There are lots of low-cost hosts available that provide a decent service. WPEngine WordPress Hosting
What if you’re looking for more of a performance-oriented, concierge service? Because case, you’ll wish to check out our WP Engine review for WordPress.
WP Engine is a WordPress-specific webhosting, providing handled plans that are totally enhanced for the platform. Of course, when compared to many other WordPress hosts, WP Engine’s strategies aren’t exactly cheap. Therefore, you’ll want to know whether this hosting service is worth the cost prior to buying.
To help you out, we’re going to conduct a comprehensive WP Engine review for WordPress. We’ll discuss its essential features, support alternatives, efficiency capabilities, and everything else you’ll need to understand. Let’s get started!
WP Engine Video Review
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4oklmdvSL7s
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About WP Engine
Founded in 2010, WP Engine is now among the leading handled 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 multiple awards for Best Place to Work in Austin and regularly adds to the WordPress core and neighborhood.
WP Engine Features
The core factors to choose WP Engine over less expensive WordPress hosting are increased dependability, efficiency, support, and management, but these are hard to measure. Some functions stick out when you browse the user interface, however, that can provide you some insight into the service provided.
WP Engine Page Performance is a cool tool created to help you speed up your WordPress website by providing meaningful metrics on efficiency.
Running a test returns you a page-performance report that information how rapidly your page rendered, the length of time it took to fill in its totality, and the overall size of the page. It even includes historic information on your site’s efficiency over the past six months and suggestions on how you can lower page load.
You can establish your WordPress site 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 before it goes live. This is called Staging, and it permits your developers to make extensive changes to your website without impacting your customers.
WP Engine has a thorough list of plugins that are prohibited (Image credit: WP Engine) In a fairly unusual relocation, WP Engine limits the WordPress plugins you can set up. Those normally restricted are plugins that have actually been noted to cause efficiency issues and security holes. For important functions such as caching, backups, and search engine optimization tools, WP Engine has made options offered that don’t put a high load on the server.
WP Engine Hosting Plans
WP Engine just offers handled WordPress hosting. There are five different strategies available: Startup, Growth, Scale, and Custom.
All strategies consist of unlimited information transfer. The plans vary based upon:
- number of WordPress sets up
- traffic volume (# of visits per month)
- disk storage amount
- Custom strategy consists of dedicated dev. environments, client success, and priority support
WP Engine consists of some special features for WordPress users that the majority of hosts don’t offer, or charge additional for. These unique features include:.
- Git version control
- Staging: immediately produce a copy of your website for screening
- Easy transferable installs from complimentary to paid accounts
- Innovative innovations consisting of most current PHP variation.
In our WP Engine evaluation, we discovered that WP Engine uses the most advanced and extensive handled WordPress hosting features.
Get 3 months free when you sign up for WP Engine.
Interface and in use
WP Engine’s interface is professional and well set out, however the powerful features may mean a high knowing curve for unskilled users. If you have an understanding of terms like Git, CNAME, and reroute rules, you’ll be right at home here, but otherwise you’ll need to spend a long time on the support website.
In our testing, the default WordPress home page loaded in simply over 2 seconds. This is among the fastest reactions we’ve checked, with competitor Liquid Web just slightly behind.
Support
A handled WordPress service should offer additional value through its support, and WP Engine delivers. The support website consists of videos and articles of a quality you ‘d get out of a paid training course, with assistance on much deeper WordPress functionality that numerous WordPress hosts do not enter into.
There’s 24/7 live chat support and a ticket system, too. In our screening, the action fasted and the representative experienced. For all plans except for single-site strategies, there’s telephone assistance, too.
Pros
Exceptional Load Speed: If site filling speed is a leading concern, WP Engine succeeds in this regard. The host’s mix of custom-made NGINX extension, integrated Content Delivery Network (CDN), and SSD innovation guarantee that your web pages load quickly. NGINX extension focuses on human demands over robotic requests and uses load balancing, providing your visitors a better experience. For its part, CDN provides site content to your visitors based upon their location to increase your site’s speed and reduce latency. You get this capability free of charge with all WP Engine plans.
High Performance: It’s hard to beat WP Engine’s efficiency, which is why people continue to pay a premium rate for this service. WP Engine ensures 99.95% server uptime, roughly four and a half hours of downtime a year. You can even more increase your uptime to 99.99% with improved SLA, which equates to a little under an hour of downtime annually. WP Engine will compensate you with hosting credit if your uptime falls below the guarantee.
Advanced Security: WP Engine keeps an eye on all the traffic going to your site and automatically identifies and blocks possible attacks. In addition, the hosting service immediately updates and patches the WordPress core to remove prospective vulnerabilities. In a worst-case scenario, WP Engine instantly backups your website every day and has a one-click repair feature to get you back up and running rapidly. Finally, this hosting service safeguards your site versus JavaScript/SQL-injection attacks, strength attempts, and DDoS attacks.
