Ionos

Do not be fooled by the low-cost domain offers or the positive reviews from new users. Those are just the "bait." I have been targeted by their systematic scam twice now, and here is how the trap works:

Step 1: The Bait. They sell you incredibly cheap domains. Everything seems fine while you are just buying, which is why their initial rating looks okay.

Step 2: The Scam. The moment you try to renew your domains or add a service, the trap snaps shut. Their support claims you have "outstanding charges" and pressures you into paying via PayPal immediately while on the phone.

The Execution: As soon as you pay via PayPal, their system begins "machine-gunning" your Credit Card with repeated, unauthorized charges for the same service. They will keep drawing money until your card is empty or your bank blocks it.

The Gaslighting: When you provide proof of payment to their requested email billing email, the support staff pretends they "don't have access" to their own billing inbox. Once they have successfully drained as much money as possible, they block your user access entirely.

This happened to me yesterday for the second time. I paid for my renewals via PayPal, and they immediately tried to drain my credit card repeatedly. Luckily, I had a low limit set, but they still managed to steal $88 USD with zero service provided.

I managed to rescue my domains and move them to a legitimate provider, but IONOS refuses to refund the stolen money. This isn't a "technical glitch"—it is a programmed, systematic "Bait and Switch" operation designed to exploit the combination of PayPal and stored card details.

To everyone considering IONOS, BEWARE! I am writing this as a cautionary tale—they CLOSED MY ACCOUNT without any valid explanation and stole my money in the process. I've only been refunded a small fraction of what I'm owed ($12), and now they are actively preventing me from accessing my own data. They won't even allow me to export my files or transfer them to a different provider.

What's even more disturbing is that they are demanding sensitive personal information from users, which is clearly being used for dubious, profit-driven purposes. IONOS is not trustworthy—they are not like established, reliable companies such as GoDaddy, Bluehost, or others in the industry. These companies value your data and privacy. IONOS does not. They steal your personal information and seem to have zero regard for customer service or rights.

Do yourself a favor: Avoid IONOS and save yourself the headache, financial loss, and potential data risk. You have been warned.

1-Star Review Draft

Title: Extremely Difficult to Cancel – Beware Before Signing Up

I strongly advise anyone thinking of using IONOS to reconsider. My experience has been extremely frustrating.

I requested to cancel my Web Hosting Plus contract multiple times, both through their website and by contacting support. Despite this, I kept getting billed — even after confirming I no longer use or need their service. The cancellation process on their site is confusing, slow, and full of unnecessary obstacles.

I have wasted days trying to get a simple response, and the system seems designed to make cancellation as difficult as possible. I've used other hosting providers before, and none have made it this hard to leave.

This feels like a trap for small users who just want an honest, straightforward service. If you're considering IONOS, be cautious — read reviews and understand how hard it might be to cancel before committing.

I hope this review helps others avoid the same experience.

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WARNING! DO NOT USE! They are SCAMMERS and STEAL MONEY from you once you sign up. They FRAUDLENTLY charge for services not selected. I have emails from them pretending to apologise but they CONTINUOUSLY LIE AND STEAL.

Worst experience ever with IONOS
We are a real client, and I can say this company is a complete disaster to deal with. After signing a contract, they kept charging hidden fees, then suddenly "canceled" our service without proper notice — and expect us to call them to confirm! Their support is impossible to reach, full of automated replies, and no accountability at all. They damage your business, waste your time, and take no responsibility.
IONOS is not a serious company — avoid them at all costs.

I've been in the web business for a long time and I can confidently say IONOS is one of the worst hosting companies I've ever dealt with. Their customer service is atrocious, and their billing practices are borderline fraudulent. I called to let them know I was moving my domains elsewhere because their renewal prices were just too high. That should have been the end of it. But to try and keep my business, they offered me a 55% discount on domain renewals through May 2025. Sounded decent—so I stayed. Fast forward to this week: I receive an invoice that's wildly overcharged. Turns out, they never applied the discount to 22 of my domain names, and the same overcharge happened on the previous invoice too—which I only noticed after digging. I called immediately—AFTER I had already paid—and was told, "Sorry, we can only offer you 40% now, not the 55% we promised." Total bait and switch. To make matters worse, they billed me for virus protection I never purchased, and now refuse to refund that money as well. I spent over four hours on the phone trying to get a straight answer, was hung up on more than a dozen times, and when someone did answer, they were rude and dismissive. IONOS is happy to take your money but won't honor their word, their invoices, or basic customer respect. Yes, they might be cheap when you first sign up, but once you're with them for a while, they'll treat you like garbage. Avoid this company at all costs. I'm now being forced to file a legal claim just to be treated fairly. Absolutely disgusting business practices.

Hi, the reason I am sending this review is because I have looked for every possible means to reach ionos, even tried calling them on *******555, but the call keeps getting hung up.

On January 08, I bought joomla hosting and registered the domain name; graciousweb.com with it via ionos.com. In your order confirmation email IONOS sent to me, they promised to confirm the order within 48hours.

