WordPress Hosting Benchmarks 2025 [Real Data]

We are back with our WordPress Hosting Benchmarks for the year 2025.

Our WordPress Hosting Benchmarks reports let you analyze and benchmark most popular WordPress hosting providers in the industry. 

What sets us apart is that we buy our own hosting accounts (link to our invoices) across popular hosting providers, set identical sites, and put them for 24/7, 365 days of performance monitoring. Thus, we bring the most valued data, which is not available anywhere else on the internet.

This benchmark report is generated based on 365 days of data obtained from January 1, 2024 to December 31, 2024. We have measured all the crucial metrics like TTFB (Time to First Byte), Uptime, load handling, hardware performance, and global TTFB scores.

HTML Table View

Hosting	Type	Plan	Price (monthly)	Test Site Datacenter Location	CDN	Benchmark Start Date
A2 Hosting	Shared	Startup	$2.99	Michigan (US East Coast)	No	September 1, 2020
Bluehost	Shared	WordPress Basic Hosting	$2.95	Provo, Utah	No	November 16, 2022
ChemiCloud	Shared	Starter	$2.95	Dallas	No	August 25, 2020
Cloudways	Managed Cloud	DigitalOcean Standard	$11	New York	No	August 25, 2020
DreamPress	Managed WordPress	DreamPress	$16.95	Ashburn Virginia	No	January, 30, 2021
FastComet	Shared	Starter	$2.95	Newark, USA	No	August 25, 2020
GreenGeeks	Shared	Lite	$2.95	Chicago, US	No	September 1, 2020
HostGator	Shared	Hatchling	$3.75	Provo, Utah	No	November 16, 2022
Hostinger	Shared	Single	$2.99	North Carolina	No	November 30, 2020
Kinsta	Managed WordPress	Starter	$35	Iowa, Google Cloud	Cloudflare Enterprise	September 1, 2020
NameHero	Shared	Starter Cloud	$8.95	Wyoming	No	April 1, 2023
Nexcess	Managed WordPress	Spark	$21	Southfield, Michigan	Cloudflare	May 1, 2021
Rocket	Managed WordPress	Starter	$30	Ashburn	Cloudflare Enterprise	October 12, 2020
SiteGround	Shared	Startup	$2.99	Iowa	No	August 26, 2020
Templ	Managed WordPress	Micro	$15	North Virginia, Google Cloud	No	February 3, 2021
WP Engine	Managed WordPress	Startup	$35	North America	Cloudflare	September 1, 2020
WPX Hosting	Managed WordPress	Business	$24.99	Chicago	WPX XDN	March 26, 2021

Our Methodology:

Test Environment:

• WordPress Version 6.7.1
• WordPress Twenty Twenty-Four theme
• Active Plugins: Akismet, Contact Form 7, and Rank Math
• Caching:
  • Default server-side caching on Managed WordPress.
  • WP Fastest Cache plugin is used to enable caching on shared hosting.
• PHP version: 8.1

Testing Parameters:

1. TTFB
2. Uptime
3. Load Test
4. WPBenchmarks
5. Global TTFB.

The complete test details can be found in the respective sections.

Benchmark Test 1 – TTFB

Time to First Byte (TTFB) is the crucial metric to evaluate the performance of any hosting company.

We use Pingdom synthetic monitoring tool configured to ping the test site at 60-second intervals from 22 geographically distributed test locations across the USA. The TTFB scores are collected from all locations and then averaged to bring the final TTFB score.

In numbers, we do 43,800 individual tests a month and a whopping 52,56,00 tests a year to write this annual WordPress benchmarks post. The test parameters:

• Test Frequency: 60-second interval
• Monitoring Locations: 22 points across USA
• Timeout threshold: 30 seconds
• Test Type: HTTPS
• SSL/TSL: Enabled
• Test Duration: 365 days
• Total Tests/Month: 43,800
• Annual Tests: 525,600
• Metrics Collected: Min/Max/Average TTFB
  

Results:

Based on our benchmark report, Rocket hosting maintains its top TTFB performer position with 355ms average TTFB. Templ hosting (357ms) and WPX (365ms) offers similar performance with sub-400ms TTFB score.

Among shared hosting companies, GreenGeeks (395ms) and A2 Hosting (397ms) secures the top spots. HostGator, like last few years, takes the last spot with 790ms TTFB.

The data shows a ~455ms gap between top and bottom performing host indicates how the hosting choices are critical for business websites. 

Based on the obtained TTFB data (335ms – 790ms), we grouped the companies by 50ms increments. 

