Which WordPress Plan Should You Use? (Expert Answer)

Are you looking at WordPress plans and can’t figure out which one to use?

There are so many companies offering different WordPress plans that it becomes difficult to choose the right option for your website.

In this guide, we’ll help you decide which WordPress plan you should use, and how to compare different plans for your own requirements.

Most Common Types of WordPress Plans

WordPress is the most popular website builder in the world. Many different companies offer WordPress hosting plans with different types of services and features.

When we say WordPress, we are talking about the popular WordPress.org software and not just WordPress.com which is actually one of the more expensive blog hosting services.

Please see our guide on the difference between self hosted WordPress.org vs free WordPress.com blog.

To easily explain all the different types of WordPress hosting solutions, we have categorized them into the most commonly used WordPress plans:

1. Shared Self-Hosted WordPress Plans – Good for small websites & blogs.
2. Managed Hosting WordPress Plans – Good for larger websites.
3. Fully Hosted WordPress Plans – Very expensive – not recommended.

Now, each one of these WordPress plans can be further categorized.

That’s because individual WordPress hosting companies try to create their own plans with different features and levels of service. Later in this article, we will discuss those options as well.

Let’s take a look at the most common WordPress plans available and what types of websites you can build with them (at the lowest costs).

Shared Self-Hosted WordPress Plans

Shared self-hosted WordPress plans are the most popular hosting solution for beginners. They are affordable, flexible, and easy to manage, which is why they can also be called WordPress starter plans.

The reason behind their low costs is quite simple. These plans allow you to share hosting resources with other small business / individual users.

Most websites when first starting out do not need more expensive WordPress plans. If you are just starting a blog or setting up a small business website, then shared hosting plans are quite adequate to get started.

You can even use these plans to start an online store.

Downsides of a Shared Self-Hosted WordPress Plan

There are two big downsides of using a shared self-hosted WordPress plan.

First, you have limited server resources because these plans are built for start-up websites. These plans keep the cost of building a website lower, so you can spend that money to grow your business.

Once you start making money online, you can easily upgrade to a more powerful WordPress plan.

Most shared hosting companies offer multiple levels of upgrades with more resources, so you can also upgrade to their VPS hosting plans if needed. Or jump to a managed WordPress plan, which we will discuss in a moment.

The other downside is website maintenance. You will be responsible for installing WordPress updates, making backups, etc.

However, WordPress is incredibly easy to use, and millions of non-techy beginner users easily manage their own websites without any technical skills (using point-and-click tools).

Which Shared WordPress Plan is Right for Me?

There are hundreds of companies offering shared WordPress plans. The competition in this industry is fierce which means that available choices can easily overwhelm a beginner user.

That’s why we did the research for you.

We signed up for all the top WordPress hosting companies and thoroughly tested their service and performance.

Check out our complete guide on choosing the best WordPress hosting plan for your website for the full breakdown.

If you are just starting out, then we recommend Bluehost. They are one of the biggest hosting companies in the world and an officially recommended WordPress hosting provider.

They are also offering WPBeginner users a generous discount on hosting with a free domain name + free SSL certificate. Basically, you can get started for just $2.75 per month.

→ Click Here to Claim This Exclusive Bluehost Offer ←

The other top contenders in this category, are HostGator and SiteGround.

HostGator is better if you have a small budget. SiteGround costs a little more but offers premium value for your money with absolute top-notch support and industry leading technology.

You can start with their lowest priced plans and get all the powerful WordPress features without paying the high prices of a fully-hosted WordPress plan.

This is a great value that many beginners don’t discover until they’ve overpaid for the more premium plans.

Bonus: Need help with setting up a blog? Our expert team can help setup your blog for free. See the details on our free WordPress blog setup service.

Now, what happens when your business grows, and your website starts getting large traffic, over 100,000 visitors per month?

Then the next type of WordPress plans are best suited to match those requirements.

Managed WordPress Plans

Managed WordPress plans are like a concierge service where all technical aspects of running WordPress is managed by the host.

They handle WordPress security, website speed, installing updates, keep backups, and scalability.

These plans include premium support from more knowledgable WordPress engineers. It is like having your own small team of developers to take care of your website maintenance.

When and Who Needs Managed WordPress Plan?

Most starter websites and businesses do not make any money in the beginning. They may find it harder to justify the cost associated with the managed WordPress plans.

However, if you started out on a shared plan and now your website is bringing in enough revenue and traffic, then upgrading to a managed WordPress plan can be a good idea.

