Cloudways WordPress hosting is often pitched as an easy upgrade for creators who have outgrown bargain shared hosting. In a short promotional video, Income School’s Ricky says Cloudways became his long-term hosting choice after years of using it across his WordPress sites—but the useful takeaway is less about a seasonal discount and more about how to evaluate a host before a move.

The original video promotes a Black Friday/Cyber Monday offer of 50% off for three months and migration help for up to 50 sites. That specific deal is time-bound and should be treated as historical, not as a currently available offer. Cloudways has continued to run seasonal promotions in recent years, but the discount, eligibility rules, migration allowance, and end date can change from one campaign to the next. (cloudways.com)

The appeal of Cloudways WordPress hosting

Income School’s endorsement is straightforward: hosting should be dependable enough that creators can focus on publishing rather than wrestling with slow load times, outages, or server administration. That message resonates because a WordPress site that gains traffic eventually exposes the limits of entry-level hosting plans—especially when it runs a resource-heavy theme, ecommerce plugins, an online course, or a large library of images.

Cloudways is not conventional shared hosting. Its Flexible product is a managed cloud platform that lets customers deploy WordPress and other applications on infrastructure from providers including DigitalOcean, AWS, Google Cloud, Vultr, and Linode. In practice, that gives users more control over server resources and scaling than a typical one-click shared-hosting plan, while Cloudways handles much of the operational layer. (cloudways.com)

That distinction matters. More flexibility can be valuable for agencies and publishers managing multiple sites, but it also means buyers should expect a different level of complexity than they would get from an all-inclusive beginner host. The platform is designed to make cloud hosting more accessible; it does not make hosting decisions disappear.

Why a migration offer is compelling—but not enough

The strongest part of the Income School pitch is not the introductory discount. It is the removal of migration friction. Site owners commonly delay a move because they fear downtime, broken forms, missing images, database errors, SEO damage, or an accidental change to DNS records.

Cloudways currently offers several migration paths. Its official materials promote expert-led managed migrations, a WordPress Migrator plugin, and a free-migration offer, though the exact scope varies across pages and campaigns. For example, its WordPress hosting page refers to one expert-handled migration, while its migration service page advertises unlimited WordPress migrations. That is a good reminder to confirm the terms applicable to your account in writing before committing to a plan. (cloudways.com)

A host-assisted migration can save significant time, particularly for an agency moving client sites. But it should be viewed as implementation support—not a substitute for a launch plan. Before changing hosts, site owners should know what success looks like and how they will verify it.

Here is a practical pre-migration checklist:

  • Create and download an independent backup of files and database.
  • Record current traffic, conversion rate, uptime, and page-speed benchmarks.
  • List critical functions: ecommerce checkout, membership logins, forms, email delivery, redirects, analytics, and ad scripts.
  • Lower DNS TTL in advance if possible, then schedule the cutover outside peak traffic hours.
  • Test the copied site on a temporary URL or staging environment before pointing the live domain.
  • Recheck SSL, robots.txt, XML sitemaps, canonical tags, redirects, and Search Console after launch.

Cloudways’ own migration guidance similarly emphasizes backups, staging, DNS and SSL updates, plus post-move testing of links, analytics, and SEO signals. (cloudways.com)

Cloudways WordPress hosting costs: look beyond the first invoice

Promotional pricing is useful, but it should not drive the hosting decision. The original video’s 50%-off-for-three-months framing is a classic example: it lowers the perceived cost of switching while saying little about the ongoing monthly bill, needed add-ons, server size, or support level after the promotion ends.

Cloudways currently lists plans starting at $14 per month, with pricing dependent on the hosting model, chosen cloud provider, server resources, and options. Its Flexible offering is built around configurable infrastructure, while its Autonomous offering targets high-traffic dynamic WordPress workloads that need managed autoscaling. (cloudways.com)

For a small content site, that may be more capacity and configuration than necessary. For a growing publisher, WooCommerce store, course platform, or agency portfolio, the ability to choose resources and scale can justify the premium over basic shared hosting.

When comparing costs, use the price you expect to pay in month six or month 12—not the first promotional invoice. Include backups, email, CDN or security services, premium support, developer time, and the cost of overprovisioning a server just to handle brief traffic spikes.

Who should consider Cloudways—and who should not

Cloudways can be a strong fit when performance control and operational flexibility matter more than having every service bundled under one dashboard. It is especially worth evaluating for builders who already understand WordPress basics and have a clear reason to leave their current host.

Cloudways may suit:

  • Content publishers with rising traffic and slow shared-hosting performance.
  • Agencies that want to manage multiple WordPress installs on cloud infrastructure.
  • WooCommerce, membership, LMS, or other dynamic sites that need more server headroom.
  • Technical founders who want managed infrastructure but still want provider and server choices.

It may be a weaker fit for:

  • First-time site owners who want a domain, email, website builder, and support bundled in one beginner-oriented package.
  • Very small sites with no performance problems and limited budgets.
  • Teams without someone responsible for monitoring plugin updates, backups, site changes, and billing.

That does not make one category of host universally better. The right question is whether your current host is demonstrably blocking page speed, reliability, workflow, or growth.

Treat creator recommendations as a starting point

The Income School video is valuable as a concise real-world endorsement from a team that builds content sites. Ricky’s claim that he had stayed with Cloudways longer than prior hosts tells prospective buyers something about his experience, even if it is not an independent performance test.

Still, viewers should recognize the commercial context. The video directs people to a referral link, and the message is built around a limited-time promotion. That does not invalidate the recommendation; it means the recommendation should be followed by due diligence.

Ask for details that a short promotional video cannot cover: Which cloud provider will host the site? What server size is appropriate? What is included in the migration? What happens if the transfer fails? Which support channel is available on the selected plan? And what will the account cost after introductory pricing ends?

The bottom line

Cloudways WordPress hosting is worth considering when your site needs a step up from low-cost shared hosting and you value managed cloud infrastructure, flexible server choices, and migration assistance. Income School’s promotion gets the key emotional insight right: changing hosts is easier when someone else handles the move.

But a discount should be the final nudge, not the core business case. Benchmark your existing site, calculate the non-promotional cost, verify migration terms, and test the new environment before DNS cutover. That approach turns a hosting sale into a measured infrastructure decision—one that supports the creator business you are actually building.