Cloudflare WAF
Options

Reports can be drilled down from the last 30 minutes to the last 30 days.

  • Last 30 Minutes
  • Last 6 Hours
  • Last 12 Hours
  • Last 24 Hours
  • Last 72 Hours
  • Last 7 Days
  • Last 30 Days
Multiple Firewalls

On Rocket.net, WordPress websites receive multiple layers of firewall protection.
(Firewall #1): Cloudflare Enterprise provides the initial firewall and forms the initial protective layer.
(Firewall #2): Imunify360 provides the final layer of protection. And it is unlikely to beat both of them.

Data Protection

The security of your site is exceedingly important. You may even have to hire a professional to secure it. But Rocket Hosting has an automatic Data Protection pack that starts the instant you migrate your site.

Malware Protection

There are countless ways that malware can infect your site. Sometimes they will replace your contents, or reduce your search engine rankings, or force unauthorized redirects, but with Rocket.net malware protection, you can rest easy.

Automated Patching

The website will be automatically cleaned if you migrate an infected website to Rocket.net.

Automatic Updates

Updating your WordPress website can be time-consuming, but if you let Rocket.net host it, you can choose to enable automatic updates, including core (WordPress) updates and plugin updates.

Updates ensure that your site stays protected from security threats, and you don’t have to wait for things to happen.

Optimization Features

Automatic Image Optimization

When an image is retrieved from your site, Polish automatically optimizes it in the Cloudflare cache.

Whenever the same image is requested again, a smaller, faster, optimized version will be delivered. They’ve been testing Polish for the last 9+ years, and the results are impressive.

Polish saves data transfer, and therefore improves performance, more than more common techniques like code minification.

The Mirage engine adapts its display to the visitor’s device and detects their connection speed to optimally deliver images based on the current browser window.

This service will eliminate the need to use plugins, like ShortPixel and Smush, since it ensures lazy loading and uniformity in size and image quality.

JS Prioritization

It is imperative to minimize JavaScript’s impact on website performance. JavaScript runs in the background when your website loads, and its impact can be detrimental. Javascript prioritization makes loading faster and optimizes performance of your website.

Advanced Caching Technology

One of the standout features of Rocket.net is its use of advanced caching technology, which helps to ensure that your website loads quickly and efficiently, even during times of high traffic. This is particularly important for businesses that rely on their website to generate leads and sales, as a slow-loading website can lead to lost customers and revenue.

In addition to its impressive performance, Rocket.net also offers a range of tools and services that can help users to manage and maintain their WordPress website. This includes automatic backups, security updates, and a user-friendly control panel that makes it easy to manage your website from any device.

Green Sustainability

Another benefit of using Rocket.net for your WordPress hosting needs is the company’s commitment to sustainability. Rocket.net uses renewable energy sources to power its servers, which helps to reduce its carbon footprint and make a positive impact on the environment.

Rocket.net offers free, hassle-free site migration

It is painful to migrate your website from one server to another. First, you must download the files from your old server and then upload them to the new server. This often leads to serious damage to your website. But Rocket hosting ensures a seamless migration.

It is recommended that you create an account with Rocket.net and contact their experts. Small sites can be migrated using only WP-Admin access. However, larger sites may need FTP access as well. The site should remain active throughout the migration.

Automatic Daily and On-demand Backups

Rocket.net keeps your data safe. Their backups are automatic, so you won’t lose your data if anything happens.

On top of automatic backups, they also offer on-demand manual backups. This feature allows the user to update their software without fear of losing their data.

Feature Requests

One neat thing about Rocket.net is that you can actually request features once you become a subscriber, and the platform will add them if they get enough attention.

Here is a short list of planned feature requests coming up.

Enable/Disable Redis Caching – It would be great to be able to enable or disable Redis caching via the advanced options, including automatic installation and setup of the Redis plugin within Wordpress.

Support for Additional Domains – You can add multiple domains to the same installation as a customer.

Provide A record IP details when APEX CNAME – It would be helpful if, somewhere on the Update DNS page, a link or hidden text could be clicked to reveal the IP address that can be used if the CNAME is not allowed.

