Product Name: WP Engine
-
Performance
(4)
-
Customer Support
(4.5)
-
Ease of Use
(4.8)
-
Security
(4.7)
Summary
WPEngine hosting is a good choice for growing websites as they offer a perfect balance of high performance in a mid level budget. They are also slightly ahead of Kinsta.
WP Engine is also a great pick for web designers or agencies that make sites for clients. Their staging feature makes it easy to work on a copy of the site without messing up the live version.
And their support team really knows their stuff, so they can help you out if you run into any tricky issues.
Some entry level site owners might be disappointed with the WP Engine pricing because it starts from $20 per month. But that’s the nature of it as it only suits growing sites where budget is not the primary issue.
Compared to affordable hosting services like Hostinger or Bluehost, you don’t find a free domain name benefit here in WP Engine. That’s the major disappointment. Also WPEngine does not support cPanel as they offer their custom built user interface.
For Whom It’s Not The Best Option:
- Beginners on a tight budget
- Those who prefer cPanel hostings
- Those who host want to host multiple (more than 30) sites (because the highest tier plan, most WP Engine servers are shared servers only)
For Whom It’s The Best Option:
- Businesses and brands needing high-performance
- Web designers and agencies
- Bloggers and online stores who prefer speed and reliability
In this WP Engine review, you’ll get:
- REAL Speed Test Results
- User experience and customer service
- Unbiased opinions on pros and cons
- AND Suitable alternative options
If you were looking for an in-depth guide that actually helps you decide whether or not to choose WP Engine, this is it.
So grab a cup of coffee, and stay with me for the next 5-10 minutes as I share everything you need to know about WP Engine, the pros, the cons, and the features to make the right decision.
Ready? Let’s get started!
Table of Contents
WP Engine Review 2025: Why Choose WP Engine Host for WordPress Sites?
WP Engine: Introduction
WP Engine is a reputable and leading managed WordPress hosting provider founded in 2010. WP Engine aims to deliver a secure, high-performance, and reliable hosting environment for WordPress websites.
To ensure the fastest hosting service, WP Engine uses Google Cloud, AWS, and Microsoft data centers to host its services. This provides you the flexibility to opt for the data center that aligns with the location of your target audience, thereby enhancing your website’s loading speed.
WP Engine data centers are located in:
- North America – Iowa, South Carolina, Oregon, Montreal, Virginia, Ohio, and Washington (US)
- Europe – Belgium, London, Frankfurt, Netherlands, Finland, and Ireland
- Asia/Pacific – Taiwan, Tokyo, Sydney, and Singapore
- Middle East – Tel Aviv
- Free access to Genesis framework
- Gives you access to 35+ StudioPress themes for free
- 24/7 chat support
- Dev, Stage, Prod Environments (extremely useful for website developers)
- Transferable Sites (free site migration)
- PHP 7.3 ready
- SSH Gateway for better security
- LargeFS
- Access to Global CDN for faster speeds
- 24/7 phone support (except startup plan)
- Automated SSL certificates
- 60 days money back guarantee
Pros And Cons Of WP Engine:
| Pros: | Cons: |
| Fast performance and reliable uptime | Higher pricing compared to some hosts |
| Great staging features | Free domain not available |
| Excellent technical support | No free email hosting provided |
| Strong security features | cPanel not available |
| User-friendly interface | Cheaper plans are shared hosting |
Performance Test: Is WP Engine Hosting Fast?
We used the website speed testing tool – Pingdom to test a website hosted on WP Engine’s servers. And here are the speed test results we got.
| Speed Test Location: | Loading Speed Results: |
| San Francisco, USA, North America | 3.35 seconds |
| London, UK | 2.26 seconds |
| Frankfurt, Germany | 2.43 seconds |
| Tokyo, Japan | 3.75 seconds |
| Sydney, Australia | 3.98 seconds |
| Brazil, South America | 3.56 seconds |
On average, the website loading speed we got in our tests was between 2-3 seconds. The website we tested is a heavy e-commerce site with lots of product listings and images. So, it’s worth noting while analyzing the speed results.
In my opinion, if a heavy e-commerce site can get 2-3 seconds speed results, then a lightweight, well-optimized website can easily get a loading speed between 1-2 seconds or lower.
Now, if you’re thinking about uptime, well, you get a server uptime of 99.95%. With premium hosting like WP Engine, it goes without saying that you’ll get a reliable and amazing uptime. Don’t worry!
Overall, I’m quite satisfied with the performance results – a 9/10 score after this testing!
Words on WP Engine Key Features:
WP Engine acquired StudioPress WordPress solutions in 2018. After that, WP Engine started offering both Genesis Framework and StudioPress themes for free to all its customers, which otherwise cost $50 to $200 for a single theme.
WP Engine’s “Site Building” feature empowers you to create, design, and refine your websites with ease. You get free access to premium themes, Genesis Blocks, and staging environments.
- 10 Premium Themes Included: You get a collection of 10 premium themes with its hosting plan for free. These themes are designed to give your website an attractive and professional look. Users can choose from various styles and layouts to match their brand or content.
