Laughing Squid CH 1, $ 6.00/mo. on Linux Cloud

CH 1 has been updated on September 16, 2026 (added June 3, 2020)

🔌 Hosted domains :	1
🆓 free domains :	0
📌 Dedicated IPs :	0
💳 Payment Methods :	Credit / Debit / Prepaid CardsPayPal
🔨 Control Panel :	DirectAdmin
🔧 Category :	DNS
✍️ Support Options :	Help Desk
⚑ Targeting :	US

See also initial CH 1 plan location on their website!

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*📜 Plan description

📄 Editorial Review

Laughing Squid Hosting is a long-established independent U.S. hosting provider whose history goes back to the early commercial web. Founder Scott Beale started Laughing Squid in San Francisco in 1995 as a film and video production company, while the web hosting operation began in 1998 and eventually became the main commercial activity. Laughing Squid became an LLC in 2000 and moved its headquarters from San Francisco to New York City in 2010.

Hosting has a close connection with the better-known Laughing Squid art, culture, and technology blog. Revenue from the hosting operation helps support the editorial side of Laughing Squid, giving the company a rather different background from the large hosting groups that dominate the shared hosting market.

The current hosting range centers on Cloud Hosting and Managed WordPress Hosting. They do not offer VPS or dedicated servers, and domain registration is not part of the service. Each hosted domain requires its own hosting plan.

Cloud Hosting is the general-purpose option and can accommodate WordPress, static HTML websites, Drupal, Joomla, and custom PHP applications. It includes SSD storage, PHP 8.x, MariaDB 10.x, SFTP access, phpMyAdmin, free Let's Encrypt SSL certificates, and CloudLinux resource isolation. CloudLinux separates CPU and memory resources between hosting accounts, which helps keep resource usage under control when multiple customers share the same platform.

Cloud Hosting uses DirectAdmin for administration. Customers can manage files, databases, SSL certificates, domains, and resource usage through the control panel. DNS can be managed through Cloudflare, and the current hosting platform uses Cloudflare nameservers when Laughing Squid handles DNS for the domain.

Managed WordPress Hosting is provided in cooperation with Pressable. Laughing Squid has been hosting WordPress websites since 2004, and this managed platform is intended for customers who want WordPress maintenance and server administration handled for them rather than managing a conventional hosting account.

Managed WordPress includes free site migration, automatic SSL, SFTP, phpMyAdmin, daily downloadable backups, Jetpack integration, malware protection, brute-force protection, traffic statistics, server-side caching, and CDN delivery. The environment is built specifically for WordPress and can handle temporary traffic spikes more efficiently than an ordinary small shared hosting account.

The managed environment also imposes some platform restrictions. Applications other than WordPress are not appropriate for these plans, while certain caching, backup, and resource-intensive plugins can be restricted because their functions are already handled at platform level.

Email hosting is separate from website hosting. Customers can use Rackspace Email or PolarisMail (polarismail.com). Mailboxes support POP/IMAP, webmail, aliases, and spam filtering. PolarisMail became an additional email option in 2026, while Rackspace Email continues to remain available.

A Forwarding service is also available for customers who only need a domain redirected to another website. It does not include normal website storage and can also be combined with separately purchased email service.

Existing customers can still use the older Legacy Cloud Sites platform, which operates through Liquid Web Cloud Sites. This is now primarily a legacy environment, while the newer Cloud Hosting service is the practical option for ordinary PHP websites and Managed WordPress is better suited to WordPress-only projects.

The overall service is best suited to individuals, bloggers, artists, small organizations, and small businesses that prefer a compact independent hosting company. The website and customer documentation are in English, while pricing is handled in U.S. dollars (USD).