Signing Up with Hostinger — What We Found
Hostinger is a budget hosting provider that’s popular with Kiwis chasing low pricing. It’s a globally-operated brand that’s based overseas, so it’s worth noting that it’s not a local NZ host like some of the other brands we’ve run comparisons on.
For our test, we signed up for Hostinger’s Single plan, recorded the checkout process, and benchmarked WordPress performance. Here’s what we found.
The Hostinger signup story
We found Hostinger's onboarding to be polished and fast. One noteworthy difference we noticed straight away is that instead of using cPanel, websites are managed in their proprietary hPanel. The UI is clean and usable, but if you're used to navigating cPanel, it will require some different muscle memory.
Hostinger offered us a choice of server location from different countries and regions, but the closest we could get to New Zealand was Singapore. We verified the location of the server with (147.93.78.125, AS47583 Hostinger International Limited). For some NZ shoppers this may pass as “local enough”, but it will create more latency for your website than hosting based in Auckland.
Once we’d installed WordPress, we ran a PHP Vitals (B+ in 9.3s), then ran WP Benchmark (scored 6.0/10).
A useful quirk we noticed during the sign-up process: Hostinger provides you with a temporary domain during setup, so you can install WordPress and run benchmarks before your real DNS is ready, rather than having to wait for the nameservers to propagate.
Control panel
Plan features: Hostinger Single
Last updated 19 August, 2026
Overview
| Price | $16.48/mo NZD ex-GST · renewal rate |
|---|---|
| Storage | Not stated |
| Panel | Proprietary (not cPanel) |
| PHP | 8.2, 8.3, 8.4, 8.5 |
| Staging | Yes |
| Support | email, tickets |
| Server | Singapore (147.93.78.125, AS47583 Hostinger International Limited) |
| Trustpilot | 4.7 out of 54.7 |
Proprietary control panel. Includes a temporary domain for tests.
Benchmark results ?
| Test | Result | Date |
|---|---|---|
| PHP Vitals | B+ (9.30s) | 2026-08-19 |
| WP Benchmark | 6 / 10 | 2026-08-19 |
Hostinger’s results sit in the middle of the pack: clearly faster than Hoopla (F / 4.7) and GoDaddy (E / 5.4), but behind the top NZ and Australian entries (A−–A+ PHP Vitals, WP Benchmark 8+).
Reasonable for basic WordPress sites if you don’t mind overseas servers and the extra latency that adds for NZ visitors.
What you can expect with Hostinger
Good fit if you want
- Modern PHP versions and staging on the entry plan
- Polished signup UX and a temp domain for early testing
- Mid-table price with mid-table benchmarks
Watch out for
- Offshore Singapore servers (not NZ)
- Non-cPanel (hPanel) workflow
- Unconfirmed backup / email / SSL details on the plan we tested
Location and Backups
Try Hostinger
Sign up for their Single shared plan on their site.