Please read the Methodology to fully understand the scope of these tests.
Note: Please check company profiles for summary of performances across multiple tiers. Some companies also offer promotions or coupon codes for a discount as well.
Servebolt submitted two plans, Business and Pro+Accelerated Domains (ACD).
Every company handled the static test almost perfect. There was a decrease in average and p95 response times from every company that participated in the previous year. Cloudways went from 212/489 to 111/217 [Avg/p95]. Nexcess went from 248/473 to 14/22. Pressable went from 5.9/19 to 5.3/12. Servebolt went from 176/283 + 37/50 to 20/28 + 30/41. It shows the companies which were slower last year saw the biggest gains, but even the fastest companies continue to speed up.
Uptime Testing Results
Uptime is monitored by two companies: HetrixTools and Uptime Robot. A self hosted monitor was also run in case there was a major discrepancy between the two third party monitors.
Results Table
Company
Uptime Robot
Hetrix
Cloudways
100
100
Nexcess
100
99.9909
Pressable
100
100
Servebolt
100
99.9941
Servebolt Pro+ACD
100
99.9972
Discussion
Perfect uptime on Uptime Robot for everyone and nobody was below 99.99% on Hetrix Tools.
WebPageTest Testing Results
WebPageTest fully loads the homepage and records how long it takes from 12 different locations around the world. Result are measured in seconds.
Results Table
Company
Virginia
California
Salt Lake City
London
Frankfurt
Cape Town
Singapore
Mumbai
Tokyo
Sydney
Brazil
Dubai
Average
Cloudways
203
462
399
509
578
1330
1190
1200
873
1148
676
1171
812
Nexcess
283
482
433
465
921
1005
1141
1146
773
1120
636
941
779
Pressable
273
303
384
278
298
1534
263
726
291
282
390
386
451
Servebolt
227
355
448
323
388
218
753
865
375
465
210
240
406
Servebolt Pro+ACD
256
440
652
442
324
248
749
442
415
223
498
296
415
Discussion
Servebolt was the fastest average with 406ms with 3/12 fastest locations.
Servebolt ACD followed close behind for second at 415ms average and 2/12 fastest locations.
Pressable was third fastest average with 451ms with 6/12 fastest locations
Cloudways was the fastest in Virginia.
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
Company
PHP Bench
WP Bench
Cloudways
7.161
873.3624454
Nexcess
6.297
2512.562814
Pressable
9.68
1647.446458
Servebolt
4.233
4716.981132
Servebolt Pro+ACD
4.227
4464.285714
Discussion
Servebolt had the fastest PHP bench and WP Bench scores by a significant margin. Servebolt run a patched version of MariaDB whereas the default version performs AES_ENCRYPT() function slower. I debated changing the plugin before I was aware it was patchable, but considering it is something fixable, I opted not to change it this year.
Nexcess had an incredibly fast WP Bench, the fastest of any WP Bench this year for a company not named Servebolt.
Everyone got an A with Servebolt earning two A+'s.
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.
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.
Cloudways handled the Static test flawlessly with no errors or signs of load and a quick 111ms average response time. Cloudways also had perfect uptime. Cloudways even picked up the fastest response time in Virginia on WPT. Unfortunately, the Load Storm test proved a little much with the server slowing down around 2300 users. This was a dramatic improvement over last year where issues started around 900 users and it errored out. It's nice to see a lot of improvement, but there's definitely a little more work left to be done.
Nexcess earned Top Tier last year but the performance didn't stand out against its peers. The improvement this year was dramatic with Load Storm's p95 going from 509 down to 299. The Static test saw an even more dramatic drop from 248ms average to 14ms and 473ms to 22ms for the p95. The Static results were the second fastest this year from being in the slowest the previous year. Nexcess had 100% and 99.99%+ uptime. The PHP and WP Bench scores from Nexcess would be the fastest of any company this year except Servebolt. It's nice to see a Top Tier performer improve considerably and earn another Top Tier award.
Pressable had a fantastic Load Storm test where it led every response time metric (p95, wp-login, Page, Asset, Login). Pressable also led the average and p95 response times on the Static test. Pressable had perfect uptime on both monitors. Despite having the third fastest WPT average, it led in 6/12 locations as the fastest. Pressable was unquestionably Top Tier this year.
Servebolt's Business plan compared fairly similarly to it's Pro+ACD variant. The Load Storm test saw Servebolt earn second fastest p95 and Asset response times; along with third fastest wp-login response time. Servebolt aced the static test with 20ms average and 28ms p95. The Uptime was 100% and 99.99%+. This Servebolt plan also had the fastest average WPT speed and led in 3/12 locations. Servebolt's plans ran away in PHP/WP Bench scores posting the highest numbers we've seen to date this year. The SSL test earned an A+. The test results were excellent for Servebolt, yet again, and they find themselves earning another Top Tier award.
Servebolt Pro+ACD handled the Load Storm test effortlessly. It had the second fastest wp-login, Page, and Login; as well as the third fastest p95, and Asset response times. The Static test was easy as well with Servebolt clocking in 30ms average and 41ms p95 response times. Uptime was 100% and 99.99%+. Servebolt Pro+ACD had the second fastest WPT average and was the fastest in 2/12 locations. Servebolt ran away in PHP/WP Bench scores posting the highest numbers we've seen to date this year. Add in an A+ SSL for good measure. Yet another Top Tier performance for Servebolt.
Please read the Methodology to fully understand the scope of these tests.
Note: Please check company profiles for summary of performances across multiple tiers. Some companies also offer promotions or coupon codes for a discount as well.
WooCommerce Hosting Performance Benchmarks is spawned off WordPress Hosting Performance Benchmarks and is designed to create a consistent set of benchmarks showing how WooCommerce specialized web hosting companies perform. The focus of these tests is performance, not support, not features, not any other dimension. These benchmarks should be looked at in combination with other sources of information when making any hosting decision. Review Signal’s web hosting reviews has insights for some of the companies with regards to aspects beyond performance. That said, for the performance conscious, these benchmarks should be a good guide.
The major differences from the WordPress methodology are the following:
Setup
All tests were performed on an identical WooCommerce dummy website with the same plugins except in cases where hosts added extra plugins or code. The Storefront theme was used with the following sample products. The following Plugins were installed: WooCommerce, and WP Performance Tester.
k6 Load Storm
The process for LoadStorm was the unique WooCommerce specific test emulated from last year into k6. There were four different profiles created and given their own user distributions (in % after profile), all with 5-10 second page think time. The test scaled from 4 to 1000 concurrent users over 40 minutes and stayed at 1,000 concurrent users for 20 minutes (60 minute test, 20 minute peak).
Profile 1 (20%): Buyer – Homepage, add item to cart, go to cart, checkout (doesn’t submit order)
Blallo started to show signs of load around 850 users and response times slowed down. It kept delivering, but it slowed down enough to keep it out of earning recognition.
Cloudways started slowing down around 350 VUsers with errors kicking in around 1,000.
Load Storm Average Response Time by Profile
This takes deeper look at the results and analyzes the performance of loading HTML mime types, to ignore a lot of static assets which are cached and bring down average response times. This tests how fast the initial pages are delivered, which is what a user would experience before loading all the other assets like css, javascript and images.
Results Table
Company
Buyer Profile
Customer Profile
Browser Profile
Home Profile
Cart Response Cumavg
Blallo
1375
1383
767
1019
571
Cloudways
22783
20095
14271
17279
11771
GreenGeeks
463
413
413
459
229
Nexcess
543
493
279
395
276
Pressable
413
361
240
313
219
Presslabs
447
407
179
271
178
Seravo
519
299
445
287
190
Servebolt
421
477
246
273
189
SiteGround
715
671
373
619
398
WordPress.com
967
643
467
563
446
Cloudways stands out with the highest response times.
Blallo had the second highest response times across every profile.
Presslabs had 2/4 of the fastest profiles along with fastest cart speed.
Pressable and Seravo picked up the two other fastest profile scores.
Servebolt was the second fastest in 2/4 profiles and 2nd fastest cart speed.
K6 Static Testing Results
K6 Static test is designed to test cached performance by repeatedly requesting the homepage.
Every single company handled the static test well. The entire cohort saw a combined 5 errors total which is astonishingly low. The highest average response time was 130ms which is still quite fast. Pressable and WordPress.com both were single digit average response times with 5 other companies following with 30ms or lower right behind them (Nexcess, Presslabs, Servebolt, SiteGround, Blallo).
Uptime Testing Results
Uptime is monitored by two companies: HetrixTools and Uptime Robot. A self hosted monitor was also run in case there was a major discrepancy between the two third party monitors.
Results Table
Company
Uptime Robot
Hetrix
Blallo
100
100
Cloudways
100
99.9991
GreenGeeks
100
99.9931
Nexcess
100
99.9849
Pressable
100
100
Presslabs
100
100
Seravo
100
99.9959
Servebolt
100
99.9927
SiteGround
100
99.9987
WordPress.com
100
100
Discussion
Uptime Robot showed 100% uptime on every single company. HetrixTools showed above 99.9% on every company. Not a single company had uptime issues during this test.
WebPageTest Testing Results
WebPageTest fully loads the homepage and records how long it takes from 12 different locations around the world. Result are measured in seconds.
Results Table
Company
Virginia
California
Salt Lake City
London
Frankfurt
Cape Town
Singapore
Mumbai
Tokyo
Sydney
Brazil
Dubai
Average
Blallo
510
647
938
927
1050
375
1819
1880
625
1240
1018
469
958.1666667
Cloudways
429
885
781
924
986
2113
2145
2120
1599
2142
1124
2000
1437.333333
GreenGeeks
235
350
402
499
586
1172
1051
1082
768
966
688
961
730
Nexcess
721
983
1017
1047
1128
748
1437
1557
1155
1878
1032
1859
1213.5
Pressable
560
700
771
673
678
813
1581
1036
856
659
650
1212
849.0833333
Presslabs
531
579
768
559
560
1442
488
654
472
603
530
1242
702.3333333
Seravo
594
739
763
1039
1114
2038
2087
1940
1598
1881
1321
2156
1439.166667
Servebolt
527
611
961
653
685
772
1329
868
493
753
523
1318
791.0833333
SiteGround
674
581
865
1350
1021
1741
556
3600
1040
590
565
1714
1191.416667
WordPress.com
517
697
964
573
665
965
639
606
623
698
558
601
675.5
Discussion
WordPress.com was the fastest this year on average but only was the fastest in Mumbai.
