InMotion Hosting: what the cheapest plan really costs

The short version

• Cheapest plan for one WordPress site: Core shared hosting, $3.19 a month on a 3-year term. It allows 1 website and has a 1-click WordPress installer.
• Three-year cost: $114.84 if you prepay 36 months (InMotion does not label the term; see the note below). Paying one year at a time costs $323.64 over the same three years.
• What renews: the 3-year price renews at $10.99 a month, the 1-year price at $11.99 a month. The free domain is free for the first year only.
• Right for: one small site on cPanel hosting, if you can pay three years at once and will make your own backups.

InMotion Hosting sells web hosting: space on its servers where your site’s files and database live. Everything below comes from InMotion’s own pricing, help and legal pages. We have not used InMotion ourselves.

What the cheapest plan really costs over three years

The arithmetic:

• (a) $3.19 × 36 months = $114.84. InMotion shows only the monthly rate, not the checkout total. In year 4 the plan renews at $10.99 a month, which is $131.88 for a year.
• (b) $2.99 × 12 months = $35.88. Then $11.99 × 24 months = $287.76, using two 12-month renewals at the 1-year plan’s renewal price. $35.88 + $287.76 = $323.64.

The 1-year intro price is lower, but its renewal is higher. Over three years, paying yearly costs $208.80 more.

The free domain needs a 12, 24 or 36-month plan. “The free domain is only for the first year,” and after that it renews “at the regular price at that time.” InMotion’s domains page does not show a .com price, so we cannot add it to the totals.

Verisign raises the .com wholesale fee from $10.26 to $10.97 a year on November 1, 2026. InMotion has not published a new .com price on the pages we checked. Its terms say renewals are charged at “then current rates,” which may be “higher or lower.” Auto-renew is on by default when a card is on file, and InMotion emails you 30 days before a renewal.

The plans in one table

The pricing page lists Power at $4.99 a month, while InMotion’s web hosting and comparison pages say $5.99. Promotional prices are for new customers only.

InMotion also sells WordPress versions of these plans. WP Core is $3.69 a month on the 3-year term ($132.84 for 36 months) and renews at $11.49 a month. It does not include automatic offsite backups or the staging tool. Those start at WP Launch.

What is included

• SSL: a free SSL certificate is “included free for all hosted domains for the life of your plan,” so your site loads over HTTPS.
• Backups: not included on Core. Shared plans say “Backup Manager Available,” an add-on “starting at $2.50/month” with daily backups. How long it keeps them and any restore fee are not published on the pages we checked. You can make your own backups in cPanel for free, and the terms say you are “solely responsible” for backup copies.
• Email: unlimited addresses on Core, with 1 GB of storage per inbox.
• Free migration: InMotion’s migrations page says “Free with one cPanel or WordPress backup.” See website migration.
• CDN: not mentioned for Core. Cloudflare integration is listed on WP Launch and up. See CDN.
• Staging: the FAQ says staging is “available on higher-tier plans.” The WordPress Staging Tool starts at WP Launch.

The uptime promise

InMotion’s plan cards advertise a “99.9% Uptime Guarantee,” and some pages say 99.99%. Its Universal Terms of Service, the contract you agree to, say something different. InMotion will use “commercially reasonable efforts” to keep sites up, but “such up-time is not a guarantee.”

We found no service credit for downtime in the terms or on the pages we checked. The terms say your remedy is for InMotion to “re-perform the defective Products.” Treat the uptime figure as a marketing promise, not one that pays you back.

Leaving later

• Full backups: InMotion’s cPanel guide shows how to generate and download a full account backup. Its Backup Wizard can also save just your MySQL databases, or just your email forwarders and filters.
• Download before the end date: when the term ends, content “is deleted from InMotion Hosting’s systems.” The help center says to download your files, email and databases first.
• Cancellation fee: the help center says you can turn off Auto-Renew or cancel, and the plan runs to the end of the paid term. But section 12.3.1 of the terms lists “a minimum $50.00 charge as an early cancellation fee” if you cancel before the term ends, with no refund for unused time outside the money-back guarantee.
• Refund window: 90 days for terms of 6 months or longer, 30 days for monthly billing. The home page FAQ says refunds asked for between day 31 and day 90 are prorated, not full. There are no refunds for add-ons or domain names, and if you got a free domain, “the regular price of the domain” comes out of your refund. That amount is not published.
• Moving the domain: you cannot transfer within 60 days of registration, or within 14 days of expiry. Ask support for the EPP code by chat or ticket. No transfer fee is mentioned. Our domain transfer guide covers the rest.

Who it is right for, and who should look elsewhere

Right for:

• Owners of one small WordPress site who can prepay $114.84 for three years.
• People who want cPanel, a long money-back window and free migration from a cPanel or WordPress backup.

Look elsewhere if:

• You want included automatic backups or staging on the cheapest plan.
• You want an uptime promise in the contract with a credit when it is missed.
• You may leave early, since the terms list a $50 minimum early cancellation fee.

To add your domain, email and plugins to the hosting bill, try our website cost calculator.

Sources

InMotion Hosting: pricing, home page (refund FAQ), shared hosting, WordPress shared hosting, web hosting, comparison page (term tabs, domain terms), FAQ, domains, Backup Manager, cPanel backups, website migrations, renewals, canceling, domain transfer out, Universal Terms of Service. Verisign: Q1 2026 results (.com price change).