The Companies and Products

LoadStorm Testing Results

The Load Storm test (in k6) is designed to simulate real users visiting the site, logging in and browsing. It tests uncached performance.

The key metrics are:

• Total Requests - Number of requests k6 made
• Total Errors - Number of error requests
• p95 - The 95th percentile response time
• Page Cum Avg - Cumulative average response time for Pages (html)
• Asset Cum Avg - Cumulative average response time for Assets (css, js, images)
• Login Cum Avg - Cumulative average response time for Login (wp-profile.php)
• WP-Login Avg Response Time - Average response time for login (301 redirect which validates credentials)

Results Table

Discussion

Bluehost, Pressable, Tangible, WP Buzz, and WPX all handled the LoadStorm test without issue. Bluehost had flat response times and zero errors. Pressable had one spike in an otherwise excellent run. WP Buzz showed the now-familiar cron-related bumps which didn't affect capacity.

InMotion Hosting kept response times in check until around 700 VUsers, after which response times started climbing for the rest of the test. The error count stayed low (283) but the slow-down was clear.

Raidboxes looked good up to about 1,000 VUsers, then started slowing down with HTTP 429s ramping up around 1,250 VUsers indicating a rate limit. The error total ran into the hundreds of thousands by the end, which kept the otherwise strong performance up to that ceiling out of an award.

K6 Static Testing Results

K6 Static test is designed to test cached performance by repeatedly requesting the homepage.

Results Table

Discussion

WPX had the fastest average response time at 4.1ms. Pressable was second at 7.2ms and Bluehost was third at 8.4ms. WP Buzz (8.6ms) and Tangible (12.9ms) round out the sub-15ms group.

Bluehost's static graph has a step-pattern partway through that looks substantial in isolation but is a sub-3ms shift in absolute terms — looks like a routing change for the Bangalore source mid-test. Easy to forgive when the axis labels are that small.

InMotion Hosting's 119.5ms average puts them in the no-edge-cache cluster. The graph shows the same 5-minute cron pattern visible on their dynamic test.

Raidboxes had the same rate-limit story on the static test — response times held steady but the rate limit cut in around 650 VUsers and 429 errors started accumulating around 1,750 VUsers, pulling the average to 854ms by the end.

Uptime Testing Results

Uptime is monitored by three sources: HetrixTools and StatusCake as third-party services, plus a self-hosted UptimeKuma instance for cross-reference in case of major discrepancy between the third-party monitors.

Results Table

Discussion

Pressable had 100% across all three monitors. Bluehost, WP Buzz, and InMotion Hosting all hit 100% on at least one monitor and were above 99.99% on the others.

WPX came in at 99.78% on the self-hosted UptimeKuma instance — the same value their lower-tier results show, which points to an UptimeKuma-side issue with that endpoint rather than three independent outages. HetrixTools (100%) and StatusCake (99.9%) on the same plan both had a normal year.

Everyone else was 99.9%+ across all three monitors.

GTmetrix Testing Results

GTmetrix loads the homepage and records how long it takes from 12 different locations around the world. (We switched from WebPageTest to GTmetrix in 2026.) Results are measured in seconds.

Results Table

Discussion

WP Buzz had the fastest average and was the fastest in 11 of the 12 locations. Raidboxes was the fastest in Frankfurt — their European peering shows. Pressable had the second fastest average and Bluehost the third, both without winning an individual location.

The slowest averages were WPX, Tangible, and InMotion Hosting. The WPX number is pulled up by a single Mumbai measurement above 8 seconds that looks like a routing event, not a steady-state result.

WPPerformanceTester Testing Results

WPPerformanceTester performs two benchmarks. One is a WordPress (WP Bench) and the other is a PHP Bench. WP Bench measures how many WP queries per second and higher tends to be better (varies considerably by architecture). PHP Bench performs a lot of computational and some database operations which are measured in seconds to complete. Lower PHP Bench is better.

Results Table

Discussion

WP Buzz had the fastest PHP Bench at 4.86s. Tangible was a fraction behind at 4.93s. WPX was third at 7.22s.

Tangible had the fastest WP Bench by a significant margin. WP Buzz was second and Bluehost was third.

WPBenchmark Score

WPBenchmark is a hosting performance benchmark that produces a single composite score per server. Higher is better.

Results Table

Discussion

The WPBenchmark.io scores were very close at the top — WP Buzz and Tangible tied at 9.9, with Bluehost and Pressable tied for third at 8.3.

SSL Testing Results

The tool is available at https://www.ssllabs.com/ssltest/

Results Table

Discussion

No B or A- grades at this tier this year.

Bluehost, Pressable, Raidboxes, and Tangible earned A+.

InMotion Hosting, WP Buzz, and WPX earned A.

Conclusion

There are two levels of recognition awarded to companies that participate in the tests. There is no ‘best’ declared, it’s simply tiered, it’s hard to come up with an objective ranking system because of the complex nature of hosting. These tests also don’t take into account outside factors such as reviews, support, and features. It is simply testing performance as described in the methodology.

Top Tier

This year's Top Tier WordPress Hosting Performance Award goes to the following companies who showed virtually no signs of struggle during the testing.

Honorable Mention

The following companies earned Honorable Mention status because they did very well and had a minor issue or two holding them back from earning Top Tier status.

No company achieved this status.

Individual Host Analysis