This blog post is part of a detailed article series aimed at helping business owners and non-technical users succeed online.
For an overview of the article series, go here:
In this article, we present a number of surprising statistics about WordPress that will help you understand why millions of businesses around the world choose WordPress to power their business websites and what kind of people and businesses use WordPress today.
WordPress: How Popular Is It? Facts And Figures About WordPress Usage
A brief summary:
- WordPress began in 2003.
- WordPress offers two formats: a hosted platform (WordPress.com) and as a self-hosted, downloadable application (WordPress.org).
- 22 out of every hundred new domains registered in the U.S. are for installing a new WordPress site.
- There are over 60 million installations of WordPress worldwide. This number is growing every day.
- WordPress powers over 30% of the internet. Over one-third of all websites worldwide are built with WordPress.
- WordPress sites around the world publish an average of 24 posts per second.
- WordPress sites receive over 22 billion monthly pageviews.
- WordPress blogs receive around 50 million comments per month.
- WordPress has been translated into over 70 languages.
- More than 60% of all websites worldwide that use a content management system are built with WordPress.
- Over 30 million searches are made on Google each month for WordPress related terms.
- WordPress is 100% free to download, use and modify. WordPress is built using an open source content management system.
- WordPress is continually worked on by volunteers. People from all around the world are at work developing and improving WordPress functionality each day.
- WordPress is regularly updated to eliminate bugs and improve both its ease of use and security.
- WordPress delivers content online to visitors worldwide. WordPress has been translated and localized into over 70 international languages.
- WordPress currently makes available thousands of free WP plugins, themes, and widgets to WordPress users.
- There is virtually no limit to what can be built with WordPress.
WordPress Market Share
In simple terms, a content management system (CMS), is a website maintenance tool for non-technical users. It is a web application designed to make it easier for non-technical users to add, modify and manage content on their website.
WordPress began in 2003. It was originally a simple program developed by co-founders Matt Mullenweg and Mike Little. It is currently the widely-used self-hosted blogging tool in the world, used on millions of sites and accessed by tens of millions of people every day.
WordPress is owned by Automattic.com, which currently employs around 300 people, all of whom are home-based. Despite its distributed model and so few employees, WordPress.com (the hosted version of the software) currently attracts more unique views per month than Facebook, Amazon, Twitter, eBay, and Yahoo.com …
(WordPress [hosted version] unique monthly visitors. Source: Automattic.com)
Here are just some of the latest stats on WordPress:
WordPress is the world’s leading CMS platform and powers over 30% of the web …
(WP usage figures. Source: trends.builtwith.com/cms)
In terms of CMS dominance, no other platform even comes close to WordPress …
(WordPress Market Share. Source: w3techs.com)
In fact, more and more websites today are being built on the WordPress CMS platform.
WordPress is so popular, that keeping up with statistics on WordPress is quite difficult because the numbers change so frequently.
For example, at the time this post was published, this is the number of downloads of the latest WordPress version …
(Source: https://wordpress.org/download/counter)
Note: The above figures represents only the latest version of WordPress. Around one third of all current users have not yet upgraded their installations to the latest release …
(WordPress versions currently in use. Source: https://wordpress.org/about/stats)
As this post was being written, the number of downloads has already grown. If you were to click on the link above and visit the WordPress download counter page, you will see a significantly higher download number … perhaps even a newer version, as the WordPress developer team continually updates the software to fix security issues and bugs, and add new or improved features.
Speaking of updates, WordPress has made available over 100 new update versions to date …
(Over 100 new WordPress versions have been released to date)
WordPress currently releases a new updated version every 3-4 months or so …
(WordPress regularly releases new software versions named after famous Jazz musicians)
Interestingly enough, all major WordPress updates are typically named after Jazz musicians, eg:
- v.1.2 = Charles Mingus (May 22, 2004),
- v.2.5 = Michael Brecker (March 29, 2008),
- v.3.2 = George Gershwin (July 4, 2011),
- v.3.5 = Elvin Jones (December 11, 2012),
- v.3.9 = Jimmy Smith (April 16, 2014),
- etc …
Who Uses WordPress?
In a nutshell, all types of companies and people from all walks of life are using WordPress to publish content about every kind of topic imaginable.
