There are a lot of cheap hosts offered that supply a decent service. WPEngine Waf
However, what if you’re looking for more of a performance-oriented, concierge service? Because case, you’ll wish to have a look at our WP Engine review for WordPress.
WP Engine is a WordPress-specific webhosting, using handled plans that are fully optimized for the platform. Naturally, when compared to numerous other WordPress hosts, WP Engine’s plans aren’t exactly inexpensive. You’ll want to know whether this hosting service is worth the expense prior to making a purchase.
To assist you out, we’re going to conduct an extensive WP Engine review for WordPress. We’ll discuss its crucial features, assistance choices, performance capabilities, and whatever else you’ll require to understand. Let’s get going!
WP Engine Video Review
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About WP Engine
Founded in 2010, WP Engine is now among the leading managed WordPress hosting companies in the market. Serial business owner Jason Cohen began WP Engine when he saw a requirement for specialized WordPress hosting due to the increasing popularity of WordPress.
WP Engine is Headquartered in Austin, Texas with offices in San Antonio (Texas), London (England), Limerick (Ireland), Brisbane (Australia), and Kraków (Poland).
The business has actually won numerous 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 reliability, performance, assistance, and management, however these are hard to measure. Some features stick out when you search the interface, nevertheless, that can offer you some insight into the service offered.
WP Engine Page Performance is a neat tool created to help you speed up your WordPress site by providing meaningful metrics on efficiency.
Running a test returns you a page-performance report that information how quickly your page rendered, the length of time it took to fill in its entirety, and the total size of the page. It even includes historical data on your site’s efficiency over the past six months and suggestions on how you can decrease page load.
You can develop your WordPress site in a Staging or Development environment prior to making the modifications live (Image credit: WP Engine) Avoid humiliating mistakes on your site by making changes to a copy of your website before it goes live. This is called Staging, and it allows your designers to make substantial modifications to your website without impacting your customers.
WP Engine has a comprehensive list of plugins that are disallowed (Image credit: WP Engine) In a relatively unusual relocation, WP Engine restricts the WordPress plugins you can install. Those generally limited are plugins that have been noted to cause efficiency issues and security holes. For crucial functions such as caching, backups, and search engine optimization tools, WP Engine has made options readily available that do not put a high load on the server.
WP Engine Hosting Plans
WP Engine just uses handled WordPress hosting. There are 5 different plans available: Startup, Growth, Scale, and Custom.
All strategies include unlimited data transfer. The strategies differ based on:
- number of WordPress installs
- traffic volume (# of visits per month)
- disk storage amount
- Custom strategy consists of dedicated dev. environments, consumer success, and priority support
WP Engine consists of some unique functions for WordPress users that many hosts don’t use, or charge additional for. These special functions consist of:.
- Git version control
- Staging: instantly create a copy of your site for screening
- Easy transferable installs from totally free to paid accounts
- Leading edge innovations consisting of most current PHP variation.
In our WP Engine review, we found that WP Engine provides the most sophisticated and comprehensive handled WordPress hosting functions.
Get 3 months free when you sign up for WP Engine.
User interface and in use
WP Engine’s user interface is expert and well set out, but the effective functions may mean a steep knowing curve for inexperienced users. If you have an understanding of terms like Git, CNAME, and redirect guidelines, you’ll be right at home here, but otherwise you’ll need to invest a long time on the support website.
In our testing, the default WordPress home page loaded in just over two seconds. This is one of the fastest actions we’ve tested, with rival Liquid Web only slightly behind.
Assistance
A managed WordPress service ought to use extra worth through its support, and WP Engine provides. The support site consists of videos and articles of a quality you ‘d expect from a paid training course, with assistance on deeper WordPress performance that numerous WordPress hosts do not go into.
There’s 24/7 live chat assistance and a ticket system, too. In our testing, the response was quick and the representative knowledgeable. For all strategies except for single-site plans, there’s telephone support, too.