My customer ID is: *******

Not only did you not confirm the order, even after debiting my card, they went silent and did nothing about it. Today makes 12days after I placed my order and received order confirmation, still no response from IONOS.

They have breached their terms of agreement and cost me this precious domain name, as I just discovered that someone else had taken it as at January 17.

In order words, IONOS has cost me my company name and branding. And I cannot let that slide.

When I wrote to them to express my frustration and demand a compensation on January 18, they did not even bother to get back to be.

I believe this is grounds for a serious lawsuit against IONOS, which I would not rule out, if they don't handle this in the most amicable manner.

Customer service is horrible; you schedule calls with the assigned "personal consultant" but never receive any. They flood your inbox and dashboard with a million things and "offers" for products you don't actually need. If, for any reason, even if the assigned personal consultant or customer service representative never gave you a callback to cancel, you can cancel the contract. However, you still get charged for something you never meant to add since the beginning. On top of that, let's say you acknowledge you didn't cancel on time, but it's a product/service that doesn't make sense AT ALL; well, sorry, you still will pay and cannot switch to another service that may help you. So, I'll gift them around $150 for a service I don't need, haven't used, and have no idea how I contracted for because I use a different domain for Microsoft 365, which was purchased even after the "free trial" for this service started. Still, well, here, the customer IS NEVER RIGHT!

If it weren't for the fact that I could not transfer the domain I purchased with them (oh! That's another one, by the way), I'd run as far as I could from Ionos. It's been the most horrible experience I have ever had, with hidden fees, misleading advertisements, confusing offers, etc.

Why do you cancelled contract after receiving payment?

They cancalled my order without any reason after debited my card.

HUGE SCAM. AVOID AVOID AVOID. I signed up for a trial for one pound a month and eventually it turned to 10 pounds a month. During this time, IONOS repeatedly called me - annoying telemarketer calls where they kept trying to sell me more. IN NO WAY DID I AGREE TO MORE. I told them I was hearing impaired on the phone, and they clearly took advantage of this.

I went online a few months ago, cancelled my contract because I wasn't really using it. Recently, they sent me a huge bill saying I owed them a ton of money because I signed up for a 'year long membership' with them. I NEVER DID THIS. They signed me up for it themselves. Then we called, and they weren't able to provide a contract I'd signed or ANY EVIDENCE I'd signed up for this contract.

We're reporting them to OFCOM. Will keep you updated.

I log into Ionos.com and see a pop-up saying my domain has over 700 threats and I should buy site scan and repair, the problem? I already have site scan and repair. This is a pattern, when I have issues, they try to sell me something to fix it but it NEVER fixes it. Very scammy.

I am deeply disappointed with IONOS's handling of my GDPR requests. Despite submitting multiple formal requests for access to my personal data—as is my right under Article 15 of the GDPR—I received no adequate response within the legally mandated timeframe. This lack of compliance with GDPR regulations raises serious concerns about their commitment to data protection and customer rights. I urge potential customers to consider this experience when evaluating IONOS's services.

Absolute fraud of a company. I purchased a domain name & got some add-on deal for web hosting. I tried to cancel the web hosting before the renewal date but when I went online to do so, I could not. I reached out via email and never received a response. Some time later, I got a bill and tried their chat, which told me to email again. So I did. Still no response. I kept trying but no one ever replied. I honestly forgot about it for a while after that because of some health issues/surgeries/recovery, and almost a year later I am still being billed. When you call it just goes to a voicemail that sounds like some rando in his parent's basement. When I emailed them again, they still did not reply.
I eventually sent them an email letting them know that I had opened a case w/ the BBB & reported their fraudulent billing practices (no way to cancel & no one responds to cancellation) to the FTC and magically I started getting responses.
This company has the balls to tell me that no matter what, I still owe them $182 even though they can CLEARLY see that I never used the domain or the web hosting. They even admitted to receiving my request from a year ago, but did nothing aside from bill me.
Their "senior manager" finally reached out after about 11 emails of them telling me I still had to pay & me telling them to pound sand, and had the absolute nerve to tell me they can send me a PayPal link for payment. Payment for what? You complete scam of a company! Beware! They will add on products & make it seem like a good deal, then make it impossible for ypu to cancel by putting you through a loop of contacting everyone but their grandmothers, then bill you and hold your domain name for ransom until you do. Run far away from IONOS!

You may be surprised...I started with them 3 weeks ago today on VPS and have spent more time on tech support being told my site is the problem. VPS keeps going down. Plesk back up files 111 up x00,000,000mb. Changed my password today and VPS went down. Had to call support again 3 hours today yesterday 4.5 hours and I forgot how many times last week... don't let me bore you with words. A picture tells a thousand words... make your choices carefully. I am close to losing a site that has tens of thousands of dollars spent through the past 4 years... today they offered me $60 credit for my first 6 months of discounted hosting. Lol

I give one star for their graphics design on their frontpage.
Do not fall for 1$/month hosting because they will force you to pay afterwards. I should have around 24$ invoice for 2 years of hosting. For my surprice I got 156$ invoice when I cancelled all services.
This did not help me to immediately terminate services but services were extrapolated to terminate after one year. This is totally unethical business.
99% of webhosting services shut down services after you do not pay invoice but not ionos. They will force you to hang out still one year after you have terminated your contract.
There was a hidden e-mail on site for cancelling that I contacted. There I was asked specific details what to cancel.
This is not as bad as hostgator but it is more like money laundering masquared as a web hosting service.

