WordPress.com supplies an alternative choice to the best website builders, and makes use of a number of the best web hosting suppliers for web site creation, combining the facility of superior website hosting with the facility of the WordPress.org content material administration system (CMS) to ship all-in-one options.
WordPress review: Snapshot
Now, WordPress.com is way from essentially the most highly effective website creation platform we’ve used, nevertheless it nonetheless brings quite a bit to the desk. There’s a fantastic free model that you should utilize to check the platform, an built-in web site builder, and entry to the complete vary of WordPress plugins and themes—so long as you’ve a high-end subscription.
This platform may be very common, however as you will notice in our WordPress review, it has a number of main flaws as properly. These embrace comparatively excessive costs and an rigid web site editor. Overall, although, it’s a suitable choice for these trying to create a easy website.
Score: 3.5/5
Read on for the complete review.
WordPress’s rivals
| WordPress.com | Wix | Hostinger | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Score | 3.5/5 | 4.5/5 | 4.5/5 |
| Pros | – Integrated WordPress web site builder – Attractive free-forever model – Full entry to WordPress plugin and theme libraries | – All-in-one internet hosting and web site builder platform – Industry-leading design flexibility – Huge collection of engaging templates | – Very competitively priced internet hosting options – Excellent native hPanel management panel – A give attention to safety |
| Cons | – Quite costly in comparison with some choices – Limited design flexibility | – Quite costly in comparison with some choices – Limited design flexibility – Customer service is common at greatest – Can be complicated to get began with | – No native web site builder – Resources are a little bit restricted with shared internet hosting plans |
| Verdict | WordPress.com is a good selection for small web sites, however its restricted design flexibility and excessive costs are main considerations. | Wix gives all-in-one web site constructing options full with built-in internet hosting and technical help, however it’s a little costly. | Hostinger gives a number of the greatest price range shared internet hosting options we’ve seen, and they’re backed by glorious safety and a collection of superior options. |
| View offers | Visit site | Visit site | Visit site |
Key options
As a totally hosted, managed model of WordPress.org, WordPress.com naturally gives a wonderful collection of superior options. You will profit from the facility of the WordPress.org CMS, together with a collection of additives designed to streamline the site-creation course of.
When you employ WordPress.com, you’ll profit from many of the instruments included with the extra common WordPress.org platform. Premium, Business, and eCommerce subscriptions present full entry to the WordPress theme library, which incorporates hundreds of designs which you can base your website on.
Similarly, the Business and Ecommerce plans embrace entry to an enormous plugin library and the power to add customized themes. The plugin library accommodates a whole bunch of extensions that you should utilize so as to add performance to your website.
All WordPress.com customers may have entry to a wonderful statistics portal. The fundamental plans allow you to trace customer numbers, interactions, sources, and extra. Upgrading to a Business or Ecommerce plan will allow you to put in plugins comparable to Cloudflare Analytics, which offer a lot deeper insights into varied key metrics.
WordPress: Key options and highlights
Although WordPress.com’s editor is a little bit fundamental and its design flexibility is proscribed at greatest, it’s really fairly a lovely choice for easy weblog creation. There’s a collection of instruments obtainable to streamline submit creation, administration, and enhancing. You may have entry to in-depth weblog analytics, and there’s really a good quantity of flexibility on provide relating to customizing the structure of your posts.
Another factor that stands out is WordPress.com’s pre-built ecommerce options. The three dearer plans all embrace some type of on-line retailer instruments, enabling you to simply accept funds and construct a powerful digital enterprise. For instance, the Premium plan allows you to settle for funds, donations, or subscriptions. You gained’t be capable to set up customized plugins although, and the precise instruments are a little bit fundamental.
The Business plan is extra superior, including the power to record merchandise in your web site. You will profit from the power to put in any of a collection of customized plugins, enabling you so as to add extra refined ecommerce instruments. And essentially the most superior Ecommerce plan provides much more highly effective instruments, together with superior advertising integrations and worldwide fee choices.
What’s new?
WordPress.com makes use of the highly effective WordPress.org CMS, which is up to date extraordinarily frequently. The newest model, WordPress 5.8 Tatum, added a collection of latest options, together with superior developer instruments.
For starters, a lot of new show choices have been added. Widget areas can now be personalized utilizing the block-based editor, and weblog submit pages will be personalized on a a lot deeper degree. In addition, now you can show particular weblog posts based mostly on their class.
Workflow instruments had been additionally added to assist streamline the enhancing course of. You will profit from a navigation panel outlining each web page’s construction, steered block patterns and layouts, and the power to stylize photographs straight inside the WordPress media interface.
A couple of developer instruments had been added, together with help for the trendy WebP picture format. A theme.json file has been added, enabling you to manage varied editor and customization settings. It’s additionally price noting that help for Internet Explorer 11 has been discontinued.
Pricing
WordPress.com doesn’t provide standalone internet hosting options. Instead, it gives all-in-one packages that embrace internet hosting, a web site builder, technical administration, and a collection of website creation and administration options. There’s a free plan with restricted entry to superior instruments, together with four premium subscription options.