Cons of Choosing a Managed WordPress Plan

One obvious downside is pricing. Managed WordPress plans are expensive.

The base plan usually starts around $29 per month. However, if you compare it to hiring a full-time developer or website admin, then it would still be a bit cheaper.

The other disadvantage is the limits and control. The managed WordPress hosting providers need tighter control on what you can install on the platform to ensure its stability.

This means you can only use WordPress on your site which is not an issue for most users who build their sties with WordPress.

They may also disallow certain WordPress= plugins that are known to slowdown websites.

Which Managed WordPress Plan is Right for Me?

Managed WordPress industry has grown a lot in the last several years. There are many companies offering managed WordPress plans with similar features.

We decided to put them through tests and signed up for the most popular managed WordPress companies.

You can read about it in our guide on choosing the best managed WordPress hosting plan for a side by side comparison.

We recommend using WP Engine as the best managed WordPress hosting provider. They are one of the pioneers in managed WordPress hosting space and offer a robust platform with excellent support options.

Alternatives: SiteGround and Liquid Web both offer excellent managed WordPress plans.

Fully Hosted WordPress Plans

These hosting plans provide you with a slightly customized version of the WordPress platform, so you can create specific types of websites.

You don’t get to use WordPress the way you would normally use on a self-hosted platform. You are limited to the features provided by the platform which vary based on the plan you choose.

Who Needs Fully Hosted WordPress Plan

If you need to quickly make a website, and you are not super-concerned about making money with it, then fully hosted WordPress plan could be a good option for you.

You can also get started for free without even buying a domain name. This is a good option for personal journals, family websites, travel photos, and more.

Disadvantages of a Fully Hosted WordPress Plan

You have limited control over your website. You can only use the features available for your plan and cannot extend them on your own.

You also have fewer options to monetize your content. Even if you pay for a business account, your options to grow your business will be less flexible than a self-hosted WordPress plan.

Which Fully Hosted WordPress Plan is Right for Me?

WordPress.com is the largest such company. They offer a basic free WordPress plan and allows you to create a website using the wordpress.com subdomain.

Paid plans start from $4 per month billed annually. Their business plan is $25 per month and eCommerce plan at $45 per month, both billed annually.

You don’t get the ability to install WordPress plugins until you pay for the business plan ($25 per month).

You can’t start your online store until you pay the $45 per month eCommerce plan.

You can do both of these things on the lowest costing $2.75 per month shared WordPress hosting plans that we mentioned above while enjoying the full freedoms of WordPress.

How Do I Choose a WordPress Plan for My Website?

Choosing the right WordPress plan for your website depends on your business goals and budget.

If you are just starting out, then we recommend going with Bluehost. Their self-hosted WordPress plan gives you powerful WordPress hosting features a long with a free domain for only $2.75 per month.

You can use it to start a blog, create an online store, make a small business website, and so much more.

As your website grows, you can upgrade to a managed WordPress hosting account with WP Engine or SiteGround. This allows you to focus on growing your business and easily scale to match your needs.

If you already have an established business or a large website, then we recommend skipping the starter step and going straight to managed WordPress hosting plans for the best experience.

We hope this article helped you learn which WordPress plan you should use. You may also want to see our guide on easy to start online business ideas that actually make money, and our comparison of the best email marketing services to grow your website traffic.

Bonus: Need help with setting up a blog? You can use our free blog setup service with any of the shared hosting service.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post Which WordPress Plan Should You Use? (Expert Answer) appeared first on WPBeginner.

July 20, 2020 at 05:48PM

21 Best WordPress Themes for Family Blogs (2020)

Are you looking for the best WordPress themes for your family blog?

Lots of people use WordPress to build small family websites. It allows them to share family news, events, and photographs with their friends and relatives.

In this article, we will show you some of the best WordPress themes for family blogs.

Creating Family Blogs with WordPress

First, you need to choose the right website platform for your family blog. We strongly recommend using WordPress from WordPress.org.

Self-hosted WordPress from WordPress.org is different from the version of WordPress at WordPress.com. You can check out our complete article on the difference between WordPress.com vs WordPress.org.

To start your WordPress blog, you will need a domain name and web hosting.

A domain name is your website’s address on the internet (like wpbeginner.com). Web hosting is where your website itself is stored.

We recommend using Bluehost for your web hosting. They are the most popular web hosting provider, and an official WordPress hosting partner.

