On October 1, 2026, WebPros emailed its hosting partners with a subject line that said everything: "I'm sorry, it's happening again: price increase 2027." No figures, no percentage, no reason — only a date. The new prices take effect on December 16, 2026, which, as of this writing, is 66 days away.
It is the eighth consecutive increase since cPanel moved to account-based pricing in 2019. Plesk followed the same path, raising its editions by an average of 26% in January 2026. If you run a hosting company, you are about to plan 2027 with a license bill you cannot predict. This article does the math with today's list prices — and shows what the same server costs on Panelica.
How Much Will a cPanel Server Cost After the 2027 Price Increase?
Nobody runs a shared hosting server on a bare cPanel license. To isolate customers from each other, stop malware and keep restorable backups, hosting companies add the same three products almost everywhere: CloudLinux for resource limits and per-user isolation, Imunify360 for malware and intrusion protection, and JetBackup for incremental, per-account backups. Each is billed separately, per server, every month. Industry reporting this autumn put the panel license at roughly 41% of the total software cost of a typical cPanel server — the rest is the add-on stack.
Here is a typical shared hosting server priced at current list prices (October 2026, before the 2027 increase):
| Per server, per month | cPanel, 100 accounts | cPanel, 300 accounts | Plesk Web Host | Panelica Enterprise |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Control panel license | $69.99 (Premier) | $167.99 (Premier + 200 × $0.49) | ~$65.99 (dedicated) | $24.99 |
| Resource limits and user isolation (CloudLinux OS Shared) | $15.00 | $15.00 | $15.00 | Included |
| Malware and intrusion protection (Imunify360) | $35.00 (up to 250 users) | $45.00 (unlimited) | $35.00 | Included |
| Incremental per-account backups (JetBackup 5) | $9.95 | $9.95 | separate backup add-on | Included |
| Total per month | $129.94 | $237.94 | ~$115.99 | $24.99 |
| Total per year | $1,559.28 | $2,855.28 | ~$1,391.88 | $248.90 (yearly plan) |
Across a fleet, the difference stops being a line item. Ten 300-account servers cost about $28,550 a year in cPanel-stack licenses at today's prices — and that number goes up on December 16. The same ten servers on Panelica Enterprise cost $2,489 a year, with no per-account fees, no matter how many customers you add.
cPanel vs Plesk vs Panelica: Feature by Feature
Price only matters if the product does the job. This is what a hosting company gets in each panel — and what it has to buy separately.
| Capability | cPanel | Plesk | Panelica |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pricing model | Per account, rising every year | Per server, by edition | Per server, flat, unlimited accounts |
| Per-user CPU, RAM, I/O and process limits | CloudLinux add-on | CloudLinux add-on | Built in (cgroups v2) |
| Per-user file system isolation | CloudLinux CageFS add-on | CloudLinux add-on | Built in (namespace isolation, per-user PHP-FPM pools, chrooted SSH) |
| Malware scanning | Imunify360 / ImunifyAV add-on | Imunify360 add-on | Panelica Shield, built in, live scan view |
| Web application firewall | ModSecurity (rules vary) | ModSecurity | ModSecurity with OWASP Core Rule Set |
| Firewall, brute-force and country blocking | CSF or Imunify360 | Fail2ban, extensions | nftables firewall, Fail2ban and GeoIP country blocking, built in |
| Incremental and per-account backups, remote storage | JetBackup add-on | Built in, extensions for some targets | Built in: full, incremental and per-account backups to S3-compatible storage, SFTP and Google Drive |
| Mail security | SpamAssassin, add-ons | SpamAssassin, add-ons | DKIM, SPF and DMARC per domain, per-account spam filtering, ClamAV virus scanning, per-account sending limits, Fail2ban for mail logins |
| PHP versions | EasyApache / CloudLinux PHP Selector | Multiple PHP handlers | PHP 8.1 to 8.5 per site, legacy PHP 5.6 to 7.4 in isolated containers |
| Docker, Node.js, Python and Git deployment | Partial | Extensions | Built in: Docker manager with app templates, Node.js and Python apps, Git deploy |
| WordPress management | WP Toolkit (full features paid) | WP Toolkit (full features in Web Pro and Web Host) | WordPress toolkit with staging and backups, included |
