When it comes to managed WordPress hosting, WP Engine is one of the most prominent hosting services in the industry. Founded by Jason Cohen back in 2010, WP Engine is the benchmark when it comes professional and enterprise WordPress hosting solution.

In this article, we'll be going through some of the top facts and answer questions that you have in mind, such as:

Let's dive into today's WPEngine review.

What is WP Engine web hosting?

Before we start the review, it is important for us to go down to the facts of what WP Engine is all about. Since the launch back in 2010, WP Engine had been the top choice when it comes to hosting wp sites. Yes, this is not your average web hosting service but a fully managed WordPress hosting solution.

A fully-managed WP hosting offers you a wide range of tools to help you grow your site while ensuring that you will not need to worry about the server optimization, firewall and all the geeky things that you probably wouldn't want to spend 3 months (or more) trying to figure those out.

WP Engine hosting plans come in several sizes and forms to ensure that you will find a suitable WordPress hosting service based on any given budget.

At this point of writing this review, WP Engine pricing plan comes in 7 different plans.

Startup. Startup is the cheapest and entry-level hosting service by WP Engine. With pricing that starts at per month, this plan offers 25,000 visits per month, 10GB local storage, 50GB bandwidth per month and WordPress hosting for 1 site. While 25,000 visits per month could be rather small for some, most WP blogs don't hit the 25k mark at least for the first 12 months of starting a blog.

Growth. Growth is the next pricing tier that is the first to be geared towards hosting a business or enterprise website(s). With pricing that starts at $95.83 per month, this plan offers 100,000 visits per month, 20GB local storage, 200GB bandwidth per month and WordPress hosting services for up to 10 sites. This option is the most popular ones for bloggers and business website owners.

Scale. When your WordPress site is generating traffic and revenue, Scale is a great hosting plan to grow with. With pricing that starts at $241.67 per month, this plan offers 400,000 visits per month, 50GB local storage, 500GB bandwidth per month and WordPress hosting service for up to 20 sites. The Scale plan is best for a thriving website(s) that requires a high-performance server and dedicated line of support.

Premium. Premium is where the true power of WP Engine managed WordPress hosting comes into play—especially in the enterprise level. The plan starts at $368 per month and comes with dedicated VM for high-value, highly-cacheable sites. Apart from that, the plan also offers 700,000 visits per month, 100GB local storage, 1TB bandwidth per month and the ability to host up to 30 sites.

There are three other plans, Premium 1, Premium 1.5 and custom plan for larger websites and websites that require specific infrastructure or extremely delicate hosting environment.

WP Engine Hosting Features

What does WP Engine do and why is it one of the best managed web hosting on the planet? Let's dive into the WP Engine features.

WP Engine is considered more than just a web hosting company. They consider themselves as the godfather of WordPress digital experience platform

Here are some stats about WP Engine:

WP Engine is created around four pillars—agility, performance, intelligence, and integrations—so you can enjoy simple site setups, easy workflows, stressless launches, and effortless maintenance.

Creative Agility. WP Engine empowers developers with the Genesis theme framework, dev/stage/prod environments on every site, Git and SFTP connections, automated backups, and WordPress core updates.

Enterprise Performance. WPEngine advanced security solution powered by Cloudflare, distributed global CDN, Evercache®, and high-availability, multi-datacenter clustered environments deliver speed, scalability, and durability.

Actionable Intelligence. WP Engine offers application performance monitoring from New Relic, Google Analytics integration within WordPress Admin, and a page speed performance tool, so you can further optimize your sites.

Ecosystem Integration. WP Engine is the leader in providing exclusive, integrated WordPress solutions with world-class tech partners, including Google, Amazon, Cloudflare, New Relic, and BigCommerce.

Genesis Framework and StudioPress Child Themes. Every WP Engine plan comes integrated with the popular Genesis Framework and all StudioPress child themes. Therefore, regardless you are building a website for yourself, creating a website for your client or managing your multi-team WordPress development agency, WP Engine is the best investment for both money and time.

From small business to global enterprise, WP Engine is the catalyst for bringing your imagination, skills, and business to life — serving the right content to the right audience and at the right time, beautifully without any coding skills.