Even better, Bluehost is giving WPBeginner readers a great deal. You can get a free domain name, a free SSL certificate, and a 65% discount on web hosting. Just go through our link to Bluehost to get the offer applied automatically.

Next, you will need to install WordPress. After that, check out our complete guide on how to make a website.

Let’s take a look now at some of the best WordPress themes for family blogs that you can use.

1. Astra

Astra is a lightweight WordPress multipurpose theme. It comes with dozens of starter sites and addons that you can use to create a family blog or website easily. It’s a great choice for new bloggers.

It has built-in speed optimization that makes your blog fast. Astra also integrates with all popular WordPress page builders for quick customization.

2. Divi

Divi is a powerful WordPress all-purpose theme. It includes a built-in page builder that lets you make a blog or website without editing any code.

It ships with 1200+ ready-made website layouts that cover a huge range of topics and styles. You can easily select a family blog layout and replace the content with your own words and images to get started quickly.

You can install Divi on as many websites as you like at no extra cost, so it’s a great choice if you plan to have more than one site. For instance, you might create a family blog plus a money-making blog.

3. OceanWP

OceanWP is a free WordPress theme for all kinds of websites. It features multiple demo sites, including family blogs, personal training, parenting, and more.

Inside, you’ll also find extensions for social media, post types, layout settings, and a mega menu. It’s really easy to set up using the WordPress customizer with live preview.

4. Neve

Neve is an excellent WordPress theme designed specifically for one page and multi-page websites. It offers several built-in templates for family blogs, parenting, and related websites.

The theme comes with header and footer layouts, full-width templates, and page templates. It’s highly flexible and easy to set up using page builders.

5. Ultra

Ultra is a modern WordPress multipurpose theme built to create any type of website. It has a few starter sites with beautiful layout designs and landing pages.

It comes with powerful addons, Themify drag and drop builder, color choices, and crisp typography. It supports eCommerce to create an online store easily. This could be perfect if you want to start a small family business.

6. Pretty Chic

Pretty Chic is a beautiful WordPress theme built on top of the Genesis framework. The theme is well-suited for family, parenting, and baby blogs. You could also use it for a wedding website.

It comes with 3 navigation bars, a full-width widget area, and beautiful page templates. It has ad spaces to display third-party products and make money online.

StudioPress is now part of WP Engine, the most popular managed WordPress hosting company. You can get this theme and all 35+ other StudioPress themes when you sign up for WP Engine hosting to build your website.

Bonus: WPBeginner users also get an additional 20% OFF. Get started with WP Engine today!

7. Paperbag

Paperbag is a minimalist WordPress theme for family blogs, personal blogs, and photography websites. It comes with an image gallery and beautiful typography to engage your users.

Other notable features include multiple layout choices, 80+ customizer settings, 20+ color schemes, post formats, sidebars, and custom widgets.

8. Wedding Day

Wedding Day is a WordPress family blog theme designed specifically for wedding and event websites. It comes with a filterable photo album to showcase your photos beautifully.

The theme features include a grid layout, page templates, popular posts section, featured video and image, RSVP form, Google Web fonts, and homepage slider.

9. Hestia Pro

Hestia Pro is a stylish WordPress multipurpose theme. It comes with one-page and multi-page templates to create your family blog or website quickly.

It includes custom layout options, a fully customizable header, a video background, and full-width page templates. Hestia Pro is compatible with WooCommerce and popular WooCommerce plugins to sell your homemade products online.

10. Brigsby

Brigsby is a free WordPress theme. It features a light color scheme with a beautiful display of images on the homepage.

It’s a multipurpose theme, and you can use it for your personal, family, photography, or magazine website. It comes with 2 navigation menus, social icons, and easy customization options.

11. Salt and Pepper

Salt and Pepper is a WordPress recipe and food blog theme. It’s well-suited for a family website to share food recipes online.

The theme includes a recipe filter, ingredients list, and contact form. It seamlessly integrates with WPML to create a multilingual website.

12. Brittany

Brittany is an elegant WordPress all-purpose theme. It comes with gorgeous typography and a beautiful display of images.

It offers tons of customization options, including custom colors, widgets, header, background, and more. It also supports WooCommerce out of the box.

13. Peak

Peak is a multipurpose WordPress theme with a unique grid layout. Peak is well-suited for family blogs to share photos, events, or general news.

It has sliding menus, sidebars, full-width single pages, and multiple layouts for single posts. It also comes with a mega menu so you can easily show your best content to readers.

