There are a lot of inexpensive hosts readily available that offer a decent service. WPEngine Git
Nevertheless, what if you’re looking for more of a performance-oriented, concierge service? In that case, you’ll want to have a look at our WP Engine evaluation for WordPress.
WP Engine is a WordPress-specific web host, providing managed strategies that are fully optimized for the platform. Naturally, when compared to many other WordPress hosts, WP Engine’s strategies aren’t exactly low-cost. You’ll want to understand whether this hosting service is worth the expense before making a purchase.
To help you out, we’re going to carry out an extensive WP Engine evaluation for WordPress. We’ll discuss its essential functions, support alternatives, efficiency capabilities, and whatever else you’ll require to understand. Let’s get started!
WP Engine Video Review
Sign up for a WP Engine plan and receive the Genesis Framework and 35+ StudioPress Themes free!
About WP Engine
Founded in 2010, WP Engine is now among the leading handled WordPress hosting business in the market. Serial entrepreneur Jason Cohen began WP Engine when he saw a need for specialized WordPress hosting due to the rising appeal of WordPress.
WP Engine is Headquartered in Austin, Texas with workplaces in San Antonio (Texas), London (England), Limerick (Ireland), Brisbane (Australia), and Kraków (Poland).
The company has won several awards for Best Place to Work in Austin and consistently adds to the WordPress core and neighborhood.
WP Engine Features
The core factors to select WP Engine over more affordable WordPress hosting are increased dependability, efficiency, support, and management, but these are difficult to quantify. Some functions stick out when you browse the user interface, however, that can give you some insight into the service offered.
WP Engine Page Performance is a neat tool developed to assist you speed up your WordPress website by using meaningful metrics on efficiency.
Running a test returns you a page-performance report that information how rapidly your page rendered, for how long it took to load in its whole, and the total size of the page. It even includes historical information on your site’s efficiency over the past 6 months and suggestions on how you can lower page load.
You can develop your WordPress website in a Staging or Development environment prior to making the modifications live (Image credit: WP Engine) Avoid embarrassing errors on your website by making changes to a copy of your site prior to it goes live. This is called Staging, and it allows your designers to make extensive modifications to your site without affecting your clients.
WP Engine has an extensive list of plugins that are disallowed (Image credit: WP Engine) In a reasonably unusual relocation, WP Engine restricts the WordPress plugins you can set up. Those generally restricted are plugins that have actually been noted to trigger efficiency issues and security holes. For essential features such as caching, backups, and seo tools, WP Engine has made options available that do not put a high load on the server.
WP Engine Hosting Plans
WP Engine just offers managed WordPress hosting. There are 5 different strategies readily available: Startup, Growth, Scale, and Custom.
All strategies include limitless data transfer. The plans vary based on:
- number of WordPress sets up
- traffic volume (# of visits per month)
- disk storage amount
- Custom plan includes dedicated dev. environments, client success, and priority support
WP Engine consists of some unique features for WordPress users that the majority of hosts do not provide, or charge extra for. These unique functions include:.
- Git version control
- Staging: quickly develop a copy of your website for testing
- Easy transferable installs from totally free to paid accounts
- Innovative innovations consisting of newest PHP variation.
In our WP Engine review, we discovered that WP Engine provides the most sophisticated and comprehensive handled WordPress hosting functions.
Get 3 months free when you sign up for WP Engine.
Interface and in use
WP Engine’s interface is professional and well laid out, but the powerful functions may imply a steep knowing curve for inexperienced users. If you have an understanding of terms like Git, CNAME, and redirect rules, you’ll be right in the house here, but otherwise you’ll need to spend a long time on the support website.
In our testing, the default WordPress home page filled in simply over two seconds. This is one of the fastest actions we’ve checked, with competitor Liquid Web just a little behind.
Support
A handled WordPress service should use extra worth through its support, and WP Engine provides. The support website includes videos and posts of a quality you ‘d expect from a paid training course, with assistance on deeper WordPress functionality that many WordPress hosts do not enter into.
