A Different Weight Class
Rackspace Alternative: Real cPanel Hosting, On A Term You Can Actually Judge
Rackspace is not really a small-business web host anymore. It has moved almost entirely into enterprise managed cloud and OpenStack, priced with custom quotes rather than a published shared-hosting plan.
The one line of published pricing left is hosted email: $10/user/month for Email, $12 for Email Plus, $18 for Email Plus with Archiving. If you’re a small business that landed here looking for straightforward website hosting, you’re likely the wrong size of customer for Rackspace today.
LiberationTek publishes flat, small-business shared hosting pricing with real cPanel, on hardware we own in the United States, with a 3-year term rather than 4, site security and an SEO tool included, and no interest in your data. Prices checked September 13, 2026.
As a Rackspace alternative built specifically for small business, we skip the custom-quote sales process entirely — every plan’s price is published on this page, no call required. Moving to LiberationTek from Rackspace typically takes just a few business days: our team migrates your site, email, and DNS while your current setup stays live and untouched until the new one is tested and ready.
Because this Rackspace alternative is built on cPanel rather than a proprietary control panel, you keep the same familiar tools and can export your site again if you ever need to, instead of being locked into another vendor’s ecosystem the way Rackspace’s enterprise cloud tends to lock in larger customers.
If you searched for a Rackspace alternative because your account got quoted a custom enterprise price for what should be simple shared hosting, you are exactly who this Rackspace alternative was built for: a small business that wants a real, published price and a real support team, not a sales call.
How the move from Rackspace works
We handle each step so you can keep working.
“A year ago, I decided to migrate my website to their hosting platform in order to move away from big tech, and gradually, moved all of my domains over. Customer service is 5 stars. You get a one-to-one relationship as well as fast, friendly and knowledgeable service.”
Donna Gentile · Google review
Manage your cloud server in one panel
See resources and usage at a glance, then reboot, open a console or take a snapshot with one click.
What You Get For The Difference
Built For Enterprise, Not Small Business
Rackspace has largely exited general shared web hosting in favor of enterprise managed cloud and OpenStack, quoted individually per customer. LiberationTek is built for small businesses: published shared-hosting plans with real cPanel, ready to sign up for today.
Published Pricing vs. Custom Quotes
Rackspace’s hosted email is published — $10 to $18 per user, per month — but its core hosting and cloud services require a sales call for pricing. Our lowest shared-hosting rate is $7.99 on a 3-year term, renewing at $12.99, visible on this page with no call required.
Servers We Own, In The United States
Your site runs on hardware LiberationTek owns and operates in the U.S. — not leased capacity, never subject to foreign data-sharing laws. We do not track, sell or share your data or your activity, and we do not remove sites over lawful speech.
Fewer Sites, Genuinely Resourced
Our plans hold 2, 5 or 9 websites with 10 GB, 20 GB or 40 GB of NVMe. We would rather tell you the real number than advertise “unlimited” and manage it with resource limits you discover under load. Every plan includes a 2 GB burstable port and NVMe storage.
Security And SEO Are In The Plan
Site security and an SEO tool are included on every plan, along with a free SSL certificate and a free domain on an annual term or longer. They are not add-ons revealed at checkout or upsells that appear once your site starts getting traffic.
People Who Answer
You get U.S.-based support from a small team, not a queue. Our customers routinely mention being walked through problems personally and hearing back quickly — which is the part that actually matters when a site is down and you are not a sysadmin.
What The Headline Price Actually Costs
Introductory rates, the term you have to sign to get them, and what the plan costs once it renews. Rackspace figures are published on rackspace.com and were checked in September 2026.
Plan | Headline rate | Term you sign | Renews at |
|---|---|---|---|
Rackspace Email | $10/user/mo | no long-term contract | $10/user/mo |
Rackspace Email Plus | $12/user/mo | no long-term contract | $12/user/mo |
Rackspace Managed Cloud / OpenStack | custom quote | custom | custom quote |
LiberationTek Starter — 2 sites, 10 GB NVMe | $7.99/mo | 36 months | $12.99/mo |
LiberationTek Ramping Up — 5 sites, 20 GB NVMe | $9.99/mo | 36 months | $19.99/mo |
LiberationTek Growth — 9 sites, 40 GB NVMe | $13.99/mo | 36 months | $24.99/mo |
- Free Migration — our team moves your website, email and domain from Rackspace at no cost.
LiberationTek vs. Rackspace
Two shared hosting platforms side by side. Both sets of prices are the providers’ own published rates.