14. Hueman

Hueman is one of the most popular free WordPress themes. It offers 2-column and 3-column layouts to create family blogs easily.

It comes with 2 navigation menus, a social menu, custom widgets, custom header and background, and multiple widget-ready areas. You can use the WordPress live customizer to set up your blog in a few clicks.

15. Foodie

Foodie is a WordPress theme for food, family, and healthy lifestyle blogs. It comes with a recipe-builder where you can enter ingredients and quantity to create beautiful lists automatically.

It focuses on a beautiful display of photographs, large featured images, and beautiful thumbnail displays. You can set up your website quickly using the WordPress customizer and any page builder.

16. Tinos

Tinos is a classic WordPress theme suitable for personal and family blogs. It comes with multiple color schemes and lets you change colors on a page by page basis.

It includes multiple post formats to display your content stylishly. Tinos has beautiful typography and a multi-column layout to make your site look great.

17. Ashe

Ashe is a free WordPress blog theme designed for family, lifestyle, fashion, health, fitness, and personal bloggers. It comes with a custom header image to display a beautiful cover photo on top of the page.

The theme has 2 navigation menus, an image slider, an Instagram widget, a footer menu, and more. It’s compatible with Beaver Builder for customization.

18. Wellness Pro

Wellness Pro is one of the best WordPress themes for family blogs. It’s also ideal for fitness, health, lifestyle, and wellness blogs or websites.

It comes with 12 widget areas to quickly set up your homepage. The theme works seamlessly with WooCommerce and BigCommerce to launch your online business.

19. Cookely

Cookely is a flexible WordPress family blog theme for your recipe and food blog. It has a minimal layout and stylish fonts that make your content pop out.

It comes with a featured content section on the homepage to display your top recipes. Also, it includes 2 navigation menus, color choices, and social sharing icons.

20. Blossom Travel

Blossom Travel is a free WordPress family blog theme built specifically for travel bloggers, adventurers, and travel lovers. It comes with an email newsletter subscription form to help you share your journey with readers.

This theme lets you easily display your Instagram photos plus a follow button to grow your Instagram followers. It has simple theme options to set up your website.

21. Coastline

Coastline is a stylish WordPress theme with a focus on photos and videos. It’s perfect for photography, fashion, and family blogs.

It comes with a 3-column layout, left sidebar, multiple page templates, and color schemes. It also includes custom widgets and a portfolio template to design your homepage quickly.

We hope this article helped you find the best WordPress theme for family blogs. You may also want to check out our complete guide on the best WordPress photo gallery plugins.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post 21 Best WordPress Themes for Family Blogs (2020) appeared first on WPBeginner.

July 17, 2020 at 04:54PM

What’s Coming in WordPress 5.5 (Features and Screenshots)

WordPress 5.5 beta is out, and it is scheduled to be released on August 11, 2020. This will be the second major WordPress release of the year, and it comes packed with many new features and improvements.

We’ve been following the development closely and testing the first beta to try out new features that are on the way.

In this article, we will show you what’s coming in WordPress 5.5 with features and screenshots.

Note: You can try out the beta version on your computer or on a staging environment by using the WordPress Beta Tester plugin.

WordPress 5.5 is still under development, which means features can still change and may not make into the final release.

Having said that, let’s take a look at what’s coming in WordPress 5.5.

New Features and Improvements in The Block Editor

Back in late 2019, WordPress introduced a new writing experience with WordPress 5.0. This new writing interface is called the block editor (aka Gutenberg).

Since then, each new WordPress release brings tons of updates to the editor. WordPress 5.5 will come with many such improvements and new features that will enhance your writing experience several folds.

The following are just some of the enhancements that you may want to try out.

UI Improvements in Block Editor

WordPress 5.5 will come with major UI improvements to the block editor. You will notice borders around toolbars and buttons, new icons, and focus highlighting as you move across blocks while writing.

The (+) button for adding a new block has changed too and is now more noticeable and looks more like a button.

The New Block Directory

WordPress 5.5 will bring the new block directory to life. These are just WordPress plugins that add new blocks to the block editor, and there are already dozens of new blocks available.

The block directory is also built-in to the ‘Add New block’ search. You can simply search for a feature, and if there is no block that matches your search, then it will automatically show matching results from the block directory.

The block directory includes individual blocks. It does not include block library plugins which ship with multiple useful blocks that you can install.

Block Patterns coming in WordPress 5.5

WordPress 5.5 will introduce block patterns. They are ready-to-use blocks with commonly used settings to help you quickly add them to make layouts.