There’s 24/7 live chat support and a ticket system, too. In our testing, the action was quick and the representative experienced. For all plans except for single-site plans, there’s telephone support, too.
Pros
Extraordinary Load Speed: If site filling speed is a top priority, WP Engine succeeds in this regard. The host’s mix of customized NGINX extension, built-in Content Delivery Network (CDN), and SSD innovation make sure that your websites load quickly. NGINX extension prioritizes human demands over robot requests and provides load balancing, giving your visitors a much better experience. For its part, CDN delivers website material to your visitors based on their place to enhance your site’s speed and reduce latency. You get this capability for free with all WP Engine plans.
High Performance: It’s tough to beat WP Engine’s efficiency, which is why individuals continue to pay a premium rate for this service. WP Engine guarantees 99.95% server uptime, approximately four and a half hours of downtime a year. You can even more increase your uptime to 99.99% with boosted SLA, which equates to a little under an hour of downtime each year. WP Engine will compensate you with hosting credit if your uptime falls listed below the assurance.
Advanced Security: WP Engine keeps track of all the traffic going to your site and automatically finds and blocks possible attacks. Furthermore, the hosting service immediately updates and spots the WordPress core to get rid of potential vulnerabilities. In a worst-case scenario, WP Engine instantly backups your site every day and has a one-click restoration function to get you support and running rapidly. Lastly, this hosting service protects your site versus JavaScript/SQL-injection attacks, strength efforts, and DDoS attacks.
Sensational Customer Support: The hosting service has a transparent and trackable ticketing system to connect with client care by means of chat. The assistance group has an excellent knowledge base and can assist you resolve problems rapidly. You get 24/7 phone support for all strategies other than the Growth Plan, in addition to 24/7 live chat support on all plans.
Useful Staging Environment: The staging area allows you to clone your website’s live version and make changes or test brand-new plugins and themes. Anything you carry out in the staging area doesn’t affect your live site. This function permits designers to deal with sites without interfering with the live website’s performance or user experience.
Transferable Installs: Also targeting developers, this feature enables you to develop a website from your WP Engine account. You do not have to await the customer to add you to their WordPress website. As soon as completed, you can move the website to the client or host the site on WP Engine. This functionality conserves time if you regularly build sites for customers.
Cons
WordPress-Only Hosting: If you are using any other content management system aside from WordPress, then you run out luck. WP Engine just deals with WordPress. From an organization perspective, it makes sense to concentrate on a single market and deal remarkable services because area. However, this design locks out many people who could otherwise benefit from WP Engine’s services.
No Domains or Email Hosting: If you prefer to host your e-mail account and register your domain through your site host, you’ll require to look somewhere else. You’ll need to use third-party services for domain registration or email accounts.
Inflexible Pricing: WP Engine runs a tight ship, and this is reflected in its pricing structure. You will be punished for exceeding your strategy’s visitor limits. This may not be an issue if you have foreseeable traffic, and you can always update your plan as your site grows. Substantial spikes in traffic throughout product launches or seasonal business can cost you significant excess charges.
There is no other way to put it: WP Engine is costly. Is it worth the cost? The answer depends on determining what you are paying for.
You can get shared hosting that can deal with the very same quantity of traffic as WP Engine for a fraction of the price. You can even get dedicated hosting for the same price as WP Engine. What you are really paying for here is security, performance, speed, and, most notably, peace of mind. The supreme question is how much these things deserve to you.
Plans and Pricing
Get 3 months free when you sign up for WP Engine.
With a WP Engine strategy, you are normally paying for performance & not having to think excessive about maintenance, security & speed. If you look at WP Engine’s prices based on the functions you’re getting- you really do not get a great deal.
And if you are the type who will think about your site’s health anyway (ie, keeping WordPress upgraded and usually visiting frequently), you’ll likely be paying for “management” that is unnecessary.