WP Engine Feature #1: Creative Agility

Creative Agility by WP Engine are features that allow you to innovate and get to market a website faster. Here, you are given multiple tools to not only build a beautiful WordPress website in minutes but to easily scale it.

StudioPress Themes. Build amazing, mobile-responsive WordPress digital experiences with 36 easy-to-use, premium themes powered by our Genesis Framework, featuring built-in SEO and security, and all included in your WP Engine plan.

Local. A free, easy way to spin up local WordPress sites, test your latest site updates, and speed up your development workflow.

Auto Migration. Your move to WPEngine is as simple as a couple of clicks using WP Engine auto migration plugin.

Serviced Onboarding. For premium solutions, a dedicated technical and account management team ensure a smooth start and continued success on WP Engine.

Deploy Sites. Easily move data between your cloud development environments on WP Engine.

Git and SFTP Connections. Let your development team keep using their favorite development tools to increase productivity and collaboration.

One-Click Staging. Use our tools to simplify and shorten development cycles through rapid testing of changes so you’re never surprised.

Dev, Stage, Prod Environments. Every WP Engine site comes with three environments to help you quickly set up an efficient development workflow.

Launch Readiness Assessments. Gain a personalized pre-launch review with WP Engine’s team of experts on performance and best practices through a series of code compatibility tests and site staging.

Dedicated Dev Environments. Isolated environments for development and testing purposes.

Automated Backups. WP Engine performs daily automatic backups on your digital experience to give you peace of mind in case you run into any site issues.

WordPress Core Updates. WPEngine handles all major updates automatically to ensure sites stay up-to-date, and test the minor updates before recommending them.

Free CDN and SSL Certificates. WPEngine makes it easy to scale your site up with CDN and keep your transactions safe with SSL—just add them with a single click.

Multi-Site Conversion. WP Engine lets you set up and turn off multisite with just a few clicks in the User Portal.

User Permissions. Highly secured interface makes it easy for you to ensure all users have the proper roles and access, making it easy for you to add or delete users and change permissions.

SSH Gateway. Save time by efficiently managing any number of WordPress sites through the command line.

Ownership Transfer. Provides an easy way for agencies or freelancers to transition site ownership and billing to clients post-launch.

Activity Log. Gain visibility on your account, including updates and published content, and use the activity log to help provide governance.

24/7/365 Support. If you need help, the support team is always available to answer any questions—anytime, day or night.

GeoTarget. Provides location-specific content for your audiences increasing engagement and transactions.

WordPress Plugins. WP Engine helps you by powering a wide variety of personalized experiences through plugins and custom functionality.

WordPress Powered CMS. Publish quality content at scale with WordPress, a world-class CMS that increases creative agility through collaboration and ease of use.

WP Engine Feature #2: Enterprise Performance

In today's technology world, you may be hit with a million views overnight (thanks to being on the first page of Reddit) or simply encounter numerous hacking and other website security breaches. With WP Engine secured servers, you know that you are more than just in good hands.

Amazon Web Services. As an AWS Advanced Technology Partner, WP Engine offers a range of solutions that meet the needs of customers seeking high-performance optimized for WordPress.

Global Data Centers. Select a wide range of servers across the United States, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and in the Asia-Pacific region.

Data Center Redundancy. Keep your data safe and sound with Amazon Web Services (so you sleep better at night)

Uptime Protection. Stay up and running with clustered configurations in dedicated environments, fully-managed content delivery network, and proactive, multi-layered security measures.

PHP 7.4 and HTTP/2 Enabled. Get better SEO, visitor retention, and conversions with the latest updates, which can serve up to 3x more requests per second even with the lowest WP Engine plan.

Proprietary EverCache®. Reduce strain on your site’s resources with our caching solution, which is capable of moving hundreds of millions of hits per day through a solid WP Engine ecosystem.

Fully Managed Global CDN. Load content faster with our global content delivery network (CDN), which routes local requests to the nearest server.

Increased Speed. WP Engine customers enjoy an average of 38% faster load times by switching to WP Engine hosting solution.