Elite Performance (sub 400ms):

• Rocket.net (335ms)
• Templ.io (357ms)
• WPX (365ms)
• GreenGeeks (395ms)
• A2 Hosting (397ms)

Strong Performance (400 – 450ms):

• Cloudways (405ms)
• FastComet (427ms)
• ChemiCloud (435ms)
• DreamPress (437ms)
• Hostinger (443ms)

Average Performance (451 – 500ms):

• NameHero (452ms)
• Nexcess (454ms)
• WP Engine (462ms)
• Kinsta (466ms)
• Bluehost (472ms)

Below Average Performance (>500ms):

• SiteGround (510ms)
• HostGator (790ms)

Here is a visual representation of how each hosting provider stack up in TTFB performance:

Benchmark Test 2 – Uptime

The Uptime benchmark is done through the same Pingdom synthetic monitoring tool which pings the test sites from 22 locations. There is a 30 second threshold time and if the site is unresponsive, downtime is calculated.

Each hosting provider offers an uptime SLA and below which they are obliged to compensate the users. So, it’s best recommended to use a proper uptime tracking for your website. The test parameters are:

• Test Frequency: 60-second interval
• Monitoring Locations: 22 points across USA
• Timeout threshold: 30 seconds
• Test Type: HTTPS
• SSL/TSL: Enabled
• Test Duration: 365 days
• Total Tests/Month: 43,800
• Annual Tests: 525,600
• Metrics measured: Total Downtime/outages/Average Uptime.

Results:

The Managed WordPress hosts (Templ, Rocket, Kinsta, WP Engine, Cloudways, Nexcess, etc) generally offer better uptime compared to shared hosts.

Services like A2 Hosting and GreenGeeks offer excellent speed but lags in uptime, though the uptime range is within their SLA. We have tested their starter plans alone. Since they are superior in speed, we recommend to try their mid or top tier plans to get better reliability similar to what we get in Managed WordPress hosts. 

Our data reveals some interesting uptime patterns. We have nine hosting services recorded 99.99% uptime. But if you look closely, Rocket.net hosting with 1 minute of downtime and SiteGround hosting with 1 hour 18 minutes of downtime is calculated as 99.99% uptime.
So, we included the total downtime and outage data in the chart giving you a clearer view for indepth analysis of a company.

It’s evident from the report, the site owners should cautiously choose a reliable hosting provider because 99.99% uptime feels good on paper but reality is different.

Since we use the same Pingdom tool for measuring TTFB and uptime, refer the screenshots in TTFB section  to view the uptime data.

Perfect Reliability:

• Templ.io (100%) – zero downtime, zero outages

Elite Reliability (99.99%):

• Rocket.net (99.99%) – 1 min, 1 outage
• WPX (99.99%) – 2 mins, 2 outages
• Kinsta (99.99%) – 3 mins, 1 outage
• DreamPress (99.99%) – 35 mins, 4 outages
• WP Engine (99.99%) – 42 mins, 4 outages
• Cloudways (99.99%) – 1 hour 2 mins, 5 outages
• Nexcess (99.99%) – 1 hour 5 mins, 9 outages
• Hostinger (99.99%) – 1 hour 15 mins, 26 outages
• SiteGround (99.99%) – 1 hour 18 mins, 23 outages

Strong Reliability (99.98 – 99.96%):

• HostGator (99.98%) – 1 hour 54 mins, 20 outages
• Bluehost (99.97%) – 2 hours 21 mins, 34 outages
• NameHero (99.97%) – 2 hour 31 mins, 55 outages
• A2 Hosting (99.97%) – 2 hours 47 mins, 23 outages
• GreenGeeks (99.96%) – 3 hours 37 mins, 39 outages

Below Average (< 99.95%):

• ChemiCloud (99.92%) – 6 hours 55 mins, 45 outages
• FastComet (99.84%) – 13 hours 56 mins, 133 outages

Benchmark Test 3 – Load Testing

The load test is the advanced benchmark for sites that receives constant traffic throughout the day. The test is done to know how does the hosting handles the constant traffic in fastest time.

We send 100 constant visitors to the site using Loader tool to measure the average response time. Lesser than response time indicates the server handles the load exceptionally faster. The test parameters are:

• Virtual users: 0-100 concurrent visitors
• Duration: 1 minute
• Test Type: Maintain Client Load
• Method: GET
• Protocol: HTTPS
• Measured: Response time (Average / Min / Max)

Results:

For the first time, WP Engine secured the top position in load testing. This is due to their aggressive upgrades to their tech stacks in the last few years. Rocket hosting scored the top spot in the last few years but their security settings block our testing, so unfortunately we don’t have data to prove their load handling capabilities.

Looking at the results of GreenGeeks, it achieved elite performance with no CDN involved whereas other Elite performers WP Engine and Kinsta are tested with CDN edge caching. GreenGeeks truly deserves an applause here for the value they bring at an affordable price.

