Announcements

cPanel and Linux Pricing Change

24-07-2019

Note: This announcement affects all customers using Linux based hosting with cPanel. It does not apply to Windows servers or Plesk.

Dear Customer, 

As some of you may have already heard, cPanel has announced significant pricing changes and increases starting from September 1, 2019. We are sending this email to make you aware of exact changes that will become effective on all packages going forward.

cPanel, Inc. wrote that the "hosting industry has changed a lot in the last 20 years, and has long out-grown the licensing and pricing structure that we have used at cPanel." cPanel further said that this "new structure defines the price of each license based on the number of Accounts hosted on the server." - This change was met with a lot of backlash by the industry and many providers and customers reached out to cPanel over twitter, various web forums and also direct channels. However, cPanel  has decided to stick with this new pricing structure and are not considering any kind of roll back.

When cPanel was taken over by Oakley Capital last year, we had expected that there may be marginal increases which we could have absorbed fully but they have entirely changed the pricing structure and introduced per account pricing which forces us to pass on this increase to our end customers and resellers. We have still made an effort to absorb some of this as will be detailed below.

Shared Hosting
Entry level Linux shared hosting plans will see an increase of up to Rs. 200 plus tax per annum for accounts that use a single cPanel login. On some of the larger and unlimited plans, we will absorb this cost so you will remain unaffected.

Reseller Hosting
Reseller plan pricing has been increased and will have set limits on the number of cPanel accounts included. You are free to host multiple (add on) domains per cPanel account but cPanel accounts themselves will have preset limits. Usage over the limits will be charged in blocks - Every block of 10 additional accounts after the initial limit will be charged Rs. 200 plus tax/month or Rs. 2000 plus tax/annum depending on your billing cycle. We will reach out to all resellers individually with specific details about their accounts in the coming days to discuss applicable changes.

Cloud Instances
You will be affected only if you have more than 5 cPanel accounts on your server. Revised pricing for cloud instances and virtual private servers will work as follows:

5 accounts or less: Rs.1500 plus tax/month
6-30 accounts: Rs. 2500 plus tax/month
31-50 accounts: Rs. 3500 plus tax/month
50-100 accounts: Rs. 4000 plus tax/month

Every 100 additional accounts after the first 100 will be charged in blocks at Rs. 1,500 plus tax/month. For example, if the server has 190 accounts, the total license cost will be Rs.5500 plus tax per month (4000 + 1500).  We will reach out to all Cloud customers individually with specific details about their accounts in the coming days to discuss applicable changes.

Dedicated Servers
You will be affected only if your present pricing for cPanel has been set at below Rs. 4000/m and you have more than 100 cPanel accounts on your server. Revised pricing for dedicated servers (bare metal) will work as follows:

Up to 100 accounts: Rs. 4000 plus tax/month

Every 100 additional accounts after the first 100 will be charged in blocks at Rs. 1,500 plus tax/month. For example, if the server has 190 accounts, the total license cost will be Rs.5500 plus tax per month (4000 + 1500).  We will reach out to all Dedicated Server customers individually with specific details about their accounts in the coming days to discuss applicable changes.

cPanel released a license document explaining the changes here. If you have any questions about these changes, please reach out to us and we will work with you to best address how these changes affect you.

There are alternative products with similar functionality to cPanel that retain unlimited account licensing models, such as Plesk, DirectAdmin and some others. We can provide licenses for these control panels, so if you are heavily affected by this licensing model change in cPanel and would like to consider other options, please get in touch so that we can work with you to helpminimize the effect of this change. Please do note that this will have to be on a separate new cloud or dedicated server and will involve migration - also since it will be a cross platform migration we will offer best effort assistance but there are bound to be some initial issues with cross control panel migrations.

All cloud and dedicated hosting clients who have already pre-paid (paid us in advance) for the next 1 year of service (or more) will be contacted soon to arrange for invoicing of the adjusted cPanel pricing during the remaining prepayment period with proper consideration for the prepayment discount as may be applicable. For single account shared hosting customers as well as resellers, we will bear the increase till the next renewal date.

Please feel free to reach out to us with any queries or concerns. We will be happy to assist.