Remarkable Customer Support: The hosting service has a transparent and trackable ticketing system to connect with consumer care through chat. The assistance group has an excellent knowledge base and can assist you resolve issues quickly. You get 24/7 phone support for all plans except the Growth Plan, in addition to 24/7 live chat support on all plans.
Useful Staging Environment: The staging area permits you to clone your site’s live variation and make changes or check brand-new plugins and styles. Anything you perform in the staging area does not impact your live site. This feature permits designers to work on websites without hindering the live website’s functionality or user experience.
Transferable Installs: Also targeting developers, this feature enables you to construct a website from your WP Engine account. You do not need to wait for the client to include you to their WordPress site. When finished, you can transfer the site to the customer or host the site on WP Engine. This performance saves time if you regularly construct 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 only works with WordPress. From a business viewpoint, it makes sense to concentrate on a single market and deal remarkable services because area. This design locks out numerous people 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 site host, you’ll require to look in other places. You’ll have to use third-party services for domain registration or e-mail accounts.
Inflexible Pricing: WP Engine runs a tight ship, and this is reflected in its prices structure. You will be penalized for surpassing your strategy’s visitor limitations. This may not be an issue if you have foreseeable traffic, and you can constantly update your strategy as your site grows. Considerable spikes in traffic throughout item launches or seasonal organization can cost you considerable overage charges.
There is no other way to put it: WP Engine is expensive. Is it worth the expense? The response depends on finding out what you are spending for.
You can get shared hosting that can deal with the same quantity of traffic as WP Engine for a portion of the cost. You can even get dedicated hosting for the very same rate as WP Engine. What you are truly paying for here is security, efficiency, speed, and, most importantly, assurance. The ultimate question is just how much these things are worth 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 prices based upon the functions you’re getting- you truly do not get a lot.
And if you are the type who will think of your site’s health anyhow (ie, keeping WordPress upgraded and normally visiting often), you’ll likely be paying for “management” that is superfluous.
Many shared hosting servers can deal with the same traffic numbers as WP Engine- and cost a portion of the cost. My individual site a shared hosting strategy from HostGator with standard caching) managed more than 15,000+ visits in a 24 hour period when a post of mine And if you are running a trusted VPS, you can definitely handle a lot more for much less. The website you are on manages more than 110,000+ gos to per month with plenty of space left to spare for side-projects, gigabytes of media, e-mail, RSS apps, etc with an InMotion VPS. I pay for the VPS plus a CDN for less than WP Engine’s starter strategy.
They are fairly transparent about how they count visits, however it can still be rather a surprise for “small” website owners how rapidly they can enter the $290 monthly tier. I have a customer who started with the Startup plan, however rapidly wound up with a custom strategy.
And as discussed earlier that doesn’t even include a number 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 regional media storage. Anything above the limits needs additional costs & technical execution of Amazon cloud services.
And most importantly for me- you are limited on your installs. If you have a few side projects or low-traffic test sites, you have to factor those into the rate. You can’t use them to expand the expense of your strategy- particularly if you are striking your visitor cap rather than your set up cap.
If you are wanting to pay for hosting- ie, a server that will hold & dish out your website files- WP Engine is an expensive choice, particularly compared to other non-managed hosting options.
Startup
The Startup plan is the most fundamental strategy and will set you back $25 monthly. With this plan, you get:.
25,000 gos to each month.
50GB bandwidth each month.
10GB storage.
One site included.
WP Engine targets little websites and blog sites with this strategy, however we think it may be overkill for many people in this classification. You can get a far better deal with shared hosting at Bluehost However, if you do not want to take any opportunities with uptime or require a guarantee that your site can handle 25,000 visitors per month, WP Engine is a sure thing. We ‘d advise this choice to small companies, affiliate sites, and blog sites making good cash and desire guarantees that absolutely nothing will alter.
You can conserve $60 annually or 2 months free if you pay every year.
Growth
The growth strategy targets growing services and will cost you $95 monthly. Here you get:.
100,000 gos to per month.
200GB bandwidth each month.
25GB storage.
Ten websites included a while.
This plan is a fantastic entry point for a growing business, and it might be a while prior to you need to upgrade. With this strategy, you likewise get 24/7 phone support in addition to round-the-clock chat assistance. This addition will can be found in handy if you have a complicated concern that you need to deal with rapidly.
You can conserve a cool $230 or two months complimentary with yearly billing.
Scale
WP Engine advertises its scale plan as the very best value alternative. This one costs $241 each month. Here you get:.
400,000 visits each month.
500GB bandwidth each month.
50GB storage.
30 websites included.
We suggest this choice for a fast-growing blog site or organization. You get access to 24/7 live chat and 24/7 phone assistance in addition to the support center.
You can save $580 or more months complimentary with annual pre-paid billing.
Customized
Lastly, if you have a mission-critical site or large organization, the Custom plan may be appealing. With this strategy, you get:.
Millions of check outs monthly.
400GB+ bandwidth each month.
100GB-1TB storage.
30 websites included.
