For every ten websites you visit, four are probably created using WordPress. An open-source software, WordPress has made a huge impact on the internet that is perhaps hard to imagine, considering its roots as a primarily blogging platform. Today, individual bloggers and well-known brands—including Zoom, Grammarly, Microsoft, and Udemy—are using WordPress to create professional-looking websites that can be combined with marketing software tools to grow their business.
In this article, we’ve collected WordPress websites statistics that are sure to impress. These facts and numbers will not only support the status of WordPress as a leading technology in its category but also help you learn more about the costs behind building your own website using the platform. Questions like how many websites use WordPress and is WordPress really free will all be answered, so read on.
WordPress Websites Statistics Table of Contents
General WordPress Websites Statistics
Current data on the percentage of websites using WordPress in 2021 revealed that 41.4% of the web is now powered by WordPress. If that’s not enough to convince you how popular the platform is, then just take a look at its market share in the Content Management System (CMS) category—it currently holds a 64.9% market share. It’s also top in open source usage distribution in the top one million sites.
Moreover, the platform boasts of having over 409 million monthly viewers of WordPress blogs who view more than 20 billion pages each month. Though Automattic, the company behind WordPress, is estimated to have $155 million in yearly revenue, it still a surprisingly small company with only about 1,200 employees.
- 41.4% of the web uses WordPress (w3techs, 2021).
- WordPress holds a 34.66% market share in the top 100,000 sites and a 36.64% share in the top 10,000 sites. On the other hand, in the top one million websites, 34.53% are powered by WordPress (BuiltWith-WP Usage Statistics, 2021).
- It holds a 64.9% market share in the CMS market. Its growth has been continuous—from 59.7% in 2019 to 62.1% in 2020. (w3techs, 2021).
- WordPress is the top choice among the top one million websites using Open Source technologies (70%), followed by Drupal (7%), WooCommerce Checkout (7%), Joomla (4%), and others (12%) (BuiltWith-Open Source, 2021).
- The WordPress workforce is surprisingly small, considering its online dominance. Automattic, the company that runs WordPress, only has 1,266 employees compared to Facebook’s 58,604, and Google’s 139,995 employees (Owler, n.d.)
- WordPress.com blogs have over 409 million monthly viewers who view more than 20 billion pages each month (WordPress.com-Live Activity, n.d.)
- About 70 million new posts and 77 million new comments are published each month on WordPress.com (WordPress.com, n.d.).
- Automattic, the company behind WordPress, has an estimated annual revenue of $155 million (Growjo, n.d.).
How Many Websites Use WordPress
WordPress is not only the top technology in terms of the number of live websites using the platform; it also has a commanding lead over the competition. Both in the United States and globally, it is among the top content management systems.
Moreover, WordPress is available in more than 120 languages with English as the most used language (71%). According to the latest data, more than 500 sites are built each day using WordPress.
- WordPress is the top CMS hosting over 28 million live websites (44.5%), followed by Wix (over 4 million live websites, 7.21%), Progress Sitefinity (over 3 million live sites, 4.9%), Squarespace (over 2 million, 4.1%), and Others (39%) (BuiltWith, 2021).
- More than 7.9 million live websites in the US use WordPress as their CMS (BuiltWith-United States, 2021).
- Different nationalities and countries use WordPress. The platform is translated into more than 120 languages (WordPress.com-Live Activity, n.d.).
- The top languages used on WordPress sites include English (71%), Spanish (4.7%), Indonesian (2.4%), Portuguese (2.3%), and French (1.5%) (WordPress.com-Live Activity, n.d.).
- More than 500 sites are built each day using WordPress (Osman, 2021).
Source: BuiltWith
Data on WordPress Website Creation
WordPress uses a variety of programming languages. These include PHP (server-side), MySQL (database), HTML, CSS, Javascript (front-end), JQuery and ReactJS (client-side) (Abhinav, 2020). You can create a wide range of websites using WordPress because it’s a versatile CMS.
Although you can download WordPress for free, you’ll need some extras if you want to make a stunning, fully functioning website. We’re talking about stuff like WordPress themes and plugins. Currently, the theme “Choices” is the most popular choice among the top one million websites. As for plugins, some of the most popular include Yoast SEO, WooCommerce, and Jetpack.
Themes
- There are more than 4,000 themes available for WordPress (Whoishostingthis, 2020).
- The theme “Choices” is currently the top WordPress theme in the top one million websites. It is used by 30,688 customers in the top one million sites by traffic. This is followed by Divi (15, 032), Popper (10,446), Astra Theme (9,479), and Avada (7,989)(BuiltWith-WP Themes, n.d.).
- More than $286 million has been spent on ThemeForest for WordPress since 2008 (WebsiteBuilder, 2021).
- Avada is the top-selling theme with over $21 million in sales (WebsiteBuilder, 2021).
Plugins
- There are over 58,000 plugins available for WordPress (WordPress.org, n.d.).
- Among the top 10,000 sites using WordPress plugins technologies, Yoast SEO is the top WordPress plugin used by 19.64% of websites. It’s followed by Jetpack (6.35%), Visual Composer (5.21%), WordPress Bakery (4.47%), and MonsterInsights (4.39%)(BuiltWith-WordPress Plugins, n.d.)
- Yoast SEO was downloaded over 300 million times (Yoast SEO, n.d.).
- WooCommerce is used by 28.19% of all online stores (Southern, 2021) and 19.5% of all websites that use WordPress (w3techs, 2021).
