Imagine having a website that allows you to save money or get back the value for every amount you spend. WP Engine guarantees this, and I’m here to tell you how.
The world is fast evolving, and as a business owner or a web developer, you need a reliable hosting platform that will help you go with the flow.
WP Engine caters to all types of websites and is not shy to claim they have perfected WordPress hosting.
WP Engine also declares boldly that they can help businesses and individual websites to bring their online presence to life by providing exceptional services, such as remarkable support, best features, quality performance, and standard security.
This sounds like a big claim, and you might feel like ignoring it because you trusted other providers who said the same, and it didn’t turn out so great.
In fact, in all my years of working with websites, I’ve learned never to trust any hosting company blindly. So, I know that feeling.
From what I have learned about WP Engine, I can tell you that it is different from others, and it could be a great option if you’re a scalable brand.
Of course, no provider is perfect; they all have their upsides and downsides. In this guide, I will tell you everything you need about this hosting provider to enable you to decide if they are the right fit for your hosting needs.
About WP Engine
WP Engine was founded by Bullen Wilson, Ben Matcalfe, and Jason Cohen on March 1st, 2010. Their Co-founder, Aaron Brazell, was also very active in the WP developer community.
Together, they discovered many opportunities for WordPress users looking for better hosting experiences.
WP Engine was established in Austin, Texas. But they have other offices in London, San Francisco, Ireland, and Limerick.
WP Engine combines a team of WordPress experts with the best technologies to cater to multiple business websites across these countries by providing support and helping them create a perfect digital experience.
With WP Engine, those with WordPress websites can have more scalability, performance, integrations, and strength to showcase themselves online and succeed.
WP Engine’s Pros and Cons
As I mentioned before, no hosting provider is perfect. But, there is a suitable hosting solution for every business. Indeed, every business has its own unique needs, which is why hosting companies have evolved to give more capabilities, features, pros, and cons. Knowing about WP Engines will help you choose well before diving in.
Pros
Here are the good sides of WP Engine that you should know about:
- Impressive Load Speed: WP Engine combines SSD technology, built-in Content Delivery Network, and NGINX extension to improve your website load speed. While CDN offers site content to your website, visitors, depending on their location, the NGINX extension places human requests above robot requests and delivers load balancing. The best part is that WP Engine offers fast load speed for free across all its hosting plans.
- High Performance: WP Engine’s performance is worth bragging about. Many people purchase the premium package for this service because it’s simply the best. This hosting service offers an uptime rate of 99.99% with an optimized SLA. Also, if your uptime falls below the guaranteed rate, this hosting provider will compensate you with hosting credits.
- Advanced Security: WP Engine monitors your website traffic, ensures auto-detection, and blocks potential vulnerabilities. Besides, They automatically patch and update the WordPress core to get rid of potential attacks. WP Engine comes with a one-click restoration feature that ensures daily automatic backup of your website. To crown it all, this hosting service offers your website protection against DDoS attacks, brute force attempts, and JavaScript/SQL injection attacks.
- Remarkable Customer Support: WP Engine has an easy ticketing system that allows users to get in touch with customer care personnel via chat. The support team is knowledgeable, and they provide fast responses to all issues related to WP Engine. On all plans, they offer live chat support 24/7 and phone support for all plans excluding the Growth plan.
- Useful Staging Environment: WP Engine has staging areas allowing you to access your website in its live version. With this, making changes or testing new themes and plugins is easy. The changes you make in the staging area will not alter your live site. It also allows a developer to work on a website without disturbing the user’s experience or the live site’s functions.
- Transferable Installs: WP Engine has amazing features that allow you to build a website from your WordPress Engine account without waiting for your client to invite you to their WordPress website. After building your site, you can host it on WP Engine or transfer it to your client. This will save you time if you are always building websites for clients.
Cons
Here are the bad sides of WP Engine:
- WordPress-Only Hosting: You’ll be wasting your time if you are using any content management system that is not WordPress based. WP Engine works only with WordPress. In my business opinion, attending to just one market and delivering the best services in that area is sensible. But, this kind of system will hinder many people who could also enjoy the advantage of WP Engine service.
- No Domains or Email Hosting: WP Engine does not allow users to host their email account or register their domain through their website host. You will have to use other services for email accounts and domain registrations.
- Inflexible Pricing: Their plans show that WP Engine does not have flexible pricing. You will be penalized once you operate beyond your plan limit as a visitor. But, if you understand your website’s traffic, you can upgrade gradually as your website grows. However, this can be expensive.
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WP Engine’s Services
1. WordPress Hosting
WP Engine provides phenomenal WordPress Hosting services. They are a Content Management system that uses their platform to create and manage your website no matter the size.
Whether it is an eCommerce website, enterprise, or personal blog, this hosting allows you to build a functional and professional website easily. With so many websites built on this platform, it is a well-known content management system in the web hosting market.
What I like about WordPress hosting is that it gives you a space on a server to help showcase your website files online.