Global corporations, business of all sizes, technology companies, celebrities, politicians, famous actors, colleges, government department sites, not-for-profits – even nations are using WordPress …
WordPress.org Showcase
Here are just some of the growing number of sites, organizations and people who use WordPress:
- Global Brands & Companies: Sony Music, YRC Freight, Groupe Renault, McDonald’s Singapore, Mercedes-Benz, etc …
- Celebs, Politicians, Sports Stars, Artists & Musicians: US Air Force General Chuck Yeager, Narendra Modi, Prime Minister of India, The Meredith Vieira Show, Beyoncé, Usain Bolt, Snoop Dogg, Kobe Bryant, Channing Tatum, Russell Brand, etc …
- Colleges & Educational Institutions: University of Manitoba Today, Stony Brook University School of Journalism, Bates College, Salve Regina University, etc.
- Magazines & News Media: Fortune, The Australian, InStyle News, LinkedIn, etc.
- Government Sites, Not For Profits & Humanitarian Organizations: San Pellegrino Terme, Chicago Weather Center, Maryland National Road Association, Official Gazette of the Republic of the Philippines, Amnesty International Korea, etc.
Earlier, we mentioned that WordPress offers users the choice of two formats: a hosted application (WordPress.com) and as a self-hosted, downloadable application (WordPress.org).
- Businesses prefer the self-hosted version, which can be installed in their own domain names and freely modified to suit their needs. In fact, most WordPress self-hosted installations are business marketing activities.
- More than half of all WordPress users use the hosted version on WordPress.com
- In 2014, WordPress blogs (blogs hosted either on WordPress.com or externally-hosted WordPress sites) published on average 17 new posts every second (around 1.5 million posts per day).
You can see a live map showing user activity across its hosted platform …
WordPress.com – Live Activity
In later tutorials, we discuss the difference between WordPress.com (hosted) and WordPress.org (self-hosted) versions.
Other Statistics About WordPress
WordPress Plugins
WordPress users have access to over almost 40,000 free plugins from the WordPress plugins directory …
(WP free plugins directory)
For more information about plugins see this post:
WordPress Themes
WordPress users also have access to over 1,700 free WP themes …
(WordPress theme repository)
For more information about themes see this post:
WordPress Translations
WordPress has been translated and localized into over 70 languages in addition to English …
(WP language translations)
Searching Online For WordPress
The search term “WordPress” alone receives around 2.7 million monthly searches on Google. Additional WordPress-related terms (e.g. “WP themes”, “WP plugins”, “WordPress tutorials”, etc. brings the total number of searches online for WordPress terms to more than 37 million …
(WP-related searches online)
If you compare searches for WordPress to other CMS platforms, WordPress is searched five times more than Joomla and 9x more often than Drupal.
WordPress Services
According to WordPress’ own “State of the Word” 2014 survey, one quarter of all users who answered the survey stated that they make a full-time living off WordPress. An earlier survey conducted by WordPress (2012) also found that the average hourly rate of WordPress projects is around US$50.
You can find WordPress designers and developers for hire by searching on freelancing sites like Upwork …
According to Upwork.com, the typical job cost ranges for WordPress are between $10 – $500 …
(Source: Upwork)
As you can clearly see from the above information, there is no end in sight for how much further WordPress can continue to grow.
In other articles, you will learn:
- Why WordPress is the best choice when you need a platform for growing your small business online,
- Dozens of compelling reasons why you should choose WordPress for your business website or blog, including a comprehensive review of the benefits, features, and advantages of using the WordPress CMS platform,
- Ways to automate your business marketing with WordPress,
- How to drive more visitors, get more leads, and sell more products and services with WordPress.
- Plus, we’ll provide loads of step-by-step tutorials and tips on how you can use WordPress and expand your business online, and save thousands of dollars on website development and web design costs.
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Information Sources:
The above figures were sourced from various locations around the web, including the following sites:
- https://wordpress.org
- https://wordpress.com
- http://automattic.com
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WordPress
- http://w3techs.com/technologies/details/cm-wordpress/all/all
- http://trends.builtwith.com/cms
- http://ma.tt/2014/10/sotw-2014
- https://managewp.com/14-surprising-statistics-about-wordpress-usage
- http://torquemag.io/13-surprising-wordpress-statistics
- https://websitebuilder.org/resources/amazing-facts-you-probably-dont-know-about-wordpress
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"These tutorials have so much information and are easy to understand. If you use WordPress or plan to in the future these will help you with everything you need to know." - Valisa (Mesa, Arizona)