Canvas Host In 2018: How Would Canvas Host Clients Review Them?

Canvas Host Introduction

Canvas Host was founded in 1998 as a web design and marketing business. In 2002, they began selling hosting services to their existing customers and realized that they were able to provide a better service than what their customers were used to receiving. This led Canvas Host to build a datacenter in Portland, OR in 2005 and transition fully into the hosting business with a focus on excellent customer service and sustainable business practices.

A Sustainability-Minded Hosting Provider

Canvas Host was the first hosting company in the Pacific Northwest to use 100% renewable energy. Today, they are committed to purchasing 200% of their monthly energy from renewable wind and geothermal energy projects — meaning that Canvas host purchases enough renewable energy to power their own datacenter and 15 Portland-area homes.

This commitment to sustainability has been recognized multiple times. Canvas Host is a Gold Accredited Green American Certified Business and an EPA Green Power program partner. In addition, the city of Portland has recognized Canvas Host as a Gold Certified Sustainability at Work PDX company.

Additional memberships that demonstrate Canvas Host’s commitment to sustainability include: Friend of Tree Planting Partner, Bonneville Environmental Foundation membership, Rediret Guidee, PDX Green Drinks member, and West Side Green Drinks member.

Finally, Canvas Host is a Certified B Corporation, meaning that the non-profit organization B Lab has audited Canvas Host and certified compliance with a variety of rigorous social and environmental performance, accountability, and transparency metrics.

Services and Specializations

Hosting products include a variety of shared hosting plans, virtual private servers, dedicated servers, and add-on products and services. All hosting plans are built on servers running the latest version of CentOS (Linux).

Shared hosting plans are suitable for hosting 1 to 10 websites and plans include a limited number of email addresses, MySQL databases, disk space, and bandwidth. All plans include cPanel, Softaculous, RV SiteBuilder, basic CloudFlare integration, unlimited subdomains, and weekly account backups. SSL certificates and dedicated IP addresses are also available.

A few specialized shared hosting plans are also available:

• Reseller hosting plans include all shared hosting plan features, support for 10 to 80 cPanel accounts, and include a range of disk space and bandwidth allocations.
• WordPress hosting plans include preinstalled WordPress and automatic WordPress updates for 1 to 10 WordPress websites in addition to all shared hosting plan features.
• PCI website hosting plans are available to host one PCI-compliant ecommerce site. As a Trustwave Trusted Commerce company, Canvas Host is qualified to validate PCI DSS compliance, and PCI hosting customers get assistance from Canvas Host to ensure compliance with PCI ASV security scans. In addition, PCI plans include daily backups.

Virtual private server (VPS) hosting plans are available for customers who need more server power than what is available from a shared hosting plan. A variety of CPU, RAM, bandwidth, and disk space configurations are available. All VPS accounts include one dedicated IP address, root access, and free setup. Customers have the option to add-on cPanel, additional IP addresses, and automatic backups.

Dedicated servers are also available in several different CPU, RAM, disk space, bandwidth, and IP addresses configurations. Additional IP addresses, increased bandwidth, automatic backups, cPanel with WHM, Softaculous, and advanced server management are also available to dedicated server customers.

Infrastructure

Canvas Host owns its own datacenter in Portland. The company offices are located in the same building as the datacenter, meaning Canvas Host directly and actively maintains the datacenter.

The datacenter features on-site support, robust security and controlled access features, 24-7 video monitoring, redundant connections to the Portland power grid, and diesel power backups. Customers who opt to colocate equipment at the facility have 24-7 access to the equipment but are always supervised by Canvas Host personnel when accessing their equipment.

Uptime Guarantee

99.9% server uptime is guaranteed and the historical uptime track record is approximately 99.99%. For every hour of downtime in excess of the permissible 44 minutes per month (.1%), customers are eligible for account credit equal to the value of one day of hosting. To request credit, customers should submit a request through the online support system.

Support and Customer Service

24-7 human support is available. Canvas Host maintains two support facilities: one in Portland and a second in the UK. Support is available over the phone, through an online ticketing system, or over email. In addition, Canvas Host maintains an extensive knowledgebase with hundreds of articles and a database of WordPress training videos.

Billing and Payment Policies

All shared hosting plans are backed by a 30-day money back guarantee. Customers may cancel for any reason and receive a full refund of all fees paid minus domain name and SSL certificate fees.

Monthly, quarterly, semi-annual, annual, bi-annual, and tri-annual billing cycles are available. Customers who opt billing cycles one to three years in length receive a discount on their monthly rate. An additional 20% discount is offered to non-profit organizations who purchase shared hosting.

Unique Terms

We reviewed Canvas Host’s Terms of Service, Acceptable Use Policy, and Service Level Agreement. All three were reasonable and typical for the hosting industry. One policy that did catch our eye is the “No mean people” policy. In simple terms, Canvas Host believes in maintaining positive, respectful, patient relationships with their customers and they expect their customers to reciprocate this commitment. Customers who “shout at, curse at, insult” or threaten Canvas Host personnel will be contacted by management and asked to find a new hosting provider.

A policy that has more concrete value to customers is the “No overselling” policy. While all Canvas Host shared hosting plans include limited resources, this guarantee means that server resources will never be oversold. What this means is that each shared server is likely to have many fewer accounts than a hosting provider boasting so-called unlimited features.

Summary

Canvas Host is hosting provider who has demonstrated a strong commitment to doing business, treating people, and caring for the environment in the right ways. If it’s important to you that your host mirrors your commitment to sustainability and responsible business practices, Canvas Host is an impressive organization.