Feature | LiberationTek | Rackspace |
|---|---|---|
Control panel | Real cPanel | No cPanel for core hosting; email plans have their own webmail admin |
Moving to another host later | A cPanel backup restores on any cPanel host | Depends entirely on the specific service purchased |
Term for the headline price | 36 months | None on email; custom-quoted terms on managed cloud |
Websites per plan | 2, 5 or 9 depending on plan | Not applicable — Rackspace is not a per-website shared-hosting product today |
Storage | 10 GB, 20 GB or 40 GB NVMe | Not published for core hosting/cloud |
Free domain | Included on an annual term or longer | Not included — domain purchased separately |
SSL certificate | Included | Included |
Enterprise-grade, but scoped per contract | Included on every plan | Varies by plan |
SEO tool | Included on every plan | Not included in the plan |
Burstable port | 2 GB on every plan | Not published |
Rackspace-operated data centers, enterprise-tier | Hardware LiberationTek owns and operates in the United States | Rackspace data centers worldwide |
Your data | Never tracked, sold or shared | Governed by their terms |
Content removal | We do not remove sites over lawful speech | Governed by their terms |
Support | U.S.-based, from a small team | 24/7 support |
What Customers Say After Switching
Real customer reviews. LiberationTek is rated 4.9 out of 5 on Google and 4.7 out of 5 on Trustpilot (September 2026).
Liberation Shared Hosting Plans
Plan | Built for | Included | Price |
|---|---|---|---|
Starter | Brochure sites, small business apps, low-traffic WooCommerce | 2 websites · 10 GB NVMe · cPanel · SSL · security · SEO tool | $7.99/mo on a 3-yr term |
Ramping Up | Growing sites, agencies, line-of-business apps | 5 websites · 20 GB NVMe · cPanel · SSL · security · SEO tool | $9.99/mo on a 3-yr term |
Growth | Ecommerce, heavier WordPress, multi-site, light CRM/ERP | 9 websites · 40 GB NVMe · cPanel · SSL · security · SEO tool | $13.99/mo on a 3-yr term |
Move Your Site In 4 Steps
1. Tell Us What You Are Running
Send your current plan, the sites on it and your domain. We will tell you which Liberation plan fits and, honestly, if the Site Builder or a VPS would serve you better.
2. We Move It For You
Liberation transfers website content from most hosts and site builders. Coming from cPanel, a full account backup restores cleanly; coming from hPanel, we rebuild the hosting side around your files and database.
3. Check It Before Anyone Else Does
Your site runs on the new server at a temporary address while your Rackspace plan keeps serving live traffic. You review it before a single visitor is affected.
4. Point The Domain And Go
We update DNS, issue SSL through AutoSSL and watch the first 48 hours. Then you let the old plan lapse rather than paying out a term you no longer use.
Already on Rackspace? Read the step-by-step Rackspace migration guide — what transfers, what changes, and how long a typical move takes.
Get Started
By Transferring Your Website
Liberation can transfer your website content from most site builder platforms.
Rackspace Alternative FAQs
Not really in the small-business sense anymore. Rackspace has moved into enterprise managed cloud and OpenStack, priced with custom quotes. The one published price left is hosted email ($10–$18/user/month). If you want to run an ordinary business website, LiberationTek’s shared hosting is built for that specifically.
We can’t give you a direct comparison — Rackspace doesn’t publish pricing for its core cloud and hosting services, only for hosted email. Our shared hosting starts at $7.99 on a 3-year term, renewing at $12.99, visible on this page.
Enterprise managed cloud is typically priced per contract based on workload, compliance requirements and support level, which is why it’s quoted rather than listed. That’s a reasonable model for a large enterprise; it’s a poor fit for a small business that just wants a website live.
Yes. Our team reviews what your current Rackspace service actually includes, migrates your site and email to our cPanel servers, tests everything, then switches your DNS with no downtime window you have to manage yourself. That’s the core of being a real Rackspace alternative: one flat, published price instead of a custom quote, so you know the cost of switching before you ever get on a call.
Rackspace Email is $10/user/month, Email Plus is $12/user/month, and Email Plus with Archiving is $18/user/month — all with a 14-day free trial and no long-term contract. That’s the clearest published number Rackspace offers.
Site security and an SEO tool are included on every LiberationTek plan regardless of tier, plus real cPanel access and a flat, published price with no sales call required to find out what you’ll pay.
Rackspace runs its own enterprise-tier data centers. LiberationTek runs on hardware we own and operate ourselves in the United States — sized for small businesses, not enterprise workloads.
Yes, and deliberately. Our plans hold 2, 5 or 9 websites with 10 GB, 20 GB or 40 GB of NVMe. We would rather publish the real number than advertise unlimited sites and then manage it through resource limits you meet under load. If you genuinely need to host many sites, our VPS and reseller plans are built for that and we will point you there instead.
Site security and an SEO tool are in every Liberation plan, along with a free SSL certificate, a cPanel license, a 2 GB burstable port and a free domain on an annual term or longer. The point is not that Rackspace hides things — their pricing is clear — but that our plan is assembled for a business that wants one number, rather than a low entry rate with the useful parts sold alongside.
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Shared hosting plans · Site Builder · Fully managed VPS · Transfer your website
Sources: Rackspace web hosting plans, terms and renewal prices, checked September 13, 2026. LiberationTek prices are list prices on this site.