Scalable Architecture. Manage traffic spikes–from 10,000 to 100 million users—seamlessly.

Dedicated Security Engineering Team. Leave the code reviews and security audits of all internal environments and processes to our in-house team.

Managed Core Updates & Patches. Rest easy knowing that minor updates will be pushed through automatically, while WPEngine automatically vets major updates thoroughly before recommending them.

Multi-Factor Authentication. Complex passwords enforced on WordPress sites and the WP Engine User Portal by default. You can even add a layer of security to the user portal with multi-factor authentication (MFA) technology.

Traffic Encryption with SSL. Use free SSL certificates on every page thanks to Let’s Encrypt.

Threat Detection & Blocking. WPEngine dynamically detects and blocks malicious behaviour with a state-of-the-art proprietary system, making sure your site doesn’t suffer embarrassing hacks.

Disaster Recovery. In the unlikely event your site is compromised, you can bounce back quickly with WP Engine expert support and recovery help.

WP Engine Feature #3: Actionable Intelligence

Having a beautiful WordPress website is not enough, especially when you are looking for lead generation and growth in revenue. With WP Engine managed WordPress hosting, you get all the features to optimize your website with actionable insights on-site traffic and performance.

Application Performance. Open up visibility at the code-level for your IT operations and development teams so you can troubleshoot application issues, no matter how complex your hosting environment.

Page Performance. Improve your website speed with the first-speed performance tool integrated into the user dashboard. See the impact of new plugins and site features as quickly as you implement them.

WP Engine Feature #4: Ecosystem Integration

Integration is important for thriving websites. With WPEngine hosting, you can easily integrate your website to a wide range of applications.

Integration DNA. Take advantage of WP Engine’s status as a master integrator, combining and optimizing 40+ technologies into the platform while building its own proprietary solutions, plugins, and tools.

Thousands of WordPress Plugins. Build versatile, robust digital experiences using curated solutions from over 55,000 WordPress plugins—from eCommerce, to design, to security, and beyond.

Technology Partnerships. Discover new capabilities thanks to the partnerships with best-in-class innovators like Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud Platform, and more—all optimized for WordPress.

WordPress Experts. Leverage an entire company of WordPress experts at WP Engine, including 14 subject matter experts and a support team whose members are trained for eight weeks.

Core Contributors. Enjoy constant improvement to the open-source WordPress project, thanks in part to code contributed by WP Engine team members.

Enterprise Onboarding & Account Management. Get the solutions you need with premier, hands-on service when you sign up for WP Engine web hosting solution.

International, 24/7/365 Support. Find the help you need with a team of award-winning WordPress experts in the U.S. and Ireland, available via chat any time of day or night.

Award-Winning Help. Rest assured you’re in the best hands with WP Engine four-time-Stevie Award-winning support team that has earned a world-class Net Promoter Score (NPS) of 86.

Knowledge and Advice. Learn more and go deeper with content provided by the WordPress experts at award-winning publications Torque Magazine and Velocitize.

WP Engine Review On Shared — Entry Level Hosting

It is important to note that not all plans are using dedicated environment. For example, WP Engine Startup plan is the most entry-level plan that comes with all the required basics to start a small website or blog. This tier is best for beginners (bloggers or website owners) who are looking to host their WordPress site cheaply but with all the managed WordPress hosting perks such as live chat support, free SSL certificate and optimized WordPress servers.

This WP Engine plan comes with 25,000 visits per month which is rather sufficient for small to medium-sized sites.

We also spun up a test website hosted on the Startup plan to test the WP Engine loading speed using Pingdom Tools. Here's the result.

The website takes less than half a second to load and we got to say that we are thrilled.

WP Engine Review on Data Centers

Choosing the right data centers closest to your website audience is important especially when it comes to website performance. This server location can reduce round-trip time latency for domestic visitors because the website data is physically closer, the site can load more quickly. This performance increase for visitors also helps improve SEO by creating a better user experience. The faster the site loads, the better your website SEO and the greater the opportunity to drive conversion.

