What Is WordPress Hosting, and Does WordPress Host Your Site for You?

By Mark Fail · July 21, 2020 · Updated October 7, 2026

Most people who search for WordPress hosting have already hit the same wall. They downloaded WordPress, or opened an account at WordPress.com, and now a setup screen wants to know where the site will live. The software costs nothing. The computer that runs it day and night does, and that computer is what a hosting company rents you.

This page covers what WordPress hosting is, whether WordPress hosts your site for you, how the domain fits in, and what the first bill and the second bill look like. I checked the plan prices on WordPress.com, HostUpon and GreenGeeks on 7 October 2026. We sell WordPress themes, not hosting, and two links near the end are affiliate links. I point them out again where they appear.

At a glance

Option	Advertised price	Without the long prepay	Sites	Who runs it
WordPress.com Personal	$4/mo, billed yearly	$9/mo	1	WordPress.com
WordPress.com Business	$25/mo, billed yearly	$40/mo	1	WordPress.com, managed
HostUpon Starter Plus	$4.95/mo for 36 months	$7.95/mo	2	You, with their tools
GreenGeeks Lite	$2.95/mo, first year	Renews at $13.95/mo	1	You, with their tools

What it is

WordPress.org requirements page recommending PHP 8.3, MySQL 8.0 or MariaDB 10.11 and HTTPS support

WordPress hosting is ordinary web hosting with the things WordPress needs already switched on. WordPress asks for very little. Its official requirements page recommends PHP 8.3 or newer, MySQL 8.0 or MariaDB 10.11 or newer, and HTTPS, and says any server that supports PHP and MySQL will do.

So the label is mostly about what a host bundles around that. A typical WordPress plan adds a one-click installer, a caching layer, automatic updates, a free SSL certificate and support staff who have fixed a broken plugin before. HostUpon's WordPress plans list LiteSpeed caching, a WordPress firewall with malware scanning and free migration. GreenGeeks lists automatic WordPress updates, daily backups and free SSL on every plan.

None of that changes what WordPress itself can do. A plain cPanel account that meets the requirements runs the same site, and you set up caching and backups yourself.

Hosts sell it as a separate product because the market is huge. W3Techs counts WordPress on 40.1% of all websites this month. For our own themes, the PremiumPress requirements page says any host that meets the WordPress requirements will run them, with PHP 8.1 or newer recommended for speed.

Does WordPress host sites?

WordPress, the software, doesn't host anything. You download it from WordPress.org and install it on a server you pay for. WordPress.com is a separate business run by Automattic that hosts WordPress sites for you, and WordPress.org keeps a whole help article explaining the difference because so many people mix the two up.

WordPress.com has a free plan with 1 GB of storage that shows WordPress.com ads to your visitors. Its paid plans today are Personal at $4 a month, Premium at $8, Business at $25 and Commerce at $45, all billed yearly. Paying month to month costs $9, $18, $40 and $70. Every paid plan now lists plugin installs, and the yearly ones include a free domain for the first year.

If you searched for WordPress premium hosting, the Premium plan is WordPress.com's middle tier with payment buttons, all premium themes and video uploads. The name has nothing to do with faster servers.

Self-hosted WordPress on rented hosting is what most business sites use, and it's what our themes are built and tested on. You own the files and the database, you get a control panel, and you can move the whole site to another host whenever you like.

Domain and hosting

You need both. The domain is the name people type, and the hosting is the server that answers. A domain with no hosting shows an error or a parked page. Hosting with no domain gives you a temporary address nobody will remember.

All three companies I checked throw in a free domain for the first year, and that's where a common mistake starts. HostUpon's small print says the free domain only applies to a 1, 2 or 3-year term and renews at the regular price after that. More important, the name now sits inside your hosting account. If you fall out with the host, the address your customers know is held by the company you're trying to leave.

Registering the domain separately, in your own name, avoids that for a few dollars a year. ICANN's registrant rights page says your registrar must give you clear instructions for renewing and transferring it. Our older post on signs your hosting provider is letting you down covers the domain trap as well.

Shared or managed

Shared hosting puts your site on a server with many other customers. It's cheap because the hardware is split, and it suits most new sites. HostUpon Starter Plus hosts 2 websites on 20 GB of SSD storage. GreenGeeks Lite hosts 1 website on 25 GB.