Presslabs earned itself second fastest average with 3/12 locations showing it to be the fastest.
Last year's fastest GreenGeeks, improved their average from 773ms to 730ms, a 43ms improvement. It was the fastest in 4/12 locations. The field continued to get faster and it only earned third this year on average response time.
SiteGround had the fastest in Sydney, Servebolt in Brazil, Blallo in Dubai and Cape Town.
Everyone, especially consumers, looks like a winner given the historical context.
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
Company
PHP Bench
WP Bench
Blallo
12.617
656.5988181
Cloudways
9.182
542.0054201
GreenGeeks
9.393
1926.782274
Nexcess
7.965
1745.200698
Pressable
9.697
1689.189189
Presslabs
6.935
1109.877913
Seravo
8.931
314.7623544
Servebolt
4.22
4672.897196
SiteGround
8.825
1329.787234
WordPress.com
9.454
2325.581395
Discussion
Servebolt had the fastest PHP bench and WP Bench scores by a significant margin. Servebolt run a patched version of MariaDB whereas the default version performs AES_ENCRYPT() function slower. I debated changing the plugin before I was aware it was patchable, but considering it is something fixable, I opted not to change it this year.
Presslabs and then Nexcess had the second and third fastest PHP bench scores. Then the field becomes pretty close with Blallo in the rear.
The WP Bench scores were much more distributed with WordPress.com and GreenGeeks taking second and third respectively.
Seravo had the slowest WP Bench but operates in a cluster, which is a good reminder that WPPerformanceTester is single threaded. Which is why it's a nice piece of information but doesn't necessarily determine real world performance.
GreenGeeks, Pressable, Seravo, Servebolt and WordPress.com all earned A+'s.
Cloudways, Nexcess, Presslabs, and SiteGround earned A's.
Blallo earned a B.
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.
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.
Blallo was a new entrant this year and had a pretty good first showing in these difficult tests. The static test was handled near perfect with an average response time of 30ms and a single error in roughly 875,000 requests. Blallo also maintained perfect uptime with both monitors showing 100%. They also had the fastest WPT response time in Dubai and Cape Town. The Load Storm test created a little too much load and the server started to slow down noticeably around 850 users. It didn't fail or error out, but response times started creeping up for the remainder of the test. Overall, Blallo definitely had some bright spots and hopefully earns itself some recognition in the coming years.
Cloudways's static test was excellent with zero errors and a flat response time. It had perfect and 99.9991% uptime. The Load Storm test was a struggle again this year, Cloudways showed some signs of improvement over last year. Overall, it's trending the right direction and handling the test better. Unfortunately, it still needs to improve more to earn some recognition in these benchmarks.
GreenGeeks handled the Load Storm test without issue. It didn't stand out in any particular category but it was performed solidly without any issues. The static test wasn't an issue for GreenGeeks either, the response time was completely flat with 0 errors. GreenGeeks had 100%/99.99%+ uptime. GreenGeeks had the fastest response times in 4/12 locations in the WPT test and improved the average response time from 773ms to 730ms this year. Despite being the fastest last year and improving this year, it was the third fastest average on WPT. GreenGeeks also had the third fastest WP Bench score. Overall, GreenGeeks saw some improvements and maintained their Top Tier status as the cheapest plan in the tests, well done.
Nexcess saw tremendous improvement over their 2022 WooCommerce performance. Last year the Load Storm test overwhelmed them, this year's performance was a night and day difference. Nexcess even earned the third fastest Page speed this year. The improvements didn't just stop there, the Static test went from 297ms average last year to 15ms this year. Nexcess earned the third fastest average and p95 speeds on the Static test. Nexcess showed 100% and 99.98% on the uptime monitors. Nexcess went from struggling to handling this test well and even starting to compete for the fastest results, it's nice to see companies improve their performance so much between years. It's a pleasure to award Nexcess their first Top Tier recognition for the WooCommerce benchmark.
Pressable had an excellent showing this year. The Load Storm test had no errors, flat response times, the second fastest P95, the fastest Page load times, fastest Buyer profile, and second fastest customer+browser profile. Pressable did flawlessly on the static test with zero errors again, the fastest average and p95 (tie) response times. Throw in perfect uptime on both monitors and giving Pressable Top Tier status this year was an easy choice.
This was Presslabs's first time entering the WooCommerce benchmark. They've regularly earned Top Tier recognition in the WordPress benchmarks. Their first foray into the WooCommerce benchmark did not disappoint. Presslabs had the fastest P95, wp-login, asset, login, Browser profile, Home profile and Woo Cart response times. It also had the second fastest Page, and third fastest Buyer profile and Customer profile response times. The Static results were also blazingly fast with a 16ms average and 52ms p95 response times. Perfect uptime on both monitors. The second fastest average on the WPT test with the fastest score in 3/12 locations. Presslabs also had the second fastest PHP Bench score. Overall, Presslabs had an undeniably Top Tier performance for their first WooCommerce benchmark.
Seravo returned to the benchmarks after taking a year off. The break seems to have paid off as Seravo has earned their first Top Tier award for the WooCommerce benchmark. The Load Storm test didn't show a hint of load and didn't have a single error. Seravo clocked the fastest fastest customer profile, second fastest login cumulative average, and third fastest p95, wp-login speed, woo cart response time, and home profile. The static test went fine for Seravo, it had the slowest average response time, but that time was a very snappy 130ms with zero errors. Seravo also had 100%/99.99%+ uptime scores. Seravo had the slowest WPT average. It received an A+ grade from the SSL test. Overall, it was a massive improvement for Seravo. It earned Top Tier status because it handled the load tests quickly and without showing signs of performance degradation.
Servebolt's servers came roaring in with the fastest PHP and WP bench scores we've seen to date this year. The Load Storm test went effortlessly with Servebolt had the second fastest wp-login / Asset Loading / Buyer Profile / Home Profile / Woo Cart Response. It also had the third fastest P95 / Browser profile. The Static test was excellent as well with a 21ms average and 29ms p95. They also achieved perfect uptime and 99.99%+ on each uptime monitor. Servebolt had the fastest WPT response time in Brazil to boot. Servebolt easily achieves another Top Tier honor this year.
SiteGround handled the Load Storm test smoothly with a single error and flat response times. It wasn't the fastest in any metric but the results were good. The static test saw SiteGround achieve an excellent 23ms average without a single error. Uptime was 100% / 99.99%+. SiteGround was the fastest average response time in Sydney on the WPT. Overall, SiteGround handled all the tests very well; it was mostly in the middle of the pack, but the pack has become very fast. Considering it was the second cheapest plan in this test, it looks like a great result and earned a well deserved Top Tier award.
WordPress.com handled the Load Storm test very well. There were zero errors. There was the slightest hint of rising response times over the test with page response times increasing ~15ms over the duration and login response times going up ~60ms. But those slight response times kept WordPress.com out of being the fastest in any statistical categories this year. WordPress.com however did shine in the static test where it had a 6.7ms average response time which was the second fastest only slower than sister company Pressable - who they tied for first with on the P95 at 14ms. They also had perfect 100% uptime on both monitors. WordPress.com managed the fastest average speed on WPT. Overall, it's pretty obviously a Top Tier performance again.
Please read the Methodology to fully understand the scope of these tests.
Note: Please check company profiles for summary of performances across multiple tiers. Some companies also offer promotions or coupon codes for a discount as well.
The Enterprise tier of these benchmarks is special in that companies are allowed to change configurations to optimize for performance because at this price tier it’s expected for customers paying a lot of money. All other price tiers test default configurations.
Servebolt submitted two plans, the Scale + ACD plan is utilizing their Scale and Accelerated Domains addon which adds performance, scalability and security enhancements and their Enterprise Plan.
Altis Cloud had a strange pattern where performance has the initial cold start spike and becomes fast quickly, but then slowed down early in the test, but then improves and stabilizes for the remainder of the test. I've don't recall seeing this pattern before and was told it was caching related. Overall, it the system handled the max load without issue, but saw some strange spikes while scaling up.
Seravo ran into issues handling this test, it was an issue they were actively working on a fix for but it wasn't deployed in time before the testing for these benchmarks finished. It was related to a proxy running into issues when certain conditions were met which caused connections to stay open.
Every company handled this test very well. Seravo stood out at the bottom without a CDN, but still had an incredibly fast 117ms average. Excluding Seravo, every company was 33ms average or below and 43ms p95 or below. Compared to last year where the fastest average was 6.4 ms and p95 was 20ms. There are four companies this year below both of those levels. The performance at the Enterprise tier is mind bogglingly fast and getting even faster which is hard to comprehend when last year's 6.4ms was beaten by 4 plans this year.
Uptime Testing Results
Uptime is monitored by two companies: HetrixTools and Uptime Robot. A self hosted monitor was also run in case there was a major discrepancy between the two third party monitors.
Results Table
Company
Uptime Robot
Hetrix
A2 Hosting
100
100
Altis Cloud
100
100
Blallo
100
100
Performant Websites
98.169
99.9995
Pressable
100
100
Presslabs
100
100
Rocket.net
100
100
Seravo
99.999
99.9972
Servebolt
99.6
99.6966
Servebolt Scale+ACD
100
99.9972
Stoute Web Solutions
99.909
99.9279
WordPress VIP
100
100
Discussion
Every company except Performant Websites and Servebolt had above 99.9% uptime on both monitors. Both of those companies had issues with the uptime monitor being blocked by security measures when the servers weren't actually down. Effectively, none of these companies had any uptime issues.
WebPageTest Testing Results
WebPageTest fully loads the homepage and records how long it takes from 12 different locations around the world. Result are measured in seconds.
