This article is part of an article series designed to help you understand how the WordPress content publishing platform can help your business grow online.
For more information about of the article series, see this post:
In this article, you will learn some WordPress usage facts and figures that will help you understand why millions of businesses around the world rely on WordPress to power their websites and blogs and what kind of businesses are using WordPress today.
WordPress: Statistics And Popularity
Below is a summary of what we will cover:
- WordPress started as a blogging tool in 2003.
- WordPress is available as a hosted application (WordPress.com) and as a self-hosted, downloadable application (WordPress.org).
- 23 out of every one hundred new domains registered in the U.S. are for a new WordPress website.
- There are over 60 million installations of WordPress worldwide. This number grows everyday.
- 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 using a CMS application are driven 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. The WordPress application is distributed as an open source content management system.
- WordPress code is built and improved upon by volunteers. People from all around the world work on developing and improving the WordPress application every day.
- The WordPress software is updated on a regular basis to fix bugs and improve 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 plugins, themes, and widgets to WordPress users.
- There is practically no limit to what someone can do using WordPress.
WordPress CMS Popularity
A content management system (CMS), is a web tool for non-technical users. It is designed to make it easy for non-technical users to add, modify and manage content on their website.
WordPress began in 2003. It was originally written by Matt Mullenweg and Mike Little. Since then, WordPress has grown to be the largest self-hosted blogging tool in the world, used on millions of websites 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 having so few employees, WordPress.com (the hosted version of WordPress) currently attracts more unique monthly views than Amazon, Facebook, eBay, Twitter, and Yahoo …
(WordPress [hosted version] unique visitors. Source: http://automattic.com/about)
Consider the following WP usage stats:
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 usage, no other platform even comes close to WordPress …
(WordPress Market Share. Source: w3techs.com)
In fact, more and more websites are being built on WordPress.
WordPress is so popular, that keeping up with statistics on WordPress is very difficult because the data changes so frequently.
For example, at the time this post was published, here is the number of downloads of the latest WordPress version …
(Source: https://wordpress.org/download/counter)
Note: The above download figure represents only the most recently released version of WordPress. Around one third of all current users have not yet updated their sites to the latest release …
(WP versions in current use. Source: https://wordpress.org/about/stats)
As this article was being written, the number of downloads has already shot up. If you were to click on the link above and visit the WordPress download counter site, you should expect to see a much higher figure … perhaps even a newer version, as the WordPress community continually updates the software to fix security issues and bugs, and add new or improved features.
Regarding updates, WordPress has released over one hundred new updates in its first 11 years of existence …
(Over 100 new versions of WordPress have been made available in its first 11 years)
WordPress currently releases a new software update every 3-4 months …
(WordPress regularly releases new software versions named after famous Jazz musicians)
here is an interesting fact: all major WordPress upgrades have a tradition of being named after Jazz music artists, eg:
- v.2.1 = Ella Fitzgerald (January 22, 2007),
- v.2.7 = John Coltrane (December 10, 2008),
- v.3.0 = Thelonious Monk (June 17, 2010),
- v.3.5 = Elvin Jones (December 11, 2012),
- v.4.1 = Dinah Washington (December 18, 2014),
- etc …
Who Is Using WordPress?
In a nutshell, all different kinds of organizations and people use WordPress to publish content about everything and anything.
Leading corporations, businesses, retail companies, celebrities, politicians, famous actors, educational institutions, government sectors, not-for-profits – even countries are using WordPress to publish web content and run their official websites …
WP Web Site Showcase
Here are just some of the businesses, institutions and people who have chosen to use WordPress:
- Global Brands & Companies: Aqua Hotels and Resorts, Public Storage Canada, Groupe Renault, Groupe Vivendi, Vogue, etc …
- Celebrities, Politicians, Sports Stars, Artists & Musicians: US Air Force General Chuck Yeager, Rush, Lily Allen, Justin Bieber, Usain Bolt, The Rolling Stones, Blondie, Howie Mandel, Russell Brand, etc …
- Colleges & Educational Institutions: Georgia State University, International Relations Online at American University, Bates College, The University of Mary Washington, etc.
- Magazines & News Media: Fortune, Time.com, InStyle News, Dusty Cartridge, etc.
- Governments, Not For Profits & Community Organizations: Sweden’s Official Site, Chicago Weather Center, Maryland National Road Association, CURE International, Ovarian Cancer National Alliance, etc.
Earlier, we mentioned that WordPress offers users two formats: a hosted platform (WordPress.com) and as a self-hosted, downloadable software (WordPress.org).
- Businesses clearly prefer the self-hosted version, which can be installed in their domains 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 per second (around 1.5 million per day).
WordPress.com provides a live map that lets you see blog post updates around the world in real-time …
WordPress (Hosted Version) – Live Activity
In other posts, we will cover 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 WordPress plugins for free from the WordPress free plugins directory …
(WP plugin repository)
We have written a detailed article about plugins here:
WordPress Themes
WordPress users can also access over 1,700 free WP themes …
(WordPress.org free themes directory)
For more information about themes go here:
WordPress Translations
WordPress has been translated and localized into over seventy international languages and dialects 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. Including WordPress-related terms (e.g. “WordPress themes”, “WP plugins”, ”WordPress SEO”, etc. brings the total number of online searches for WordPress terms to around 37 million …
(WordPress searches online)
If you compare searches for WordPress to other CMS platforms, WordPress is searched online 5 x as much as Joomla and nine times more often than Drupal.
WordPress Developers
According to WordPress’ own “State of the Word” 2014 survey, one quarter of all 33,000 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 median hourly rate of WordPress projects is around US$50.
You can find WordPress designers and developers for hire at freelancing sites like Upwork.com …
According to Upwork.com, the typical job cost ranges for WordPress are around $10 – $500 …
(Source: Upwork)
As you can see, WordPress is set for continued growth for a long time to come.
In other blog posts, we will explore the following areas in more detail:
- Why WordPress is the best vehicle to grow your business online,
- Dozens of compelling reasons why you should choose WordPress for your business website or blog, including a detailed breakdown of the unique benefits, features, and advantages of using the WordPress platform,
- How to automate your business with WordPress,
- How to generate targeted traffic to your website, increase conversions, and sell more products and services with WordPress.
- Plus, we’ll be regularly posting loads of tutorials and tips on how to use WordPress and grow your business presence online, and save thousands of dollars on web development and website design costs.
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References:
The information for this post 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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"Wow! I never knew there's so much to learn about WordPress! I bought one of the WordPress for Dummies three years ago, such authors need to be on this course!" - Rich Law, Create A Blog Now