WP Engine hosting : best high-end WordPress host

In this WPEngine review, I’m going to cover everything you need to know about this WordPress-focused provider. Read on to find out more about its pricing and plans, performance, features, customer support, and more.

Unfortunately or not, this turned out to be a big read. If you don’t have half an hour to spare, here’s a ticket to the conclusion. Or, you can pick the part that interests you the most:

Pros

• Advanced custom control panel
• Hosted on high-end cloud infrastructure
• Top-tier security measures
• Helpful customer support

WP Engine pricing

WP Engine has a variety of managed WordPress hosting plans, with prices starting at $22.50/mo. Not so long ago, 4 plans and a custom enterprise solution were all that the provider got. Now the host offers 3 more types of hosting solutions.

Today, I’ll be focusing on the standard Managed Hosting option as it covers all the basics that websites need.

WP Engine has 4 plans that all include: free SSL certificates, daily backups, free automated migrations, and 3-level staging environments. Additionally, 30+ premium themes, caching, and global CDN (content delivery network) are at your disposal.

Server resources might not seem like a lot, but keep in mind that an average WordPress site will not take more than 5GB of storage. Well, unless you have a big online store to host. Nonetheless, all other “basic” features are very useful.

But no matter how you look at it, not everything brings the same value. So my personal suggestions are:

• Startup is a great option if you have a small yet important business website. It’s quite affordable considering the features and support you get.
• If you’re building or designing websites for clients as an agency or freelancer, the Scale plan is the one. If you’d host all of the 30 allowed websites, the price would drop to $7.25 per site.

Of course, your individual needs might be very different. So see what kind of requirements you have and pick the best small business hosting for your project.

Hosting management – is it easy to use?

WP Engine is more advanced than regular shared hosting options. For this reason, some of the tasks are not done automatically, but the explanations are placed everywhere you go. So while more advanced, WP Engine still delivers in terms of ease of use. Plus, the control panel is looking really good.

The first thing you see after you’re done with the signup process is this:

The main WP Engine dashboard is pretty clean and organized. To your left, you’ll find the tools and features you need to manage your site. And, on the opposite end, you’ll find your site’s stats. Things like the number of sites, total visits, and projected visits. This is very useful to track growth and your resource usage.

Meanwhile, right in the middle is the notification center. I find this somewhat unnecessary. I’d have preferred for the notification center to be smaller and to the side. But, this is, of course, just my preference.

Speaking of convenience, let’s see if WP Engine fares better in this regard when it comes to setting up a site.

How to add a WordPress website?

Let’s cut to the chase: it’s extremely easy to install WordPress with WP Engine. All you need is a click, and the provider will automatically install the CMS for you.

To install WordPress, you need to find Sites on your dashboard. Once you click on that, you have 2 options: Accept transfer if a developer or agency has built the site for you or Add site if you’re building the site yourself.

A form to enter details such as your new site’s name and naming the environment appears. You can also select which environment you want to create. Production is the live version, while the Staging and Development environment can be used as sandboxes.

It takes a couple of minutes, but once the site is created, you’ll see a new area. This is where you can manage each environment separately.

The menu on the left has Domain, SSL, backups, CDN, and other management options.

Also, if you’d look at the top bar, you’d see a convenient WP-Admin button that leads you to the WordPress admin panel.

Adding domain is the obvious next step in setting up WP Engine account.

Performance – is WP Engine fast?

For this WP Engine hosting review, I’ve put the provider through 3 tests – reliability, speed, and stability. In all 3 categories, the provider proved its worth – it was 100% up, showed great load time, and handled a big spike in traffic.

Let’s get into the detail.

WP Engine uptime and response time

WP Engine’s reliability is absolutely remarkable. When observed for 2 months, the provider returned an outstanding 100% uptime. Server response time is also good, averaging at 489ms.

Staying up 100% with no outages over 2 months is impressive. This shows that WP Engine has its servers well maintained. Nonetheless, don’t be surprised if you do see a minute or two of yearly downtime – for maintenance purposes, it’s simply unavoidable.

