WP Engine Web Hosting Review
$25 / mo.
Reg. Price $35 – Get 28% Off!
- Optimized for WordPress
- Free SSL certificate
- Free daily automatic backup
- Expert support
WP Engine is the best WordPress Host! Is it true?
WP engine is geared explicitly towards WordPress web hosting, offering fully optimized managed plans for WordPress sites. WP engine is the option worth considering if you are looking for hands-off web hosting solutions where you need not work a lot to get things going.
When talking about Web Hosting, plenty of cheap solutions are available with fully managed plans for WordPress sites. Still, if you are looking for something matchless performance-oriented solid hosting solution, then no other than WP Engine can serve you best.
But before locking on WP Engine web hosting, you have to get a good insight if it’s worth the cost or just hype in the market.
WP engine web hosting – one of the top WordPress Managed Hosting
If you are looking for a leading WordPress hosting platform to focus on growing site visitors and a better conversion rate without putting effort into setting up and maintaining your site, then trust WP engine hosting.
WP engine isn’t one of the early entrants in the web hosting market; they broke ground in 2010 and have carved themselves as one of the biggest names in the WordPress Hosting industry.
Unlike any other hosting company, WP engine focuses on only one “WordPress” market alone. The reason behind their huge success is that the company nurtures an award-winning team of WordPress experts of more than 250 employees. The estimated annual recurring revenue is over +100 million annually, with 120,000 customers from around the world.
WP engine holds an incredible share of around 5% internet visits which is quite a significant portion.
Moreover, you’ll get top-notch customer support that’s always available to help identify troubleshoots and any other issues via chat. The highly supportive customer support will go over and beyond to fix any problem right away.
Some perks of using WP engine hosting for a WordPress site includes;
- Faster servers from all over the world
- An inbuilt caching plugin that helps in increasing your site speed dramatically
- It comes with a free automated plugin to migrate your existing site without any risk.
- The managed plans include free SSL certificates.
- WP engine is equipped with developer-friendly tools, i.e., 1 – click staging environment,
WP engine stands out from other WordPress managed to host because of its first-rated brand recognition, out-of-the-box features, and reliable speed for all industries, especially the enterprise sector.
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WP Engine Evaluation – WordPress specific Features
When it comes to WordPress-specific features, WP Engine provides excellent options. These features are equally beneficial for beginners who find WordPress overwhelming and for web developers looking for ready-to-use solutions.
You’ll have access to these WordPress-specific features.
- Auto WordPress installer software that quickly installs WordPress in a single click.
- No need to update WordPress manually; WordPress will be automatically updated
- Daily backups to keep your website’s data safe
- Easy way to migrate your website from old host
- Stagging site support for website developers
- Keep your site secured with a free SSL certificate.
Excellent support Team
You’ll get assistance from a qualified staff that is very helpful and quick to respond to your query. WP engine offers 24/7 support with a phone call, live chat, or email. You can easily access support options right after you have signed up through your user portal.
Moreover, for any other kind of assistance, you’ll get a knowledge base full of information regarding hosting and WordPress troubleshoots. Also, you can take advantage of well-written documentation and tutorials.
Performance-enhancing features with all plans
WP engine is packed with high-value performance-oriented features in all of their plans.
- A free CDN content delivery network powered by MaxCDN is included in each plan that makes your website readily accessible from all over the world without any delay.
- Instant caching solutions to speed optimize your site.
- A great optimizer add-on “GeoTarget” to optimize your site for any specific region.
- Free page performance analyzing tools to check your website’s speed performance
WP engine has more than 19 servers locations, including North America, Europe, Australia, and Asia. These distinct server locations are excellent for real-world performance.
What does the Pingdom test revealed for Page Speed?
To check the page loading speed for the WordPress website, we set up a test site and checked its loading speed using the Pingdom tool from different locations. Here are the results.
- San Jose: 0.39 seconds
- Stockholm: 1.60 seconds
- New York: 1.61 seconds
- Melbourne: 1.67 seconds
It’s pretty visible that page loading speed is remarkably consistent and remains below 2 seconds. However, the 1.67 seconds for Melbourne isn’t that impressive, yet it’s still below 2 seconds mark.
We also conducted a second test using the Load Impact tool to counter-check the website loading speed.