Pros
Exceptional Load Speed: If site packing speed is a leading concern, WP Engine succeeds in this regard. The host’s combination of customized NGINX extension, built-in Content Delivery Network (CDN), and SSD innovation make sure that your web pages load rapidly. NGINX extension focuses on human requests over robot demands and uses load balancing, providing your visitors a much better experience. For its part, CDN delivers site content to your visitors based on their area to increase your website’s speed and minimize latency. You get this ability free of charge with all WP Engine plans.
High Performance: It’s difficult to beat WP Engine’s performance, 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 further increase your uptime to 99.99% with improved SLA, which translates 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 an eye on all the traffic going to your website and immediately spots and obstructs possible attacks. Additionally, the hosting service instantly updates and patches the WordPress core to remove potential vulnerabilities. In a worst-case circumstance, WP Engine automatically backups your site every day and has a one-click restoration feature to get you support and running rapidly. Finally, this hosting service safeguards your website against JavaScript/SQL-injection attacks, strength efforts, and DDoS attacks.
Incredible Customer Support: The hosting service has a transparent and trackable ticketing system to get in touch with consumer care by means of chat. The support group has an outstanding knowledge base and can assist you solve problems rapidly. You get 24/7 phone support for all plans other than the Growth Plan, in addition to 24/7 live chat assistance on all plans.
Useful Staging Environment: The staging area enables you to clone your site’s live version and make changes or check new plugins and styles. Anything you carry out in the staging area does not impact your live site. This feature permits designers to work on websites without disrupting the live website’s functionality or user experience.
Transferable Installs: Also targeting designers, this function permits you to construct a website from your WP Engine account. You don’t have to wait for the customer to include you to their WordPress website. When completed, you can transfer the site to the client or host the site on WP Engine. This functionality conserves time if you regularly develop sites for customers.
Cons
WordPress-Only Hosting: If you are utilizing any other content management system aside from WordPress, then you run out luck. WP Engine only deals with WordPress. From a company point of view, it makes sense to concentrate on a single market and deal exceptional services because area. This design locks out numerous individuals who could otherwise benefit from WP Engine’s services.
No Domains or Email Hosting: If you choose to host your e-mail account and register your domain through your website host, you’ll require to look elsewhere. You’ll have to utilize third-party services for domain registration or email accounts.
Inflexible Pricing: WP Engine runs a tight ship, and this is reflected in its rates structure. You will be punished for exceeding your strategy’s visitor limitations. This might not be a problem if you have foreseeable traffic, and you can always update your plan as your site grows. Nevertheless, considerable spikes in traffic during item launches or seasonal company can cost you considerable overage charges.
There is no other method to put it: WP Engine is costly. Is it worth the cost? The response lies in determining what you are paying for.
You can get shared hosting that can deal with the same quantity of traffic as WP Engine for a portion of the price. You can even get devoted hosting for the very same price as WP Engine. What you are really paying for here is security, efficiency, speed, and, most significantly, comfort. The ultimate 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 generally spending for efficiency & not having to think too much about maintenance, security & speed. If you take a look at WP Engine’s rates based upon the functions you’re getting- you really don’t get a lot.
And if you are the type who will think of your website’s health anyway (ie, keeping WordPress updated and normally visiting regularly), you’ll likely be paying for “management” that is unnecessary.
Many shared hosting servers can deal with the very same traffic numbers as WP Engine- and cost a fraction of the cost. My individual site a shared hosting plan from HostGator with standard caching) handled more than 15,000+ check outs in a 24 hour duration when a post of mine And if you are running a dependable VPS, you can definitely deal with a lot more for much less. The site you are on manages more than 110,000+ sees per month with plenty of space left to spare for side-projects, gigabytes of media, email, RSS apps, etc with an InMotion VPS. I spend for the VPS plus a CDN for less than WP Engine’s starter plan.