You will need to speak with a sales associate to get your tailored quote depending upon your requirements. This plan likewise uses exclusive assistance must something go wrong.
Migrate WordPress websites in just a few clicks.
Strong Uptime
WP Engine achieves over 99% uptime thanks to its first-rate network infrastructure.
The company also has three information centers in London, Tokyo, and Midwest USA.
As a result, you can get better website speeds by choosing to host your site on servers that are closest to your target market.
WP Engine blocks harmful attacks on your site.
Speed & Performance
There are a lot of variables that go into site speed, but the rule of thumb is that the more intricate your site is, the more intricate the options to speed ended up being.
Out of package- WordPress is fairly lean and quick. If you are running a primarily text site with a few fundamental plugins and a couple of small images, you’ll be fine with an economical shared hosting strategy from someone like InMotion HostGator Bluehost But couple of site owners keep their WordPress set up lean. There’s normally additional plugins, custom style files, lots of images, widgets, advertisements, forms and more.
All these functions integrated with decent levels of traffic can start to slow down your WordPress setup.
A sluggish website doesn’t mean that you require a larger, much better server. It does suggest that you need to get smarter about speed. In some cases it’s as easy as getting a more effective server, however often it’s more about caching particular resources in a specific order and optimizing your files. Simply put- it gets complex.
Picture you are trying to haul a trailer with a pickup. Picture your trailer keeps getting much heavier. It’s pointless to keep grumbling that your truck is not big enough when you may simply need to get rid of the emergency brake, set up a turbocharger, revitalize the transmission fluid and combine your load.
The point is that WordPress needs help to remain fast as you grow. There are plenty of solutions … however either you or a designer should implement them.
That’s where managed WordPress hosting comes in. WP Engine looks after (nearly) all speed issues. They have actually personalized servers with very aggressive caching and much more sophisticated “stack” than a typical webhosting. They also have trained assistance who will go into your WordPress install and determine the precise chokepoint to get your website moving.
They don’t even enable caching plugins on their installs since they have such a customized caching setup.
The intriguing thing is that even unoptimized WordPress installs still succeed on their platform since their platform does the additional work.
Here’s the speed test for among my clients on WP Engine (who has a puffed up theme, extra scripts, a lot of uncompressed images, among other things)- Note the Time To First Byte and the Start Render numbers. That measures how quickly the server returned enough information to begin filling the page.
It’s great to have that sort of speed right out of package- and have it remain that way no matter how big or complicated the website gets.
* Note that the other point here is that if you are obsessed about speed, you can get even better numbers with WP Engine than you might get with other services because you are complimentary to focus on speed elements that you can easily control like image compression, usage of scripts, etc
. The last observation on speed- WP Engine not just supplies an incorporated CDN, but they likewise supply global data centers in case your audience is mainly in Asia and/or Europe.
If you are trying to get top speeds without messing with layered caching plugins- the WP Engine does exactly that. And because they run on Google Cloud, you don’t need to fret about uptime either.
CDN Included
All strategies include an international CDN (material shipment network).
The CDN will assist your site load fast for consumers worldwide by serving it to them from the network node that’s geographically closest to them.
Security and Backups
An estimated 78% of hacked sites are WordPress sites, according to Sucuri, a web security company. Regularly the “open doors” are plugins that weren’t updated.
Securing sites is one of the fortes of WP Engine’s managed WordPress hosting service.
The business takes numerous procedures to safeguard WordPress websites:.
WP Engine runs everyday malware/virus scans in collaboration with Sucuri.
They monitor an upgraded firewall to obstruct the latest threats.
All sites are supported daily.
You get a one-click restore function that can assist you recuperate your site in case of an attack.
The WP Engine website provides 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 lists for developers and engineers.
If your website gets hacked, WPE will clean it free of charge.
Online Resources
WP Engine supplies webinars, guides, article, updates, tutorials, and a knowledgebase. With these you can learn how to:.
Release your first website.
Troubleshoot typical issues.
Make improvements to your site.
Manage your hosting account with greater performance.
Both beginners and knowledgeable WordPress website owners will discover the support documentation important.
WP Engine’s 60-Day Guarantee
WP Engine’s 60-day money-back guarantee on all subscription fees is unique in the hosting market.
It enables you to check out the service in a risk-free method.
Keep in mind: this alternative is not offered on custom-made hosting plans.
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, budget plan, resources & routines.
If you remain in what I consider WP Engine’s core markets- they provide an excellent service with a solid product. As a handled WordPress host, their pricing is competitive. They offer more features than “WordPress hosting” strategies from other hosting brands. Their feature-set is unrivaled for smart DIYers, WordPress website developers and/or high-traffic sites that do not want to stress over hosting concerns.
If handled hosting is a suitable for you- then go take a look at WP Engine’s strategies here View Current Plans They do a 60-day money-back assurance. Do a test set up and see what you believe of their backend. Be sure to talk w/ support & sales.
Get 3 months free when you sign up for WP Engine.