These begin at $4 a month for an annual Personal subscription ($7 with month-to-month funds), which features a free area, superior internet hosting, and full entry to the location builder. The Premium ($8 a month), Business ($25 a month), and Ecommerce ($45 a month) plans add more and more superior instruments.
| Plan kind/function | Free | Personal | Premium | Business | Ecommerce |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cost monthly | Free | $7 | $14 | $33 | $59 |
| Cost per yr | Free | $48 | $96 | $300 | $540 |
| Free area | X | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Live chat help | X | X | Basic | Priority | Priority |
| Storage | 3GB | 3GB | 13GB | 200GB | 200GB |
| search engine optimisation instruments | X | X | X | ✓ | ✓ |
Testing WordPress
In order to comprehensively evaluate WordPress to the competitors, we analyzed a collection of its options and instruments to see the way it carried out. This included its web site creation course of, and its uptime and response time, as these elements are key when taking web site constructing into consideration.
How do you construct a web site with WordPress?
To begin a brand new web site with WordPress.com, you’ll be able to both make the most of the free-forever plan, or join a premium plan from the beginning. You can join together with your Google or Apple account for streamlined administration. We labored by means of this course of, constructing a easy website to see how properly the platform actually features.
Select a free WordPress subdomain, wait a number of moments, and you may be taken straight to the administration dashboard. Here, you will see quite a few instruments, together with a Site Setup information that can assist you maintain the fundamentals.
With the lower-end plans, you should have entry to the native WordPress editor. It makes use of a block-based constructing interface, and you will see that it’s fairly restricted until you’ve the data and expertise to make use of the code editor. It is kind of straightforward to make use of, although, and also you shouldn’t have an excessive amount of bother getting your website up and operating. There are numerous WordPress tutorials on the internet for those who run into bother.
On prime of that, you’ll be able to even use superior page-builder plugins comparable to Elementor or the Beaver Builder when you have a Business or Ecommerce subscription. These present a extra beginner-friendly drag-and-drop interface that you should utilize to design your website. Read our complete Elementor review to seek out out extra about this specific WordPress website builder.
How does WordPress carry out?
To take a look at the efficiency of WordPress.com’s servers, we used Pingdom.com to watch a fundamental website for a 14-day interval. The outcomes weren’t the perfect we’ve seen, however they had been actually greater than passable.
For starters, our web site had a 100% uptime determine throughout the take a look at interval, and there are not any considerations there. The common server response time was 362ms, with a most of 446ms and a minimal of 293ms.
The factor that stands out right here is WordPress’s consistency. There had been no main spikes within the response instances, suggesting that the servers are properly maintained and never overloaded. However, the typical response time was a little bit longer than a number of the best-performing internet hosting suppliers we’ve examined, which have a tendency to return in between 200 and 300ms.
The competitors
WordPress.com is an attention-grabbing platform, because it combines the facility of the WordPress.org CMS and its personal superior internet hosting options. It’s identified for its inexpensive low-end choices, which begin at simply $4 a month, however its dearer plans are simply too expensive for our liking.
Like WordPress, Wix gives all-in-one website creation options, full with internet hosting, technical help, and a sophisticated web site builder. The Wix Editor is among the many greatest web site editors we’ve seen. It gives main drag-and-drop design flexibility, and it’s way more highly effective than WordPress.com.
Unfortunately, although, Wix can also be fairly costly. It does have a free-forever plan, however that is fairly restricted. The most cost-effective premium plan prices $14 a month, and this solely will get you 3GB of storage. Our detailed Wix review discusses the web site builder and analyzes its options in addition to different parts.
Hostinger is a little bit totally different, because it doesn’t include an built-in web site builder. It’s a fantastic choice for these on the lookout for highly effective internet hosting to make use of with a CMS comparable to WordPress.org, Drupal, or Joomla, and costs begin from simply $1.39 a month for a fundamental shared internet hosting plan. This flexibility to decide on your CMS is one thing that WordPress.com doesn’t provide, making Hostinger a lovely choice for a lot of customers.
On prime of this, Hostinger boasts glorious customer support and a pleasant help crew. Storage and bandwidth are a little bit restricted with the bottom plans, however you’ll nonetheless get considerably extra assets than you’d with Wix or WordPress.com. Make positive to learn our complete Hostinger review, and discover out extra about this main internet host.
| WordPress.com | Wix | Hostinger | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Integrated web site builder | Yes | Yes | No |
| Free area | Yes | Yes | With higher-end plans |
| Base storage | 6GB | 3GB | 30GB |
| Support | Email, stay chat with superior plans | Online ticketing, callback, chatbot | 24/7 stay chat, e-mail |
| Basic plan | $4 a month | $14 a month | $1.39 a month |
The verdict
After a full evaluation, it’s straightforward to see that WordPress.com gives fairly specialised internet hosting and web site constructing options. It solely allows you to create a web site with the WordPress.org software program, and the enhancing interface is on the essential aspect, to say the least.
However, it’s fairly a beginner-friendly choice. You shouldn’t have an excessive amount of bother beginning your website and publishing your first pages or posts. And for those who use a high-end plan, it is possible for you to to put in a page-builder plugin for much more enhancing energy.
Another standout function is the truth that, with choose plans, WordPress.com supplies entry to the WordPress.org plugin and template libraries. You will be capable to set up customized templates, and full code entry gives extra design flexibility for superior customers.
On the draw back, although, WordPress.com is kind of costly when in comparison with many different web site builders or internet hosts. Its free plan may be very restricted, and most options are solely obtainable with one of many two most costly subscription choices.
The first rate efficiency of our take a look at web site was a serious plus for WordPress.com. It’s actually not the quickest host we’ve used, nevertheless it’s proper up there among the many greatest. Ultimately, although, WordPress.com simply doesn’t do sufficient to make it stand out from the competitors.
It might be choice for these trying to create a weblog or easy web site, however we’d advocate trying elsewhere for extra highly effective web site constructing or internet hosting options.
