Cloudways alternatives
xCloud vs Cloudways: Pricing, Server Control, and Features Compared
Cloudways rents an instance it controls. xCloud manages a server you own, with root access, from $5 a month.
- From $5/month against Cloudways' $11
- Root access on a server that stays yours
- Any Ubuntu host: Vultr, DigitalOcean, Hetzner, AWS, GCP
- Bulk site and server migration, included on every plan
- Incremental backups and the 7G/8G firewall rule sets
Last updated
- 14-day money-back guarantee
- No migration fee, ever
- 4.8 · 390+ reviews on TrustpilotRated by the people already running WordPress on xCloud
Quick verdict
Choose xCloud if…
- You want root access and full control of the server underneath WordPress.
- You already have (or want) your own Vultr, DigitalOcean, Hetzner, AWS or GCP account.
- You want to avoid lock-in. The server stays yours if you stop paying for the panel.
- You need WordPress-specific tooling: blueprints, staging push/pull, incremental backups, 7G/8G firewall.
- You run an agency and need team roles and white-labelling without a separate tier.
- You want to pay less. xCloud starts at $5/month against Cloudways' $11.
- You want free bulk site and server migration, not a fee to switch.
- You want a WordPress-first panel with a one-click library of 287 open-source apps.
- You want managed hosting for AI agents like OpenClaw, Hermes, Paperclip and Buzz.
- You want a 14-day money-back guarantee and no long-term contract.
14-day money-back guarantee. Cancel any time.
Still comparing providers? See the best Cloudways alternatives in 2026
Pick How You Pay. Cloudways Picks For You.
Cloudways sells one thing: a server it provisions, bundled with the panel. xCloud sells three: managed, bring-your-own-server, or a white-label reseller program.
1Managed by xCloud
| What the managed plan includes |  xCloud$5/moManaged 1 GB, billed monthly |  Cloudways$11/moDigitalOcean 1 GB, billed monthly |
|---|---|---|
| Managed plan | ||
| What the price covers | Yes. The panel and the server, one bill. xCloud provisions and manages the infrastructure for you. | Limited. Server and management as one package too. The panel cannot be bought on its own. |
| Hosting type | Cloud servers, provisioned for you. | Cloud servers, provisioned for you. |
| Sites per server | Yes. Unlimited, bounded only by the server size you pick. | Yes. Unlimited, within the plan's resources. |
| Bandwidth | Yes. Included. Managed plans start at 1 TB. | Yes. Per-plan allowance, starting at 1 TB on the 1 GB tier. |
| Root access | Yes. Yes. Still yours, even on a plan we manage. | No. Not offered. The instance stays under Cloudways' control. |
| Migration included | Yes. Bulk site and server migration, at no extra cost. | No. Not offered on the captured page. See the migration section below. |
| Money-back guarantee | Yes. 14 days, cancel any time. | Limited. Not stated on the page this table was captured from. Check their current terms. |
2Bring your own server
| What the free panel includes | xCloudFree/moPanel only, provider billed separately | CloudwaysN/A/moNo bring-your-own-server tier exists |
|---|---|---|
| Bring your own server | ||
| What the price covers | Yes. The panel only, free. You keep and pay your own cloud provider directly. | No. Not possible. Cloudways provisions and bills the server itself; there is no bring-your-own-server tier. |
| Root access | Yes. Full root on every server you connect. | No. Not offered at any tier. |
| Supported providers | Yes. Vultr, DigitalOcean, Hetzner, AWS, GCP, or any Ubuntu host over SSH. | No. None. Cloudways only runs servers it provisions itself. |
| Server locations | Yes. Every region your chosen provider offers. You pick the datacentre directly. | No. Not applicable. There is no BYOS route. |
| Sites per server | Yes. Unlimited, bounded only by the server you chose. | Yes. Not applicable. |
| Custom NGINX | Yes. Full server-level NGINX access. It is your server. | No. Not applicable. |
3White-Label Reseller Program
| What the reseller program includes | xCloud$25/moStartup tier, 25 servers, billed monthly | CloudwaysN/A/moNo dedicated reseller product exists |
|---|---|---|
| Reseller program | ||
| What it is | Yes. A dedicated white-label hosting brand, not a feature toggle. Set your own prices, take payment through your own Stripe account, and bill clients under your own name. | Limited. No dedicated reseller product with its own pricing tiers is published. Cloudways' white-label options sit inside its own agency programme instead. |
| Branding | Yes. 100% white-label. Your brand name, logo and domain throughout. | Limited. Not published as a standalone product. |
| Billing | Yes. Automated, through your own Stripe account. You set the price; the platform takes a fee, not a cut of your invoice. | Limited. Not published. |
| Entry tier | Yes. Startup, $25/month: 25 servers, a platform fee of 25% or $3 per sale, whichever is lower. | Limited. Not applicable. No comparable tier is published. |
Pricing
xCloud vs Cloudways: Pricing Comparison
Two server classes, at the specs each side sells them at.
