Enterprise ($500+/Month) WordPress Hosting Performance Benchmarks 2021
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 Accelerated plan is utilizing their Accelerated Domains addon which adds performance, scalability and security enhancements.
The Companies and Products
| Company | Plan Monthly Price | Plan Visitors Allowed | Plan Memory | Plan Disk Space | Plan Bandwidth | Plan Sites Allowed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CloudJiffy powered by Jelastic | $535 | Unlimited (absolute maximum depends on available plan resources and code of the hosted websites) | Based on usage. Up to 49 GiB | Based on usage. Up to 310 GB | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Infomaniak powered by Jelastic | CHF 480 | Unlimited (absolute maximum depends on available plan resources and code of the hosted websites) | Based on usage. Up to 49 GiB | Based on usage. Up to 310 GB | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Presslabs | $599 | 1000000; These are the included pageviews in the plan, the extra pageviews are charged with $0.10 for every 1,000 additional pageviews. | Unmetered | 100GB | Unlimited | 1 |
| RAIDBOXES | 899€ | Unlimited | 64GB | 100GB | Unlimited | 1 |
| Scaleforce powered by Jelastic | $1,279 | Unlimited (absolute maximum depends on available plan resources and code of the hosted websites) | 98 GiB | 360 GiB | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Seravo | €650.00 | 40 000 per day | N/A | 300GB | N/A | 1 |
| Servebolt | $990.00 | Custom | Unmetered | Custom | Unmetered | Custom |
| Servebolt Accelerated | $2,490.00 | Custom | Unmetered | Custom | Custom | Custom |
| WordPress VIP | $2,000 | Unlimited | Optimized per site | Unlimited | Unlimited | 1 |
| WPOven | $599.95 | Unlimted | 64GB | 800GB | Unlimited | Unlimited |
LoadStorm Testing Results
Load Storm is designed to simulate real users visiting the site, logging in and browsing. It tests uncached performance.
Results Table
| Company | Total Requests | Total Errors | Peak Rps | Average Rps | Peak Response Time | Average Response Time | Total Data Transferred | Peak Throughput | Average Throughput | Wp-login Average Response Time |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CloudJiffy powered by Jelastic | 2460662 | 617 | 1966.12 | 1367.03 | 15172 | 101 | 115.04 | 92 | 64 | 442 |
| Infomaniak powered by Jelastic | 2611376 | 650 | 2100.12 | 1450.76 | 15101 | 98 | 117.92 | 95 | 66 | 485 |
| Presslabs | 2847806 | 0 | 2302.25 | 1582.11 | 5204 | 199 | 110.68 | 90 | 61.49 | 388 |
| RAIDBOXES | 2036073 | 17 | 1705.00 | 1131.15 | 15051 | 513 | 102.33 | 86 | 56.85 | 876 |
| Scaleforce powered by Jelastic | 2443013 | 214 | 1934.12 | 1357.23 | 15745 | 71 | 113.1 | 89.93 | 62.83 | 273 |
| Seravo | 2427112 | 48 | 1997.18 | 1348.40 | 15100 | 98 | 108.31 | 90 | 60.17 | 315 |
| Servebolt | 3078292 | 12 | 2500.92 | 1710.16 | 15098 | 55 | 101.81 | 83 | 56.56 | 189 |
| Servebolt Accelerated | 3152492 | 67 | 2535.47 | 1751.38 | 7471 | 61 | 105.04 | 84 | 58.36 | 209 |
| WordPress VIP | 2348033 | 15 | 1884.93 | 1304.46 | 4027 | 90 | 154.86 | 125 | 86.03 | 247 |
| WPOven | 2029225 | 39972 | 1701.52 | 1127.35 | 15112 | 545 | 94.04 | 81 | 52 | 1303 |
Discussion
CloudJiffy, Infomaniak, Presslabs, RAIDBOXES, Scaleforce, Seravo, Servebolt, Servebolt Accelerated, and WordPress VIP all handled this test without issue.
WPOven had some errors and slowed down.
It's interesting to see the wp-login average response times because it is guaranteed to hit the database to authenticate the request. The requests are also coming from all over the world, so keeping it fast for everyone is a challenge. Servebolt and Servebolt Accelerated had the fastest average at 189ms and 247ms respectively. WordPress VIP picked up the third fastest at 247ms.
K6 Static Testing Results
K6 Static test is designed to test cached performance by repeatedly requesting the homepage.
