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Updated: Feb 1, 2024, 3:42pm
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Email has been a crucial form of electronic communication for decades, and it will likely be ubiquitous for many more years to come. While there are plenty of free email services available for users and businesses, many of them lack specialized features, such as central management that lend themselves well for office use.
We evaluated the best systems on the market and compared them based on price, features, security and more to help you make the best decision for your team.
Featured Partner Offer
1
Bluehost
On Bluehost.com’s Website
Starting price
$2.95 USD ($4.05 CAD) per month
Storage and bandwidth
Unmetered bandwidth, and SSD storage starts at 10GB
Extras and inclusions
Free domain name and SSL for a year, free CDN
2
Hostgator
On Hostgator’s Website
Starting price
$2.75 USD ($3.68 CAD)per month
Money-Back Guarantee
30 days
Inclusions
Free SSL certificate, free website transfer
3
Namecheap
On Namecheap’s Website
Starting price
$1.58 USD ($2.15 CAD) per month (with 24 months contract)
Money-Back Guarantee
30 days
Inclusions
Free SSL certificate, host three sites, low-cost VPS hosting
4
DreamHost
On DreamHosts’ Website
Starting price
$2.59 USD ($3.47 CAD) per month
Money-Back Guarantee
97 days
Inclusions
Top-rated tech support, free domain name, free SSL certificate
The Forbes Advisor Small Business team is committed to bringing you unbiased rankings and information with full editorial independence. We use product data, strategic methodologies and expert insights to inform all of our content and guide you in making the best decisions for your business journey.
We reviewed providers using a complex scoring methodology to help you find the five best email hosting services for small businesses. Our ratings consider factors such as price per user, number of features available and a review by our experts based on the opinions of real users. All ratings are determined solely by our editorial team.
$1.67 USD ($2.25 CAD) to $1.99 USD ($2.68 CAD)
per mailbox per month (depending on payment terms)
25 GB

Not applicable

$1.67 USD ($2.25 CAD) to $1.99 USD ($2.68 CAD)
per mailbox per month (depending on payment terms)
25 GB

Not applicable

DreamHost delivers a rich feature set with a consistent and easy user experience across multiple platforms at an affordable price. DreamHost comes with webmail built-in, and syncs messages across mobile and desktop devices to ensure users don’t miss a single message.
DreamHost is constantly updating its anti-spam features so that customers are a step ahead of the spammers. The company also has strong virus and anti-phishing tools to protect your inbox from cyber criminals.
Who should use it? DreamHost is great for SMBs. You don’t have to be a tech expert to get up and running or to protect yourself from phishing attacks and spam.
$3.99 USD ($5.38 CAD) to $10.69 USD ($14.43 CAD)
per month
Unlimited

Not applicable

$3.99 USD ($5.38 CAD) to $10.69 USD ($14.43 CAD)
per month
Unlimited

Not applicable

SiteGround provides a full complement of hosting services, including email, website and WordPress site hosting. The solution supports an unlimited number of users per domain as well as unlimited inbox sizes. This should be particularly handy for businesses with high volumes of emails and/or a large user base.
Administrators can manage email through a central panel and configure automated forwarding and responders. The solution also supports SMTP, IMAP and POP3, which makes it a great fit in any environment.
Who should use it? SiteGround is ideal for businesses that host WordPress sites or use WooCommerce (managed WordPress e-commerce hosting solution). SiteGround is an ideal platform for resellers and service providers to host their customers’ solutions.
$1.59 USD ($2.14 CAD) to $2.59 USD ($3.49 CAD)
per month (depending on package and payment terms)
10 GB to 30 GB
(depending on package)
Not applicable

$1.59 USD ($2.14 CAD) to $2.59 USD ($3.49 CAD)
per month (depending on package and payment terms)
10 GB to 30 GB
(depending on package)
Not applicable

A2 Hosting is feature-rich, providing unlimited email addresses, spam protection, preinstalled webmail software and automated email forwarding and responding.
A2 Hosting works with POP3, IMAP and SMTP, and comes with popular email clients preinstalled, which makes it a great fit for any SMB. Support for Contact Form 7 and integration with phpList, Dada Mail and poMMo make it easy for businesses to automate and enhance customer communications processes.
Who should use it? A2 Hosting’s security features make it a solid fit for any business that prioritizes keeping data safe.
$1.25 CAD to $5 CAD
per user per month
5 GB to 50 GB

250 MB to 1 GB

$1.25 CAD to $5 CAD
per user per month
5 GB to 50 GB

250 MB to 1 GB

Zoho Mail offers a well-rounded feature set, including hosting for multiple domains, domain aliases, email recall and more. The solution supports “events,” “tasks,” and “notes.” The former makes it easy for users to schedule events, while the latter two can be used to plan, track and collaborate on processes. When events, tasks and notes are created within emails, there’s a neat feature that allows users to @mention others to make sure messages don’t slip through the cracks.
Zoho’s commitment to security played a big role in making Forbes Advisor’s Best Email Hosting Services list. All data is encrypted during transfer and at rest, and security policies can be created to quarantine or reject unauthorized emails. The solution also comes with malware detection capabilities and enables administrators to set email policies to prevent data leaks. Email retention, audits and eDiscovery functionality are also useful for investigating breaches.
Who should use it? Zoho Mail has email hosting packages for everyone. The Mail Lite version is great for front desk staff, contract employees and frequent travellers, while the premium version is better for power users, senior technical professionals and IT professionals.
$7.80 CAD to $23.40 CAD
per user per month, depending on package
30 GB to 5 TB

25 MB

$7.80 CAD to $23.40 CAD
per user per month, depending on package
30 GB to 5 TB

25 MB

Gmail is one of the most commonly used email solutions, with 1.8 billion users across the globe. Given its massive user base, most will be familiar with the look and feel and functionality of Gmail, so you can spend less time training employees. Gmail also offers tight integration with the rest of the Google Workspace suite.
All of Gmail’s plans come with security features like 2FA, group-based policy controls (to ensure users only see the data that they are authorized to see) and end point management tools. Gmail also leverages AI to block spam, phishing emails and malware.
Who should use it? Google Workspace is a good choice for SMBs. Google Workspace provides businesses with an email hosting platform plus an entire suite of office productivity applications like Google Drive, Calendar, Meet and more.