Another thing is that the WP Engine helps in delivering the best performance, speed, and top-tier security that your website needs.
So if you are aiming to optimize your WordPress website security and performance, investing in a managed WordPress service like WP Engine is worth everything.
Another fascinating thing about WP Engine WordPress is its limitless possibility, and Included in all plans are design and web-building tools, including WordPress themes, plugins, frameworks, and developer tools that enable faster and better build.
2. WooCommerce Hosting
Imagine having the most popular WordPress platform to sell anything you want online. I like this hosting because it comes with customization options and extensive features.
WP Engine WooCommerce plugins help users to build the professional online store they want. This hosting platform offers on-the-go-management, responsive support teams, and secured payment options.
You can build a WP Engine’s WooCommerce online store from scratch, or if you already have a WordPress website, you can add WooCommerce plugins to it in only a few clicks.
This impressive tool allows you to convert any WordPress website into a working eCommerce business without needing long-term technical expertise.
One Unique thing about Woocommerce is that since it is already popular with WordPress websites or store owners, WP Engine and other hosting providers now focus on the needs of this demographic by allowing them to get WooCommerce-specific hostings.
If you choose WP Engine’s WooCommerce hosting plan, you can publish your eCommerce website in record time. This is because WP Engine will help you design installation and setup.
I like WooCommerce hosting plans, as they come with the best features, including simplified store maintenance, high-performance carts, search tools for your products, and more.
WP Engine Plans and Pricing
WP Engine has different packages that suit the needs of anyone opting for WordPress or WooCommerce hosting platforms. The plans are available for all sizes of businesses, so it doesn’t matter if you are a starter or you’ve been in business for a long time. Let’s jump into the different plans and prices offered by WP Engine:
1. WordPress Hosting
WP Engine offers various WordPress plans that make them different from other content management services. Here are their specific details and prices.
- Startup ($20 per month): This hosting plan is great for beginners, and it offers 1 website, 25,000 site traffic, 10 GB local storage, and 50 GB bandwidth.
- Professional ($40 per month): If you want to step up a little more, this plan is for you. It offers 3 websites, 75,000 site traffic, 15 GB of storage, and 125 GB of bandwidth.
- Growth ($77 per month): The growth plan allows you to attach to 10 websites and is available to 100,000 site visitors. It offers 20 GB storage and 200 GB bandwidth.
- Scale ( $194 per month): This top tier allows 400,000 visitors to visit your website, and you can attach 30 websites. It also offers 50 GB storage and 500 GB bandwidth.
2. Commerce Hosting
WP Engine’s hosting offers four different WooCommerce plans, which are:
- Startup ($24 per month): The startup plan offers 1 website, 25,000 visits, 10 GB storage, 50 GB bandwidth, and free SSL
- Professional ($50 per month): This plan offers 3 websites, 75,000 visits, 15 GB storage, 125 GB bandwidth, free SSL certificate.
- Growth ($94 per month): The growth plan offers 10 websites, free SSL, 100,000 visits, 200 GB bandwidth, and 20 GB storage.
- Scale ($234 per month): This offers a free SSL certificate, 30 websites, 400,000 visits, 50 GB storage, and 500 GB bandwidth.
WP Engine’s Performance
WP Engine delivers fast and stable servers to users. Every time a speed test was carried out on this hosting service, it resulted in an uptime rate of 99.99%.
When it comes to the best hosting providers, I always base my recommendations on their impressive speed. WP Engine did not disappoint me; I rather find this hosting phenomenal.
It has a better and faster page load speed than many other hosting companies.
In the hosting field, uptime rate is critical because if it is poor, your website will experience a lot of downtimes.
Clients hate it when the site is down; they can leave and never return. But with an excellent uptime rate, your clients can load the page quickly and access your products and services whenever they want.
WP Engine claims to be faster than most hosting services because they manage their speed with EverCache, which is an optimized caching system designed by WP Engine for their hosted websites.
WP Engine’s Support
Aside from their exceptional performance, another area I like so much about WP Engine is their outstanding support system.
While some web hosting providers infuse third-party support, which usually stresses out customers, WP Engine hires their support team.
WP Engine’s support team is knowledgeable about all WP technical problems, so they will surely know how to solve your WordPress hosting issues.
Also, you can reach them at any time, as they are available 24/7.
You can choose from different support channels, and they are all responsive. They include:
- Live chat
- Phone (excluding the lowest plans
- Video (including guides and tutorials on solving common WP hosting problems.
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WP Engine’s Features
1. Money-Back Guarantee and Monthly Billing
The money-back guarantee is one functionality that many customers look forward to. As expected, WP Engine offers you a 60-day money-back guarantee if you are a new customer, and this refund applies to hosting services alone.
Also, as a customer, WP Engine will not force you into any long-term contracts. Rather, they offer monthly plans allowing you to opt out every month.
2. Easy and Automatic Backups
WP Engine has an excellent feature that is designed to ensure automatic data backup.