- WooCommerce Checkout is also top in ecommerce usage distribution with over 2.8 million live sites using the plugin and over 34,000 WooCommerce Checkout customers in the top one million sites by traffic (BuiltWith-WooCommerce Checkout, n.d.).
WP versions and domains
- WordPress version 5.7 has been downloaded 48 million times and counting (WordPress.org-Download Counter, n.d.).
- Version 5 is used by 87.9% of all the websites that use WordPress (w3techs, 2021).
- The .blog top-level domain has the highest WordPress market share at 92.2%, followed by .news at 86.7%. The top-level domain with the lowest WordPress usage is .mil (Gelbmann, 2021).
- Users create 70 million new posts and 77 million new comments monthly (WordPress.com-About, n.d.).
Cost of Creating a WordPress Website
The cost of creating your WordPress website will depend on the theme and different plugins you choose to install. The average price of themes is $57.54, while the average for plugins is $138. There are of course free themes and plugins and more expensive ones that can range from $200 to more than $1,000.
Like we previously stated, you can download WordPress for free, but it’s not really entirely a free content management software (CMS) because you still have to spend on other things to get your site running. These include hosting, domain name, security, and if you choose to hire the services of developers.
- WordPress plugins can cost anywhere from $15 to $200 (Miller, 2021).
- The average price of plugins is $138 (Miller, 2021).
- The average price of WordPress themes is $57.54 (codeinwp, 2020).
- The median price of a theme is $59 (codeinwp, 2020).
- Prepare for a one-off cost of around $200 and a recurring/monthly cost of between $11 and $40 (WebsiteBuilderExpert, 2021).
- Costs to consider when creating a WordPress website include a domain name ($12 annually), hosting (from $2.95 per month), pre-made themes (from $0 to $200 one-off charge), plugins (from $0 to $1,000 ongoing or one-off charge), security (from $50 ongoing or one-off charge), developer fees (from $0 to $1,000 one-time cost) (WebsiteBuilderExpert, 2021).
- Expensive plugins can range from $200 to more than $1,000. The most expensive WordPress themes include Filoxenia ($1,019), OneMax ($1,012), Creative Zodiac ($1,000), JustLanded ($1,000), Planter ($399), Wild ($399), Pearl ($300), Wise Church ($275), Medicom ($249), PILE ($225), and BeSmart ($199) (Patel, 2020).
Source: HooThemes
WordPress Beyond Blogging
These WordPress websites statistics clearly show how far the software has gone since its establishment as a blogging platform in 2003. You can definitely use WordPress for creating a variety of websites, from ecommerce stores to company websites, government websites, news, and so on. It looks like WordPress’s growth will continue in the future as it currently has the lion’s share of the market. The platform’s community of developers and creators is contributing to the continuous improvement of the software, so we can only expect more amazing themes, plugins, and features to come.
There’s more to learn about WordPress and how it has impacted the way websites are created. As such, we suggest taking a look at the current statistics on WordPress to see its state not only as a hosting platform but also as a CMS and as an ecommerce tool.
References:
- Abhinav (2020). Programming Languages Used in WordPress – An Introduction. Retrieved from Codingreflections
- Barron (2020). 2020’s Most Surprising WordPress Statistics. Retrieved from Whoishostingthis
- BuiltWith (2021). CMS Usage Distribution on the Entire Internet. Retrieved from BuiltWith
- BuiltWith-United States (2021). CMS Usage Distribution in the United States. Retrieved from BuiltWith
- BuiltWith-WP Usage Statistics (2021). WordPress Usage Statistics. Retrieved from BuiltWith
- BuiltWith-WooCommerce Checkout (n.d.). Retrieved from BuiltWith
- BuiltWith-Open Source (2021). Open Source Usage Distribution in the Top 1 Million Sites. Retrieved from BuiltWith
- BuiltWith-WordPress Plugins (n.d.). WordPress Plugins Usage Distribution in the Top 10k Sites. Retrieved from BuiltWith
- BuiltWith-WP Themes (n.d.). Choices Usage Statistics. Retrieved from BuiltWith
- Denning (2020). How Much Should a WordPress Theme Cost? Hundreds of Themes Analyzed, Here’s What the Data Says. Retrieved from codeinwp
- Gelbmann (2021). 40% of the web uses WordPress. Retrieved from WebsiteBuilder
- Growjo (n.d.). Automattic Overview. Retrieved from Growjo
- Osman (2021). Wild and Interesting WordPress Statistics and Facts (2021). Retrieved from Kinsta
- Owler (n.d.) Automattic. Retrieved from Owler
- Patel (2020). 11 Most Expensive WordPress Themes. Retrieved from HooThemes
- Sourthern (2021). WordPress Powers 39.5% of All Websites. Retrieved from SEJ
- WebsiteBuilder (2021). Retrieved from WebsiteBuilder
- WordPress.com-Live Activity (n.d.) A live look at activity across WordPress.com. Retrieved from WordPress.com
- WordPress.org (n.d.) Plugins. Retrieved from WordPress.org
- WordPress.com-About (n.d.). About Us. Retrieved from WordPress.com
- WordPress.org-Download Counter (n.d.). Retrieved from WordPress.org
- Whitfield (2021). WordPress Pricing 2021. Retrieved from WebsiteBuilderExpert
- w3techs (2021). Usage statistics and market share of WordPress. Retrieved from w3techs
- Yoast SEO (n.d.). Yoast SEO: the #1 WordPress SEO plugin. Retrieved from Yoast SEO
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