Results Table
Company
Virginia
California
Salt Lake City
London
Frankfurt
Cape Town
Singapore
Mumbai
Tokyo
Sydney
Brazil
Dubai
Average
A2 Hosting
195
207
853
207
681
207
205
276
425
321
561
210
362
Altis Cloud
215
206
299
253
240
190
486
234
246
271
247
144
253
Blallo
215
218
356
230
623
232
1279
222
226
971
227
267
422
Performant Websites
422
290
388
390
456
504
954
850
375
506
852
959
579
Pressable
268
269
401
454
319
1541
453
259
530
331
268
376
456
Presslabs
211
222
329
228
232
967
217
199
221
194
220
258
292
Rocket.net
178
234
274
174
177
142
167
187
163
173
167
211
187
Seravo
286
345
298
607
650
1269
1222
1198
916
1021
800
1182
816
Servebolt
248
207
497
202
191
174
685
206
164
228
179
244
269
Servebolt Scale+ACD
277
334
441
198
187
187
550
177
780
176
192
224
310
Stoute Web Solutions
229
248
611
533
550
238
1188
1773
228
1004
706
269
631
WordPress VIP
188
213
295
184
217
861
205
206
205
212
199
232
268
Discussion
Rocket.net had the fastest average at 187ms and was the fastest in 9/12 locations. Rocket Intelligent Edge looks to be paying off on the results here.
Altis picked up the second fastest average at 253ms and was the fastest in California and Dubai.
Servebolt Scale+ACD picked up the final fastest time in Mumbai.
WordPress VIP had the third fastest average.
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
Company
PHP Bench
WP Bench
A2 Hosting
12.576
1347.708895
Altis Cloud
11.484
230.5741296
Blallo
10.575
669.3440428
Performant Websites
10.252
651.8904824
Pressable
9.681
1692.047377
Presslabs
6.603
1388.888889
Rocket.net
6.942
2079.002079
Seravo
8.932
302.1148036
Servebolt
4.222
4444.444444
Servebolt Scale+ACD
4.215
4629.62963
Stoute Web Solutions
7.44
1919.385797
WordPress VIP
10.533
703.7297678
Discussion
Servebolt had the fastest PHP bench and WP Bench scores by a significant margin. Servebolt run a patched version of MariaDB whereas the default version performs AES_ENCRYPT() function slower. I debated changing the plugin before I was aware it was patchable, but considering it is something fixable, I opted not to change it this year.
It should be noted that at the Enterprise tier especially the architecture can have a huge impact on these scores. WPPerformanceTester is a single threaded test whereas many of these setups are designed to use many servers.
A2 Hosting, Altis Cloud, Performant Website, Presslabs, Seravo, Servebolt and WordPress VIP all earned A+
Pressable and Rocket.net earned A's.
Blallo and Stoute Web Solutions earned B's.
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.
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.
A2 Hosting's first entry into the Enterprise Tier is a nice signal they are going to be competing. The Static test saw A2 Hosting take third place for average response time with 5.4ms and tied for second at 13ms for p95. A2 also had perfect uptime and an A+ SSL test. Unfortunately, the Load Storm test was a bit too much for with the server beginning to slow down around 4250 users. It's great to see A2 Hosting competing in the Enterprise tier and the Static test showed they certainly can compete, but there's a little improvement still left to do before they earn Top Tier status.
Altis Cloud was a first time participant in the benchmarks. Altis Cloud is the enterprise hosting platform by well known WordPress consulting company HumanMade. Altis Cloud certainly stood out on the Static test in the best kind of way. Altis set a new record for the fastest average response time at 4.5ms and 11ms p95. Altis also had perfect uptime on both monitors. Altis was the second fastest average on WPT and the fastest in California and Dubai. Altis also picked up an A+ SSL test. Unfortunately, the Load Storm test was a little rocky with some odd spikes related to cache expiring issues that couldn't be fixed within the testing window. Despite the cache expiry issue Altis Cloud had the second fastest Asset response time. It was nice to see Altis finally enter the benchmarks this year and earn an Honorable Mention. It looks to be about one caching issue away from Top Tier status.
Blallo is another new entrant for the benchmarks and Enterprise tier. This GridPane powered hosting company picked up the third fastest Page cumulative average in the Load Storm test. They also had an identical 22ms average in the Static test alongside other GridPane powered hosts Stoute Web Solutions and Performant Websites. Blallo had perfect uptime on both monitors. Blallo's first performance earned it Top Tier recognition, it handled all the tests with ease.
Performant Websites's sophomore performance did not slump. In fact, Performant Websites had the second fastest wp-login on the Load Storm test. The 22ms and 33ms average and p95 on the Static test were no slouch either. There was a minor issue with an uptime monitor being blocked but the other showed 99.9995% uptime. They also earned an A+ on the SSL test. Performant Websites defended their Top Tier status with a great repeat performance.
Pressable had the second fastest p95 and third fastest login on the Load Storm test. Pressable also had the second fastest average and p95 on the Static test with 5.2ms and 13ms respectively. Perfect uptime. This is the first time since 2020 that Pressable competed in the Enterprise tier and they didn't lose a step. Congrats Pressable for earning Top Tier status.
Presslabs had the fastest everything (p95, wp-login, page, asset, login) in the Load Storm test, along with 0 errors. The Static test also went well with 10ms and 27ms average/p95 respectively. Perfect uptime. The highest PHP bench after anyone not named Servebolt. Presslabs earned an A+ on the SSL test for good measure. Presslabs easily earned Top Tier status this year with their blazingly fast and consistent performance.
Rocket.net's first participation in the Enterprise benchmarks certainly made a splash. Rocket.net had the second fastest Page and Login cumulative average speeds on the Load Storm test. The Static test was a quick 22/31ms average/p95. They also had perfect uptime. Rocket.net stood out on the WPT with the fastest average at 187ms and the fastest score in 9/12 locations. Rocket.net also picked up the third fastest WP Bench after both Servebolt plans. It's nice to see Rocket.net jump into the Enterprise tier and earn itself Top Tier status right away.
Seravo's return to the Enterprise tier was a little rocky. The Load Storm test ran into a problem with a bug in the proxy that couldn't be fixed before the testing was finished which cause the test to error out. The Static test went smoothly and saw an average response time of 117ms but that was a noticeable step above all the other competitors. Seravo was the only plan without an integrated CDN reducing load speeds globally and it showed in some of the tests. Seravo maintained 99.99%+ uptime on both monitors. Seravo earned an A+ on the SSL test. The proxy bug in the Load Storm test kept Seravo away from earning any rewards, but it's clear there is a solid platform that a fix or two gets it back into the Top Tier, and a CDN wouldn't hurt.
Servebolt consistently delivers excellent results. Servebolt stood out again on the WPPerformanceTester results where they delivered the highest scores seen on this benchmark. Servebolt handled the Load Storm test without issue. The Static test had a snappy 33ms and 43ms average and p95 response times. The Uptime numbers were off because of a security measure blocking them while the servers remained online (I confirmed they were loading during that window myself). Servebolt had the fourth fastest average on the WPT test. Add in an A+ on the SSL test for good measure and Servebolt earned yet another Top Tier award.
Servebolt's Scale + ACD plan had near identical results in Load Storm and the Static test where the the p95 differed by 4ms, the wp login by 2ms, the Page by 12ms, login by 5ms and identical Asset and static average+p95. The Scale+ACD plan didn't have the uptime monitoring issue and showed 100% and 99.99%+ uptime. It also picked up the fastest WPT time in Mumbai. The Scale+ACD plan managed the fastest PHP Bench and WP Bench score narrowly edging out the Servebolt Enterprise plan. It would be impossible not to give Servebolt Scale+ACD a Top Tier award again this year after a great performance.
Stoute Web Solutions was a new entrant to the benchmarks this year. Their first foray was quite a success. The Load Storm test was handled gracefully with no signs of load. The Static test had a 22ms and 29ms average and p95 respectively which is very fast. Uptime remained above 99.9%. Stoute Web Solutions didn't lead any categories or tests in their first run, but they delivered a service worthy of Top Tier recognition. The tests were handled without issue and the service delivered, congratulations.
WordPress VIP is a familiar face in the Enterprise benchmarks. They've been a model of consistency earning Top Tier recognition every year they've participated. This year was no exception. The Load Storm test saw WPVIP earn the third fastest p95, wp-login, and asset response times. The Static test had a 5.7ms average and 13ms p95 (tied for second fastest). WordPress VIP maintained perfect uptime on both monitors. They also earned third fastest average for WPT. Overall, an unsurprising Top Tier status earned yet again for a stellar performance.
Please read the Methodology to fully understand the scope of these tests.
Note: Please check company profiles for summary of performances across multiple tiers. Some companies also offer promotions or coupon codes for a discount as well.
Cloudways competed with a DigitalOcean 8GB Premium Droplet.
Everyone handled the static test well. There was literally not an error between all the companies combined. Last year I was impressed to see 4 companies below 50ms, now it's 4 companies below 20ms. The field continues to improve each and every year which is fantastic for everyone.
Uptime Testing Results
Uptime is monitored by two companies: HetrixTools and Uptime Robot. A self hosted monitor was also run in case there was a major discrepancy between the two third party monitors.
Results Table
Company
Uptime Robot
Hetrix
Cloudways
100
99.9944
Pressable
100
100
Presslabs
100
100
Servebolt
100
99.995
WPX
100
100
Discussion
Uptime Robot showed every company at perfect 100% uptime. Hetrix Tools had everyone above 99.99%. Basically perfect across the board.
WebPageTest Testing Results
WebPageTest fully loads the homepage and records how long it takes from 12 different locations around the world. Result are measured in seconds.
Results Table
Company
Virginia
California
Salt Lake City
London
Frankfurt
Cape Town
Singapore
Mumbai
Tokyo
Sydney
Brazil
Dubai
Average
Cloudways
225
508
401
518
529
1223
1210
1215
918
1147
698
1012
800
Pressable
280
355
410
419
532
1538
664
277
401
294
410
321
492
Presslabs
187
214
343
238
245
945
214
215
215
187
206
273
290
Servebolt
204
456
411
324
391
225
864
235
218
422
326
390
372
WPX
214
233
277
211
217
238
1061
207
502
234
1223
140
396
Discussion
Presslabs had the fastest average at 290ms and 6/12 fastest single location speeds.
Servebolt was the second fastest at 372ms and picked up 1/12 fastest single location speeds.
WPX was the third fastest at 396ms and picked up 5/12 fastest single location speeds.
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
Company
PHP Bench
WP Bench
Cloudways
9.364
285.5511136
Pressable
9.692
1692.047377
Presslabs
6.821
1383.125864
Servebolt
4.226
4830.917874
WPX
7.746
2164.502165
Discussion
Servebolt had the fastest PHP bench and WP Bench scores by a significant margin. Servebolt run a patched version of MariaDB whereas the default version performs AES_ENCRYPT() function slower. I debated changing the plugin before I was aware it was patchable, but considering it is something fixable, I opted not to change it this year.