You know how it feels when you lose so much revenue after experiencing data loss due to attacks or server downtimes. With WP Engine’s automatic backup feature – Snapshot, you won’t face data loss issues anymore.
The provider uses this developed and solid backup system to help you to back up your information daily. It will take you only a few clicks to create your snapshot. But WP Engine helps you do this once a day. With it, you can restore your website to how you want it to be.
3. WP Engine Local Advancement Features
WP Engine offers a complete featured environment, allowing developers to experience more flexibility and freedom. Even though this is established in a local space, you still have access to the best debugging tools, such as WP-CLI, MailHog, and Xdebug.
Besides, WP Engine offers a one-click WordPress installation that allows you to build a local WordPress site in one click. Also, you can operate in any environment of your choice, including PHP 7.3, MySQL, PHP 5.6, and Hot-Swap.
4. Staging Features
The staging version of any website allows users to test the changes they have made. So, WP Engine offers staging features that allow you to design three versions of your WP site quickly. Once your website looks as perfect as you want it to be, you can further push it to the Live version for the public to see.
5. Website Site Migration:
Website Migration can sometimes get frustrating, so WP Engine makes it easy for you. You can access Automated Migration Plugin through their automated migration plan and have a seamless WP site migration.
6. Improved Security Features
There are many things to like about WP Engine, and one of the multiple features that stand out the most is the premium security they offer. They offer a WordPress core that is automatically upgraded to the latest version.
WP Engine runs tests on customers’ core updates carefully before ensuring their upgrade.
They also have an exclusive detection tool and prevention system that hinders DDoS attacks, malware, brute force attacks, and JavaScript/SQL injection attacks. If your WP website encounters security threats, WP Engine fixes it for free.
7. Free SSL Certificates
WP Engine offers Let’s Encrypt SSL certificates in all its hosting packages. This is often a plus for most websites. But, if you have many subdomains and require better security, there are many more options you can avail of.
Expert Review: Do We Recommend It?
After thoroughly analyzing WP Engine’s services, features, support and plans, and performance, It has become easier to share our honest thoughts. As one of the best web hosting solutions we’ve reviewed, we confidently recommend this hosting service.
WP Engine has the standard to help you host your WordPress website without hassle.
It offers potent and valuable WP hosting options that come with accessible customer support, flexible packages, and the best uptime guarantee that solves the needs of developers and business owners.
If you have WordPress-based issues, you can consider this hosting to bail you out. With WP Engine, your website is completely hacker-proof, thanks to their top-tier security options.
They offer daily backups,one-click staging environments, one-click restore points, automatic caching, and more.
If you are an individual or an organization in the web hosting space who does not want to face the technical downsides of running a successful blog, then we recommend WP Engine as a reliable service for you.
Who is WP Engine Best For?
WP Engine is best for people who want their website assisted by a managed hosting provider because they don’t have time to do it alone.
Since WordPress is a managed hosting service, this makes it a suitable option for such individuals.
WP Engine also caters to those who have an interest in the technical aspects of web hosting but do not want to do the main work.
If factors like backup, site performance, migrations, security, optimization, and flexibility are too tedious for you to handle, then WP Engine is best for you.
It is also the best hosting service for expert WordPress developers. It allows them to design a professional website from scratch or modify an existing WP website. This hosting service is specifically best for the following sets:
- WordPress websites that depend only on online sales
- Medium to large-scale publishers
- Professional developers and web designers
- Fast-scaling startups
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Frequently Asked Questions
Is WP Engine a shared hosting solution?
No, WP Engine is not a shared hosting solution, and they do not have the same services or hosting packages. WP Engine is a managed WordPress hosting service that offers hosting solutions to only WordPress sites.
Is WP Engine worth investing in?
Yes, WP Engine is worth investing in. If your business has grown beyond the limitations of VPS and shared hosting plans. Then you need a scalable upgrade like WP Engine. With this hosting, you can have better growth and manage security and updates easily.
Which WP Engine hosting plan is suitable for me?
WP Engine’s plans are suitable depending on the websites. For a single website, you need to sign up for WP Engine’s Startup plans. However, if you experience more traffic to your website or manage multiple sites, you should go with Scale or Growth plans.
What is managed WordPress hosting?
Managed WordPress hosting is like the custodian service for your WordPress website. WordPress is a website builder and a solid content management system. A managed hosting provider offers advanced services and handles backups, security, caching, updates, and more. This gives you time to focus on growing your business.
Can I cancel WP Engine hosting and get a refund?
Yes, You can cancel your WP Engine hosting service from your user dashboard whenever you want. Also, WP Engine hosting offers a 60-day money-back guarantee.
Conclusion
When it comes to WordPress-specific hosting, WP Engine is a powerful host that delivers professional-level security, support, and performance. It is the best option for web developers and businesses with WordPress hosting needs. That aside, WP Engine has expensive packages, which is why most sites that are hosted on this platform are aimed at generating income. Your WordPress website can benefit from a high-performance host if you make WP Engine your best choice.