- Minimum Response Time: 0.51 seconds
- Maximum Response Time: 0.59 seconds
We tested page speed using Ann Arbor, USA server, and the page loading speed was remarkably below 1 second.
Excellent Security Features
Suppose you are looking for online selling via your WordPress website. In that case, having a Secure Socket Layer (SSL) is a must that safeguards any financial information provided by your customers to your site. Luckily, you‘ll get a free SSL certificate with WP engine. Along with this, WordPress experts have other security-oriented features such as daily malware detection service, regular updates, real-time threat detection, enterprise-grade firewalls, and free hackers’ protection strategies.
Pricing plans of WP engine hosting service
WP engine offers more or less 12 Hosting solutions along with custom dedicated hosting solutions. The hosting plans comprise managed to host, managed to host plus, and secured hosting packages. If you go for yearly subscription plans, you‘ll receive a discount of 20% on the overall hosting price.
Managed Hosting plans
The managed hosting plan starts at 25$ / month and includes one website hosting facility, 10 GB storage, 50GB bandwidth, and the total number of visitors allowed is 25000 per month.
While other Managed hosting plans, including an increased number of sites and more visitors and extra storage for $59/month, $115/month, and $290/month comparatively.
Managed Hosting plans Plus
The managed hosting plans can be bought at $28/month for a single site, and if you want the managed hosting plan for multiple locations, the price can go up to $310/month. Notably, you‘ll get the same bandwidth, storage, and number of visitors allowed per month as that in managed hosting, in addition to some more features like automated plugin updates, plugin update tests using third–party plugins.
Secured hosting packages
As the name shows, secured hosting packages includes extra security features along with the basic managed hosting features. It starts at $44/month and goes up to $291/month for a max of 30 sites, and the package includes protection from malicious traffic spikes (DDoS) and a security firewall for your website on top of the regular managed hosting plans.
Who can get the benefit of using WP Engine Hosting?
We have divided WP Hosting benefits for three types of users.
Small business owners.
You‘ll get a special GeoTarget plugin to deliver content specifically to the local users. Also, it‘ll give you the privilege of free site migration and a pre-launch preview of your site. Once your site‘s traffic starts increasing, it‘ll help you quickly scale up your site resources.
Web Developers
Web developers will get a one-click staging environment to test their sites also Dev, stage Prod Environments, SSH Gateways, and Git and SFTP integration.
Basic WordPress users' websites
More secure, easily scalable, and fast website loading speed with global CDN option and Ever Cache plugin. Access to WordPress expert support team anytime. Also, free site migration along with more than 35+ free themes.
Pros & Cons of Using WP Engine Hosting
Pros
- Excellent option for small businesses.
- Easy to use interface
- Excellent customer support
- Data centers are available almost in all regions.
- Extraordinary security measures
- Daily automatic backup
Cons
- It is limited to only WordPress websites
- Doesn't sell domains
- They can overcharge you if the no of visitors exceed the limit
WP engine Alternatives: HostGator
WP engine provides a top-notch WordPress hosting service to its customers; however, not everyone can have enough funds to get that privilege and are forced to buy cheap hosting services. But cheap hosting doesn’t necessarily mean you are compromising on service quality. We have some best alternatives which offer more affordable plans.
HostGator
HostGator gives you WordPress Cloud Hosting at a much lower price, and their starter plan starts at $ $5.95/month with 1 GB backup, free SSL, and free domain included. HostGator’s interface is beginners friendly and easy to use. Also, you’ll get WordPress Pre-installed. Get free site migration and a free domain for 12 months.
Host Gator is best for you if you are a novice and just starting your WordPress site; you’ll get free tutorial sessions to learn WordPress, also a top-class CDN service at an affordable price.
Siteground
Siteground is a good choice if you want cheaper WordPress hosting with top-quality service. However, there’s a caveat that they sell their most affordable hosting plans with yearly payments. The price of the basic plan starts at $4.99/month and gives you
- Free website migration
- Free SSL
- 10GB data space
- Auto WordPress installation and update
- Daily backups and free CDN
Conclusion
WP engine isn‘t a cheap WordPress hosting service, but if you prefer value over price, then WP engine won‘t dishearten you. WP engine provides you the best ROI with top–quality WordPress- tailored features, solid security measures, and 24/7 customer support. Therefore, if you aren‘t on a budget, then consider the WP engine without any doubt.