Lots of shared hosting servers can manage the same traffic numbers as WP Engine- and cost a portion of the rate. My personal site a shared hosting plan from HostGator with basic caching) handled more than 15,000+ gos to in a 24 hour duration when a post of mine And if you are running a reputable VPS, you can certainly manage a lot more for much less. The website you are on handles more than 110,000+ gos to per month with plenty of room left to spare for side-projects, gigabytes of media, e-mail, RSS apps, etc with an InMotion VPS. I spend for the VPS plus a CDN for less than WP Engine’s starter strategy.
They are fairly transparent about how they count sees, but it can still be rather a surprise for “small” site owners how quickly they can enter the $290 each month tier. I have a client who started with the Startup strategy, however rapidly ended up with a customized plan.
And as pointed out previously that does not even include a lot of the features you do not get with WP Engine’s plans. You can’t run any email from your servers. You have low limits on local media storage. Anything above the limits requires additional costs & technical application of Amazon cloud services.
And most notably for me- you are limited on your installs. If you have a few side projects or low-traffic test websites, you need to factor those into the price. You can’t utilize them to expand the cost of your plan- especially if you are hitting your visitor cap instead of your install cap.
If you are looking to spend for hosting- ie, a server that will hold & serve up your site files- WP Engine is a pricey option, specifically compared to other non-managed hosting choices.
Startup
The Startup plan is one of the most basic plan and will set you back $25 monthly. With this plan, you get:.
25,000 sees monthly.
50GB bandwidth monthly.
10GB storage.
One site included.
WP Engine targets small sites and blogs with this plan, but we think it may be overkill for the majority of people in this category. You can get a far much better handle shared hosting at Bluehost However, if you don’t want to take any possibilities with uptime or need a warranty that your site can manage 25,000 visitors per month, WP Engine is a certainty. We ‘d advise this choice to small companies, affiliate sites, and blogs making great money and desire assurances that absolutely nothing will change.
You can conserve $60 annually or more months free if you pay annually.
Growth
The growth plan targets growing organizations and will cost you $95 each month. Here you get:.
100,000 gos to each month.
200GB bandwidth monthly.
25GB storage.
Ten sites included a while.
This strategy is an excellent entry point for a growing service, and it might be a while before you require to update. With this strategy, you likewise get 24/7 phone assistance in addition to round-the-clock chat assistance. This addition will come in helpful if you have a complicated problem that you need to solve rapidly.
You can conserve a cool $230 or 2 months totally free with annual billing.
Scale
WP Engine advertises its scale strategy as the very best value choice. This one expenses $241 monthly. Here you get:.
400,000 gos to per month.
500GB bandwidth per month.
50GB storage.
30 sites included.
We suggest this option for a fast-growing blog site or company. You get access to 24/7 live chat and 24/7 phone assistance in addition to the support.
You can save $580 or two months complimentary with annual pre-paid billing.
Customized
Finally, if you have a mission-critical site or big organization, the Custom plan might be appealing. With this plan, you get:.
Millions of visits each month.
400GB+ bandwidth each month.
100GB-1TB storage.
30 websites consisted of.
You will have to speak with a sales associate to get your customized quote depending on your requirements. This plan also provides exclusive assistance should something fail.
Migrate WordPress websites in just a few clicks.
Strong Uptime
WP Engine accomplishes over 99% uptime thanks to its first-rate network facilities.
The company also has 3 information centers in London, Tokyo, and Midwest USA.
As a result, you can improve site speeds by picking to host your website on servers that are closest to your target audience.
WP Engine blocks destructive attacks on your website.
Speed & Performance
There are a lot of variables that go into site speed, but the guideline is that the more intricate your site is, the more intricate the options to speed become.
Out of package- WordPress is fairly lean and quick. If you are running a mainly text site with a few standard plugins and a few little images, you’ll be great with an inexpensive shared hosting plan from somebody like InMotion HostGator Bluehost But couple of site owners keep their WordPress install lean. There’s typically extra plugins, custom-made theme files, great deals of images, widgets, advertisements, types and more.
All these features integrated with good levels of traffic can begin to slow down your WordPress setup.
A slow website does not mean that you require a bigger, better server. It does suggest that you need to get smarter about speed. Often it’s as basic as getting a more effective server, however in some cases it’s more about caching particular resources in a particular order and optimizing your files. To put it simply- it gets complex.