Managed WordPress hosting costs more because the host takes over jobs you'd otherwise do yourself. Updates, backups, caching and restores become their problem. WordPress.com Business is a fair example at $25 a month billed yearly, with real-time backups, one-click restores, SFTP and SSH access and 50 GB of storage.

A blog or brochure site with a few thousand visits a month will be fine on shared hosting. Move up once the site earns money every day it's online, or once you know you'll never want to open a control panel.

Renewal prices

The price on a hosting homepage is usually a first-term price that only applies if you prepay. GreenGeeks shows this plainly beside each plan. Lite is $2.95 a month for the first year and then $13.95. Pro is $4.95 and then $18.95.

Work it out over three years for one small site on GreenGeeks Lite. Year one costs $35.40. Years two and three at $13.95 a month cost $334.80. That's $370.20 in total, against the $106.20 the homepage price suggests.

HostUpon prices by term length instead. Starter Plus is $7.95 month to month, $6.95 a month on a 12-month term, $5.95 on 24 months and $4.95 on 36 months, so three years paid upfront comes to $178.20. Its small print says plans renew at their regular rates, and the regular price shown for Starter Plus is $9.95 a month.

WordPress.com Personal works out at $48 a year on yearly billing.

Hosts we use

HostUpon WordPress hosting plans Starter Plus, Business Plus and Premium Plus with prices and included features

Our WordPress hosting page rates ten hosts our customers use. Three get 4 out of 5 from us, and these two sit at the top of that list. The two links below are affiliate links, so we may earn a commission if you sign up through them.

HostUpon is the one we've used ourselves for years. Every WordPress plan includes LiteSpeed caching, the WordPress firewall, a backup service and free migration, and the support team is in-house. Starter Plus covers two sites, which is handy if you want a test copy alongside the live one. See HostUpon's WordPress plans.

GreenGeeks is the host we've recommended to clients for years. Every plan includes a free domain for the first year, free SSL and free migration, and the site gets daily backups and automatic WordPress updates. It buys renewable energy credits to cover three times the power it uses, which it advertises as a 300% green website. See GreenGeeks' WordPress plans.

If your site is mainly a blog, our WordPress blog hosting roundup compares five more hosts, including IONOS and Krystal.

Final thoughts

If you only want to write and don't want to think about servers at all, WordPress.com Personal at $48 a year is hard to argue with. You give up some control, and you can still move to self-hosting later.

For a business site, a shop, a directory or anything built on a premium theme, rent shared hosting and install WordPress yourself. HostUpon Starter Plus and GreenGeeks Lite both do the job. Compare them on the renewal price, because that's what you'll pay from year two onward.

Once the site earns real money, a managed plan is worth the extra. And whichever you choose, register the domain in your own name, somewhere other than your host.

FAQ

Is WordPress hosting free?

The WordPress software is free, and WordPress.com has a free plan with 1 GB of storage and ads on your site. Proper hosting for a self-hosted site starts at $2.95 to $4.95 a month on a long first term, and renews at a higher price.

Does WordPress host domains?

WordPress.org doesn't sell or host anything. WordPress.com sells domains and includes one free for the first year on its yearly paid plans. After that the domain renews at the normal price.

Do I need special WordPress hosting, or will normal hosting work?

Normal hosting works if it offers PHP 8.3 or newer, MySQL 8.0 or MariaDB 10.11 or newer, and HTTPS. A WordPress plan adds an installer, caching and automatic updates, which saves you setting them up.

How much does WordPress hosting cost a year?

Today WordPress.com Personal is $48 a year on yearly billing. GreenGeeks Lite is $35.40 for the first year and $167.40 a year after that. HostUpon Starter Plus is $59.40 a year if you pay for three years upfront.

Is WordPress a web hosting service?

WordPress is software. WordPress.com is a hosting service that runs that software for you. They share a name but they're different things, which is why so many people search for this.

Can I move my WordPress site to another host later?

Yes, if it's self-hosted. A WordPress site is a folder of files plus a database, and both HostUpon and GreenGeeks offer free migration when you move in. Keeping the domain at a separate registrar makes the switch much simpler.

Can someone look after the hosting side for me?

A managed plan covers updates, backups and restores. If you run a PremiumPress site, our care plans handle updates, backups and security every month on the hosting you already have.