Pros and Cons
Here are the pros and cons of using DreamHost as your hosting platform.
Positives
Negatives
Interesting facts
Discover the unique features that make DreamHost stand out
DreamHost is one of only three hosting providers officially recommended by WordPress.org.
In February 2025, DreamHost opened its first international data center in Amsterdam — and its Knowledge Base also lists Singapore as an active "AP Southeast" data center, though this has not been formally announced via press release.
In 2017, DreamHost publicly challenged a DOJ warrant seeking IP addresses of 1.3 million visitors to a political protest website — a notable stance on user privacy.
DreamHost's CDN (DreamSpeed) is powered by the Fastly network, with PoPs in Singapore, Hong Kong, Tokyo, and other Asian cities, which partially offsets the data center gap for static assets.
Commit to 3 years upfront for maximum savings. Paying for three years at once costs approximately $142 compared to $299 for one year now plus two renewal years at standard rates — a saving of over 50%. Monthly billing can cost up to 60% more than the equivalent annual rate.
Renewal pricing is automatic and requires manual cancellation to stop. DreamHost's billing system does not offer an "opt out of auto-renew" toggle per their own documentation. The only way to prevent a charge is to manually cancel each service before its renewal date via the Manage Account panel.
Domain renewals are billed 31 days early and are non-refundable. Domains are charged one month before expiration. Per their Domain Registration Agreement, domain fees cannot be refunded. Multiple BBB complaints involve customers who believed they had canceled, only to discover domain auto-renewal was a separate process from account closure.
mail is NOT included in the Shared Starter (Launch) plan. Email hosting must be purchased as an add-on ($1.67/mailbox/month on an annual plan). This is not prominently disclosed in the plan comparison table on the DreamHost pricing page.
The 97-day money-back guarantee only applies if you paid by credit card. Users who pay via PayPal, check, or money order are not eligible for the refund even within the guarantee window. This caveat is buried in the Terms of Service.
Founded in 1996 by four Harvey Mudd College undergraduates — Dallas Bethune, Josh Jones, Michael Rodriguez, and Sage Weil — DreamHost began hosting customer websites in 1997 and has since grown to support over 1.5 million websites and 400,000 customers across more than 100 countries.