To Whom It May Concern

I have been IONOS's customer since 2018 and everything was OKAY back then, BUT after 2020, IONOS became unbearable and started sending me random emails with overcharged invoices and when I called to complain about it, they said, they'll fix it BUT they never fix anything and they lock the server because the invoice wasn't paid. My contract says that I have 30-days to settle any invoice but IONOS is locking the server on the 15th of each month because IONOS sent me overcharged invoices and I called them to complain about it.

So My question is How am I supposed to pay an overcharged invoice and I already called you, guys to fix it, and you, guys promised you'd fix the invoices but never fixed it.

IONOS locked the server last month and sent me 2 random emails with overcharged invoices. I paid one invoice on the 24th valued at $306.95 USD. After the payment, I realized the server wasn't working. So I called the customer service and they said they would migrate the websites to a new server because the old server was damaged. It wasn't me who damaged the server. So they told me that the new server comes with $300 credit and I agreed to migrate to new server.

I was surprised I was charged the administration fee in advance and I had already paid for it even before they migrated the websites (Please see the attached PayPal invoice to see the administration fee paid invoice).

IONOS locked the server again on the 15th, I called the company on the 14th to discuss the pending overcharged invoice and I was waiting for the updated invoice but I was slapped with a locked server on the 15th.

Today, I received another email with overcharged invoices.
Server ($152.00) is overcharged because the new server came with $300 credit. There's no payment toward the new server.
Server Administration $75.00 is already paid. Please see the attached PayPal invoice.

Please update the invoice before sending it out and PLEASE stop sending me invoices twice per month because when you split the invoices you charged the IP and the DNS twice per month.

IONOS sent me an invoice valued at $ 846.24 for 1 month. My invoice should have been $292.95

PLEASE STOP SCAMMING CUSTOMERS.
PLEASE STOP SCAMMING CUSTOMERS.
PLEASE STOP SCAMMING CUSTOMERS.
PLEASE STOP SCAMMING CUSTOMERS.
PLEASE STOP SCAMMING CUSTOMERS.
PLEASE STOP SCAMMING CUSTOMERS.
PLEASE STOP SCAMMING CUSTOMERS.

I am very very very disappointed with IONOS.

Incompetent customer "service" and emails that never get a reply. They don't hesitate to email you new bills though! I disputed a $2.21 charge with my bank since they overcharged me, and they proceeded to SHUT DOWN MY WEBSITES OVER $2.21. Nevermind that I've been a customer before they were ionos (formerly 1and1, when things were way better), for close to a decade. They don't give a flying $#*!.

I CANNOT WAIT to leave this company. They probably know it's a pain in the $#*! to change hosting so they definitely use that against you. I wish I never chose this company because I've wasted hours of my life quibbling to people with Indian accents about charges that I didn't authorize. They put you on hold for 10-30m at a time, they must be so extremely disorganized to need that much time to look into your records. Also, they talk over you and don't listen to you. Rude af and incompetent to boot.

Seriously the worst company I've ever had the displeasure of working with.

75% of the people I spoke with at ionos did not listen to what I was saying. It seemed like most of them are commission sales people wanting to push products even if you don't know how to use them.

Took me a month and a half to get away from them and make sure they are not charging my account for anything.

Do yourself a favor and go to an all-in-one place like wix because these people will hard sell you every time you call.

The worst hosting company on the face of this planet.

They cancelled my service because I purchased an SSL certificate, then changed my mind and decided I didn't need it. The next day, all of my websites were offline, I'm locked out of my admin account, and my FTP doesn't connect. When I was able to finally get in touch with someone there, I was told my account was suspended because of "suspicious activity", and that I'd need to contact their security team to have my products unlocked again. Tried to contact their security team for days and days, email, follow up calls - all to no avail. Was finally told that my service had been cancelled by the security team, that I needed to seek hosting "elsewhere", and that I had 48 hours to remove my websites and databases from their server. I was given no reason for this eviction, other than my account had "suspicious activity". I've always paid my dues on time, I had quite a lot of services through Ionos, and several websites hosted there.

All I can think of is that they didn't like the fact that I'd made a purchase, then decided I didn't want that $200 service and asked it be removed. That's the only explanation I can come up with, as their security team doesn't respond through phone interactions, the supervisor I spoke with was at a loss and said she had no idea why this happened, other than the security team "made a judgement call." I had to beg them over the phone to ask the security team to let me have access to my account long enough to download my databases. Absolutely humiliating, and from a company I'd paid hundreds of dollars a month to for almost a year - I wish this was an exaggeration, but, unfortunately, it's the worst experience I've ever had with hosting and service in general. I would highly recommend not risking any service with them whatsoever - if they can just do this to someone out of the blue for cancelling a product, what's to stop them from, oh, say, deleting your entire website, or stopping your email service out of the blue.