Results Table
| Company | Requests | Errors | Peak Rps | Average Response Time | Average Rps | P95 | P99 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CloudJiffy powered by Jelastic | 2220701 | 213 | 4903 | 15 | 2438 | 77 | 78 |
| Infomaniak powered by Jelastic | 2222993 | 473 | 4925 | 14 | 2427 | 65 | 65 |
| Presslabs | 2096111 | 0 | 4623 | 75 | 2303 | 245 | 245 |
| RAIDBOXES | 1972189 | 0 | 4364 | 142 | 2153 | 299 | 299 |
| Scaleforce powered by Jelastic | 2229096 | 433 | 4902 | 11 | 2450 | 42 | 42 |
| Seravo | 2233679 | 97 | 4882 | 9 | 2457 | 31 | 41 |
| Servebolt | 2199952 | 0 | 4838 | 24 | 2420 | 35 | 113 |
| Servebolt Accelerated | 2204239 | 1 | 4850 | 22 | 2420 | 33 | 80 |
| WordPress VIP | 2225952 | 0 | 4922 | 12 | 2441 | 75 | 75 |
| WPOven | 1850749 | 0 | 4161 | 217 | 2023 | 429 | 531 |
Discussion
CloudJiffy, Infomaniak, Presslabs, RAIDBOXES, Scaleforce, Seravo, Servebolt, Servebolt Accelerated, and WordPress VIP all handled this test without issue.
WPOven had some spikes.
This test really highlights how fast the CDNs are because static content should be cached and scalable without issue. Seravo had the fastest average response time in all tests across any tier this year at an incredibly fast 9ms. It was also the fastest at the P95 and P99 levels at 31ms and 41ms. It's also impressive that 6 (CloudJiffy, Infomaniak, Scaleforce, Seravo, Servebolt Accelerated, WordPress VIP) companies served 99% of the requests at 80ms of less.
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 | Alt Uptime Monitor |
|---|---|---|---|
| CloudJiffy powered by Jelastic | 85.114 | 100 | 99.991 |
| Infomaniak powered by Jelastic | 85.086 | 100 | 100 |
| Presslabs | 97.818 | 100 | 99.983 |
| RAIDBOXES | 99.993 | 99.9922 | |
| Scaleforce powered by Jelastic | 100 | 100 | |
| Seravo | 99.998 | 99.9827 | |
| Servebolt | 100 | 100 | |
| Servebolt Accelerated | 99.962 | 99.974 | |
| WordPress VIP | 100 | 100 | |
| WPOven | 99.981 | 99.9668 |
Discussion
RAIDBOXES, Scaleforce, Seravo, Servebolt, Servebolt Accelerated, WordPress VIP and WPOven also had over 99.9% uptime.
CloudJiffy, Infomaniak and Presslabs all had an SSL renewal bug which caused some downtime dropping them below the 99.9% threshold.
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CloudJiffy powered by Jelastic | 0.764 | 1.251 | 1.485 | 0.646 | 0.752 | 1.058 | 0.766 | 1.389 | 1.568 | 1.748 | 1.249 | 1.623 | 1.191583333 |
| Infomaniak powered by Jelastic | 0.849 | 1.336 | 1.593 | 0.603 | 0.675 | 1.096 | 1.34 | 1.142 | 1.716 | 1.849 | 0.896 | 1.664 | 1.229916667 |
| Presslabs | 0.591 | 0.673 | 0.859 | 0.646 | 0.661 | 2.014 | 0.569 | 0.879 | 0.772 | 0.859 | 0.976 | 0.939 | 0.8698333333 |
| RAIDBOXES | 1.087 | 1.07 | 1.122 | 0.572 | 0.587 | 1.254 | 1.133 | 0.866 | 1.475 | 1.904 | 1.281 | 0.809 | 1.096666667 |
| Scaleforce powered by Jelastic | 1.027 | 1.063 | 1.157 | 0.602 | 0.671 | 1.022 | 1.056 | 0.904 | 1.234 | 1.425 | 1.11 | 1.169 | 1.036666667 |
| Seravo | 0.55 | 0.664 | 0.742 | 0.574 | 0.587 | 0.563 | 0.533 | 0.739 | 0.605 | 0.498 | 0.907 | 0.845 | 0.6505833333 |
| Servebolt | 0.684 | 0.695 | 0.794 | 0.662 | 0.667 | 0.696 | 0.58 | 0.717 | 0.659 | 0.656 | 0.713 | 0.706 | 0.68575 |
| Servebolt Accelerated | 0.677 | 0.683 | 0.783 | 0.673 | 0.67 | 0.609 | 0.571 | 0.616 | 0.608 | 0.678 | 0.75 | 0.698 | 0.668 |
| WordPress VIP | 0.778 | 0.667 | 0.952 | 0.736 | 0.658 | 1.299 | 1.07 | 1.226 | 0.951 | 1.036 | 0.781 | 1.391 | 0.9620833333 |
| WPOven | 0.709 | 0.804 | 0.96 | 1.074 | 1.067 | 1.782 | 1.392 | 1.579 | 1.088 | 1.33 | 5.143 | 1.582 | 1.5425 |
Discussion
Seravo had the fastest average response time globally at 651ms ekeing out the slimmest of margins against Servebolt Accelerated (668ms) and Servebolt (686ms).