A's for everyone except Servebolt, who received an 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.
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.
Cloudways handled the Static test without issue. It even was about 25% faster compared to last year which is nice to see. Cloudways' Uptime was 100% and 99.9944% which is excellent. The other test results didn't stand out, and they are maybe hindered a bit by not having a CDN by default like the competition at this price. Unfortunately, the Load Storm test was its Achilles heel again this year with a slow down starting around 1300 VUsers again. The server couldn't keep up with the requests and response times climbed to a point outside of recognition range again.
Pressable had an excellent Load Storm test with the second fastest p95 and third fastest on all the metrics. Pressable took it to near light speed with 5.3ms average response time on the Static test. Pressable had perfect uptime on both monitors. Pressable has been one of the more consistent Top Tier performers year after year, and this year is no exception - congrats on another Top Tier performance.
Presslabs swept the Load Storm metrics with the fastest p95, wp-login, page, asset and login speeds. It had the second fastest Static test in both average and p95 response time. Perfect uptime on both monitors. The fastest WPT average and fastest in 6/12 locations individually. It would be impossible to give Presslabs anything but Top Tier status for their results this year.
Servebolt flew through the Load Storm test again with the second fastest wp-login and third fastest p95. A measly 20ms average response time on the Static test was nothing to scoff at as well. Uptime was perfect and 99.995%. Servebolt also managed the second fastest average on the WPT. It also continued it's benchmark leading results on PHP/WP Bench. It's one of the least shocking statements to say Servebolt earned Top Tier status again this year.
WPX had another good year. The Load Storm test saw it clock in the second fastest Page, Asset and Login speed. The Static test had an blazingly fast 11ms average response time. Perfect uptime on both monitors is always nice to see as well. WPX's home built CDN showed off in the WPT results where they picked up 5/12 fastest speeds in individual locations. Overall, it was another great performance from WPX which earned them Top Tier status.
Please read the Methodology to fully understand the scope of these tests.
Note: Please check company profiles for summary of performances across multiple tiers. Some companies also offer promotions or coupon codes for a discount as well.
Due to the increase in participation fees this year, I started a Sponsorship program for new/small/first time participants who wanted to participate in the two lowest price tiers. I asked participating companies if any would be willing to sponsor the participation of other hosting companies that fit this criteria. Only 1 company took advantage of this program, WP Buzz. I want to personally thank and recognize the four amazingly generous companies stepped forward and provided financial support to allow more companies to participate: 20i, Krystal Hosting, Nexcess and Pressable. Thank you.
Cloudways competed with a Digital Ocean Premium 1GB droplet.
ShortPixel Hosting is no longer being offered after the benchmarks finished but before publishing. The results are published for posterity.
Stromonic was sold during the tests and the new owner was not prepared to participate in the benchmark. No load tests were run. Some of the other tests were run, and the results are recorded for posterity.
20i and SiteGround had very good performances with a minor spike or two, but the issues didn't seem to impact the ability of the server to handle the load. Sometimes things happen on the networks out of the control of the server itself and I decided to err in favor of not penalizing the spikes and keep both results as good.
A2Hosting had issues starting around 300 VUsers slowing down and then erroring.
Cloudways started to slow down around 80 VUsers and started erroring towards the end.
Hostgator started to slow down around 425 users and then errored out.
Cloudways had some spikes due to max CPU towards the end of the test.
The remaining companies handled the Static test without much issue.
Last year 3 companies were sub 50ms average response times. This year that number is 10. Those numbers for the p95 metric jumped from 3 to 8 this year as well.
Pressable kept their fastest average response time but A2 Hosting was 0.2ms behind and tied them for fastest p95 this year.
Even at the other end, last year's slowest was 267/575 (avg/p95) while this year was 162/423 (avg/p95). ManagedWPHosting improved roughly 100ms faster average and 140ms faster p95. It's great to see such improvements at both ends.
It does seem like there is a pretty clear line between companies with and without CDNs installed by default.
Uptime Testing Results
Uptime is monitored by two companies: HetrixTools and Uptime Robot. A self hosted monitor was also run in case there was a major discrepancy between the two third party monitors.
Results Table
Company
Uptime Robot
Hetrix
20i
100
100
34SP.com
100
99.9954
A2 Hosting
99.975
100
Bluehost
100
100
Cloudways
100
99.9755
EasyWP by Namecheap
100
99.9954
GreenGeeks
99.894
99.9783
Hostgator
100
100
ICDSoft
100
99.9924
Krystal Hosting
100
99.9991
Lightning Base
100
100
ManagedWPHosting
100
99.9991
Nexcess
99.999
99.9873
Pressable
100
100
ROMARG
99.962
99.9372
ShortPixel Hosting
100
99.9964
SiteGround
100
99.9982
Stoute Web Solutions
100
99.9868
Stromonic
99.947
99.99
WP Buzz
100
99.9991
WPX
100
99.9995
Discussion
Only one company was below the 99.9% threshold on a single monitor: GreenGeeks on the Uptime Robot was a borderline 99.894%. Meanwhile HetrixTools showed it having 99.9783%. The error was from the very start of the uptime monitoring and it said SSL-Host Mismatch. Hetrix Tools had no issues recorded during the same time frame. I am erring on an uptime monitoring tool problem versus a GreenGeeks problem since it automatically resolved itself and the other service didn't have any issue.
All the other companies maintained 99.9%+ uptime on both monitors.
WebPageTest Testing Results
WebPageTest fully loads the homepage and records how long it takes from 12 different locations around the world. Result are measured in seconds.
Results Table
Company
Virginia
California
Salt Lake City
London
Frankfurt
Cape Town
Singapore
Mumbai
Tokyo
Sydney
Brazil
Dubai
Average
20i
287
223
923
280
223
920
854
1066
193
948
724
876
626
34SP.com
547
884
883
211
280
894
1108
942
1252
1596
1071
702
864
A2 Hosting
209
224
748
237
663
204
215
371
213
276
661
195
351
Bluehost
445
309
851
364
629
293
1022
2042
1006
636
573
319
707
Cloudways
207
523
397
517
560
1198
1225
1206
916
1346
708
1007
818
EasyWP by Namecheap
499
223
399
862
872
1524
1148
1467
773
1190
1011
1374
945
GreenGeeks
202
333
334
492
837
1130
1231
978
662
919
1458
934
793
Hostgator
299
267
546
916
428
242
1835
2140
380
932
884
286
763
ICDSoft
242
502
406
531
596
1188
1541
1319
1239
1188
852
1068
889
Krystal Hosting
321
655
516
533
602
1228
1377
1210
1419
1184
859
1102
917
Lightning Base
284
271
259
493
524
1147
960
1029
852
870
859
1033
715
ManagedWPHosting
719
1212
1009
218
244
1042
1502
909
1536
1825
1245
827
1024
Nexcess
273
488
436
482
663
1026
1001
970
747
1005
625
909
719
Pressable
280
267
472
432
575
1532
1010
279
270
315
416
382
519
ROMARG
854
1300
964
367
359
1056
1252
881
1497
1651
1288
869
1028
ShortPixel Hosting
846
1329
923
333
216
920
1264
807
1697
2257
1152
734
1040
SiteGround
383
232
322
208
223
1138
193
506
577
230
197
750
413
Stoute Web Solutions
566
454
599
537
535
237
1164
220
239
991
260
238
503
Stromonic
6183
1557
942
2109
8616
2298
7277
4641
2334
1984
2134
2155
3519
WP Buzz
208
218
806
213
222
897
672
949
220
931
897
865
592
WPX
232
222
298
218
230
225
214
236
505
219
2320
130
421
Discussion
The chart can be adjusted by clicking on a company. Stromonic stands out here for being the slowest by a wide margin at every location. Once you remove them from the graph, it's a lot easier to see how the field who were actively participating performed.
A2 Hosting had the fastest average speed and was the fastest in 1/12 locations
SiteGround had the second fastest average speed and was the fastest in 3/12 locations
WPX had the third fastest average speed and was the fastest in 2/12 locations
GreenGeeks, WPBuzz, LightningBase, ShortPixel, Stoute Web Solutions, and 20i each picked up the fastest speed in a single location.
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
Company
PHP Bench
WP Bench
20i
9.26
388.9537145
34SP.com
15.623
885.7395926
A2 Hosting
8.922
1295.336788
Bluehost
11.698
920.8103131
Cloudways
15.064
488.997555
EasyWP by Namecheap
9.637
885.7395926
GreenGeeks
10.104
1418.439716
Hostgator
9.982
632.5110689
ICDSoft
13.191
1406.469761
Krystal Hosting
9.089
1672.240803
Lightning Base
9.143
481.9277108
ManagedWPHosting
6.895
1067.235859
Nexcess
6.11
2304.147465
Pressable
9.704
1700.680272
ROMARG
7.918
1937.984496
ShortPixel Hosting
8.006
2092.050209
SiteGround
9.877
993.0486594
Stoute Web Solutions
7.279
1926.782274
Stromonic
19.169
105.1524711
WP Buzz
10.724
409.5004095
WPX
7.658
1869.158879
Discussion
Nexcess had the fastest PHP Bench and WP Bench. ShortPixel had the second fastest WP Bench and ROMARG was third. ManagedWPHosting and Stoute Web Solutions were second and third respectively on the PHP Bench.
20i, A2 Hosting, GreenGeeks, ManagedWPHosting, and Namecheap had A+.
Everyone else earned an 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.
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.
20i handled the Static test with ease scoring a quick 48ms average response time. 20i also had perfect uptime on both monitors. It picked up the fastest speed in Tokyo on WPT. It also had an A+ SSL Grade. The Load Storm was extremely borderline, it had a few errors, but well below any concerning threshold, and a spike, but otherwise handled it just fine. I'm erring on the side of not penalizing what could just be random network noise versus a deeper server performance issue. 20i earns Top Tier status for this years performance.
34SP had an good showing in the Load Storm test with the second fastest wp-login, Page and Login speed. The Static test went by without any issues. Uptime was perfect and 99.9954%. It's nice to see 34SP.com delivered a Top Tier result again this year.