Email hosting refers to the technology that stores your email messages, files and other information on a remote server. Email hosting services also make it easy to set up and deploy individual email accounts for your employees. Whether it’s your personal email address, such as a Gmail account, or a work account, all email activity is hosted in some way.
Finding the right email hosting solution for your business is a function of your needs. You have to consider factors like your industry, existing information technology (IT) environment, headcount, inbox and attachment size requirements, feature requirements and more. If you need to support a lot of users, you probably want something with volume discounting. If you are in an industry that is disproportionately targeted by cybercriminals, then you should consider security-focused providers.
To choose the email hosting providers for this ranking, Forbes Advisor compared each company based on important factors that include features and pricing. We ranked each company on these factors based on a five-star rating system, with the highest score being five out of five stars. Our criteria were similar to that we applied to our guide to the best web hosting services but with some changes to account for email-specific needs.
Email hosting pricing models and total costs were evaluated based on per-user pricing and volume discounting. Those providers whose pricing was considered to be cheap or midrange fared the best. Pricing accounted for 30% of our weighted scoring.
We compared email hosting providers based on their functions and features, giving preference to providers with the most useful features and tools. Among these included whether a provider offered security tools and calendar functionality, made a mobile app available, offered inbox sizes of at least 20 GB and allowed for attachment sizes of at least 10 MB. We weighted features at 40% of our total score.
Vendors should make it easy for customers to get in touch with support staff in case they need help. That was one of the many factors that real users mentioned in third-party reviews, and our experts scoured these reviews to gauge opinions of these email hosting services. Additionally, we researched reviews to get users’ opinions related to ease of use, stand-out features, popularity and value for the money. Our experts’ analysis made up 30% of the total score.
Canadian specific editing and pricing research conducted by Anna Rey.
Featured Partner Offer
1
Bluehost
On Bluehost.com’s Website
Starting price
$2.95 USD ($4.05 CAD) per month
Storage and bandwidth
Unmetered bandwidth, and SSD storage starts at 10GB
Extras and inclusions
Free domain name and SSL for a year, free CDN
2
Hostgator
On Hostgator’s Website
Starting price
$2.75 USD ($3.68 CAD)per month
Money-Back Guarantee
30 days
Inclusions
Free SSL certificate, free website transfer
3
Namecheap
On Namecheap’s Website
Starting price
$1.58 USD ($2.15 CAD) per month (with 24 months contract)
Money-Back Guarantee
30 days
Inclusions
Free SSL certificate, host three sites, low-cost VPS hosting
4
DreamHost
On DreamHosts’ Website
Starting price
$2.59 USD ($3.47 CAD) per month
Money-Back Guarantee
97 days
Inclusions
Top-rated tech support, free domain name, free SSL certificate
You don’t have to pay someone to host your email for you. You can host email on your own servers. However, that means you have to purchase, configure and maintain an email server and register your domain on your own. Using an email hosting provider will save companies a lot of time, money and frustration.
Similar to web hosting sites, email hosting services use several layers of security to protect the integrity of your email communications. These include end-to-end encryption, which obscures your data when its sent or received; two-factor authentication (2FA) or multifactor authentication (MFA), which means whoever accesses your email account must know certain information or have access to certain things, such as a mobile device or email address, to get into the account; and Pretty Good Privacy (PGP) encryption, which makes it so that email communications remain secure even when the network, such as a public network used in a library or cafe, is not.
No. Nothing is preventing a business from hosting their website with one provider, and their email on another. Keep in mind that many web hosting companies typically include a free email domain for customers.
Some essential features you will want to have include spam protection for your emails, such as spam filters; the ability to create and have an unlimited amount of email addresses for yourself and your employees; email forwarders for those times when you are away from the office; autoresponders, which can also be used when you are unable to answer your emails and can also be used to answer supply informational responses to any general email addresses that you set up; and webmail software, which allows you to send emails via a web browser. You also want to have large mailbox sizes―preferably unlimited.
There are a few web hosting services available that allow you to send and receive emails at no charge, usually through webmail or POP clients and email or IMAP clients. Some examples of these include Hotmail, Yahoo Mail and Gmail. While these sites are free and generally offer a decent amount of storage space for individuals or small businesses, they offer limited cloud storage space that might be needed by medium or large businesses. They usually also have limited security measures in place, limited customer support options and no way to personalize your email address to represent yourself or your business.
As with other providers, the best email hosting providers offer many levels of security. When choosing these providers, you want to look for security features like two-factor authentication (2FA) or multifactor authentication (MFA), documentation that shows frequent security updates and patches, intrusion detection, the monitoring of user activities, data encryption and privacy protection.
Lee Davis is a tech analyst who has been covering the document imaging industry for over five years. Currently, Lee is the Associate Director of Software and Scanners at Keypoint Intelligence, where he is responsible for maintaining coverage of document imaging software and office scanning technology. Lee also contributes editorial content centered on news and trends in the document imaging industry.

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