Scroll the table sideways to see every column.
| Ram/Bandwidth | SSD/NVMe | vCPU |  xCloud | Cloudways |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1GB/1TB | 25GB | 1 | $5 | $14 |
| 2GB/2TB | 55GB | 1 | $12 | $28 |
| 4GB/3TB | 80GB | 2 | $24 | $54 |
| 8GB/4TB | 160GB | 4 | $45 | $99 |
| 16GB/5TB | 320GB | 6 | $88 | $170 |
Scroll the table sideways to see every column.
| Ram/ Bandwidth | SSD/ NVMe | vCPU | xCloud | Cloudways |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1GB/1TB | 32GB | 1 | $7.5 | $11 |
| 2GB/3TB | 80GB | 2 | $20 | $24 |
| 4GB/3TB | 120GB | 2 | $30 | $46 |
| 8GB/4TB | 256GB | 3 | $50 | $88 |
| 16GB/5TB | 384GB | 4 | $100 | $149 |
| 32GB/7TB | 512GB | 8 | $200 | $240 |
Is the Server Really Yours?
Root access decides everything else on this table. Cloudways keeps the server: no root, no bring-your-own-server. xCloud hands you both.
| Server control | xCloud | Cloudways |
|---|---|---|
| Control and configuration | ||
| Custom NGINX | Yes. Edit the server's NGINX configuration directly. | No. No server-level configuration is exposed. |
| Multiple PHP versions in the same server | Yes. Run several PHP versions side by side on one machine. | No. One stack per server, set by Cloudways. |
| External Database | Yes. Point a site at a managed or remote database. | No. The bundled database is the database. |
| Add existing database | Yes. Attach a database that already exists. | No. Not offered. |
| Vertical scaling | Yes. Resize at your provider, in their sizes and regions. | Yes. Scale up the plan within the ladder Cloudways exposes. |
| Blueprints | Yes. Save a site setup and stamp it out repeatedly. | No. No equivalent published. |
| SSH lockdown | Yes. Restrict SSH to trusted IPs and a custom port. | No. The server is not exposed, so there is nothing to lock down. |
| PHP-FPM tuning | Yes. Per-site worker counts and a PHP extension manager. | No. Not exposed. The server layer is abstracted away. |
| Database and OPcache tuning | Yes. Auto-tuning plus manual OPcache control. | No. Not exposed. |
| Docker / Compose hosting | Yes. Run arbitrary containers, not just WordPress. | No. WordPress-only managed stack. No container hosting. |
| Browser SSH terminal | Yes. A shell into the actual server, from the panel. | No. No server shell is offered. |
Support, and What It Costs on Top
Both answer around the clock. Cloudways' higher-touch support costs extra, so the $11 you are comparing against $5 buys only the entry tier.