A2 Hosting stood out on the Static test with an staggeringly fast 5.4ms average response time, a mere 0.2ms behind Pressable, for second fastest average. It also tied Pressable for fastest p95 in the test. Uptime was perfect and 99.975%. A2 Hosting also had the fastest average speed on WPT and was the fastest in a single location. It also earned an A+ SSL grade. Unfortunately, A2 Hosting struggled with the Load Storm test and started to slow down around 300 VUsers and errored out later. There was a lot to like in the A2 Hosting's performance, but there's a little work left to be done before it earns Top Tier recognition.
Bluehost took a year off after a slightly disappointing performance, but the break was worth it. Last time the Load Storm test proved a bit much for the plan. This year Bluehost handled the Load Storm test without issue. The Static test saw Bluehost score a snappy 18ms average and 25ms p95. Bluehost also had perfect uptime. It's always nice to see engineering efforts pay off, congrats to Bluehost on earning Top Tier status.
It was not Cloudways' best performance. The Load Storm test started having issues early at 80 VUsers and started having errors towards the end. The Static test had some spikes due to CPU usage towards the end of the test. Uptime was perfect on one monitor and 99.9755% on another.
Namecheap experienced no problems during the Load Storm test. The Static test went equally as well, both having zero errors. Uptime was 100% and 99.9954%. Namecheap also had an A+ SSL grade. Overall, the product was Top Tier and handled all the tests without any noticeable issues.
GreenGeeks did well on the Load Storm test and even had the third fastest Login speed. GreenGeeks handled the Static test with a near perfectly flat response time. Uptime monitors showed 99.894% and 99.9783%. The Uptime Robot downtime was attributed to an SSL-Host Mismatch at the very start of the test. The other monitor noticed zero issues during this window, so the decision is erring on the side of tooling problem vs hosting problem. GreenGeeks picked up a fastest WPT speed in a single location. It also earned an A+ SSL grade. GreenGeeks had a Top Tier performance again this year.
Hostgator is owned by Newfold Digital, same parent company as Bluehost, but the products are not the same. Hostgator actually slightly edged it's sister product in the Static test with an impressive 16ms average response time and 24ms p95. Hostgator had perfect uptime. Unfortunately, the Load Storm test exposed the difference in the Hostgator product vs Bluehost. Hostgator started to slow down around 425 VUsers and eventually errored out.
ICDSoft stepped up their game last year and didn't let up. ICDSoft had the fastest wp-login, Page and Login speed on the Load Storm test. It also had the third fastest p95. The Static test went smoothly. Uptime was 100% and 99.9924%. It's great to see ICDSoft maintain consistency and earn back to back Top Tier awards.
Krystal Hosting handled the Static test without a single error. It had perfect uptime on one monitor and the other showed 99.9991%. Unfortunately, Krystal started to slow down around 700 VUsers during the Load Storm test which kept it out of award contention.
LightningBase is one of, if not, the longest continuous participant(s) in the benchmarks. The Load Storm test went well with LightningBase having the third fastest wp-login. The Static test also went well. Uptime was perfect. LightningBase also picked up a fastest single location speed on WPT. LightningBase's streak of longest continuous Top Tier awards continues.
ManagedWPHosting handled the Static test fine, it may have been the slowest in average and p95, but the graph was flatish and slightly speeding up as the test went on with an average of 162ms. They had excellent uptime at perfect and 99.9991%. ManagedWPHosting also picked up the second fastest PHP Bench and an A+ SSL grade. Unfortunately, the Load Storm test had a spike right as it reached 1000VUsers causing a slow down, which it recovered from. However, it caused too much of a slow down and errors to be considered for an award. I'm not sure what caused it because it handled 1000VUsers after recovering for a while, but the product looks about one spike away from award consideration.
Nexcess has been a regular participant in these benchmarks and missed earning any awards the last couple years at this price tier. But this was finally Nexcess's year. It's nice to see hard work and improvements pay off. The Load Storm test went by effortlessly. The Static test saw Nexcess pickup the third fastest average and p95 at 13ms and 20ms respectively. Their Achilles heal had been uptime issues which were finally solved this year with 99.999% and 99.9873% uptime. Nexcess also had the fastest PHP and WP Bench scores. Nexcess finally earned a well deserved Top Tier award for this price tier.
Pressable brought the speed again this year. Pressable had the fastest p95 on the Load Storm test and the second fastest Asset speed. Pressable also had the fastest Static test with an average response time of 5.2ms and 12ms p95. Perfect uptime on both monitors. Another year, another Top Tier for Pressable.
ROMARG was another first time participant in the benchmarks. The Load Storm and Static test went without issue, flat response times and zero errors is always nice to see. ROMARG's uptime was 99.962% and 99.9372%. ROMARG also picked up the third fastest WP Bench score. Overall, ROMARG's performance was Top Tier, it handled all the tests without showing any signs of stress.
Despite no longer offering the product, ShortPixel Hosting had a very good showing. The Load Storm test went well and ShortPixel even managed the third fastest wp-login speed. The Static test also went well with 140ms average response time. ShortPixel also had perfect and 99.9964% uptime. ShortPixel even picked up the fastest speed in one location on the WPT and the second fastest WP Bench. It was a Top Tier performance for ShortPixel's hosting product.
SiteGround's Static test had a quick average response time of 22ms. The uptime was perfect and 99.9982%. SiteGround looked excellent on the WPT where it had the second fastest average and was the fastested in 3 locations individually. The Load Storm test went almost perfect but there was a few spikes that looked like a couple locations had networking issues causing the very small spikes. I've erred on the side of these being networking issues, as the server itself seemed fine and continued to server content fine to the other locations without any impact on loading speed. So SiteGround earns Top Tier status this year.
Stoute Web Solutions is a new GridPane powered participant in the benchmarks. Stoute Web Solutions handled the Load Storm test without issue. While their results in the Load Storm test were somewhat middle of the pack, the Static test saw Stoute Web Solutions deliver a very fast 21ms average response time and 30ms p95. Uptime was solid at 100% and 99.9868%. It even picked up a fastest single location in the WPT. They also picked up third fastest PHP Bench. Stoute Web Solutions was a welcome newcomer that had an excellent first showing - earning themselves Top Tier recognition.
Stromonic was acquired mid-test and the new owner was not prepared or interested in participating. The results are incomplete. They were disqualified from any award consideration.
WP Buzz was a new entrant this year and the only company to take advantage of the sponsorship program. The Static test went very well for WP Buzz with an average response time of 48ms. The uptime was 100% and 99.9991% which is fantastic. WP Buzz even picked up the fastest WPT speed in a single location. Unfortunately, the Load Storm test didn't go very well. There were issues starting around 250 VUsers and then errors. This was due to a security issue which couldn't be worked around. So there may very well be a very strong product underneath, but we weren't fully able to test it which kept WP Buzz from any award contention.
WPX has been a consistent Top Tier performer in these benchmarks. The Load Storm test went very well this year with WPX clocking the second fastest p95 and the fastest Asset speed. The Static test went equally as well with WPX having an blazingly fast average response time of 11ms, good for third overall. Uptime was 100% and 99.9995%. WPX also managed the third fastest average on the WPT with the fastest score in 2 locations. WPX's streak of Top Tier awards won't be broken this year.
Please read the Methodology to fully understand the scope of these tests.
Note: Please check company profiles for summary of performances across multiple tiers. Some companies also offer promotions or coupon codes for a discount as well.
Cloudways competed with a Digital Ocean Premium 4GB droplet.
Stromonic was sold during the tests and the new owner was not prepared to participate in the benchmark. No load tests were run. Some of the other tests were run, and the results are recorded for posterity.
The Static test went well for every single participant. It's very nice to see that trend continue. Delivering static content fast and at scale is becoming a default in the WordPress hosting space, even at the lower price tiers.
Uptime Testing Results
Uptime is monitored by two companies: HetrixTools and Uptime Robot. A self hosted monitor was also run in case there was a major discrepancy between the two third party monitors.
Results Table
Company
Uptime Robot
Hetrix
A2 Hosting
100
100
Cloudways
100
100
GreenGeeks
100
99.9935
Krystal Hosting
100
100
Pressable
100
100
Presslabs
100
100
Rocket.net
100
100
SiteGround
100
100
Stromonic
100
99.9931
WordPress.com
100
100
WPX
100
100
Discussion
This group had perfect uptime on Uptime Robot and near perfect with Hetrix Tools, with 2 companies below 100% and above 99.99%. Amazing.
WebPageTest Testing Results
WebPageTest fully loads the homepage and records how long it takes from 12 different locations around the world. Result are measured in seconds.
Results Table
Company
Virginia
California
Salt Lake City
London
Frankfurt
Cape Town
Singapore
Mumbai
Tokyo
Sydney
Brazil
Dubai
Average
A2 Hosting
145
140
269
129
183
131
142
227
359
232
445
98
208
Cloudways
212
550
408
527
564
1221
1220
1168
871
1153
712
1017
802
GreenGeeks
256
452
427
536
533
1144
1209
995
862
929
637
926
742
Krystal Hosting
583
1007
820
218
252
852
1288
1344
1549
1857
1043
1146
997
Pressable
268
354
394
522
299
1541
885
496
411
328
273
338
509
Presslabs
211
210
353
219
239
2048
223
506
218
673
211
549
472
Rocket.net
222
242
329
238
218
215
309
215
237
220
228
251
244
SiteGround
368
228
328
225
209
1121
199
611
583
219
191
747
419
Stromonic
6649
1441
863
2945
16135
2338
9899
2630
4740
2447
2573
2000
4555
WordPress.com
284
321
417
285
282
987
657
275
576
284
268
287
410
WPX
199
212
277
189
226
223
616
207
473
205
1343
151
360
Discussion
The chart can be adjusted by clicking on a company. Stromonic stands out here for being the slowest by a wide margin at every location. Once you remove them from the graph, it's a lot easier to see how the field who were actively participating performed.
A2 Hosting had the fastest average and was the fastest in 8/12 locations individually.
Rocket.net had the second fastest average.
WPX had the third fastest average and was the fastest in 2/12 locations.
Presslabs and SiteGround each picked up a fastest speed in a single location.