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 |
|---|---|---|
| CloudJiffy powered by Jelastic | 9.453 | 274.3484225 |
| Infomaniak powered by Jelastic | 7.574 | 656.167979 |
| Presslabs | 4.691 | 1336.898396 |
| RAIDBOXES | 4.109 | 825.7638315 |
| Scaleforce powered by Jelastic | 8.155 | 385.653683 |
| Seravo | 5.487 | 201.9793981 |
| Servebolt | 3.29 | 1798.561151 |
| Servebolt Accelerated | 3.311 | 1897.533207 |
| WordPress VIP | 8.276 | 890.4719501 |
| WPOven | 0 | 318.3699459 |
Discussion
Servebolt and Servebolt Accelerated stand out as having the fastest PHP and WP bench scores.
WPOven doesn't have a PHP Bench score because PHP 8 which they run as default isn't compatible with the benchmark.
SSL Testing Results
The tool is available at https://www.ssllabs.com/ssltest/
Results Table
| Company | Qualsys SSL Grade |
|---|---|
| CloudJiffy powered by Jelastic | A+ |
| Infomaniak powered by Jelastic | A+ |
| Presslabs | A+ |
| RAIDBOXES | A+ |
| Scaleforce powered by Jelastic | A+ |
| Seravo | A+ |
| Servebolt | A+ |
| Servebolt Accelerated | A+ |
| WordPress VIP | A+ |
| WPOven | B |
Discussion
A+ for everyone except WPOven which earned a B for supporting older TLS versions.
Internet.nl Testing Results
The tool is available at https://internet.nl/test-site/.
Results Table
| Company | Internet.nl |
|---|---|
| CloudJiffy powered by Jelastic | 30 |
| Infomaniak powered by Jelastic | 30 |
| Presslabs | 50 |
| RAIDBOXES | 52 |
| Scaleforce powered by Jelastic | 47 |
| Seravo | 47 |
| Servebolt | 66 |
| Servebolt Accelerated | 95 |
| WordPress VIP | 68 |
| WPOven | 52 |
Discussion
Servebolt Accelerated earned 95 followed by WordPress VIP (68) and Servebolt (66) while CloudJiffy and Infomaniak earned 30.
I'm not sure how much value there is in this metric, but the results are here for people to look at and evaluate for themselves.
Mozilla Observatory Testing Results
The tool is available at https://observatory.mozilla.org/.
Results Table
| Company | Mozilla Observatory |
|---|---|
| CloudJiffy powered by Jelastic | F |
| Infomaniak powered by Jelastic | F |
| Presslabs | D |
| RAIDBOXES | C |
| Scaleforce powered by Jelastic | F |
| Seravo | C+ |
| Servebolt | D- |
| Servebolt Accelerated | C- |
| WordPress VIP | D+ |
| WPOven | F |
Discussion
Seravo had the highest grade at C+ followed by RAIDBOXES's C, Servebolt Accelerated's C-, WordPress VIP's D+, Presslabs's D, Servebolt's D-. CloudJiffy, Infomaniak, Scaleforce and WPOven all earned F's.
It's interesting to note that this is the only tier where the majority of companies didn't earn a grade of F.
I really don't know what to make of these results, when most companies are failing, I have to consider whether the test is useful, or are many companies not doing a good job securing the servers or are these measuring things which are beyond the hosting provider's scope and more on the user? Or is it something else? I don't have an answer, but I am publishing the results to add another data point to the discussion.
Conclusion
There are two levels of recognition awarded to companies that participate in the tests. There is no ‘best’ declared, it’s simply tiered, it’s hard to come up with an objective ranking system because of the complex nature of hosting. These tests also don’t take into account outside factors such as reviews, support, and features. It is simply testing performance as described in the methodology.
Top Tier
This year's Top Tier WordPress Hosting Performance Award goes to the following companies who showed virtually no signs of struggle during the testing.
Honorable Mention
The following companies earned Honorable Mention status because they did very well and had a minor issue or two holding them back from earning Top Tier status.
No company achieved this status.