They are relatively transparent about how they count check outs, but it can still be rather a surprise for “small” site owners how rapidly they can enter the $290 monthly tier. I have a client who started with the Startup strategy, but quickly wound up with a custom plan.
And as mentioned earlier that doesn’t even include a lot of the features you do not get with WP Engine’s strategies. You can’t run any e-mail from your servers. You have low limits on regional media storage. Anything above the limits needs extra expenses & technical execution of Amazon cloud services.
And most notably for me- you are limited on your installs. If you have a couple of side projects or low-traffic test websites, you have to factor those into the rate. You can’t utilize them to expand the expense of your plan- specifically if you are hitting your visitor cap rather than your set up cap.
If you are aiming to spend for hosting- ie, a server that will hold & provide your website files- WP Engine is an expensive option, specifically compared to other non-managed hosting options.
Startup
The Startup bundle is one of the most fundamental strategy and will set you back $25 per month. With this package, you get:.
25,000 check outs each month.
50GB bandwidth each month.
10GB storage.
One website consisted of.
WP Engine targets little sites and blog sites with this plan, but we think it may be overkill for many people in this category. You can get a far much better deal with shared hosting at Bluehost However, if you do not wish to take any possibilities with uptime or need a guarantee that your site can deal with 25,000 visitors per month, WP Engine is a sure bet. We ‘d recommend this option to small businesses, affiliate websites, and blogs making great money and desire guarantees that nothing will alter.
You can conserve $60 each year or more months complimentary if you pay annually.
Growth
The development strategy targets growing organizations and will cost you $95 monthly. Here you get:.
100,000 check outs each month.
200GB bandwidth each month.
25GB storage.
10 sites consisted of a while.
This plan is a terrific entry point for a growing organization, and it might be a while before you require to upgrade. With this strategy, you also get 24/7 phone assistance in addition to round-the-clock chat support. This addition will be available in helpful if you have a complicated issue that you need to fix rapidly.
You can conserve a cool $230 or two months totally free with annual billing.
Scale
WP Engine markets its scale strategy as the very best value option. This one expenses $241 per month. Here you get:.
400,000 sees each month.
500GB bandwidth each month.
50GB storage.
30 sites included.
We suggest this option for a fast-growing blog site or business. You get access to 24/7 live chat and 24/7 phone assistance in addition to the assistance.
You can conserve $580 or two months complimentary with annual pre-paid billing.
Custom-made
If you have a mission-critical site or large company, the Custom plan might be appealing. With this plan, you get:.
Countless check outs each month.
400GB+ bandwidth per month.
100GB-1TB storage.
30 websites included.
You will have to speak to a sales rep to get your tailored quote depending upon your requirements. This strategy also offers exclusive assistance should something go wrong.
Migrate WordPress websites in just a few clicks.
Solid Uptime
WP Engine achieves over 99% uptime thanks to its first-rate network facilities.
The business likewise has 3 information centers in London, Tokyo, and Midwest USA.
As a result, you can get better site speeds by picking to host your site on servers that are closest to your target audience.
WP Engine blocks malicious attacks on your site.
Speed & Performance
There are a great deal of variables that enter into site speed, however the guideline is that the more complex your website is, the more complex the options to speed become.
Out of the box- WordPress is relatively lean and fast. If you are running a primarily text site with a couple of fundamental plugins and a few small images, you’ll be great with a budget friendly shared hosting plan from someone like InMotion HostGator Bluehost But few site owners keep their WordPress set up lean. There’s normally extra plugins, custom-made theme files, great deals of images, widgets, advertisements, forms and more.
All these features integrated with decent levels of traffic can start to slow down your WordPress setup.
However a slow website does not mean that you need a bigger, better server. It does imply that you need to get smarter about speed. Often it’s as basic as getting a more powerful server, but in some cases it’s more about caching specific resources in a specific order and enhancing your files. To put it simply- it gets complex.