| Support and alerting | xCloud | Cloudways |
|---|---|---|
| Getting hold of someone | ||
| Support channels | Yes. Live chat and ticketing on every plan, including the free bring-your-own-server tier, plus documentation. | Limited. 24/7 support. The higher-touch tiers are a paid add-on above the plan price. |
| Live chat | Yes. Included. | Yes. Included. |
| Server and site monitoring | Yes. Built in. | Yes. Built in. |
| Server and site logs | Yes. Viewable from the panel. | Yes. Viewable from the panel. |
| File manager | Yes. Browser-based, built in. | Yes. Browser-based, built in. |
| Slack alerts | Yes. Native integration. | No. Not published. |
| WhatsApp alerts | Yes. Native integration. | No. Not published. |
| Telegram alerts | Yes. Native integration. | Not published. |
| Per-site analytics | Yes. PHP, MySQL and traffic analytics, per site. | Not published. |
| Core Web Vitals monitoring | Yes. Scheduled, with history. | Not published. |
| Broken-link monitoring | Yes. One-click 301 redirect from the panel. | No. Not published. |
| Native macOS app | Yes. xCloud Pulse, in the menu bar. | No. Not offered. |
The Stack Underneath: Caching, Redis and the CDN
Both run the same building blocks: NGINX, OpenLiteSpeed, Redis. Neither publishes a benchmark, and this page will not invent one.
| Performance stack | xCloud | Cloudways |
|---|---|---|
| Stack and caching | ||
| Web server | Yes. NGINX and OpenLiteSpeed. | Yes. NGINX and OpenLiteSpeed. |
| Full-page and Redis cache | Yes. Both, configured for WordPress. | Yes. Both, on the managed stack. |
| PHP 8.3 | Yes. Supported and managed from the panel. | Yes. Supported. |
| WP-CLI | Yes. Available on every server. | Yes. Available. |
| CDN | Yes. Cloudflare integration included. Point any CDN at the server yourself. | Limited. Cloudflare Enterprise available as a paid first-party add-on. |
| Edge cache (global PoPs) | Limited. Not published as a first-party edge network. | Limited. Not published on the captured page. |
| HTTP/3 and Brotli | Yes. One click, per site. | Not published. |
| Auto-healing services | Yes. Restarts MySQL, NGINX, Redis or PHP automatically if one stops. | Not published. |
| Automatic cron | Yes. Set up automatically for WordPress. | Yes. Set up automatically for WordPress. |
| Custom cron jobs | Yes. Add your own, per site. | Yes. Add your own, per site. |
Moving Off Cloudways Is Two Routes, Not a Rebuild
Migration is where a comparison page usually goes quiet, because the answer is normally "contact sales". Here it is a feature of the panel.
Who runs the migration
xCloud- Yes. Bulk site and server migration, included on every plan
- Yes. A feature of the panel. Nothing to schedule, no ticket to wait on
- Yes. cPanel Site Migration path for sites hosted elsewhere
- Yes. Full server clone and server-to-server migration
Cloudways- Yes. Cloudways offers migrations as part of its service
- Limited. Terms follow whatever promotion is currently running
What it costs
xCloud- Yes. Nothing, on either route. No migration fee
- Yes. No onboarding tier and no per-site charge
- Yes. Unlimited number of sites migrated
Cloudways- Yes. Free migrations are offered
- Limited. The number included and the conditions attached follow the current promotion
What moves
xCloud- Yes. Files and database together, in one pass
- Yes. In bulk, across many sites at once
- Yes. Migrate Guru, a free WordPress plugin documented as compatible with xCloud
Cloudways- Yes. WordPress sites move onto the managed stack
- Limited. The server underneath is provisioned by Cloudways, not carried across
Before you start
xCloud- Limited. Disable 2FA on the source site first
- Limited. Disable Cloudflare Bot Fight Mode on the source site first
- Yes. Then migrate, test while DNS still points at your old host, and cut over
Cloudways- Limited. Check the current promotion's terms before counting on a free migration
Firewalls, Backups and What You Can Restore
Both cover the baseline: free SSL, Fail2Ban, firewall management, vulnerability scanning. Backups are where they diverge, and only one side does incremental site backups.
