Short answer
Almost every shared host advertises a price you will pay once. The price you pay for the rest of the site’s life is a different number, and it is usually printed somewhere you have to go looking for. Our own hosting renewed at 3.6× the introductory rate. Enter your host’s own numbers in the calculator below to see your real multi-year cost before the cheap first year runs out.
We know because we walked into it. This site runs on Hostinger Premium. The first year cost ¥5,268 (about $34 at the time). The renewal price already sitting in our billing panel is ¥15,588 for hosting plus ¥3,129 for the domain that was free in year one — ¥18,717 a year, a jump of more than 3.5×, and nothing about the service changes when it happens.
That is not a complaint about Hostinger specifically. It is how nearly the whole shared-hosting category prices itself, and it is why comparing hosts on the advertised number tells you very little. The calculator below asks for both numbers and shows you what the next five years actually cost.
What will this host actually cost you?
Enter the introductory price and the renewal price. Both are on the host’s own pricing page — the renewal figure is often in small print, a footnote, or only visible once you are inside the billing panel.
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The advertised price covers the intro term only. Everything after that is the renewal rate, so the longer you keep the site, the closer your real average cost gets to the renewal number — not the one on the ad.
Why the gap exists at all
Shared hosting is sold the way gym memberships are sold. Acquiring a customer costs real money — affiliate commissions in this category routinely run to a hundred dollars or more per signup, which is more than the first year’s revenue on a cheap plan. The introductory price is not a discount in any meaningful sense; it is customer acquisition cost, spent up front and recovered from year two onward.
That model works because moving a website is annoying. Once the site is live, has email attached, has DNS pointed at it and has a year of small configuration decisions baked in, most owners will pay the higher number rather than spend a weekend migrating. The renewal price is set on the assumption that you will not leave, and for most people that assumption is correct.
What to check before you sign up
- The renewal price, in writing, before you pay. Not the plan page headline — the checkout summary or the terms footnote. If you cannot find it, that is itself information.
- Whether the free domain renews free. It almost never does. Ours goes from ¥0 to ¥3,129, which is a sixth of our total renewal bill hiding inside the word “free”.
- What auto-renews, and when. Trials attached to the main purchase renew on their own schedule. We turned off a ¥1,188 email trial on day two specifically so it could not quietly convert a year later.
- Whether the long term is actually cheaper. A four-year prepay locks the low rate for longer, but it also means the comparison you are making is between a number you pay now and a number you will not see for four years.
- Migration cost, in hours. The renewal price is only leverage because leaving is expensive. Hosts that migrate you in for free are removing their own competitor’s leverage, which is why the more expensive managed hosts advertise it so loudly.
Frequently asked questions
Why is the renewal price so much higher than the intro price?
Because the intro price is customer-acquisition cost, not a discount. Affiliate commissions in shared hosting routinely run to a hundred dollars or more per signup — more than the first year’s revenue on a cheap plan — so the renewal rate is what recovers that cost from year two onward.
Does the free domain stay free?
Almost never. Ours goes from ¥0 in year one to ¥3,129 a year after — a sixth of our total renewal bill hiding inside the word “free.” Check the domain renewal rate separately from the hosting renewal rate; hosts quote them apart for a reason.
Is prepaying multiple years worth it to lock the low rate?
It locks the rate for longer, but the comparison you’re actually making is between a number you pay now and a number you won’t see for years. Use the calculator’s multi-year totals with your own numbers before deciding, rather than the intro price alone.
What should I check before signing up for any host?
The renewal price in writing (the checkout summary or terms footnote, not the plan headline), whether the domain renews free, what auto-renews and when, and how many hours a future migration would cost — that last one is what gives the renewal price its leverage in the first place.
How we know: the figures for this site are from our own Hostinger billing panel, checked on September 8, 2026 — introductory ¥5,268, renewal ¥15,588 hosting plus ¥3,129 domain, both dated 2027-08-28. The reasoning about acquisition cost is our reading of publicly published hosting affiliate commission rates, not inside knowledge of any host’s finances. We have not audited any other host’s billing panel, so use the calculator with numbers you have confirmed yourself rather than ones we supplied.