| AI assistant | cPanel AI Assistant (new Meridian interface) | AI Support Assistant | OpsAI: works with your own Claude, Codex, Gemini or Cursor account |
| Autonomous 24/7 AI monitoring | — | — | OpsAI Sentinel: 40 triggers, three autonomy levels |
| MCP for external AI agents | Through a WebPros Account | MCP with tool-call logging | Open-source panelica-mcp server on npm, connects to your server directly |
| Billing and automation | WHMCS, separate license | WHMCS, separate license | PNLCS billing platform, plus WHMCS and FOSSBilling modules |
| Interface languages | Many | Many | 31 |
AI as a Metered Add-On, or AI as the Operator
cPanel and Plesk have both shipped AI this year, and it is worth being precise about what that means. cPanel AI reached general availability in September 2026 with cPanel & WHM 138. The AI Assistant lives inside the new, opt-in Meridian interface and must be enabled by the administrator. The MCP connection for AI agents requires a connected WebPros Account. And the headline builder, Nova, is sold in credits — with, as trade press noted in September, no published wholesale price per credit. Plesk enables an AI Support Assistant by default on new retail servers.
That is AI as a layer on top of a license that keeps getting more expensive: a chat window, a vendor account and a meter.
Panelica takes the opposite approach. The AI works on your server, under your control, with the AI subscription you already pay for:
- OpsAI connects your own Claude, Codex, Gemini or Cursor account to the panel. It works in a terminal inside the panel, so you can see everything it does while it reads logs, explains a failing service, fixes a configuration or restores a backup. No credits, no markup on your AI bill.
- OpsAI Sentinel is an always-on watcher that only thinks when something happens. The panel monitors 40 triggers — failed services, PHP and web server errors, mail queue growth, backup age, certificate expiry, disk and inode pressure, load spikes and site health — and runs a single AI investigation only when one fires. You choose how far it may go: inform (diagnose and report), safe (apply approved, reversible actions) or full. Findings arrive in the panel and through your webhooks.
- panelica-mcp is an open-source MCP server published on npm. Any MCP-capable agent can manage domains, mail, databases, DNS and backups through Panelica's authenticated External API — with scoped API keys, not a vendor account.
- Everything has an API and a CLI. The same operations are available in the panel, through the HMAC-signed External API and through the
panelicacommand line, so agents and scripts never have to scrape a web interface.
For a hosting company, this changes the add-on math again. A large part of what CloudLinux, Imunify360 and JetBackup are bought for — isolation, malware detection, restorable backups — is already part of the panel. And the work that used to need a human at 3 a.m. — a stuck mail queue, a crashed PHP pool, a backup that silently stopped — is exactly what Sentinel is built to catch and handle.
Mail Protection That Reacts on Its Own
Mail is where shared hosting servers get attacked most often: brute-force logins, compromised accounts sending spam, and malware in attachments. Panelica ships the defenses in the box — SPF, DKIM and DMARC records created for every domain, SpamAssassin spam filtering that can be switched per email account, ClamAV virus scanning on incoming mail, hourly and daily sending limits per account so a compromised mailbox cannot flood the internet, and Fail2ban protection for SMTP and IMAP logins. Panelica Shield scans hosting accounts for malicious code with continuously updated signatures. And Sentinel watches the mail queue and mail services around the clock, so a compromised mailbox that starts flooding the queue is investigated the moment it happens, not when your IP lands on a blacklist.
Migration: Move the Whole Server, Not Just the Accounts
Eight increases in eight years rest on a single assumption: that customers cannot leave. For a long time, moving hundreds of sites, hundreds of email accounts and years of accumulated mail to another panel really was hard — and pricing was built on top of that difficulty. As long as hosting companies believe they cannot migrate, they can be expected to pay a little more every year. That assumption no longer holds.