| Security and backups | xCloud | Cloudways |
|---|---|---|
| Protection and recovery | ||
| 7G / 8G firewall | Yes. Both rule sets, managed from the panel. | No. Not published. |
| Firewall management | Yes. Managed from the panel. | Yes. Managed from the panel. |
| Fail2Ban | Yes. Integrated. | Yes. Integrated. |
| Vulnerability scanning | Yes. Built in. | Yes. Built in. |
| Free SSL | Yes. Automatic Let's Encrypt. | Yes. Automatic Let's Encrypt. |
| Custom SSL/TLS | Yes. Bring your own certificate. | Yes. Bring your own certificate. |
| Virtual patching | Add-on, $2/site. | Not published. |
| Core integrity monitor | Yes. Verifies WordPress core files against checksums. | Not published. |
| Custom security headers | Yes. HSTS and CSP, set from the panel. | Not published. |
| HTTP auth and IP allow/deny | Yes. Per-site, from the panel. | Not published. |
| Full site backup | Yes. Automated, with restore. | Yes. Automated, with restore. |
| Incremental site backup | Yes. Yes. Restore granularity without a full copy each time. | No. Full backups only. |
| Downloadable backups | Yes. Download any backup for offsite storage. | Yes. Supported. |
WordPress Tooling, Staging and Agency Features
Both ship WordPress staging in one click. The gap opens around it: 297 one-click apps, managed AI agent hosting for OpenClaw, Hermes, Paperclip and Buzz, one-click Git deployment, and team roles included, not sold as an upsell.
| Panel and tooling | xCloud | Cloudways |
|---|---|---|
| Day-to-day WordPress work | ||
| WordPress-first panel | Yes. Purpose-built for WordPress from the ground up. | No. Not published as a WordPress-first design. |
| Theme / plugin / core updates | Yes. Managed from the panel across every site. | No. No built-in update manager. |
| WordPress Multisite | Yes. Sub-domain and sub-folder, supported. | Yes. Sub-domain and sub-folder, supported. |
| Staging | Yes. One click, on the same server or another. | Yes. One click. |
| Staging push / pull | Yes. Promote a tested change rather than redoing it by hand. | Yes. Supported. |
| Clone a site | Yes. To the same server or a different one. | Yes. Supported. |
| Deploy from Git | Yes. Clone and deploy straight from a Git repository. | Yes. Supported. |
| One-click Git deployment | Yes. Push a repository and xCloud detects the stack and deploys it, no manual clone step. | Not published. |
| 1-click magic login | Yes. Into any site's admin. | No. Not offered. |
| Disable magic login | Yes. Turn it off per site. | No. Not applicable. The feature does not exist to disable. |
| Team accounts and roles | Yes. Included, not a separate tier. | No. Team collaboration available; the agency programme is separate. |
| White-label | Yes. Included. | Yes. Available. |
| MCP server (AI agent control) | Yes. Drive servers and sites from Claude, Cursor or any MCP-capable agent. | No. No MCP endpoint published. |
| Managed AI agent hosting | Yes. One-click hosting for OpenClaw, Hermes Agent, Paperclip, Buzz and more, each on a managed server with backups and monitoring included. | No. Not offered. The managed stack is WordPress and PHP only, the same limit that rules out Docker and Node.js hosting above. |
| One-click app library | 297 open-source apps, deployed in one click. | Not published. WordPress-only stack. |
Refunds, Add-Ons and the Bill You Did Not Expect
What the price does after the first month, and what is not in it. Two boxes below: what each side charges extra for, and what stays free.
