Disclosure: WebFin is reader-supported. If you buy hosting through links on this page, we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. Commissions vary between providers and our ratings do not — here’s our full disclosure.
First, a correction that changes the whole question. There is no EIG any more. Endurance International Group became Newfold Digital in 2021, and the brands people mean by “EIG” are now Newfold brands: Bluehost, HostGator and the rest. Second, and more awkwardly for an article with this title: the recent measurements do not support moving on reputation alone. Bluehost passed the 2026 load test at 41 ms with no errors and scores 9.6 of 10 on hardware, after Newfold moved it onto Oracle Cloud.
Should You Move? The Short Answer
Move if your renewal has stepped up, or if the extras in your account cost more than the hosting. Move if support has failed you on something specific. Do not move because of a group name from the last decade. Check your own renewal invoice and the current figures first, then decide, and do the move in an order that keeps email and the domain intact.
What Actually Happened to EIG
Endurance International Group was taken private by Clearlake Capital in 2021 and renamed Newfold Digital. Bluehost and HostGator both sit inside that group today, alongside Yoast SEO. Our page on who owns Bluehost traces it in detail.
Other brands people file under the same label have moved elsewhere. A2 Hosting went to World Host Group in January 2025 and now trades as hosting.com. Rocket.net joined the same group in August 2025. Namecheap gained a majority owner in September 2025, and IONOS has been listed in Frankfurt since 2023.
⚠️ So “EIG” as a shopping filter is out of date by several years. The useful filter is what your own invoice says and what the current measurements show.
| Host | Owner (since) | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Bluehost | Newfold Digital (2021) | Newfold press releases |
| HostGator | Newfold Digital (2021) | Newfold press releases |
| Network Solutions | Newfold Digital (2021) | Newfold press releases |
| Register.com | Newfold Digital (2021) | Newfold press releases |
| Crazy Domains | Newfold Digital (2021) | Newfold press releases |
| Web.com | Newfold Digital (2021) | Newfold press releases |
| Yoast SEO | Newfold Digital (12 Aug 2021) | Newfold, PRNewswire |
| YITH | Newfold Digital (Mar 2022) | Newfold, Siris |
| Liquid Web | CloudOne Digital, One Equity Partners (Apr 2023) | Acquisition reporting, 2023 |
| Nexcess | CloudOne Digital | Group brand listings |
| StellarWP | CloudOne Digital | Group brand listings |
| Modern Tribe | CloudOne Digital | Group brand listings |
| A2 Hosting, now hosting.com | World Host Group (Jan 2025), renamed Apr 2025 | Company announcement, WHG release |
| Doteasy | World Host Group | Group brand listings |
| WebHostPython | World Host Group | Group brand listings |
| ColombiaHosting | World Host Group | Group brand listings |
| Cloudways | DigitalOcean (2022) | Acquisition reporting, 2022 |
| WP Engine | Silver Lake, majority stake (2018) | Reported at about $250 million |
| Pressable | Automattic | WordPress.org hosting page |
| Hostinger | Privately held, Vilnius; about 30% PE-held | Company's own statement |
| DreamHost | Independent, describes itself as employee-owned | Company's own statement |
| InMotion | Independent for 25 years, never acquired | Company's own statement |
| InterServer | Independent since 1999, owns its data centers | Company's own statement |
| Hostwinds | Independent since 2010, Seattle | Company's own statement |
| GoDaddy | Publicly listed | Public filings |
| IONOS | United Internet about 64%; listed since Feb 2023 | IONOS Group investor relations, 30 Jun 2026 |
| Namecheap | CVC Capital Partners, majority since September 2025 | Company's own leadership page; deal reporting |
| Scala Hosting | Owner not established; Dallas-based since about 2008 | Company's own profile, read 20 Sep 2026 |
| ChemiCloud | Operated by CChosting, Inc.; owner not established | Site's own copyright line, read 20 Sep 2026 |
| GreenGeeks | Founder-led by Trey Gardner; independent | Company statements and press, 2026 |
| Rocket.net | hosting.com, part of World Host Group (Aug 2025) | Rocket.net and hosting.com announcements, 26 Aug 2025 |
| Kinsta | Not established in the sources we read | — |
| SiteGround | Privately held since 2004, Sofia | Company's own pages |
The Honest Case Against Moving
Bluehost finished the 2026 load test at 41 ms with a 0% error rate, and scores 9.6 of 10 on hardware. It recorded 99.99% uptime and delivers cached pages at 224 ms globally. That is a strong set of figures, and the monitoring project attributes the improvement to the move onto Oracle Cloud.
HostGator’s hardware sits joint highest in its field after the same move, by the project’s September 2026 update. Its uptime record of 99.68% predates that change, so its next window is the one to watch, as our HostGator review explains.
If your site is on Bluehost, working, and renewing at a price you accepted, the measured case for moving is weak. Reputation from 2018 is not a reason, and our Bluehost review lists what it does well alongside the extras to decline.