- Genesis Blocks for Easy Site Creation: WP Engine incorporates Genesis Blocks, a WordPress block editor plugin that offers a wide range of pre-designed blocks and templates. You can easily customize your websites by dragging and dropping these blocks, allowing for quick and hassle-free site creation.
- 1-Click Staging and Development Environments: You can duplicate your existing website with just one click. These staging environments are isolated from the live site, enabling you to experiment, test updates, or make changes without affecting the main site. Once satisfied, you can deploy the changes to the live website.
WP Engine Customer Support:
WP Engine customer support is AWESOME!
You get email, live chat as well phone support. Usually, I prefer live chat because it’s just easier to share the issues and get it resolved on the fly.
Whenever I’ve had a question or issue, WP Engine’s customer support team quickly helped me out – within 5-10 minutes through live chat.
For instance, once I was about to set up a new feature on my site. So I hopped on a live chat with their support and they guided me through the whole process. They even sent me helpful links to articles in their knowledge base for future reference.
I’ve contacted their support probably a dozen times over the past couple years. And every single time, I’ve come away happy with the help I received. It’s clear that they really care about making sure their customers are taken care of.
I’m happy to give a 9.5/10 score!
User Experience with WPEngine:
The interface is clean, intuitive, and doesn’t overwhelm you. But yes, the cPanel user interface is not supported.
Some screenshots:
You don’t need to be a developer to figure things out. All setup starts from a single easy-to-use dashboard called – User Portal. From there, you get ALL the options you need to manage your sites, add new sites, view the billing details, access support, your account details, and more.
The whole dashboard and working area has a minimalistic design which I REALLY enjoyed while testing. Everything felt easy on the eyes.
Managing plugins and themes from their dashboard was also effortless. I barely need to touch any code.
Their support is top-notch too. Whenever I had questions, their expert team patiently walked me through with simple and helpful instructions.
In my experience, you don’t need to be tech-savvy to use WP Engine. It’s built to make managing your WP site simple for everyone.
Overall, I give WP Engine a 9/10 for ease of use.
Security – Does WPEngine Offer Stable And Secure Servers?
Security is rock-solid with WP Engine. Every site you host with WP Engine gets a free SSL certificate (which is a bare minimum security level expected with every hosting nowadays.)
But that’s just the beginning. They’ve got enterprise-grade firewalls protecting your site 24/7.
WP Engine also keeps an eye out for any strange traffic. If they spot something fishy, like a DDoS attack, they jump into action. It’s called managed WAF (Web Application Firewall). Basically, they filter out the bad traffic so it doesn’t take down your site. Cool, huh?
And you know how WordPress is always releasing updates? WP Engine handles those for you too. No more worrying about your site getting attacked or exploited because you didn’t update it on time. Phew!
Plus, there’s the daily automatic backup feature, which takes a backup of your site. This means even if your site gets down for some reason, there’s always a backup available to restore it in one click. Booyah!
So the overall score? 9.5/10 – yes, seriously! We’re talking about premium hosting with enterprise-level security checks.
Migration Process:
WP Engine provides a free “WP Engine Automated Migration” plugin that you can use to migrate any number of websites on WP Engine free of cost. Those who want a complete automated migration process then I would like to say sorry! That facility is not available.
The whole migration process is so simple that you don’t need any technical knowledge.
You can migrate your websites with just 3 steps.
Add the site on WP Engine that you want to migrate and generate the SFTP credentials
Install and activate the “WP Engine automated migration” plugin into your current website
Enter the SFTP credentials and click on the migration button to initiate the migration process.
That’s it. Once the migration process is completed, you will see a successful migration message.
At any point in time, if you face any issue while migrating your site on WP Engine, you can contact their 24×7 support staff.
Pricing: Does WP Engine Offer Fair Plans?
WP Engine focuses exclusively on managed WordPress hosting, and offers four standard plans plus custom Enterprise solutions. It also has WooCommerce-specific plans for eCommerce businesses.
Here’s a quick breakdown of WP Engine’s core plans (with annual billing discounts applied):
WP Engine Plans Overview:
- Startup ($20/month) – Supports 1 site, up to 25,000 visits, 10 GB storage, and 50 GB bandwidth.
- Professional ($40/month) – Covers 3 sites, up to 75,000 visits, 15 GB storage, and 75 GB bandwidth.
- Growth ($77/month) – Supports 10 sites, up to 100,000 visits, 20 GB storage, and 200 GB bandwidth, plus 24/7 phone support.
- Scale ($194/month) – For up to 30 sites, 400,000 visits, 50 GB storage, and 500 GB bandwidth.
For businesses with larger needs, Premium and Enterprise plans offer dedicated infrastructure and resources tailored to high-traffic sites.
How Do These Plans Compare?
When comparing these plans, it’s clear that WP Engine has scalability in mind. Each tier is designed to fit a specific stage of website growth — from small business owners to agencies managing multiple client sites.
- Startup is good for freelancers or solo entrepreneurs who need top-tier hosting for one website.
- Professional works well for small agencies or bloggers managing a few sites.