The strong performance group is led by most managed WordPress hosts and A2 Hosting being the sole shared hosting provider with 44ms response time.

The average performance group comprises mostly shared hosting services. Hosts like NameHero, HostGator, ChemiCloud received 4xx/5xx errors either due to poor server handling or their security blocks our testing tool. 

Elite Performance (<30ms):

• WP Engine (19ms)
• GreenGeeks (26ms)
• Kinsta (27ms)

Strong Performance (30-70ms):

• WPX (41ms)
• A2 Hosting (44ms)
• Nexcess (60ms)
• Templ.io (68ms)

Average Performance (71-150ms):

• FastComet (79ms)
• Cloudways (128ms)
• Bluehost (131ms)
• NameHero (141ms)*
• SiteGround (147ms)

Poor Performance (>150ms):

• HostGator (152ms)*
• DreamPress (223ms)
• Hostinger (256ms)
• ChemiCloud (1068ms)*

*Indicates hosts experiencing 4xx/5xx errors during testing.

Benchmark Test 4 – WPBenchmark Test

WPBenchmark plugin is installed on the test sites and the hardware performance is measured. It does a series of tests like CPU, Memory, file system and database performance and gives a score out of 10. Higher the score indicates better the host at handling huge workloads at the backend. The parameters are:

Server Tests Conducted:

• CPU and Memory
• Filesystem
• Database
• Network
• Scoring System: Scale: 0-10

Results:

Like the last few years, Kinsta got the best hardware performance. The company claims to offer the fastest virtual machines on Google Cloud and it’s evident from the fact, no other company has ever beaten Kinsta’ score in WPBenchmark test. We recommend Kinsta for resource hungry WordPress sites.

SiteGround and Hostinger secures the next spots despite their average speed performance in above tests.

Elite Server Performance (8.0 – 8.5):

• Kinsta (8.5)
• SiteGround (8.3)
• Hostinger (8.0)
• Rocket.net (8.1)

High Server Performance (7.0 – 7.9):

• WPX (7.7)
• Nexcess (7.5)

Moderate Server Performance (5.0 – 6.9):

• Templ.io (6.5)
• DreamPress (6.2)
• WP Engine (5.9)
• GreenGeeks (5.1)

Limited Server Performance (< 5.0):

• FastComet (4.8)
• HostGator (4.3)
• Bluehost (4.0)
• Cloudways (3.7)
• ChemiCloud (3.5)
• A2 Hosting (3.4)
• NameHero (3.4)

Benchmark Test 6 – Global TTFB

The Global TTFB test is for sites which get traffic across the globe. The SpeedVitals tools ping the site from 40 international locations, the scores are averaged to measure the overall global TTFB score. 

This test helps to identify the regional performance bottlenecks and helps us to choose the right regional CDN or hosting provider. The testing parameters are:

Locations: 40 international points

• Americas: 15 points
• Europe: 15 points
• Asia-Pacific: 10 points
• Protocol: HTTPS

Analysis: Average and regional Global TTFB score.

Results:

Rocket hosting, powered by Cloudflare Enterprise, stays at the top position with a 177ms score. Templ hosting powered by Google Cloud CDN gets the second spot with 264ms score. WP Engine secured third with 298ms global TTFB score. All the top spots are secured by companies which use CDN edge caching which demonstrates the need of CDN edge caching for fastest TTFB performance.

Bluehost is in an interesting spot, thanks to the addition of Cloudflare CDN with Argo routing, it secured strong performance. Cloudways leads the non-CDN hosts with 444ms score. SiteGround which comes with their own CDN got the worst performing TTFB like last year.

Elite Global Performance (< 300ms):

• Rocket.net (177ms)
• Templ.io (264ms)
• WP Engine (298ms)

Strong Performance (300 – 500ms):

• Bluehost (394ms)
• Cloudways (444ms)
• GreenGeeks (491ms)
• Hostinger (503ms)

Average Performance (501 – 700ms):

• A2 Hosting (527ms)
• FastComet (553ms)
• ChemiCloud (599ms)
• WPX (597ms)
• DreamPress (632ms)
• Kinsta (622ms)
• Nexcess (640ms)
• NameHero (673ms)

Below Average ( >700ms):

• HostGator (792ms)
• SiteGround (886ms)

Regional TTFB Leaders:

• Americas: Rocket.net (114ms), WP Engine (135ms), Templ.io (154ms)
• Europe: WP Engine (112ms), Rocket.net (112ms), Templ.io (200ms)
• Asia-Pacific: Rocket.net (273ms), Templ.io (393ms), WP Engine (560ms)

Benchmark Reports of individual Hosting Companies [Ordered by its Value Score]