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
Company
PHP Bench
WP Bench
A2 Hosting
9.24
1766.784452
Cloudways
7.547
376.9317753
GreenGeeks
9.55
1610.305958
Krystal Hosting
9.312
726.744186
Pressable
9.679
1700.680272
Presslabs
7.01
1297.016861
Rocket.net
9.824
1406.469761
SiteGround
9.377
1158.748552
Stromonic
18.794
91.5164272
WordPress.com
9.46
2314.814815
WPX
7.566
1964.636542
Discussion
WordPress.com had the fastest WP Bench at 2314 (queries/second) and Presslabs had the fastest PHP Bench at 7.01 seconds.
A2 Hosting, GreenGeeks, Presslabs and WordPress.com all had A+.
Everyone else had A's. Except Stromonic which had a B.
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.
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.
A2 Hosting had some incredible highs, like the Static test which say it record an average response time of 6.1ms and 14ms p95. A2 Hosting recorded perfect uptime. A2 Hosting also was a force to be reckoned with in the WPT test which saw it earn the fastest average and fastest individual speed in 8/12 locations. It also recorded an A+ grade on the SSL test. Unfortunately, the Load Storm test proved its undoing this year with a slow down starting around 400 VUsers and errors as well. There's some much potential here, I can't wait to see them get the Load Storm test figured out and joining the Top Tier.
Cloudways handled the Static test perfectly, completely flat response time and no errors. Uptime was perfect as well. Cloudways, however, did struggle with the Load Storm test where it slowed down around 700 VUsers and response times shot up. There were relatively few errors, so the requests were still being served, just a lot slower than needed to earn recognition.
GreenGeeks managed to deal with the Load Storm test well and had the fastest wp-login and Login speeds. The Static test also went well with a couple little spikes and zero errors. GreenGeeks had 100% and 99.9935% uptime which is excellent. Overall, GreenGeeks handled the tests remarkably well and earned another Top Tier award this year.
Krystal Hosting handled the Static test effortlessly without a single error and completely flat response time graph. Krystal also had perfect uptime on both uptime monitors. The Load Storm test was mostly great except there was a consistent spike exactly every 5 minutes which increased response times above 1500ms on the p95 graph from it's baseline around ~700ms. I'm not sure if this was a cache clear or some other kind of cron job, but something looks like it was taxing the server specifically every 5 minutes causing a tiny load spike. Unfortunately, the spikes were just a little too large by the end of the test, so Krystal Hosting earned an Honorable Mention this year. I have high hopes Krystal will rejoin the Top Tier next year, they're only one timer away.
Pressable had no issue with the Load Storm test, in fact it had the second fastest p95 and third fastest wp-login and Asset speed. Pressable also blazed through the Static test leading the pack with a 5.2ms average and 13ms p95. Pressable also had perfect uptime. Simply put, Pressable aced all the tests thrown at it and earned Top Tier status.
Presslabs handled the Load Storm test fabulously. It had the fastest p95, second fastest wp-login and Login speed, and the third fastest Page speed. The Static test also went well with a 24ms average response time. Uptime was perfect. Presslabs also managed to have the fastest single speed location on WPT in Tokyo. It also managed an A+ SSL grade and the fastest PHP Bench. It doesn't get old awarding Presslabs another Top Tier award.
Rocket.net handled the Load Storm test without any issues. It also handled the Static test without any issues having a very fast 22ms average response time and 31ms p95 which was the 4th fastest which is always impressive to have average and p95 as close together as possible. Rocket.net had perfect uptime. Rocket.net picked up the second fastest average on the WPT. Overall, Rocket.net took these tests in stride and didn't break a sweat. It didn't stand out in any statistical category, but it was consistently quick in all the tests. Rocket.net earns a well deserved Top Tier award.
SiteGround flew through the Static test with 21ms average response time without a single error. SiteGround also had perfect uptime. It even picked up the fastest speed in a single location in WPT. Unfortunately, the Load Storm test was a little spikey. There were a few spikes going over 1000ms throughout the test and it wasn't just a single location having issues, the spikes were across multiple regions. It could have been network issues or could have been minor server issues. For that reason, SiteGround earns an Honorable Mention this year.
Stromonic was acquired mid-test and the new owner was not prepared or interested in participating. The results are incomplete. They were disqualified from any award consideration.
WordPress.com had no issues with the Load Storm test and even picked up the second fastest Asset speed. The Static test went even better with the second fastest average response at 5.8ms and tied for first with 13ms in p95. Perfect uptime on both monitors. WordPress.com also managed to pickup the fastest WP Bench score and an A+ SSL grade. It's easy to say WordPress.com handled these tests without blinking and earned Top Tier status again this year.
WPX handled the Load Storm test without issue. It had the fastest Page and Asset speed, along with the third fastest p95 and Login speed. The Static test went equally as well with an incredibly fast 11ms average response time. WPX had perfect uptime on both monitors. It also had the third fastest average speed on WPT and was the fastest in 2/12 locations. WPX continues to earn Top Tier recognition year after year with excellent performances like this one.
Please read the Methodology to fully understand the scope of these tests.
Note: Please check company profiles for summary of performances across multiple tiers. Some companies also offer promotions or coupon codes for a discount as well.
Cloudways competed with a DigitalOcean 16GB Premium Droplet.
Leverage WP had a slightly bumpy start but handled the test without issue with the p95 starting under 1000ms and dropping down to around 300ms as the test went on.
Every company handled this test without issue. Incredibly the median average response time would be 20-22ms.
Uptime Testing Results
Uptime is monitored by two companies: HetrixTools and Uptime Robot. A self hosted monitor was also run in case there was a major discrepancy between the two third party monitors.
Results Table
Company
Uptime Robot
Hetrix
A2 Hosting
99.998
100
Cloudways
100
100
Leverage WP
100
99.9995
Pressable
100
100
Presslabs
100
100
Seravo
99.98
99.9927
Servebolt
100
99.995
SiteGround
99.933
99.9389
Discussion
All the companies maintained 99.9% uptime or higher.
WebPageTest Testing Results
WebPageTest fully loads the homepage and records how long it takes from 12 different locations around the world. Result are measured in seconds.
Results Table
Company
Virginia
California
Salt Lake City
London
Frankfurt
Cape Town
Singapore
Mumbai
Tokyo
Sydney
Brazil
Dubai
Average
A2 Hosting
196
210
390
199
921
201
217
327
199
358
698
127
337
Cloudways
204
490
396
532
538
1239
1445
1221
909
1144
701
1016
820
Leverage WP
247
663
725
763
618
976
1939
1820
735
918
581
1257
937
Pressable
284
292
391
290
326
1657
948
739
532
267
295
333
530
Presslabs
209
229
331
229
241
950
206
209
211
222
218
312
297
Seravo
267
414
312
539
627
1256
1213
1184
907
1028
789
1151
807
Servebolt
227
216
426
226
295
207
799
234
231
323
344
273
317
SiteGround
378
236
303
223
746
1140
196
2520
640
180
202
727
624
Discussion
Presslabs had the fastest average speed in the WPT test and 2/12 fastest single location results.
Servebolt had the second fastest average but wasn't the fastest in any single location
A2 Hosting was the third fastest average and 6/12 of fastest single location speeds.
SiteGround had 4/12 of the fastest single location speeds.
Despite A2 Hosting and SiteGround picking up the majority of the fastest single location speeds, a couple slow results in other locations pulled down their averages.
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
Company
PHP Bench
WP Bench
A2 Hosting
9.654
1305.483029
Cloudways
9.169
492.3682915
Leverage WP
8.439
964.3201543
Pressable
9.673
1694.915254
Presslabs
6.971
1385.041551
Seravo
8.433
353.8570418
Servebolt
4.227
4830.917874
SiteGround
9.025
1375.515818
Discussion
Servebolt had the fastest PHP bench and WP Bench scores by a significant margin. Servebolt run a patched version of MariaDB whereas the default version performs AES_ENCRYPT() function slower. I debated changing the plugin before I was aware it was patchable, but considering it is something fixable, I opted not to change it this year.
A2 Hosting, Presslabs, Seravo, and Servebolt all earned A+'s. Everyone else earned an A, except Leverage WP which earned a B.
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.
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.
A2 Hosting had some extreme highs with it being the fastest Static test with an incredible 5.3ms average and 12ms p95. A2 Hosting also managed 99.998% and 100% uptime on each monitor. A2 Hosting was the third fastest average speed on WPT and the fastest in 6/12 locations. Toss in an A+ SSL grade for good measure. There were so many impressive results. Unfortunately, the Load Storm test proved a bit too much which saw a slow down around 1400 users and a number of errors later. You can tell it has a lot of things going for it - leading the pack in speed in multiple metrics. I can't wait to see it get fully put together and earning Top Tier status in the coming years.
Cloudways had a flat Static test which is exactly what you want. Cloudways also managed perfect uptime. It was middle of the pack in the other tests. But the problem was the Load Storm test. Cloudways slowed down and became very spiky around 1200 users. It never errored but the p95 was 2351ms which indicates how much the service slowed down. The performance seems to have gone down a little compared to last year which used a similarly sized Vultr HF server. Cloudways showed last year they were capable of coming close to earning Top Tier status, I'd like to see them return.
Leverage WP was a new comer to the benchmarks this year and another GridPane powered provider. The Load Storm test took a few minutes to really get going with a little shakiness at the start. But the p95 was below 1000ms and came down relatively quickly as the test scaled up. It even managed the third fastest login speed. The Static test shows Leverage WP as the slowest, but even the slowest average handled the test well and was a meager 151ms. The Uptime monitors showed 100% and 99.9995% uptime which is excellent. It's a non impacting metric, but the SSL grade for Leverage WP was a B which I would like to see match everyone else with at least an A next year. Leverage WP may not have been the flashiest or fastest host in this cohort, but handled the tests well without ever slowing down or breaking. Leverage WP's first participation could only be considered a success and deserving of a Top Tier award.
Pressable aced the Load Storm test with no errors and the second fastest p95 and Asset load speeds. It also had the third fastest wp-login. The Static test was showing off with an insanely fast 5.5ms average response time and a p95 of 13ms. Pressable managed perfect uptime on both monitors. Another benchmark, another Top Tier award for Pressable.
Presslabs was impressive in the Load Storm test capturing the fastest speeds in every metric except Page load speed, where it was second. It also boasted a sub 10ms average response time on the Static test. Throw in perfect uptime on both monitors and the fastest average speed on WPT and you've easily earned another Top Tier award. Well done.