Envision you are attempting to carry a trailer with a pickup. Envision your trailer keeps getting much heavier. It’s pointless to keep grumbling that your truck is not big enough when you might simply require to remove the emergency brake, set up a turbocharger, revitalize the transmission fluid and combine your load.
The point is that WordPress needs aid to stay quickly as you grow. There are lots of solutions … but either you or a designer must implement them.
That’s where managed WordPress hosting is available in. WP Engine takes care of (nearly) all speed concerns. They have customized servers with exceptionally aggressive caching and even more innovative “stack” than a common webhosting. They also have trained support who will go into your WordPress install and determine the specific chokepoint to get your website moving.
They don’t even allow caching plugins on their installs because they have such a personalized caching setup.
The intriguing thing is that even unoptimized WordPress sets up still succeed on their platform due to the fact that their platform does the extra work.
Here’s the speed test for among my clients on WP Engine (who has a puffed up theme, additional scripts, a lot of uncompressed images, to name a few things)- Note the Time To First Byte and the Start Render numbers. That determines how rapidly the server returned enough information to start packing the page.
It’s nice to have that kind of speed right out of the box- and have it remain that way no matter how huge or complex the website gets.
* Note that the other point here is that if you are obsessed about speed, you can get back at better numbers with WP Engine than you might get with other services because you are totally free to concentrate on speed factors that you can quickly manage like image compression, usage of scripts, etc
. The last observation on speed- WP Engine not just provides an incorporated CDN, however they likewise offer international information centers in case your audience is primarily in Asia and/or Europe.
If you are attempting to get top speeds without messing with layered caching plugins- the WP Engine does precisely that. And considering that they run on Google Cloud, you don’t have to stress over uptime either.
CDN Included
All plans consist of an international CDN (material delivery network).
The CDN will assist your website load quickly 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 websites are WordPress websites, according to Sucuri, a web security company. Regularly the “open doors” are plugins that weren’t upgraded.
Securing websites is among the strong suits of WP Engine’s managed WordPress hosting service.
The business takes several procedures to safeguard WordPress sites:.
WP Engine runs everyday malware/virus scans in collaboration with Sucuri.
They keep track of an updated firewall program to block the most recent risks.
All websites are supported daily.
You get a one-click restore function that can help you recuperate your site in case of an attack.
The WP Engine website offers a guide on “Tips to Protect Your WordPress Site From Being Hacked.”.
You’ll have access to 24/7/365 technical support for any questions regarding security.
They supply webinars on security.
They publish security guidelines and checklists for developers and engineers.
If your site gets hacked, WPE will clean it for free.
Online Resources
WP Engine provides webinars, guides, post, updates, tutorials, and a knowledgebase. With these you can learn how to:.
Release your first site.
Troubleshoot common issues.
Make improvements to your website.
Manage your hosting account with higher effectiveness.
Both beginners and knowledgeable WordPress site owners will find the support documentation vital.
WP Engine’s 60-Day Guarantee
WP Engine’s 60-day money-back assurance on all subscription costs is special in the hosting market.
It allows you to experiment with the service in a risk-free way.
Keep in mind: this choice is not available on custom hosting strategies.
Is WP Engine Worth It?
Like any service, it’s not about what is best overall, but what is finest for you based on your objectives, spending plan, resources & routines.
If you remain in what I think of as WP Engine’s core markets- they provide a great service with a strong item. As a handled WordPress host, their prices is competitive. They use more functions than “WordPress hosting” strategies from other hosting brand names. Their feature-set is unmatched for smart DIYers, WordPress website designers and/or high-traffic websites that don’t want to worry about hosting problems.
If managed hosting is a fit for you- then go take a look at WP Engine’s strategies here View Current Plans They do a 60-day money-back warranty. Do a test install and see what you believe of their backend. Make sure to chat w/ support & sales.
Get 3 months free when you sign up for WP Engine.