Refunds and cancellation
xCloud- Yes. 14-day money-back guarantee
- Yes. Cancel any time, no lock-in contract
- Yes. Bring-your-own-server route: the server stays yours whether you keep paying for the panel or not
Cloudways- Limited. Pay-as-you-go with a free trial
- Limited. Confirm the current refund terms on their own site. They move with the promotion
What costs extra
xCloud- Yes. Migration: included, not an add-on
- Yes. Team roles and white-labelling: included
- Yes. Staging and the 7G/8G firewall rule sets: included
- Limited. Your cloud provider's own bill, on the bring-your-own-server route. That line is not ours
Cloudways- Limited. Cloudflare Enterprise: a paid first-party add-on
- Limited. Higher-touch support tiers: a paid add-on above the plan price
The full table
Every xCloud and Cloudways Feature, Side by Side
Every published feature, side by side. 50 of 84 differ.
Scroll the table sideways to see every column.
| xCloud | Cloudways | |
|---|---|---|
| Hosting type | Cloud servers | Cloud servers |
| Lowest plan | Starts at $5/month | Starts at $11/month |
| Web Server – NGINX & OLS | Yes | Yes |
| Integrate Your Own Provider(Vultr, DigitalOcean, GCP, Hetzner, AWS or any Ubuntu) | Yes | No |
| Root access to server | Yes | No |
| Vertical Scaling | Yes | Yes |
| Unlimited websites creation | Yes | Yes |
| External Database | Yes | No |
| WordPress Multisite ( support for sub-domain and sub-folder ) | Yes | Yes |
| Site Disable | Yes | Yes |
| Blueprints | Yes | No |
| Custom NGINX | Yes | No |
| Full page & Redis cache | Yes | Yes |
| Transactional email service | Yes | Yes |
| Easy integration with Mailgun, SendGrid, ElasticEmail, or any SMTP provider | Yes | Yes |
| Fully WordPress focused | Yes | No |
| WordPress theme, plugin, & core update | Yes | No |
| Automatic security updates | Yes | Yes |
| 7G & 8G Firewall | Yes | No |
| Fail2Ban Integration | Yes | Yes |
| Firewall Management | Yes | Yes |
| Vulnerability Scanner | Yes | Yes |
| Accounts & roles management for team | Yes | No |
| Automatic FREE Let’s Encrypt SSL certificates | Yes | Yes |
| Custom SSL/TLS certificates | Yes | Yes |
| Automatic Cron job | Yes | Yes |
| Custom Cron Jobs | Yes | Yes |
| Multiple PHP versions in the same server | Yes | No |
| Compatibility & easy management for PHP 8.3 | Yes | Yes |
| WP-CLI | Yes | Yes |
| Bulk site & server migration | Yes | No |
| cPanel Site Migration | Yes | No |
| Multisite with Subdomain Support | Yes | Yes |
| Full Site Backup | Yes | Yes |
| Incremental Site Backup | Yes | No |
| Site Backup download option for remote backups | Yes | Yes |
| Full Server Backup Management | Yes | Yes |
| File Manager | Yes | Yes |
| Reset File & Folder Permissions | Yes | Yes |
| Server & Site monitoring | Yes | Yes |
| Slack Integration | Yes | No |
| WhatsApp Integration | Yes | No |
| Server and Site Log | Yes | Yes |
| Add existing database | Yes | No |
| Clone site to same & another server | Yes | Yes |
| 1-click staging | Yes | Yes |
| Staging With Pull Push | Yes | Yes |
| 1-click magic login | Yes | No |
| Magic Login Disable | Yes | No |
| Live chat support | Yes | Yes |
| Clone & Deploy from GIT | Yes | Yes |
| Whitelabel | Yes | Yes |
| Moneyback guarantee | 14 days | — |
| AI and agent control | ||
| MCP server — drive servers and sites from Claude, Cursor or any AI agent | Yes | No |
| Installable AI agent skills (servers, sites, WordPress, SSL, account) | Yes | No |
| AI bot blocker — block AI crawlers and scrapers at the server | Yes | — |
| Public REST API with scoped tokens | Yes | Yes |
| Security and WordPress integrity | ||