The hardest part of leaving cPanel or Plesk has never been the new panel. It is the move. Panelica was built around exactly that problem. Its migration engine connects to the old server, discovers every site, user and reseller account with its hierarchy, and brings everything across:
- Websites, files, subdomains and PHP settings
- MySQL and MariaDB databases, with user password hashes preserved — sites keep working without editing their configuration
- Email accounts with their original passwords, every folder, read and unread flags, and forwarders — users simply keep logging in
- DNS zones, ready to switch nameservers whenever you choose
- SSL certificates, with automatic Let's Encrypt issuance once DNS points to the new server
Supported sources include cPanel, Plesk, DirectAdmin, CyberPanel, HestiaCP, aaPanel and CentOS Web Panel, as well as other Panelica servers. Old servers are read, never written to: customers stay online on the old server until the moment you switch DNS, and a final sync after the switch brings over the mail that arrived in between.
Large hosting infrastructures running hundreds of sites, databases and email accounts on Plesk and cPanel have already moved to Panelica. Sites, users and reseller hierarchies were carried over as they were; email was transferred and verified against the source folder by folder without losing a single message, and users kept signing in to their mailboxes with the same passwords. Along the way, malicious code hidden in sites was detected and reported — threats that had sat unnoticed on the old server for years were caught before they ever reached the new one.
An Ecosystem, Not Just a Panel
Panelica is growing into a complete platform for hosting businesses: the control panel itself; PNLCS, a billing and automation platform built as a modern alternative to WHMCS; ready-made modules for WHMCS and FOSSBilling; the open-source MCP server for AI agents; a browser extension for managing servers from the side panel; and a library of Docker application templates. It runs on Ubuntu, Debian, AlmaLinux and Rocky Linux, and the interface is available in 31 languages.
Offers for Hosting Companies
The December 16 increase is a deadline, but it is also the best moment in years to stop renting your panel stack by the account. As of today, Panelica offers hosting companies tailored terms: volume pricing per server, support for large migrations from cPanel and Plesk, and a pilot on your own hardware before you commit.
Tell us how many servers you run and what is on them. We will send you the cost comparison for your fleet and a migration plan. Contact the Panelica team.
Frequently Asked Questions
When does the cPanel 2027 price increase take effect?
December 16, 2026. WebPros announced it on October 1, 2026, and it is the eighth consecutive price increase since cPanel moved to account-based pricing in 2019.
How much does a cPanel server cost per month in 2026?
At current list prices, a 100-account cPanel server with CloudLinux, Imunify360 and JetBackup costs $129.94 per month ($1,559.28 per year). A 300-account server costs $237.94 per month ($2,855.28 per year), largely because of the per-account overage above the Premier tier.
How does Plesk pricing compare to cPanel?
A Plesk Web Host server with the same CloudLinux and Imunify360 add-ons runs about $115.99 per month (roughly $1,391.88 per year). Plesk also raised its editions by an average of 26% in January 2026.
What does Panelica include that cPanel and Plesk charge extra for?
Panelica Enterprise is $24.99 per server per month ($248.90 per year on a yearly plan), with per-user resource and file-system isolation, malware and intrusion protection, and incremental per-account backups all included — no CloudLinux, Imunify360 or JetBackup add-ons to buy.
Can I migrate my existing cPanel or Plesk server to Panelica without downtime?
Yes. Panelica's migration engine reads the old server — cPanel, Plesk, DirectAdmin, CyberPanel, HestiaCP, aaPanel or CentOS Web Panel — without writing to it. It moves sites, databases with password hashes preserved, email accounts with their original passwords and folders, DNS zones and SSL certificates, while customers stay online on the old server until you switch DNS.
Related reading on panelica.com
- cPanel Unlimited Accounts: What "Unlimited" Actually Costs in 2026
- Plesk License Cost vs Free Alternatives: Is It Still Worth Paying?
- cPanel vs Panelica in 2026: Which Panel Can Your AI Actually Use?
- Panelica pricing
Prices are vendor list prices as of October 11, 2026, before the announced 2027 increase, in US dollars per server per month; reseller and volume pricing varies. Sources: cPanel and Plesk pricing pages, CloudLinux, Imunify360 and JetBackup published prices, and trade press coverage of the WebPros 2027 announcement and the cPanel 138 release.