Picture you are attempting to carry a trailer with a pickup truck. Picture your trailer keeps getting much heavier. It’s pointless to keep complaining that your truck is not big enough when you might just require to eliminate the emergency brake, set up a turbocharger, refresh the transmission fluid and consolidate your load.
The point is that WordPress needs assistance to remain quick as you grow. There are plenty of solutions … but either you or a developer should execute them.
That’s where managed WordPress hosting is available in. WP Engine takes care of (almost) all speed concerns. They have personalized servers with very aggressive caching and a lot more advanced “stack” than a common webhosting. They also have actually trained assistance who will go into your WordPress set up and recognize the exact chokepoint to get your website moving.
They do not even enable caching plugins on their installs due to the fact that they have actually such a tailored caching setup.
The intriguing thing is that even unoptimized WordPress installs still do well on their platform since their platform does the additional work.
Here’s the speed test for among my customers on WP Engine (who has a puffed up theme, additional scripts, too many uncompressed images, among other things)- Note the Time To First Byte and the Start Render numbers. That measures how quickly the server returned enough data to begin packing the page.
It’s great to have that sort of speed right out of the box- and have it remain that way no matter how huge or complicated the website gets.
* Note that the other point here is that if you are consumed about speed, you can get even better numbers with WP Engine than you may get with other services considering that you are totally free to concentrate on speed elements that you can quickly control like image compression, use of scripts, and so on
. The last observation on speed- WP Engine not just provides an incorporated CDN, however they likewise offer worldwide data centers in case your audience is primarily in Asia and/or Europe.
If you are attempting to get top speeds without tinkering layered caching plugins- the WP Engine does precisely that. And since they operate on Google Cloud, you don’t have to worry about uptime either.
CDN Included
All strategies consist of an international CDN (material delivery network).
The CDN will assist your site load fast for customers all over the world by serving it to them from the network node that’s geographically closest to them.
Security and Backups
An approximated 78% of hacked sites are WordPress websites, according to Sucuri, a web security company. Frequently the “open doors” are plugins that weren’t upgraded.
Securing websites is one of the strengths of WP Engine’s managed WordPress hosting service.
The business takes numerous measures to safeguard WordPress websites:.
WP Engine runs everyday malware/virus scans in partnership with Sucuri.
They keep track of an updated firewall to obstruct the latest dangers.
All websites are backed up daily.
You get a one-click bring back function that can assist you recuperate your site in case of an attack.
The WP Engine site supplies a guide on “Tips to Protect Your WordPress Site From Being Hacked.”.
You’ll have access to 24/7/365 technical support for any concerns concerning security.
They offer webinars on security.
They release security standards and checklists for developers and engineers.
If your website gets hacked, WPE will clean it totally free.
Online Resources
WP Engine supplies webinars, guides, post, updates, tutorials, and a knowledgebase. With these you can find out how to:.
Introduce your very first website.
Troubleshoot common issues.
Make improvements to your website.
Manage your hosting account with greater performance.
Both novices and knowledgeable WordPress website owners will discover the assistance paperwork important.
WP Engine’s 60-Day Guarantee
WP Engine’s 60-day money-back guarantee on all subscription charges is distinct in the hosting market.
It enables you to check out the service in a safe method.
Note: this option is not available on custom-made hosting strategies.
Is WP Engine Worth It?
Like any service, it’s not about what is best overall, however what is finest for you based upon your goals, spending plan, resources & practices.
If you are in what I consider WP Engine’s core markets- they provide a great service with a strong product. As a handled WordPress host, their pricing is competitive. They use more features than “WordPress hosting” plans from other hosting brand names. Their feature-set is unequaled for smart DIYers, WordPress site designers and/or high-traffic websites that do not wish to worry about hosting problems.
If handled hosting is a fit for you- then go check out WP Engine’s strategies here View Current Plans They do a 60-day money-back assurance. So do a test install and see what you think about their backend. Be sure to chat w/ assistance & sales.
Get 3 months free when you sign up for WP Engine.