| Virtual patching for known vulnerabilities (Site Security PRO) | Add-on, $2/site | — |
| WordPress integrity monitor — verifies core files against checksums | Yes | — |
| Custom security headers (HSTS, CSP) from the panel | Yes | — |
| HTTP basic auth and per-site IP allow/deny | Yes | — |
| SSH lockdown — restrict SSH to trusted IPs, custom port | Yes | No |
| Performance and caching | ||
| Edge full-page cache on a global PoP network | Yes | — |
| Cloudflare Enterprise (330+ PoPs, Enterprise WAF) | Add-on, $5/domain | Paid add-on |
| HTTP/3 (QUIC) and Brotli compression, one click | Yes | — |
| Per-site PHP-FPM worker tuning and PHP extension manager | Yes | No |
| Auto-healing — restarts MySQL, NGINX, Redis or PHP if it stops | Yes | — |
| MySQL/MariaDB auto-tuning and OPcache control | Yes | No |
| Monitoring and observability | ||
| Broken link monitoring with one-click 301 redirect | Yes | No |
| Site Insights — PHP, MySQL and traffic analytics per site | Yes | — |
| Scheduled PageSpeed / Core Web Vitals monitoring with history | Yes | — |
| Telegram alerts for site, server and team events | Yes | — |
| Native macOS menu-bar app (xCloud Pulse) | Yes | No |
| Developer and deployment | ||
| Browser SSH terminal and command runner | Yes | No |
| One-click deploy from Git with stack auto-detection | Yes | — |
| Docker and Docker Compose application hosting | Yes | No |
| Node.js, Laravel and Next.js hosting with queue workers | Yes | — |
| One-click app library | 297 apps | — |
| Supervisor process management and site snapshots | Yes | — |
| Backups, migration and agency tooling | ||
| Off-site backups to your own S3, R2, Backblaze, Wasabi, Google Drive or pCloud | Yes | — |
| Full server clone and server-to-server migration | Yes | — |
| Branded client maintenance reports (PDF) | Yes | — |
| White-label reseller programme with Stripe billing and your own plans | Yes | — |
| Business mailboxes on your own domain | Add-on, $1/mo | — |
People who moved from Cloudways
In their own words, unedited.
I had 150 sites on cloudways and am in the process of moving them to xcloud. Much faster and better priced.
Dan SpinozaI came from Cloudways and won't go back. Highly impressed with xCloud. Glad I gave them a chance.
Jared McDowellI went from Cloudways to xCloud. No intention on switching in the foreseeable future.
Blaine MooreKeep comparing
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Ready to leave Cloudways?
Ready To Try xCloud Instead?
Start free, bring your own server or ours, and move when you are ready. No contract, no migration fee, root access either way.
- From $5/month against $11
- Root access on a server you own
- Any Ubuntu host, or a managed plan
- Bulk migration included on every plan
- Incremental backups, 7G/8G firewall
- Team roles and white-label, no upsell
xCloud vs Cloudways: Frequently Asked Questions
Direct answers to what people ask before moving between xCloud and Cloudways.
What is the difference between xCloud and Cloudways?
The difference is who owns the server: Cloudways rents you an instance it provisions and controls, while xCloud manages a server you own, with root access.
Cloudways sells a managed instance billed as one package. xCloud is a WordPress hosting control panel that manages a server you own on any provider, and also offers its own managed plans if you would rather not hold a provider account. That is why xCloud gives root access and portability where Cloudways does not.
Is xCloud cheaper than Cloudways?
Yes, at entry level: xCloud's managed 1 GB plan is $5/month against Cloudways' $11/month.