The Honest Case for Moving
The renewal stepped up. Bluehost Starter renews at $9.99 on a 36-month term and $11.99 on an annual one, and HostGator Hatchling at $10.99. Our page on hosting renewal prices records the steps across the field.
The extras cost more than the plan. CodeGuard at $35.88 a year for daily backups, SiteLock pre-selected at $23.88, a dedicated IP at $59.40, a premium certificate at $89.88. Our page on hidden hosting fees lists them.
Backups are a courtesy. HostGator describes its weekly copies that way, which means they are not a promise you can plan around.
Mailbox limits. Bluehost Starter caps each mailbox at 100 MB, which a working inbox fills.
Step 1: Audit Before You Touch Anything
Write down what the account holds: every site, every mailbox, the domain and where it is registered, any certificates, and which backups exist. Screenshots of the billing page are worth more than memory.
Then note the renewal date and the refund window. Bluehost and HostGator both refund within their windows but exclude domains, and Bluehost deducts $15.99 for a free domain, which our guide to canceling hosting and getting a refund covers.
Step 2: Do Not Cancel First
The mistake that costs most here is canceling the old plan before the new one works. Keep both running for a week. Hosting is cheap; a dark site during a domain transfer is not.
Keep the domain where it is until the site is live elsewhere, then move the DNS. If the domain sits with the old host, plan for the transfer lock. It runs 30 days after a registration or a previous transfer under the revised policy. Our guide to transferring a domain explains it.
Step 3: Move the Site
Both Newfold brands run cPanel, which is the easy case. A full cPanel backup imports into another cPanel host, and several hosts will do the migration for you. Our guide to migrating web hosting covers the order.
If you are moving to a host with its own panel, such as Hostinger or Scala, the site moves as files and a database instead. Take your own copy first either way, as our guide to backing up a WordPress site describes.
Step 4: Move Email Separately, and Carefully
Email is where these moves go wrong. Mailboxes on the old host are not part of a site migration. And changing DNS points new mail at the new host whether you are ready or not.
Create the mailboxes on the new host first, copy the messages, then change the DNS records. Our guide to setting up email on your domain covers the records. A business with staff addresses should schedule this for a quiet evening rather than a Monday morning.
Step 5: Test, Then Cancel
Load the site from a phone on mobile data. Send and receive a test email, submit a contact form, and check an uncached page such as a cart or a login. Run the same speed check you ran on the old host, as our guide to testing your site speed properly describes.
Only then cancel. Ask for the refund in writing if you are inside the window, keep the reply, and expect domains to be excluded.
Where People Move To
A locked price. InterServer at $2.50 a month, the same rate for the life of the account, on standard cPanel with phone support.
A clean load result at a shared price. Scala Hosting at 48 ms with no errors, with daily backups included.
A long promotion. Hostinger at $2.99 held for 48 months, renewing to $10.99, which our page on Hostinger for WordPress covers.
A server. Cloudways from $14.00 a month, billed by the hour, when the site has outgrown shared hosting rather than outgrown its host.
How We Research
We run no tests. Load, hardware, uptime and delivery figures come from Hostingstep’s 2026 benchmarks and its September 2026 update, each with its window. Prices, renewal rates, backup terms and add-on charges come from the providers’ own pages, read on 20 September 2026, and sit in our tables.
Ownership comes from company announcements and filings: the Clearlake acquisition and Newfold renaming in 2021, World Host Group’s purchases in 2025, and the IONOS listing in 2023. The criteria behind our scores are on our about page.
Leaving a Newfold Brand FAQ
Not under that name. Endurance International Group was taken private by Clearlake Capital in 2021 and renamed Newfold Digital. Bluehost and HostGator are Newfold brands today, alongside Yoast SEO.
Not on the current figures. It passed the 2026 load test at 41 ms with no errors and scores 9.6 of 10 on hardware. It also recorded 99.99% uptime and delivers cached pages at 224 ms globally, after the move onto Oracle Cloud.
A renewal that stepped up. Add-ons costing more than the hosting. Backups described as a courtesy rather than a promise, or a 100 MB cap on each mailbox. All of those are checkable on your own invoice.
Canceling the old plan first. Keep both running for a week, move email deliberately rather than as a side effect of a DNS change, and cancel only after testing the new site.
Inside the window, usually, but domains are excluded at both brands and Bluehost deducts $15.99 for a free domain. Ask in writing and keep the reply.
The Verdict
The label people want to escape has not existed since 2021. The host most associated with it now posts one of the stronger measured records among shared plans we price. So start with your invoice rather than with a forum thread from 2018.
If the renewal, the add-ons or the mailbox limits are the problem, moving is the right call. The order then matters more than the destination: audit, run both, move the site, move email deliberately, test, then cancel. Our roundup of cheap web hosting lists where to land.