Whitelabel and Custom Site CNAME – Replace Rocket.net for cname and control panel with a fully whitelabel domain instead of random characters.

WordPress Install without Plugins – If you wish to use the woocommerce option, you can turn on default plugins, otherwise, a blank install is recommended.

Customer input is important to them and I appreciate their willingness to let us request features.

Rocket.net Pros and Cons

During my review of Rocket.net, I noted the following five advantages.

Advantages of Rocket.net

Website Speed

You should definitely consider Rocket hosting if site speed is important to you. You can ensure that your site’s performance is not hindered by geography by utilizing CDN services and multiple servers.

Optimization

Rocket.net has already performed all the necessary steps to optimize nearly any website so you don’t have to and can concentrate on other aspects such as content.

Quality Support Staff

When you run into any issues, like when I was having a problem with how something was acting on mobile, they handle them swiftly and promptly. They have a ticketing system, email and chat.

Disadvantages of Rocket.net

WordPress Sites Only

Owners of sites have fewer options.

Hands Off

Rocket.net isn’t for people who want to control all aspects of their website or play around with settings. It’s not to say that this is a problem persay.

Rocket.net Review Verdict

Rocket.net is the best hosting company for small businesses. Their plans are affordable, starting at $25/mo, and they have so many tools to help you succeed online.

It’s a great option for startups and entrepreneurs who need to get their WordPress website online fast. It’s also a good choice for people that don’t want to manage the hosting themselves, or spend hours setting up a site builder tool like Squarespace or Wix.

I am one of those people that usually likes to manage everything, but it can get frustrating when you’re constantly tweaking variables to get a 1-5% gain, and sometimes things break, which impacts how your website visitors experience it.

If you want to reach a global audience with your blog or website, I recommend you try this managed WordPress hosting. A massive amount of value is provided with Cloudflare Enterprise’s capabilities.

In many regions of the world, Cloudflare Enterprise + Rocket.net web hosting improves the performance of my websites.

Are there any deals available through them that you can use to save money? They currently offer $1 for the first month as well as discounts for yearly subscriptions.

Rocket.net is a managed hosting company that offers Cloudflare Enterprise optimized hosting plans for personal, business and agency users. The most notable aspects of the service include security, speed and reliability.

If you’re considering switching to managed WordPress hosting, I recommend checking out Rocket.net.

Overall, Rocket.net is a solid choice for those looking for a reliable and high-performance webhosting provider for their WordPress website. With its advanced caching technology, range of helpful tools and services, and commitment to sustainability, Rocket.net is a great option for businesses of all sizes.

FAQ

How does all-in-one Managed WordPress Hosting work?

All of your WordPress hosting needs can be met on the Rocket.net platform. There is no need to purchase any additional plugins/services for Caching or Security when using Rocket. All of their services, including WordPress hosting, CDN, and WAF, are free.

What sets Rocket.net apart from other Managed WordPress Hosts?

With its unique footprint and offerings, Rocket.net stands out among its competitors. Your WordPress hosting account is placed at the edge of the cloud, closer to your website visitors than ever before. Additionally, every site comes with free premium services like CDN, WAF, Image Optimization, Font Optimization, and more.

Can Rocket.net help me move my WordPress sites?

It’s true! At no additional charge, they will help you move as many WordPress websites as you need from your current provider. Submit a ticket in Mission Control once your account is set up, and they’ll get started right away.

What is a Content Delivery Network (CDN)?

A content delivery network (CDN) is a system of distributed servers that deliver web content to users based on their geographical location. CDNs provide a more efficient, reliable, and secure way to deliver content over the internet. By caching content in multiple locations around the world, CDNs reduce latency and improve user experience. CDNs also provide additional security, such as DDoS protection, and can be used to protect against malicious attacks. CDNs are used by businesses of all sizes to deliver content quickly and securely to their customers. CDNs are also used to deliver streaming media, such as audio and video, and to provide software updates to users. CDNs are an essential part of the modern web, providing a reliable and secure way to deliver content across the world.

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