Seravo did excellent on the Load Storm test. It had the second fastest wp-login and Login average. Seravo also had the third fastest Page loading speed. The Static test went equally as well with Seravo having no errors and a 117ms average response time. Their Uptime was 99.98%+ and 99.99%+ which is very good. It was definitely a Top Tier performance for Seravo this year.
Servebolt handled the Load Storm test with ease. It had the third fastest p95 and Asset load speed. The Static test had a very fast 20ms average and 28ms p95 response times. Servebolt's uptime was 100 and 99.995%. They also had the second fastest WPT average speed. Servebolt had the fastest PHP/WP Bench scores by a wide margin. The streak continues, Servebolt's performance was Top Tier.
SiteGround had a very good Load Storm test with no errors and the fastest Page loading time. The Static test went effortlessly as well with no errors and a 22ms average response time. SiteGround maintained 99.9%+ uptime. SiteGround also managed 4/12 of the fastest single location WPT speeds. SiteGround earned a Top Tier award this year not struggling at all with any of the tests.
Please read the Methodology to fully understand the scope of these tests.
Note: Please check company profiles for summary of performances across multiple tiers. Some companies also offer promotions or coupon codes for a discount as well.
The Enterprise tier of these benchmarks is special in that companies are allowed to change configurations to optimize for performance because at this price tier it’s expected for customers paying a lot of money. All other price tiers test default configurations.
Servebolt submitted two plans, the Scale + ACD plan is utilizing their Scale and Accelerated Domains addon which adds performance, scalability and security enhancements.
Cloudways competed with a 4XL plan from Google Cloud.
Starting price allows for 2M http requests per month. Can grow from there at additional costs up to unlimited.
Unlimited
Unlimited
Unlimited
Starts at 1 application, which can be a multisite with no limits. Additional applications available for extra cost with no limit on how many we can support.
Cloudways ran into issues around 1500 VUsers where login stopped responding and caused errors. The numbers appear artificially low because of this.
Raidboxes started slowing down around 3700 VUsers with errors kicking in around 4600 VUsers.
Overall, it's impressive how fast most of these companies are. With the exception of Raidboxes (and Cloudways gets an asterisk), every host is loading pages under 300ms. More than half the companies are loading assets sub 30ms. At the high end, you really have a lot of high performing globally available options.
K6 Static Testing Results
K6 Static test is designed to test cached performance by repeatedly requesting the homepage.
Every company handled this test very well. It is very clear which companies have CDNs setup though based on the average response times. The P95 of all but two companies being under 60ms is just impressive.
Uptime Testing Results
Uptime is monitored by two companies: HetrixTools and Uptime Robot. A self hosted monitor was also run in case there was a major discrepancy between the two third party monitors.
Results Table
Company
Uptime Robot
Hetrix
Cloudways
99.996
99.8335
Performant Websites
100
100
Presslabs
100
99.9951
raidboxes
100
99.9996
Scaleforce powered by Virtuozzo
100
100
Servebolt (Scale + ACD)
100
100
Servebolt
100
100
WordPress VIP
100
100
Discussion
Every company with the exception of Cloudways had 100% on at least one monitor. Cloudways had very different uptimes as measured by the two providers (happened across multiple plans tested). But the higher of the two uptime monitors showed 99.99%+ which seems to indicate the server was responsive.
WebPageTest Testing Results
WebPageTest fully loads the homepage and records how long it takes from 12 different locations around the world. Result are measured in seconds.
Results Table
Company
Virginia
California
Salt Lake City
London
Frankfurt
Cape Town
Singapore
Mumbai
Tokyo
Sydney
Brazil
Dubai
Average
Cloudways
0.26
0.316
0.279
0.556
0.613
1.328
1.047
1.311
0.742
0.992
0.843
1.33
0.8014166667
Performant Websites
0.404
0.159
0.269
0.317
0.388
0.151
0.185
0.318
0.369
0.251
0.654
0.243
0.309
Presslabs
0.155
0.143
0.26
0.141
0.173
0.222
0.154
0.169
0.213
0.155
0.16
0.137
0.1735
raidboxes
0.604
0.908
0.864
0.331
0.169
0.885
0.884
0.771
1.327
1.53
1.156
0.693
0.8435
Scaleforce powered by Virtuozzo
0.282
0.246
0.292
0.22
0.241
0.274
0.387
0.222
0.329
0.156
0.246
1.051
0.3288333333
Servebolt (Scale + ACD)
0.267
0.317
0.379
0.202
0.319
0.161
0.767
0.303
0.243
0.31
0.445
0.267
0.3316666667
Servebolt
0.347
0.197
0.342
0.393
0.426
0.175
0.654
0.22
0.257
0.397
0.337
0.262
0.3339166667
WordPress VIP
0.215
0.168
0.243
0.22
0.254
0.263
0.226
0.209
0.243
0.236
0.237
0.301
0.2345833333
Discussion
Presslabs is the obvious standout here with 10/12 of the fastest response times alongside the fastest average response time at a snappy 0.1735s.
WPVIP and Performant Websites managed to grab the other two fastest response times. They also managed the second and third fastest averages respectively.
Raidboxes and Cloudways stood out on the slower end because of the lack of CDN setup in this configuration.
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
Company
PHP Bench
WP Bench
Cloudways
9.968
624.2197253
Performant Websites
9.773
1094.091904
Presslabs
6.998
1865.671642
raidboxes
8.185
1402.524544
Scaleforce powered by Virtuozzo
9.705
400
Servebolt (Scale + ACD)
5.839
2132.196162
Servebolt
5.845
2227.171492
WordPress VIP
8.408
1280.409731
Discussion
Servebolt led the way here. They took the top two spots in both tests. Presslabs was third in both tests.
Scaleforce shows us that raw single threaded speed doesn't make or break an enterprise configuration. Despite having the slowest WP Bench and one of the slowest PHP Bench scores, a clustered configuration can handle massive scale and perform well in real world delivery.
Everyone got an A+ except Cloudways which earned an 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.
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.
The one thing Cloudways did well this year was the static test. It handled it without issue. We could add in uptime if we assume it was a glitch on the monitoring end which affected all Cloudways servers being monitored by Hetrix Tools. But Cloudways struggled with the Load Storm test with the login erroring completely. There is some definite room for improvement.
New entrant Performant Websites stepped into the biggest ring and showed they belong. Perfect uptime. The third fastest WPT average including being the fastest in Cape Town. They handled all the tests without any issues, well done and welcome to the Top Tier.
Presslabs absolutely crushed the Load Storm test. They had the fastest P95, Page, Asset, and login times. Presslabs also had the third fastest average response time for the static test at 14ms. Throw in a tour de force of the WebPageTest benchmark where they were the fastest in 10/12 locations and had the fastest average response time. Sprinkle in perfect or near perfect uptime on both monitors and you've got yourself an excellent Top Tier worthy performance.
The bright spots for Raidboxes were it handled the static test effortlessly and the uptime was near perfect at 100% and 99.9996%. The less bright spots were that Raidboxes struggled with the Load Storm test which seems to have overwhelmed the system. Raidboxes also didn't have any sort of CDN integrated which slowed down global response times and averages on many of the tests. I hope with the recent acquisition we see some improvements that brings them back to to Top Tier status.
Scaleforce had the second fastest wp-login, and page speed, along with third fastest asset speeds on the Load Storm test. Scaleforce also had the second fastest average response time and p95 response time in the static test. Throw in perfect uptime for good measure and you've got another well earned Top Tier award.
Servebolt had the second fastest P95 alongside third fastest page, asset speeds and login cum avg. Perfect uptime. It seems to have eked out a slight edge over its sister product in a few tests beating getting slightly fastest response times on an already Top Tier product. Well done.
Perfect uptime. Fastest WP/PHP Bench scores alongside it's sister product. Third fastest p95 in both Load Storm and Static tests. Servebolt Enterprise delivers another Top Tier performance.
WPVIP had the second fastest asset and login cum avg scores on the Load Storm test. WPVIP had the fastest average and p95 response times on the Static test. WPVIP also had perfect uptime on both monitors. WPVIP also picked up the second fastest average response time average on the WPT. WPVIP continues to prove itself year after year as a Top Tier product. Congratulations.
Please read the Methodology to fully understand the scope of these tests.
Note: Please check company profiles for summary of performances across multiple tiers. Some companies also offer promotions or coupon codes for a discount as well.
Servebolt submitted two plans, the ACD plan is utilizing their Accelerated Domains addon, which adds performance, scalability and security enhancements.
Every company handled the static test near flawlessly. Zero total errors for all companies. The average and P95 response times show which companies have CDNs (or more relevant CDN locations for our test). The difference between Servebolt and Servebolt with Accelerated Domains is pretty clear here, ACD is adding a lot of speed.
Uptime Testing Results
Uptime is monitored by two companies: HetrixTools and Uptime Robot. A self hosted monitor was also run in case there was a major discrepancy between the two third party monitors.
Results Table
Company
Uptime Robot
Hetrix
Cloudways
99.996
99.8954
Nexcess
99.996
99.9926
Pressable
99.994
100
Presslabs
100
99.9955
raidboxes
99.991
99.99
Servebolt
100
100
Servebolt ACD
100
99.9888
Discussion
Everyone except Cloudways had near perfect uptime. Cloudways had an issue across multiple tests where one monitor struggled for a short window but the other was reporting it fine.
WebPageTest Testing Results
WebPageTest fully loads the homepage and records how long it takes from 12 different locations around the world. Result are measured in seconds.
Results Table
Company
Virginia
California
Salt Lake City
London
Frankfurt
Cape Town
Singapore
Mumbai
Tokyo
Sydney
Brazil
Dubai
Average
Cloudways
0.179
0.389
0.362
0.47
0.52
1.205
1.136
1.119
0.825
1.064
0.658
1.011
0.7448333333
Nexcess
0.334
0.525
0.469
0.586
1.056
1.701
1.34
1.432
0.903
1.596
1.162
1.821
1.077083333
Pressable
0.215
0.335
0.315
0.231
0.187
0.254
0.244
0.661
0.245
0.174
0.316
0.467
0.3036666667
Presslabs
0.173
0.14
0.262
0.152
0.184
0.21
0.148
0.167
0.17
0.15
0.161
0.14
0.1714166667
raidboxes
0.687
0.93
0.875
0.222
0.226
0.895
0.91
0.801
1.267
1.57
1.155
0.703
0.8534166667
Servebolt
0.356
0.297
0.433
0.577
0.678
0.988
1.017
0.972
0.774
0.842
0.677
0.961
0.7143333333
Servebolt ACD
0.414
0.452
0.49
0.297
0.3
0.277
0.468
0.477
0.498
0.262
0.528
0.279
0.3951666667
Discussion
Presslabs went a perfect 12/12 as the fastest in every region. Pressable was the second fastest with Servebolt + ACD not far behind.