Besides that, WP Engine’s server speed is equally as good. The provider’s response times averaged at 489ms, which is significantly better than the shared hosting average of 600ms.

On top of that, I must praise WP Engine’s stability, too. The difference between the maximum and minimum response times was just a mere 49ms. That is as stable as hosting can get.

Security – is WP Engine secure?

As far as security is concerned, WP Engine is very serious. Each plan is equipped with essentials plus, advanced security measures are available for different needs. Oh, and faulty plugins won’t cut – WP Engine blocks all plugins that are known to cause trouble.

Let’s zoom in on these features:

Free SSL certificates

WP Engine’s plans all come with free Let’s Encrypt SSL certificates. This is a great option for the majority of websites. But if you have multiple subdomains and need more advanced security, other options are there too.

For instance, WP Engine offers RapidSSL wildcard certificates ($199) that cover both domains and all subdomains. In case of a leak, a $10,000 warranty is in place as well.

In addition to that, you can import your own SSL easily.

Server monitoring – thread detection and prevention

For starters, the provider monitors server performance and traffic which helps spot and prevent threats before they reach you.

A proprietary firewall is in place. This firewall is designed to automatically direct good, bad, and malicious traffic. It works on the least-privilege base – only approved apps and protocols can go through. However, the provider declines to provide further information about the firewall “as this can compromise its secure integrity or lead to abuse.”

Additionally, security team is in-house for auditing and troubleshooting on the spot.

Daily automatic backups

The provider includes daily automated and manual backups. This is a crucial layer of security as it can restore your website if needed. When is it needed? In case there’s a security issue, if a certain plugin update broke your site, or if you did it yourself by trying to implement changes.

You can create and access up to 40 backup points via the user portal. If you need older data, you can access up to the 60 most recent backup points by getting in touch with the support team.

Global Edge Security

This is a paid add-on that will set you back a whopping $300/year. A partnership between WP Engine and Cloudflare, GES offers managed Web Application Firewall (WAF), DDoS mitigation, protection from OWASP top-10 vulnerabilities, and more.

In brief, WP Engine pretty much has the whole nine yards when it comes to security. But, if you do want the comprehensive top-notch features, be prepared to pay handsomely for them.

Good news: GES is included with Secure Managed Hosting packages. While plans themselves are more expensive, it’s still cheaper than adding GES separately.

Plugin management

WP Engine has a list of disallowed plugins that either conflict with their own systems or are known to cause security issues.

I know I know, at first, it might seem like a huge disadvantage but don’t jump to conclusions just yet.

WP Engine takes care of backups and caching, so it’s only natural that these kinds of plugins might interfere and cause trouble. As for others, WP Engine carefully vets them and if they prove to cause security or performance troubles – they are out.

What WP Engine did here, is saved you a lot of time as now you can choose allowed plugins and known that they are secure and high quality.

Reinforced account security

From Multi-Factor Authentication to activity logs, WP Engine keeps not only the server but also your account secure.

• Multi-Factor Authentication ensures that passwords on new devices wouldn’t be the only way to log in. Additional steps, such as getting a code to your phone are added.
• Account permissions – if you’re working with a big team, you can assign each member a different role with a set of permissions. This way, all users can access only those parts and settings that they need to.
• Activity logs – all actions on the account are logged and can be tracked. This helps you to know where possible permission (and security) issues might be.

All in all, even free WP Engine’s security measures cover all that most of the websites might need. Also, there are advanced options available for those websites that need the highest level of security.

WP Engine Review – the final verdict

All in all, this WPEngine review showed that the provider has certainly earned its rights to boast – far more than many others. After all, the host impressed with its amazing performance, incredible extra features, comprehensive security measures, and excellent customer support.

Who do I recommend WP Engine to?

Ultimately, WP Engine is an advanced solution offering many high-end tools already included together with great performance. This makes it great for businesses, agencies, and developers focusing on WordPress.

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