This blog post is part of a comprehensive article series aimed at helping you understand why the WordPress CMS can help your small business achieve its business goals online with the WordPress CMS platform.
For more information about of the article series, see this post:
In this blog post, you will learn some statistics about WordPress that will help you understand why millions of businesses around the world use WordPress and what kind of people and businesses use WordPress today.
Some Facts And Figures About WordPress
In short:
- WordPress started in 2003.
- WordPress is available in two formats: a hosted application (WordPress.com) and as a self-hosted, downloadable application (WordPress.org).
- 23 out of every hundred new domains registered in the U.S. are for installing a new WordPress site.
- There are over sixty million installations of WordPress. This number is growing every day.
- WordPress powers over 30% of the internet. Over one-third of all websites around the world 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 sites worldwide using a CMS application are powered by 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 built and improved upon by volunteers. People from all around the world work on developing and improving the WordPress software every day.
- The WordPress core program is continually being updated to address bugs and improve both its ease of use and security.
- WordPress can deliver your content online to visitors worldwide. WordPress has been translated and localized into over seventy international languages.
- WordPress currently makes available thousands of free WP plugins, themes, and widgets to WordPress users.
- There is almost no limit to what someone can do using WordPress.
WordPress Usage
In simple terms, a content management system (CMS), is a website tool for non-technical users. It is a web application designed to make it easy for non-technical website owners to add, modify and manage content on their website.
WordPress began in 2003. It was originally written by Matt Mullenweg and Mike Little. It is currently the largest self-hosted CMS application in the world, used on millions of websites and seen 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 being a distributed company and having so few employees, WordPress.com (the hosted version of the WordPress software) currently attracts more unique monthly views than Facebook, Amazon, Twitter, Yahoo.com, and eBay …
(WordPress.com monthly uniques. Source: http://automattic.com/about)
Here are just some of the latest statistics on WordPress CMS usage:
WordPress is the world’s leading CMS platform and powers over 30% of the web …
(WordPress usage statistics. Source: trends.builtwith.com/cms)
In terms of CMS market share, no other platform even comes close to WordPress …
(WordPress Market Share. Source: w3techs.com)
In fact, more sites are now being powered by WordPress.
WordPress is so popular, that keeping up with statistics on WordPress is very difficult because the numbers change so frequently.
For example, at the time this article was published, here is the current number of downloads of the latest WordPress version …
(Source: https://wordpress.org/download/counter)
Note: The above download number represents only the most recent version of WordPress. Around one third of all current users have not yet updated their sites to the latest release …
(WordPress versions in current use. Source: https://wordpress.org/about/stats)
As this article was being written, the number of downloads is already increasing. If you click on the link above and visit the WordPress download counter site, you should expect to see a significantly higher download number … perhaps even a different version, as the WordPress development community continually updates the software to fix security issues and bugs, and add new or improved features.
Speaking of updates, WordPress has released over one hundred new software versions since 2003 …
(Over 100 new WordPress versions have been made available since 2003)
WordPress currently releases a new update every 3-4 months or so …
(WordPress regularly releases new software updates named after famous Jazz musicians)
Curiously enough, all major WordPress version updates are traditionally named after Jazz music artists, eg:
- v.1.0 = Miles Davis (January 3, 2004),
- v.2.5 = Michael Brecker (March 29, 2008),
- v.2.8 = Chet Baker (June 11, 2009),
- v.3.3 = Sonny Stitt (December 12, 2011),
- v.3.9 = Jimmy Smith (April 16, 2014),
- etc …
Who Uses WordPress?
In a nutshell, all different types of companies and people from all walks of life are using WordPress to blog about everything under the sun.
Leading brands, businesses, retail companies, celebrities, politicians, famous actors, colleges, government department sites, not-for-profits – even nations are using WordPress …
WordPress Web Site Showcase
Here are just some of the sites, companies and people who have built their online presence with WordPress:
- Businesses & Corporations: Aqua Hotels and Resorts, YRC Freight, Groupe Renault, Group Bouygues, Hyatt Blog, etc …
- Famous People, Politicians, Sports Stars, Actors & Musicians: US Air Force General Chuck Yeager, Narendra Modi, Prime Minister of India, The Meredith Vieira Show, Beyoncé, Usain Bolt, Riverdance, Katie Couric, Channing Tatum, Jason Mraz, etc …
- Colleges & Educational Institutions: Nicholls State University, Milwaukee School of Engineering’s Bridge, UCF College of Medicine, Lafayette College, etc.
- Magazines & Online Media: Fortune, Time.com, InStyle News, LinkedIn, etc.
- Government Sites, Not For Profits & Humanitarian Organizations: Open.NASA.gov, Chicago Weather Center, Maryland National Road Association, Official Gazette of the Republic of the Philippines, Rotary Means Business – Rotary Club, etc.
Earlier, we mentioned that WordPress is available as a hosted application (WordPress.com) and as a self-hosted, downloadable software (WordPress.org).
- Businesses prefer to download the self-hosted version, which can be installed on their domain and customized 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, blogs that are part of the WordPress network (blogs hosted either on WordPress.com or externally-hosted WordPress sites) published on average 17 posts every second (around 1.5 million per day).
WordPress publishes a live map that lets you see blog post updates around the world in real-time …
WordPress (Hosted Version) – Live Activity
In later articles, we address the difference between WordPress.com (hosted) and WordPress.org (self-hosted) versions.
Other WordPress Statistics
WordPress Plugins
WordPress users can download and install over 37,000 plugins for free from the WordPress plugins repository …
(WP plugin directory)
We have written a great article about WordPress plugins here:
WordPress Themes
WordPress users can also access over 1,700 free themes from the WordPress theme repository …
(WP free themes repository)
We have written a detailed article about themes here:
WordPress Language Translations
WordPress has been translated and localized into over 70 international languages in addition to English …
(WordPress.org languages)
Searching Online For WordPress
The search term “WordPress” alone receives around 2.7 million searches per month on Google. Additional WordPress-related terms (e.g. “WordPress themes”, “WP plugins”, “WordPress tutorials”, etc. brings the total number of online searches for WordPress terms to around 37 million …
(WP searches online)
If you compare searches for WordPress to other CMS platforms, WordPress is searched online 5 x more than Joomla and nine times more often than Drupal.
WordPress Developers
According to WordPress’ own “State of the Word” 2014 survey, a quarter of WordPress users who participated in the survey said that they make a full-time living off the WordPress CMS. 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 at freelancing sites like Upwork …
According to Upwork, the typical cost for WordPress jobs is around $10 – $500 …
(Source: Upwork.com)
As you can clearly see, the growth and popularity of WordPress is predicted to continue for a long time to come.
In other articles, we will address the following areas in more detail:
- Why WordPress is the smartest option in most situations when it comes to choosing a vehicle to grow your business online,
- Over 50 great reasons why you should choose WordPress for your business website or blog, including a detailed review of the benefits, features, and advantages of using WordPress,
- How to automate your business with WordPress,
- How to generate targeted traffic to your site, get more leads, and sell more products and services with WordPress.
- Plus, we’ll be providing loads of step-by-step tutorials and actual examples of how to use WordPress and expand your business online, and save thousands of dollars on the costs of website development and web design.
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Sources:
The information for this article was 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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