This blog post is part of a multi-part article series designed to help you understand why the WordPress content publishing platform can help your business grow online.
For more information about of the article series, see this post:
In this blog post, we present some impressive statistics about WordPress that will help you understand why millions of businesses around the world use WordPress to power their business websites and what kind of businesses are using WordPress today.
Useful Statistics About WordPress
A brief summary:
- WordPress began as a blogging tool in 2003.
- WordPress offers users two formats: a hosted application (WordPress.com) and as a self-hosted, downloadable software (WordPress.org).
- 23 out of every hundred new domains registered in the U.S. are for a new WordPress site.
- There are over sixty million installations of WordPress. This number grows everyday.
- WordPress powers over 30% of the internet. Over one-third of all websites worldwide are driven by 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 that use a content management system are driven by WordPress.
- Over 35,000,000 searches are made on Google each month for terms related to WordPress.
- The WordPress application is completely free to download, use and modify. WordPress is built using an open source content management system.
- WordPress is worked on by volunteers. Thousands of people from all around the world work on developing and improving WordPress functionality every day.
- The WordPress core application is regularly updated to eliminate 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 70 international languages and dialects.
- The WordPress repository currently makes available thousands of free WordPress plugins, themes, and widgets to WordPress users.
- There is virtually no limit to what someone can do with WordPress.
WordPress CMS Market Dominance
In simple terms, a content management system (CMS), is a website maintenance tool for non-technical users. It is designed to make it easy for non-technical website owners to add, modify and manage all content on their site.
WordPress began in 2003. It was originally a simple program developed by co-founders Matt Mullenweg and Mike Little. WordPress is now the largest self-hosted CMS application 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 work from home. Despite being a distributed company with so few employees, WordPress.com (the hosted version of the WordPress software) currently attracts more unique visitors than Facebook, Amazon, Twitter, Yahoo.com, and eBay …
(WordPress [hosted version] unique monthly views. Source: Automattic.com)
Here are just some of the latest figures on WordPress usage:
WordPress is the world’s leading CMS platform and powers over 30% of the web …
(WP usage stats. 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 are now being powered by the WordPress CMS platform.
WordPress is so popular, that even trying to keep up with the latest statistics on WordPress is quite difficult because the information changes so often.
For example, at the time this post was written, here is the number of downloads of the latest WordPress version …
(Source: https://wordpress.org/download/counter)
Note: The above figure represents only the most recently released version of WordPress. Around one third of all current users have not yet updated their WP installations to the latest version …
(WP versions currently in use. Source: https://wordpress.org/about/stats)
Even 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 page, you will see a much higher download figure … perhaps even a different version, as WordPress continually updates the software to fix security issues and bugs, and add new or improved features.
Regarding updates, WordPress has made available over 100 new software updates since 2003 …
(Over one hundred new versions of WordPress have been made available since 2003)
WordPress currently releases a new updated version every 3-4 months or so …
(WordPress regularly releases new version updates honoring famous Jazz musicians)
Curiously enough, all major WordPress updates are traditionally named after Jazz music artists, eg:
- v.2.1 = Ella Fitzgerald (January 22, 2007),
- v.2.5 = Michael Brecker (March 29, 2008),
- v.2.8 = Chet Baker (June 11, 2009),
- v.3.5 = Elvin Jones (December 11, 2012),
- v.3.9 = Jimmy Smith (April 16, 2014),
- etc …
Who Is Using WordPress?
In a nutshell, all kinds of companies and people from all walks of life use WordPress to publish content about everything and anything.
Leading corporations, businesses, retail companies, celebrities, politicians, famous actors, colleges, government sectors, community organizations – even nations use WordPress to publish web content and run their official websites and blogs …
WP Website Showcase
Here are just some of the sites, organizations and people who have chosen to build their online presence with WordPress:
- Businesses & Companies: Factory Jackson, DC Diaper Bank, GDF SUEZ, Groupe Vivendi, Mercedes-Benz, etc …
- Famous People, Politicians, Sports Stars, Artists & Musicians: Alanis Morissette, Rush, Kylie Minogue, Beyoncé, Usain Bolt, The Rolling Stones, Blondie, Channing Tatum, Russell Brand, etc …
- Colleges & Educational Institutions: University of Manitoba Today, Stony Brook University School of Journalism, Washington University’s School of Law, Carleton University, etc.
- Magazines & News Media: Tribune Media, The Australian, InStyle News, LinkedIn, etc.
- Governments, Not For Profits & Humanitarian Organizations: Sweden’s Official Site, Chicago Weather Center, Maryland National Road Association, CURE International, Amnesty International Korea, etc.
Earlier, we mentioned that WordPress is available in two formats: a hosted platform (WordPress.com) and as a self-hosted, downloadable application (WordPress.org).
- Businesses clearly prefer the self-hosted version, which can be installed in their domain and customized to suit their needs. In fact, most WordPress self-hosted installations are used for business 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 self-hosted WordPress sites) published on average 17 new blog posts every second (around 1.5 million per day).
You can see a live map that lets you see blog post updates around the world in real-time …
WordPress.com – Activity Around The World
In later articles, we will explain the differences between WordPress.com (hosted) vs WordPress.org (self-hosted) versions.
Other WordPress Statistics
WordPress Plugins
WordPress users can download and install over 37,000 free plugins …
(WordPress free plugins repository)
We have published a great article about plugins here:
WordPress Themes
WordPress users can also access over 1,700 free themes …
(WordPress.org free themes repository)
We have published a comprehensive article about WordPress themes here:
Translations Of WordPress
WordPress has been translated and localized into over 70 international languages in addition to English …
(WordPress.org language translations)
WordPress Searches
The search term “WordPress” alone receives around 2.7 million monthly searches on Google. Additional WordPress-related terms (e.g. “WP themes”, “WordPress plugins”, ”WordPress SEO”, 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 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 users who participated in the survey stated that they make a full-time living off WordPress. 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 developers and designers for hire by searching on freelancing sites like Upwork.com …
According to Upwork.com, the typical WordPress job cost ranges are between $10 – $500 …
(Source: Upwork)
As you can see from the statistics presented above, the dominance of WordPress is expected to continue for many years to come.
In other blog posts, we will cover the following areas of WordPress in detail:
- Why WordPress is the best vehicle to grow your business online,
- Over 50 compelling reasons why you should choose WordPress for your website or blog, including a comprehensive breakdown of the unique 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 subscribers, and how to sell more products and services with WordPress.
- Plus, we’ll be publishing new step-by-step tutorials and practical tips on how you can use WordPress and grow your business presence online, while also saving thousands of dollars on the costs of web development and website design.
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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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"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