Hosting a website is a challenging job, and it is even more difficult to find a reliable hosting company. If you own an e-commerce website or a personal blog, it is very important to choose the right web hosting service, since a web host is a mechanism that links your website to the internet servers. If you have a WordPress blog that's small or medium in scale, you can easily find several great choices on the market.
Although you're going to be bombarded with hundreds of options to choose from if you're looking for solutions on the internet, deciding which one is better for your website is something else you'll find hard to figure out. You should be enough sensible to recognize that different websites require different hosting services. Not every web host is intended for any website!
There are a number of main things to consider when selecting a run WordPress hosting service. Using performance reviews, surveys, and other objective data will show major discrepancies between these two hosts to help you make your website's best option.
Trying to host your WordPress site by choosing between WP Engine vs SiteGround? We will compare WP Engine vs SiteGround in this post on their features, performance, customer service, and price. We will then offer recommendations on selecting the right supplier for you. Let's kick-off!
WP Engine vs SiteGround 2020 | Which One Is The Best? ( In-Depth Comparison )
Knowing The Service: WP Engine
WP Engine is a powerful hosting platform that offers website owners an array of useful tools for enhancing the website's agility, performance, expertise, and automation, so you can build and deploy a range of online experiences from campaign platforms to content hubs to eCommerce extensions.
They are known for their award-winning customer support system, solid technology, and an ecosystem of partners and developers that unify their platform to expand the value of all solutions that you benefit from.
Knowing The Service: SiteGround
SiteGround is a web hosting company that was founded in Sofia, Bulgaria in 2004. It reported serving more than 2,000,000 domains worldwide in most recent results.
It provides shared storage, cloud computing, and dedicated servers, as well as storing emails and registering domains.
The Feature Basket!
If your potential web host has been narrowed down to SiteGround and WP Engine, their features may have been a key factor in your consideration. Both platforms provide a range of valuable features that provide highly desirable resources to build high-performance WordPress sites that aren't readily accessible with other providers. Let's break both down.
WP Engine
- Improved performance with built-in caching via Varnish and Memcached.
- Access to the Genesis Framework
- Access to over 35 StudioPress Genesis child themes.
- Connection with Secure File Transfer Protocol (SFTP)
- Connection with Git for advanced development.
- Three separate staging environments (One-click)
- Automated WordPress updates and backups.
- Automated Migration plugin for simplified migration.
- Free SSL certificates and a content delivery network (CDN).
- Creation of location-specific content using GeoTargeting.
- Hosting a WooCommerce store using a dedicated WooCommerce plugin pack.
SiteGround
- SiteGround Migrator plugin to allow Free WordPress site transfers.
- Automated WordPress installation for new users.
- SG Optimizer plugin for built-in caching, and other performance improvements.
- Server firewall for protection against common WordPress security vulnerabilities.
- Automatic WordPress updates and daily backups.
- SSL certificates and CDN included.
- Git integration and other advanced development tools.
- Unlimited email accounts featuring your website's domain.
- One-click staging site creation.
As you can see, both hosts' feature sets are in many respects identical. The main differences are the StudioPress access and GeoTargeting for WP Computer, and the firewall and email service for SiteGround's server. All are useful for the management and maintenance of WordPress pages, so the winner here is really focused on both your personal interests and the needs of your platform.
Performance that matters!
When it comes to performance, both WP Engine and SiteGround loaded the websites in under two seconds, which is actually pretty damn fast! Solid performance is a necessity for the success of any website, and that's exactly what you will be able to get if you host your website from these two services. It not only affects user experience (UX), but also affects the search engine rankings. Choosing a host that doesn't suit the performance needs of your site could affect both your conversion rate and the visibility of your site.
Thankfully for many prominent hosting services, including WP Engine and SiteGround, we have had the ability to run performance tests. We used Pingdom and fresh WordPress installations in different locations around the world to test site pace. Here are the results we obtained from both the platforms:
WP Engine
- New York: 1.61 seconds.
- Melbourne: 1.67 seconds.
- Stockholm: 1.60 seconds.
SiteGround
- New York: 0.645 seconds.
- Melbourne: 1.563 seconds.
- Stockholm: 1.39 seconds.
