Most web hosting providers promise the world but deliver headaches. Fast loading times become slow crawls, “reliable” uptime becomes frequent outages, and “24/7 support” becomes automated responses that don’t solve anything.
I’ve been burned by this before, so when I heard about 20i’s Autoscale hosting, I rolled my eyes at first. But after yet another hosting headache with my current provider, I decided to give them a try.
Did they actually live up to the hype? Were their performance claims real or just more marketing fluff? In this hands-on review of 20i, I’ll share everything I learned after testing the web hosting service for a full 9 months.
20i Hosting: Overview and Key Features
20i is a UK-based hosting company that specializes in cloud hosting with automatic scaling. Instead of traditional shared hosting where your site competes for resources with hundreds of others, 20i uses what they call “Autoscale” technology that adjusts server resources automatically when your site gets busy.
Think of it like this: if your website suddenly gets a traffic spike from social media or a blog post going viral, most hosting providers would let your site crash or load slowly. With 20i’s Autoscale, the system automatically allocates more resources to handle the traffic, then scales back down when things return to normal.
20i’s platform runs on cloud infrastructure across multiple servers, so you get better reliability than traditional single-server hosting. You also get their custom My20i control panel, which is designed to be simpler than cPanel.
Key features:
- Automatic scaling that handles traffic spikes without your site crashing
- Cloud infrastructure for better reliability and speed
- Custom control panel that’s easier to use than traditional hosting interfaces
- Multiple hosting options including WordPress-optimized and managed hosting
- Built-in CDN to speed up your site globally
- Daily backups and security included at no extra cost
- UK-based support available 24/7 when you need help
Hands-On With 20i Hosting
In this section, I’ll walk through the actual steps to set up and start using 20i’s autoscale platform. I’ll show you what the process really looks like and share what I learned along the way.
Signing Up and Choosing a Plan
20i offers several hosting options with a current promotional price of $1 for the first month across all plans. Their Autoscale plans come in three tiers: Plan 1 ($30/month), Plan 2 ($60/month), and Plan 3 ($100/month). Each plan includes different amounts of websites, storage, and bandwidth to match your needs.
I started with Plan 3 since it covered my business site and a few client projects. The signup process is pretty simple. You’ll need to provide your details, choose monthly or yearly billing, and pick whether you want US or UK servers.
One thing I learned: if most of your visitors are in the US, definitely pick the US datacenter for better loading speeds. All plans include the same core features like automatic scaling, CDN, daily backups, and SSL certificates, so you’re mainly choosing based on how many sites you need to host.
Using the My20i Dashboard
Once your account is ready, you’ll get access to the My20i control panel. This is where you’ll handle everything from adding new websites to managing backups and monitoring performance.
Your first job is getting familiar with the layout and setting up basic account preferences. The main areas you’ll use most are Hosting Management (for adding sites), and WordPress Manager (if you’re running WordPress sites).
Adding Your First Website
Once you’re familiar with the dashboard layout, the next step is actually getting a website hosted. From the My20i dashboard, you click “Add Package” in the “Manage Hosting” section. This opens up a window where you pick your server location and choose a website profile.
What I liked was that you can start with a temporary domain if you’re not ready to switch your main domain over yet. This lets you test everything and set up your site before making the actual switch. The whole thing takes just a few minutes, and your hosting is ready almost right away.
Moving Sites Over to 20i
One thing that made switching to 20i easier was their Migration Centre. If your current host uses cPanel or Plesk (most do), 20i can automatically move your sites over for you. You just enter your current hosting login details, pick what you want to move, and they handle the rest.
The process creates backups before moving anything, so there’s no risk of losing your data and design. Your original site keeps running until everything is confirmed working on the new servers.
WordPress Management Tools
If you’re running WordPress sites (and let’s face it, most of us are), 20i’s WordPress tools actually make life easier. Instead of logging into each WordPress dashboard separately, you can handle most of the boring maintenance stuff right from the My20i panel.
The WordPress Tools section shows you what’s happening with all your sites in one place. The Version Checker tells you immediately if your WordPress core, themes, or plugins need updating.
What saved me the most time was being able to update plugins and themes across multiple sites without logging into each WordPress admin separately. When you’re juggling several projects, this cuts out a lot of repetitive clicking around.
The Staging Environment is really useful too. One click gives you a complete copy of your live site where you can test updates, try new plugins, or mess around with design changes safely. When everything looks good, another click pushes the changes live.
Performance and Speed Features
This is where 20i’s Autoscale really does what it promises. The CDN and caching work automatically, but you can dig into the settings if you want to tweak things.
The Website Optimization section has what they call “one-click optimization” that automatically handles image compression, JavaScript cleanup, and CSS combining. I usually avoid automated optimization tools because they tend to break things, but 20i’s version actually worked well. My PageSpeed scores got better without anything falling apart.
You can check detailed CDN stats to see how your content is being cached and delivered around the world. The Traffic Distribution map shows where your visitors are coming from, which is interesting and useful for understanding your audience.
The Cache Report shows which pages are getting cached properly and flags any problems. Most hosting companies don’t give you this kind of visibility into what’s actually happening with your caching.
Security and Backup Features
20i handles several security things automatically in the background. The daily backups just happen without you thinking about it, and you can grab up to 30 days of old backups if you need to restore something.
If you need more backup coverage, they offer Timeline Backups Pro which keeps your database backups for 60 days instead of 30, and also backs up all your email accounts. This could be a lifesaver if you run an online store or handle important business communications.
The Malware Scanner runs on its own, but you can also run manual scans when you want to. The File Permissions Checker catches common security problems before they become real issues.
SSL certificates are included and set up automatically when you add a domain. The Security Headers let you control how browsers interact with your site, though most people won’t need to mess with these.
Additional Services
There are a few extras you can add to your hosting if you need them:
- Premium Email – Upgrades your mailboxes from 10GB to 50GB each, plus adds contact and calendar syncing across your devices. Useful if you’re running out of email storage or need better organization.
- Extended SSL Certificates – Provides extra security validation and insurance coverage for high-value e-commerce sites. The free SSL works fine for most businesses, but this adds an extra layer of trust for customers.
Most people won’t need these add-ons right away, but they’re available when your business grows and you need the extra features.
Getting Help When You Need It
20i’s support is available around the clock through live chat and support tickets directly from the My20i panel. I’ve used both methods several times, and the response times have been good— usually within a few minutes for live chat.
I liked that their support team actually knows their platform well. Instead of copy-paste responses, they gave specific solutions and even walked me through some of the more advanced features when I was getting started.
Final Verdict
That’s my experience with 20i after 9 months of testing. As you can see, it’s reliable hosting that actually works without the usual headaches.
The Autoscale plans I tested work well for growing businesses and multiple WordPress sites. The hosting provider also offers basic shared hosting plans for those just getting started or running simple websites.
For $1 in the first month, it’s worth testing to see if it solves your hosting problems. If you’re dealing with slow sites or poor support elsewhere, 20i could be a good switch.