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
Company
PHP Bench
WP Bench
Cloudways
8.993
478.6979416
Nexcess
7.728
1044.932079
Pressable
10.013
1347.708895
Presslabs
6.89
1538.461538
raidboxes
7.971
1466.27566
Servebolt
5.86
2222.222222
Servebolt ACD
5.865
2207.505519
Discussion
Both Servebolt plans stood out as having the fastest scores in both tests which were near identical to one another.
Everyone got an A with Presslabs, Raidboxes and Servebolt+ACD Earning 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.
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.
Cloudways handled the static test without issue. Cloudways had great uptime on one monitor and lower than expected on the other. This seemed like it maybe was a bug and showed on every Cloudways monitor on the Hetrix Tools platform. Unfortunately, the Load Storm caused the server to error out and fail the test. I'm not sure what happened but I hope they figure it out and we see a comeback next year.
Nexcess had stellar uptime with both showing above 99.99%. Nexcess also handled the static and Load Storm tests without issue. While it didn't particularly stand out compared to some of it's peers, it delivered flawless results on everything we threw at it. Top Tier.
Pressable had the fastest average and p95 load times on the static test. Pressable also picked up the 2nd fastest page response time in the Load Storm test. Pressable had perfect or near perfect uptime. Unsurprisingly, yet another Top Tier performance for Pressable - Well done.
Presslabs had the fastest P95, Page, Asset and login response times on the Load Storm test. Presslabs had the second fastest average response time and third fastest p95 on the static test. Throw in perfect or near perfect uptime. Presslabs also went 12/12 as the fastest location for every test on WebPageTest. Overall, a very impressive performance put on Presslabs which saw them at the top or near the top of every test. Top Tier.
Raidboxes had an excellent 99.99%+ on both uptime monitors. The Static test was handled without issue. Unfortunately the Load Storm test was a bit too much and slowed the server down below the acceptable threshold of 1000ms to earn any recognition this year.
Servebolt picked up 2nd fastest P95, asset and login response times in the Load Storm test. Servebolt had perfect uptime. Servebolt stood out as the fastest on the PHP and WP Benchmarks in a virtual tie with its other offering. Servebolt earned yet another Top Tier honor.
Servebolt + ACD really shined over its sister product in the static load test and earned itself the 2nd fastest p95 load time. Servebolt + ACD picked up 3rd fastest P95, asset and login response times in the Load Storm test. Servebolt had perfect and near perfect uptime on the monitors. Servebolt stood out as the fastest on the PHP and WP Benchmarks in a virtual tie with its other offering. The ACD addition didn't slow Servebolt down, it doubled down on a second Top Tier award.
Please read the Methodology to fully understand the scope of these tests.
Note: Please check company profiles for summary of performances across multiple tiers. Some companies also offer promotions or coupon codes for a discount as well.
Pressable, Scaleforce and SiteGround stood out with sub 20ms averages and clearly have CDN setup helping them excel in this test.
Uptime Testing Results
Uptime is monitored by two companies: HetrixTools and Uptime Robot. A self hosted monitor was also run in case there was a major discrepancy between the two third party monitors.
Results Table
Company
Uptime Robot
Hetrix
Cloudways
99.985
99.8886
MechanicWeb
99.969
99.9603
Nexcess
99.997
99.9932
Pressable
99.998
100
raidboxes
99.991
99.9887
SaveinCloud
100
99.9927
Scaleforce powered by Virtuozzo
100
100
Servebolt
99.976
99.9884
Simplenet
100
99.9913
SiteGround
99.969
99.944
Discussion
All the companies kept above 99.9% uptime with the exception of Cloudways on the Hetrix Tools monitor. This issue happened on every Cloudways server this year where one monitor showed near perfect and the other had a window of downtime.
WebPageTest Testing Results
WebPageTest fully loads the homepage and records how long it takes from 12 different locations around the world. Result are measured in seconds.
Results Table
Company
Virginia
California
Salt Lake City
London
Frankfurt
Cape Town
Singapore
Mumbai
Tokyo
Sydney
Brazil
Dubai
Average
Cloudways
0.164
0.336
0.324
0.494
0.54
1.177
1.115
1.082
0.844
1.01
0.668
1.073
0.7355833333
MechanicWeb
0.313
0.292
0.332
0.615
0.876
1.356
1.164
1.302
0.9
0.939
0.851
1.213
0.8460833333
Nexcess
0.331
0.529
0.426
0.533
0.608
1.668
1.333
1.42
0.98
1.591
1.184
1.809
1.034333333
Pressable
0.312
0.159
0.359
0.29
0.236
0.248
0.241
0.457
0.356
0.197
0.397
1.033
0.3570833333
raidboxes
0.6
0.929
0.868
0.265
0.219
0.901
0.952
0.785
1.304
1.529
1.174
0.699
0.8520833333
SaveinCloud
0.891
0.676
0.709
0.759
1.505
1.208
1.24
1.431
1.125
1.298
0.377
1.54
1.06325
Scaleforce powered by Virtuozzo
0.309
0.191
0.693
0.221
0.186
0.248
0.396
0.205
0.287
0.202
0.222
1.045
0.3504166667
Servebolt
0.343
0.332
0.368
0.575
0.635
0.969
1.102
0.955
0.813
0.915
0.832
0.969
0.734
Simplenet
0.272
0.576
0.415
0.561
0.594
1.437
1.474
1.649
1.031
1.716
0.841
1.206
0.981
SiteGround
0.484
0.629
0.42
0.841
0.932
1.775
1.547
1.755
1.3
1.545
1.204
1.623
1.17125
Discussion
Scaleforce just barely edged Pressable by a miniscule 7ms for the fastest average LCP speed. They were neck and neck and showing off their global load speeds. Scaleforce took 5/12 fastest with 1 tie with Pressable. Pressable picked up 3 fastest plus the aforementioned tie. Cloudways picked up two of the fastest speeds in Virginia and Salt Lake City. SaveInCloud picked up fastest speed in their native Brazil. Raidboxes got the fastest speed in Dubai.
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
Company
PHP Bench
WP Bench
Cloudways
5.796
1597.444089
MechanicWeb
4.644
3663.003663
Nexcess
8.547
441.1116012
Pressable
10.005
1324.503311
raidboxes
8.038
919.9632015
SaveinCloud
10.031
699.790063
Scaleforce powered by Virtuozzo
10.474
1117.318436
Servebolt
5.9
2217.2949
Simplenet
8.498
1644.736842
SiteGround
9.846
1538.461538
Discussion
MechanicWeb was certainly a stand out getting the fastest score in both PHP and WP Bench.
Raidboxes, SaveInCloud and Simplenet earned A+ while everyone else earned A's.
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.
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.
Cloudways had the 4th fastest average response time on the static test. Cloudways had the fastest WPT test in two locations and were a mere 2ms behind 3rd place for fastest average. Cloudways also had the second fastest PHP bench. The uptime issue where Hetrix Tools couldn't connect to any Cloudways servers persisted across every plan while the Uptime Robot monitor showed them all online. Cloudways earned itself an Honorable Mention because the Load Storm test was extremely borderline. It showed some load spikes and they were averaging over 1000ms, but this was incredibly close. Overall, a great job, one of the closest to Top Tier performances I've had to evaluate.
New entrant MechanicWeb came in with servers blazing. MechanicWeb had the fastest PHP and WP Bench scores by a good margin. They were the fastest and second fastest scores across all price tiers respectively. MechanicWeb also had the fastest wp-login response time on the Load Storm test. It handled the static test with ease. It's nice to see a new entrant earn itself Top Tier status and push some of the fastest scores we've ever seen.
Nexcess handled the Load Storm test without much issue, there was one spike but the average response time stayed below 1000ms. The static test was handled without any problem. Nexcess had excellent uptime. While their numbers didn't lead the pack, they quietly had a solid performance earning Top Tier status. Congrats!
Pressable had the fastest average and p95 response times in the static test at a lightning fast 5.8ms and 18ms respectively. Pressable had the second fastest login cumulative average. Pressable had the second fastest WPT test average and was a mere 7ms behind first. Throw in perfect and near perfect uptime monitors and you've got yourself a Top Tier award. Well done.
Raidboxes had excellent uptime. Raidboxes handled the static load test without issue. Unfortunately, the Load Storm test proved to overwhelm the server and caused it to slow down and eventually error out.
SaveinCloud had the fastest WPT score in their native Brazil. They had perfect and near perfect uptime on both monitors. It handled the static test without issue. SaveinCloud's Load Storm test was pretty good but there were a lot of spikes which went over 1000ms which is why it earned an Honorable Mention this year. They are on the cusp of earning Top Tier status.
Scaleforce had the second fastest average (9.3ms) and p95 (28ms) score on the static test. Scaleforce had the 2nd fastest page, asset and wplogin speeds on the Load Storm test. Scaleforce had perfect uptime on both monitors. Scaleforce had the fastest average on WPT including being the fastest or tied for fastest in 6/12 locations. Yet another well earned Top Tier performance for Scaleforce.
Servebolt had the second fastest P95 in the Load Storm Test. It handled the static test easily. It had the third fastest average on the WPT. Great uptime and the second fastest WP bench score easily put them in the Top Tier again. Well done.
Simplenet had the third fastest WP Bench. Simplenet also had perfect and near perfect uptime metrics. It handled the static test without issue. Unfortunately, the Load Storm test proved too much for the plan and it ultimately ended up erroring with increased response times. For a new entrant they did quite well, hopefully they come back next year and earn some recognition.
SiteGround had the fastest P95 and page load speeds on the Load Storm test. SiteGround had the third fastest average and p95 response times in the static test. Overall an excellent performance from SiteGround has put them back in the Top Tier.