That's just one dimension of success, of course, but even so, the rivalry between these two is pretty similar. For example, the Melbourne and Stockholm test results differ by less than 0.3 seconds. Moreover, although the two hosts New York site speeds are separated by almost a full second, this isn't inherently a deal-breaker.
Further and deeper research would shed light on why that would be and might improve things by choosing a different data center. Overall, no matter how the scores compare with each other, both hosts consistently produce speeds of less than two seconds, which is just perfect for delivering high-quality UX.
Support system
Even when it came to customer support, both services scored high marks, with WP Engine taking a slight edge over SiteGround! Considering a host's customer service is vital because if anything goes wrong with your site, you'll want them to be reachable. Plus, it is extremely useful to find a provider's awareness of the WordPress platform when looking at managed WordPress hosting plans.
One of the benefits of these kinds of plans is that they are explicitly targeted towards WordPress users. Links to help with problems relating to WordPress will be included. We conducted a comprehensive survey of the quality of common WordPress hosting providers in 2018. More than 800 WordPress users took part and assessed the support status of a variety of hosts.
Those two hosts are neck-and-neck once again. With scores in all categories at or above 4.5, you can expect high quality support no matter which host you select. In reality, both of these hosts were top of any host's list in our survey.
We have to turn to their WordPress support scores as they are tied for total support to decide which is superior. WP Engine has a slight advantage here, as you can see, but in fact, both of these hosts are highly experienced and well-suited for those who need help while using the platform.
Check the price tags!
WP Engine
Perhaps the one little drawback on WP Engine's front is that their plans are a wee bit pricey as compared to SiteGround, which is more affordable of the two! Of course, fancy apps, high-performance ratings, and outstanding customer service don't matter if you can't afford them right from the start. Price could very well be the decisive factor in your decision between WP Engine vs SiteGround.
Looking at the plans of WP Engine, the least expensive plan is $30 a month, which might put it out of reach if you're trying to host your site on a budget. On the other side, SiteGround is globally accessible.
SiteGround:
The lowest tier package is only $3.95 a month with discounted rates ($11.95 a month after) which include their email service, the SiteGround Migrator app, automated updates which backups, a free Cloudflare CDN and a free SSL certificate.
If you plan on spending a big chunk of change on a premium theme and find exposure to the StudioPress themes worth the extra expense, SiteGround will take the cake when it comes to quality. Considering that you'll get most of the same features at SiteGround for almost one-third of the cost, it's pretty hard to justify the price tag of WP Engine if you consider anything else to be equivalent.
There is, therefore, another number that you may want to remember when choosing one of these plans. Although GoGeek's plan for SiteGround can accommodate only 100,000 visits a month, the Scale model for WP Engine will take on 400,000. Therefore, if you have a very large site with high rates of traffic, their custom program might be just what you need to serve millions of visitors.
Customer Testimonial
WP Engine Testimonial:
SiteGround Testimonials:
WP Engine vs SiteGround: Which one to go for?
Such two hosts have shown relatively similar results for most of our comparison between WP Engine vs SiteGround. Compared with other hosting providers, both show very good results, particularly when it comes to performance at the site and customer service.
When it comes to selecting one of these two hosts for your WordPress account, it's all about features and quality. As we have already described, WP Engine provides 35 + StudioPress themes with its hosting plans, as well as GeoTargeting to customize your site based on venue. In comparison, SiteGround has a powerful server firewall for extra security and dedicated storage of emails. Overall, your personal interests and desires determine which suits you best.
As far as price goes, low-cost plans from SiteGround would definitely be an appealing option for many budget-conscious sites. The exception would be those with six-figure traffic numbers on the broad pages. While they are costly, the Scale and Custom plans for WP Engine may be what you need to help your site here.
Conclusion! WP Engine vs SiteGround 2020
Your hosting service provider is vital to the success of your WordPress domain. Choosing one is no easy job and allows you to research each provider in detail through a range of areas in order to whittle them down. In this article, we compared two of WordPress's best run hosts on four main aspects. If you are still trying to decide between WP Engine vs SiteGround, remember these points:
Quick Links:WP Engine is better for large sites with high traffic numbers, but its StudioPress themes and GeoTargeting features could also make it worth the cost for users who want to have as many facets of the site as possible under one roof.
SiteGround offers high-end functionality for daily WordPress users at low prices. Their email hosting, server firewall, and other features include just about all you need to build a stable and professional WordPress site.