- Growth becomes ideal for mid-sized businesses or developers with multiple client projects.
- Scale caters to larger agencies and businesses running numerous high-traffic websites.
Each plan gives you access to the same high-performance infrastructure, security features, StudioPress themes, a free SSL, and a global CDN — so even lower-tier users benefit from WP Engine’s premium performance.
Why Is WP Engine Hosting Expensive?
WP Engine hosting offers you managed WordPress hosting that makes it expensive compared to other web hosts such as Bluehost and HostGator.
You’ll find cheaper plans from web hosts like Bluehost because they offer shared hosting. In shared hosting, your hosting resources, such as bandwidth and storage, are shared with others.
In managed WordPress hosting, fewer people share the resources, which means an increase in performance and speed and literally no downtime issues.
Here are a few more solid benefits of using managed WordPress hosting.
- Optimized hosting exclusively for WordPress
- Top-notch customer support assistance
- Automatic backups
- Staging feature
- Superior website performance and faster loading times
- Bulletproof security
The above are the reasons why managed WordPress hosting platforms like WP Engine hosting cost you more than other web hosts.
Which Plan Offers the Best Value?
The Growth plan stands out as the sweet spot. For $77/month (billed annually), you get access to 10 sites, higher traffic capacity, expanded storage, and 24/7 phone support — something that’s missing from the lower tiers.
It balances resources, support, and scalability well, making it a solid investment for growing businesses or agencies handling multiple projects.
Downsides of WP Engine Pricing
- Higher base pricing: Even the entry-level Startup plan at $20/month is pricier than most competitors (Hostinger, SiteGround, or Bluehost start under $5/month).
- Overage fees: WP Engine charges $1 to $2 per 1,000 extra visitors if you exceed your traffic allowance, which can add up quickly.
- No free email hosting or domain: Unlike other hosts, you’ll need to purchase email hosting and your domain name separately.
- Shared environment on all standard plans: Unless you move to Enterprise or Premium, you’ll still be sharing server resources.
What’s Good About WP Engine Pricing?
- Premium infrastructure on all plans: No matter the tier, you’re hosted on the same robust, secure platform that powers enterprise-level websites.
- Developer-friendly features: Staging environments, Git integration, and easy workflow tools are included even in lower-tier plans.
- Scalable: You can grow from 1 site to 30+ without needing to migrate to another host.
- WooCommerce-tailored plans available: Great for store owners needing eCommerce-ready performance.
Overall, WP Engine’s pricing may be higher upfront, but it delivers solid value through enterprise-grade performance, developer tools, and reliable support. It’s a fair choice for businesses or agencies that prioritize speed, security, and scalability over budget-friendliness. However, for beginners or users who need basic hosting on a shoestring budget, WP Engine may feel like overkill.
Alternatives to WPEngine:
Well, here’s what really sets WP Engine apart, in my opinion: the backup and staging tools.
I’ve tried other hosts like SiteGround and Kinsta. And while they’re decent, they can’t match WP Engine in this area.
Siteground staging is good for the price. But it’s okay – overall.
Now, Kinsta is on the premium end of the spectrum. So you do get high-quality servers with great performance.
But it still struggles a bit to deliver good performance if we consider just the staging version (because the staging version in Kinsta has limited server resources).
The only other host that comes close is Cloudways. Their cloning, staging, and scaling features are pretty great. But for pure WordPress hosting, in my opinion, WP Engine is still the best overall.
That said, budget is the only major thing to consider while choosing WP Engine. If you have a tight budget and want similar performance then InMotion Hosting or Cloudways is a better option.
Find more hosting options in our best web hosting for beginners picks. Or explore WPEngine Alternatives complete list.
FAQ’s
The basic WP Engine hosting plan costs you $20/ per month. You can host 1 WordPress site on the WP Engine basic plan.
WP Engine provides a free WordPress plugin that makes it easy to migrate your WordPress site to its hosting platform. If you are unsure how to do that, you can seek their support team’s help, and they will do it free of cost.
You can ask for a refund. You will get your full refund within 60 days of your hosting purchase from them.
Recommended Web Hosting Resources:
- WP Engine vs WPX Hosting: Which host to pick in 2025?
- Best Dreamhost alternatives to choose in 2025
- Comparison of best web hosting sites by BloggersPassion
- Kinsta vs WPEngine: Which is Better Managed Hosting?
- WordPress Review [Reviewing their Hosting Only]
Final Thoughts – Is Choosing WP Engine Worth It?
So, is WP Engine worth the investment? For serious website owners who want the best possible performance, support, and security, I say absolutely yes.
Sure, it costs a bit more than budget hosts. And, like any other hosting provider, it’s not totally perfect and comes along with a few downsides as well. So I already shared a bunch of alternatives earlier in this post.
But it all boils down to this: you really do get what you pay for. The speed and reliability of WP Engine are top-notch, which is crucial for any business or brand site.
Downtime and slow loading can cost you a lot, resulting in lost sales and frustrated visitors.
The staging feature alone is a huge time-saver and stress-reducer. And when you factor in the excellent support and added security, I think WP Engine is a GREAT choice.