Below are all Google data center locations that a WP Engine website can be hosted in. All shared hosting plans are created by default on Google Cloud servers, and the data center location will be chosen at signup. Many data center locations are available for Shared hosting plans, however, some of the locations listed below may only be available for Premium dedicated hosting plans.

WP Engine also offers integration with Amazon Web Services and the AWS clustered servers are available only to Premium dedicated hosting plans.

How to choose the best data center for your WordPress website?

Glad you ask!

Before choosing a data center it may be a good idea to test out the various locations to determine general latency for your target users. The easiest way to test for latency is to utilize 3rd party tools designed specifically for these providers.

• For Google data centers we recommend GCPping.
• For AWS data centers you can use CloudPing.

Keep in mind that these tools will test latency for ALL available data centers from these providers. Make sure that you are focusing only on the locations listed above.

Existing WPEngine customers can opt for data center change by reaching out to the support team via Live Chat or email.

WP Engine Review On Customer Service

"The success of any managed WordPress hosting lies heavily in the customer service team."

Editorial Team @ WP Maven

Customer service and support are what distinguish WP Engine with the other web hosting solutions in the WordPress industry. Here's what we can say about the customer service level at WP Engine.

"Web hosting can be challenging at times. There are things that can go wrong all the time, and as a web host, WP Engine does a great job by hiring the best customer service team on the planet. You can throw them the craziest support question and they will be happy to answer all of them."

At this point of writing this review, there are about 14 WP Engine support team who work around the clock to serve WP Engine customers.

More importantly, these are not just not tier 1 or tier 2 support team, they are all WordPress hosting experts who have deep knowledge to help you 'fix' your hosting challenges. Heck, they even throw in some 'best-effort-basis' works from time to time!

Here's how the live chat support works in the WP Engine dashboard.

Personally, they never fail us in providing timely support and we got to say that we love their live chat support service.

Do you know that the support team response time is often under 30 seconds?

WP Engine Review On Pricing

When it comes to hosting review, pricing plays a huge role in our decision. WordPress development is often a very tight game where one (or two) wrong move can impact your profitability. WP Engine hosting starts at $25 per month for entry level and an average hosting fee for several websites is around $95 monthly. It is very affordable comparing to the perks that you are getting.

Sure, WP Engine is still more expensive than typical shared services that often start at $3 each month. So, why is WP Engine so expensive?

Here's a list of what you are getting:

Make no mistake. WP Engine is one of the best web hosting companies in the world that offers very powerful and mouth-watering features fitted for both beginners and advanced users. Plus, they are very easy on your pocket too.

At any point you find WP Engine is not right for you, you can opt for a full 60 day money back guarantee with no question asked. Therefore, there is absolutely no risk if you are thinking of hosting one or more site with WP Engine.

Take a look at WP Engine here.

WPEngine Review On WordPress Migration

So, you are pretty confident right now with WP Engine and you want to take a spin with it. But there's a little problem.

Migrating a WordPress site can be a tough work to do especially when you have limited or no knowledge at all.

Don't worry, migrating WordPress site to this web host is really simple with WP Engine migrator.

All you need to do is to download and install WP Engine Automated Migration plugin for a hassle-free migration. Depending on the size of your site, it would take anywhere from 30 minutes to several hours to complete the migration process.

If you are stuck in the middle of the migration, we recommend you to reach out to WP Engine live chat team to get some quick support. There are always experts on standby to assist you with your WordPress migration process.

Overall WP Engine Review

Choosing the right web host for your WordPress site is not an easy task. For example, there are web hosting companies that offer low prices for the first year and increases 3x for renewal. And there are companies that offer subpar shared hosting plans that give you a less ideal hosting server. Don't forget, there are also those who charge you for SSL certificate while you can get it for free with Let's Encrypt!

When it comes to WP Engine, you can rest assured that your money is well spend—from powerful and optimized servers for WordPress to excellent customer service standards, you are getting more advantages compared to any other shared hosting plans. If you are concern about website security like we do here at WP Maven, WP Engine comes with automatic daily backups to ensure that your website data is always safe.

Apart from that, what truly intrigues us about WP Engine is the money back guarantee which we find it very useful especially when you are new and unsure if this web hosting service is the right choice for you.