Brain Host Introduction

Brain Host specialises in “unlimited web hosting”; typical shared hosting plans with solid tech support, unlimited resources, Cpanel and a website builder. The company’s premises are in Ohio, with the HQ located in Akron and the operations department located in Brunswick.

Founded in 2010, Brain Host is a relatively new hosting provider. It already has more than 95,000 customers. In July 2012, Brain Host appointed a new CEO, Corey Hammond. He was previously the President of the company and has been involved in its growth since day one.

Brain Host Hosting Plans

Brain Host offers three Linux hosting plans in its shared hosting portfolio. These aren’t named, so I’ll refer to them as Plan 1, Plan 2 and Plan 3.

● Plan 1 provides the basics: unlimited hosting, domains, email and bandwidth, plus a website builder. That’s it.
● Plan 2 tops this up with unlimited MySQL databases, $250 in ad credits and access to ‘more than 50’ one-click installers.
● Plan 3 is the most expensive, but it actually appears to be a step down from Plan 2. It only offers unlimited hosting, domains and email accounts, the website builder and the marketing credits.

Brain Host states it offers dedicated hosting, but there are no prices or details on the site. We can therefore assume that customers who require advanced hosting packages are considered an exception rather than the norm.

Brain Host Uptime/Downtime

Brain Host doesn’t say where its centre is, but it does provide information about its green credentials. The company arranges its servers in such a way as to eliminate hot-spots which requires less air conditioning and therefore less power consumption. Technicians also install low-voltage servers for the same reason. Beyond this, technical data is not apparent.

The company offers a 99.9% uptime guarantee, although there’s no published data on its past history.

There doesn’t appear to be an obvious automatic backup option, although backups can be created via Cpanel as you’d expect.

Brain Host Support

Brain Host’s tech support department is open 24/7 all year round. It offers support via ticket, phone and live chat (via Cpanel).

The company has active profiles on social media, although its social media pages are geared more towards posting links and photos than providing support. The Brain HostTwitter page is mainly a feed for their blog and press releases, although staff do reply to the occasional tweet. The blog does seem to be the central point for interactivity.

Their Help Centre portal is fairly small, with a ticket login and a knowledge base containing around 600 articles. A huge 100 of these are related to the web builder tool. There don’t appear to be any user forums, wikis or other opportunities for clients to interact.

Brain Host in the News

I didn’t find anything negative in the press about Brain Host. Given that it’s a fairly new company, this is probably to be expected.

Brain Host Control Panel

All Brain Host’s plans offer Cpanel as standard. Account and billing options are located in a separate account which is customised, but the actual technical control panel will be familiar to anyone who has used Cpanel before.

Brain Host Extras

● One-click installers at Brain Host feature all the usual suspects: WordPress, Magento, MediaWiki, phpBB and so on. Bear in mind that one-click installers are only available on Plan 2.
● Advertising credits are also provided on Plan 2 only. These include credits for Google, Yahoo!/Bing, Miva and Myspace, and the combined value is $250.
● It appears that Brain Host occasionally runs free domain name promotions, but you won’t get a free domain as standard.

Brain Host Money Back Guarantee / Cancellation Policy

Brain Host offers a standard 30-day money back guarantee on shared hosting plans, excluding sign-up fees and domain name registration fees. The refund covers the entire term of the contract, but cancellations may only be made by telephone to their US number.

Dedicated hosting customers are not eligible for any money-back guarantees.

Brain Host Summary

BrainHost’s website proclaims that they’re my own city’s ‘#1 Choice In Web Hosting’. While I have no stats to prove this, I’m not sure that’s strictly true. Additionally, it claims that their load balancing technology is unique, but again, it didn’t seem to be that different to the standard clustering offered by many shared hosts.

Brain Host’s prices are fine, but they’re not as competitive as some of their bigger peers. The most expensive Brain Host plan, Plan 3, represents poor value, particularly since it’s much less capable than Plan 2. In addition, it’s odd that dedicated hosting is nothing more than a footnote, when Brain Host dedicates an entire page to its drag-and-drop website builder tool.

If you’d like to use a small, independent host that’s eco-friendly, Brain Host is a good option. Support is geared towards more basic topics and their services and prices feel a little immature, but this is a young company so that’s to be expected. The fact that it already hosts 95,000 websites after just two years is a good sign for the future.