When comparing Namecheap vs Let's Encrypt, the Slant community recommends Namecheap for most people. In the question“What are the best SSL-Certificate Vendors?” Namecheap is ranked 1st while Let's Encrypt is ranked 2nd. The most important reason people chose Namecheap is:
Domain registration at Namecheap is economical, as their name implies.
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Pros
Pro Low prices
Domain registration at Namecheap is economical, as their name implies.
Pro Great support with 24 hour live chat
Namecheap support is available 24 hours a day, every day of the year. Their support is provided over live text chat, which has a lower barrier to entry, faster connection, and allows you to communicate easier than other the phone.
Because most of the support you need for domains require you to provide text configuration data, live online messaging is the most efficient way to get fast support. It also does not require your constant attention so you don't have to waste time while the operator is researching an answer for you.
Pro Free subdomains
Namecheap allows you to set up 198 subdomains for free, and also provides wildcard subdomain catching so you can manage them yourself.
Pro Free e-mail and URL forwarding
Namecheap allows you to set up 100 virtual email addresses per domain, as well as catch all forwarding all undefined addresses.
Pro Supports credit cards, PayPal and adding funds to your account separately
When it comes to paying for domains, Namecheap supports all common payment methods. For most people this will be credit cards and Paypal, but Namecheap also has an option to add funds to your account separately.
Pro Free dynamic DNS routing
Pro Strong Anti-SOPA stance
Namecheap took a stand against SOPA.
Pro FreeDNS for outside domain
Namecheap offers a free and premium (w/ SLA) DNS hosting service for domains registered with other registrars.
Pro Free WHOIS privacy protection
It's active for one year.
Pro Bitcoin payment support
Pro Expiration grace period
Namecheap will notify you if your credit card is going to expire, and has a 27 day non-guaranteed grace period for renewal.
Pro Two-factor authentication
Pro Proactive support
Not all registrar care, but when there's an error or something held up the registration they've always at least gave it a shot without prompting. This is done in a proactive way, which isn't seen very often at all. This way the user can be hands off and not need to deal with certain issues as it is taken care of in the background by their support. User is still informed, of course, but can be entirely hands off, or not, but usually they've been efficient and transparent.
Pro Free .me domain for students
Through its NC.ME program, students can get a free 1-year registration on the .me TLD and discounts on .com, .io, and other TLDs along with Namecheap Private Email hosting.
Pro Non-Profit
Lets Encrypt is a non-profit organization sponsored by EFF, Linux Foundation, and other major donors. Removing profit as a motive means their focus is security, stability, and open source, not their bank account.
Pro Free
Certs from LetsEncrypt are free, always, not just as a short-term trial.
Pro Automated
It is fairly straightforward to totally automate certificates and renewals such that you never have to worry about the dreaded "certificate expired" error. There are numerous open-source implementations of clients to fit many situations.
Pro Very easy and quick to add dozens of domains and sub-domains.
Cons
Con Misleading pricing
For example .me domain registration costs 3$ a year, but a continuation for 2 years cost 30$!
Con Expensive
It costs a lot of money to renew and purchase a domain. It also costs for their premium dns. They used to be cheap, but now it's so expensive.
Con 90 days
Certs currently are only issued for 90 days at a time. The expectation is that users will automate renewal so that this is not an issue.
Con Domain-Verified only
Only class 1 certificates are available (the kind others charge $10 or more for). Lets Encrypt does not do Extended Validation or EV certs, nor does it offer insurance or the other features traditional vendors offer. How much of a con this is depends very much on how much you value those services.