Why Choose GridPane Over RunCloud?
RunCloud is a hosting control panel alternative to cPanel who, like ourselves here at GridPane, allow you to choose your own Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) provider to provision your own servers. Because of this, we occasionally get asked by prospective clients how we compare with each other and so we’ll seek to explain the key differences here, as fairly and accurately as possible.
If you’re looking to understand the differences between GridPane and RunCloud and decide who is the better choice for your business, you’re in the right place.
Key Similarities
- Choose Your IaaS Provider
Both GridPane and RunCloud have an API integration with DigitalOcean, Vultr, Linode, AWS Lightsail, UpCloud, and you can use each of our custom VPS options to provision servers at essentially any quality VPS provider that you wish to use (including Google Cloud Compute, AWS EC2, Hetzner, OVH and many more).
You choose and control your infrastructure, you can use each of our software and UI to manage your websites and servers.
- We don't charge based on arbitrary metrics like "views"
Most traditional hosting companies put restrictions on arbitrary metrics such as “views” and PHP workers. This is due to the rigid way in which these platforms operate. Charging based on these metrics often leaves users with no choice other than to upgrade to a higher plan. The PHP worker restriction in particular can be highly problematic for eCommerce and LMS websites.
Neither GridPane or RunCloud charge based on these types of metrics. You have a VPS or dedicated server, and these can handle what they can handle – no restrictions.
Key Differences
- Business Model
The main difference between GridPane and RunCloud is the markets we serve. RunCloud are a cPanel alternative. They’re geared more towards developers who are looking to save time and gain performance over a regular shared hosting service.
GridPane is a comprehensive WordPress hosting solution built for serious WordPress agencies and developers who are looking to grow their WordPress business and provide high-end hosting services and/or website care plans for their clients for a premium price.
- Support
RunCloud offer ticket-based support. One of the biggest differences you’ll notice between ourselves and RunCloud is the level of WordPress specific support we offer.
GridPane has engineers that literally solve WordPress specific issues and nothing else. One of the main reasons WordPress agencies switch to GridPane is due to the high level of support that our team offers. If you plan on growing a team to help you manage all your hosting clients, we’re the perfect partner for your business.
- Focus
RunCloud have built a great hosting control panel that can serve many different markets, but they aren’t dedicated solely to building the best WordPress hosting solution on the planet.
GridPane is pushing the boundaries of what WordPress hosting looks like. We were the first-ever hosting control panel dedicated to WordPress, and we’re now so much more. We’re now the first to offer both Nginx and OpenLiteSpeed servers, and Percona 8 or MariaDB database options. We’ll soon be launching the most comprehensive backup solution available anywhere, and we have multiple WAF integrations, DNS integrations (including Cloudflare), UpdateSafely 2.0, and more.
We’re focused on building the absolute best WordPress hosting solution in the world.
- Pricing Model
GridPane and RunCloud both share similar pricing models, with different plans each offering different levels of features, and neither of our platforms make money from reselling infrastructure.
The main difference here is the pricing (RunCloud is cheaper) but this price gap of course reflects the level of support and the different features that we each offer.
- Stack and Performance
RunCloud’s stack is far more performant than regular shared hosting. On regular, non-complex, low traffic sites, you may not notice much of a difference in performance between RunCloud and GridPane. At scale though, there’s no real independent information about how RunCloud performs, so we can’t provide a fair comparison.
That said, we’ll happily put any of our server stack options up against ANY WordPress hosting stack in the world, any day of the week. In fact, in 2020 we did just that and threw our hat in the ring for Review Signal‘s annual performance testing, and we came out with top tier honours in the top-of-the-pyramid enterprise category. To summarise those findings, GridPane’s stack competes with the very highest priced WordPress hosting plans in the world and will handle websites at scale at any level. One of our core goals as a platform is to help our clients create enterprise-capable servers.
Our out-of-the-box defaults are ideal for most WordPress websites, but you can then further customize them to meet your website’s specific needs. Need to tweak your PHP workers for a WooCommerce or LMS website? No problem at all, you can do it right in your dashboard.
TL;DR
- These are the key differences between our services:
- GridPane can help WordPress agencies and professionals build their own enterprise-level hosting service for recurring monthly revenue.
- GridPane is better suited to WordPress agencies/professionals. RunCloud is better suited to developers who need a decent cPanel alternative.
- One of the biggest differences you’ll notice between ourselves and RunCloud is the level of WordPress specific support we offer. As we’re solely focused on WordPress we literally solve WordPress specific issues 24/7 and nothing else.
- GridPanes Nginx stack is independently tested and proven to compete at the very highest levels of the WordPress hosting industry.
- GridPane includes local backups at the server level, and gives you the ability to create remote backups at Amazon S3, Backblaze B2, and Wasabi. RunCloud includes their own backup system that backs your applications up to their own storage.
- We both allow you to provision servers at any quality VPS provider, and we each have API integrations for DigitalOcean, Vultr, Linode, Amazon Lightsail, and UpCloud.
- GridPane is 100% focused on building the best WordPress hosting solution in the world. RunCloud serves multiple different markets.
Long story short, if you need a great alternative to cPanel, you should absolutely check out RunCloud.
If you need a great alternative to Managed WordPress Hosting, GridPane may be a perfect fit for you, and you should definitely take us up on our FREE 2 week trial offer to test us out.
Which Service Is Right For You?
If you’re a developer looking for a budget friendly cPanel alternative, RunCloud is a great solution that may be ideal for you.
If you’re a WordPress agency or developer and you’re looking to grow your monthly revenue from your hosting offering, GridPane exists to serve your needs. We’re purpose-built for serious WordPress agencies and developers who are looking to grow their WordPress business and provide high-end hosting services and/or website care plans for their clients for a premium price.
Are you looking to build a high-end hosting service and add a steady, predictable stream of recurring monthly revenue to your WordPress business? We’d love to assist you on that journey.
Smash Your Hosting Problems Once & For All
WordPress pro’s from all over the world are moving their most important, high-traffic websites to GridPane. Why not take us for a test drive? You can get started today for free!