That is list pricing, billed monthly, for a comparable DigitalOcean 1 GB instance. Cloudways is $8.25/month if you pay annually. Total cost is not that simple, though: if you use xCloud's self-managed route you pay your cloud provider separately, so compare the panel fee plus the server bill against Cloudways' single bundled price.
Which is better for WordPress?
xCloud if you want WordPress-level control; Cloudways if you want to ignore the server entirely.
Both are built around WordPress. xCloud adds WordPress-specific tooling that Cloudways does not ship: blueprints for repeatable site setups, a theme/plugin/core update manager, incremental site backups, and the 7G/8G firewall rules. Cloudways' advantage is that nothing about the server is ever your problem.
Which is better for WooCommerce?
Both run WooCommerce on the same building blocks; xCloud adds server-level control that Cloudways does not expose.
For WooCommerce the deciding factors are object caching, the ability to scale the server, and staging you trust. Both platforms provide Redis object caching and full-page caching. xCloud additionally lets you vertically scale the underlying server and choose its region directly with your provider, and its staging supports push/pull so a checkout change can be tested and promoted. Neither platform is benchmarked here; we publish no head-to-head store performance test.
Which platform is better for agencies?
xCloud, if you run client servers across providers. Team roles and white-labelling are included rather than a separate tier.
xCloud also includes bulk site and server migration for onboarding client sites in batches. Cloudways offers team collaboration and white-label options too, and runs a separate agency programme. If you manage many client servers, xCloud's bring-your-own-server model usually costs less at scale; if you want one vendor and one invoice, Cloudways is simpler.
Can I use my own VPS with xCloud or Cloudways?
With xCloud, yes. With Cloudways, no.
xCloud connects Vultr, DigitalOcean, Hetzner, AWS, GCP or any Ubuntu server over SSH, and you keep root access. Cloudways provisions and manages servers itself on the providers it resells, so you cannot attach an existing VPS or get root on the instance.
Can I migrate from Cloudways to xCloud?
Yes. xCloud includes bulk site and server migration at no extra cost, so sites move across without a rebuild.
There is a cPanel migration path too, if some sites live elsewhere. The usual approach is to migrate, test on the new server while DNS still points at Cloudways, then cut over.
Does either platform include backups?
Both include automated backups with restore; only xCloud offers incremental site backups.
xCloud provides incremental site backups in addition to full site and full server backups, and lets you download backups for offsite storage. Cloudways provides automated full backups and restore.
Do xCloud and Cloudways support Redis or object caching?
Both do.
Each platform configures Redis object caching alongside full-page caching for WordPress, so the difference here is not the feature itself but how much of the server you can tune around it. xCloud exposes custom NGINX configuration and root access; Cloudways does not.
Which platform gives more server control?
xCloud, clearly: it gives root access and custom server configuration; Cloudways gives neither.
xCloud provides root access, custom NGINX configuration, multiple PHP versions on the same server, external database support, and the ability to run any Ubuntu host you choose. Cloudways deliberately abstracts the server away. That is the product, so there is no root access and no custom server-level configuration.
Does Cloudways give root access?
No. Cloudways does not offer root access.
Servers are provisioned and managed by Cloudways, and SSH/SFTP access is scoped to the application rather than the machine. xCloud takes the opposite position: the server is yours and you hold root on it, which is what makes custom NGINX configuration and multiple PHP versions on one server possible.
Does Cloudways support bring-your-own-server?
No. You cannot attach a server you already own to Cloudways.
Cloudways provisions the instance for you on the providers it resells, and it stays under Cloudways' control for as long as you pay for it. xCloud connects to a server in your own Vultr, DigitalOcean, Hetzner, AWS or GCP account, so if you stop paying for the panel, the server and its data are still yours.
Does Cloudways offer incremental backups?
Cloudways provides automated full backups and restore; incremental site backups are xCloud's addition.
The practical difference is restore granularity and how much storage a frequent backup schedule costs you. xCloud offers full site, incremental site and full server backups, all downloadable for offsite storage.