There are currently a handful of patterns already available. This will grow as plugins, WordPress themes, and the core continues registering more patterns.

Streamlined Block Navigation and Movement

WordPress 5.5 will also make it easier to move blocks around inside the content editor. You can simply click on the block handle and drag it up and down.

Another improvement is the ability to select the parent block in the nested blocks like the group or columns block.

Inline Image Editing

WordPress allows you to do some basic image editing like crop, resize, rotate, and scale. However, to do that you need to open the image in the media library.

WordPress 5.5 will allow you to edit images inline without leaving the block editor. You’ll be able to scale, crop, rotate, and resize an image on the spot.

Auto Updates for WordPress Plugins & Themes

WordPress comes with a powerful updates management system. It also allows you to enable auto-updates for WordPress plugin and themes by changing your WordPress configuration or by using a third-party plugin.

WordPress 5.5 will allow you to enable automatic updates for plugins and themes via the admin dashboard. You’ll be able to go to the plugins page and click on the ‘Enable auto-updated’ next to the plugins that you want to be automatically updated.

Similarly, you can also enable auto-updates for themes. Simply click on a theme on Appearance » Themes page and then click on the ‘Enable auto-updates’ link.

The New Default WordPress XML Sitemaps

An XML sitemap is a file that lists all of your website content in XML format. This helps search engines like Google to easily discover and index your content.

It plays a very significant role in the WordPress SEO set up. All top WordPress SEO plugins come with XML sitemap feature built-in.

WordPress 5.5 will come with a built-in sitemaps feature enabled by default. It will create a new sitemap index file called wp-sitemap.xml which will contain links to all other sitemap files it will generate.

The default Sitemap feature will support all post types, taxonomies (categories, tags and custom taxonomies), and author archives. However, it will still be only providing the basic required functionality of XML sitemap protocol.

If you are already using a WordPress SEO plugin that comes with its own XML Sitemaps, then you don’t need to do anything. The two biggest SEO plugins All in One SEO Pack and Yoast SEO have decided to continue providing their own sitemaps because they offer advanced customization features to help you get higher rankings.

Default Lazy Load Images in WordPress

Images take longer to download than plain text and this increases page load times. Optimizing images for the web can help you boost the speed and performance of your WordPress website.

One most commonly used technique is to lazy load images. This technique only downloads images that are visible on the user’s browser screen. Other images are downloaded as a user scrolls down your website.

WordPress 5.5 will make it a default option for all sites by adding the ‘loading’ attribute to img tag. This attribute is supported by all modern web browsers (except Safari).

This is an important performance bump not just for your WordPress site but for the whole internet. WordPress is the most popular website builder, and it is used by more than 35% of all websites on the internet.

Lazy loading images will save a lot of bandwidth and improve the performance of WordPress hosting servers. It will also make websites faster which is always a good thing.

Update Themes and Plugins with a Zip File

Sometimes WordPress plugin or theme updates may not work as expected in which case you have to manually update a theme or plugin. Currently, you can do that by using an FTP client.

WordPress 5.5 will allow you to do that inside the WordPress dashboard. You’ll be able to go to Plugins » Add New page and click on the Upload button.

Now go ahead and upload the zip file you downloaded for the plugin update. WordPress will automatically detect that this plugin is already installed and give you an option to ‘Replace current with uploaded’.

Similarly, you can also install updates for WordPress themes. Simply go to Appearance » Themes page and click on the ‘Add New’ button. After that click on the Upload Theme button to upload your theme zip file.

WordPress will detect that you already have that theme installed and will give you the option to ‘Replace current with uploaded’ version.

Under The Hood Changes in WordPress 5.5

WordPress 5.5 will also be bringing lots of changes for developers to explore and use in their own themes, plugins, and projects.

WordPress 5.5 will ship with several updated external libraries like phpMailer, SimplePie, Twemoji, and more. (See details). If you’re using our WP Mail SMTP plugin, then it’s already updated with the new phpMailer library.

Developers can control the auto-update options by disabling, enabling, or selectively blocking them for specific plugins or themes. (See details)

Dashicons will be updated and include 65 new icons. (See details)

WordPress 5.5 will come with the ability to scan for PHP compatibility issues more effectively. (#49922

We hope this article helped you get a good idea of what’s coming in the WordPress 5.5 release. Let us know what features you find interesting and what you’d look to see in a future WordPress release.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post What’s Coming in WordPress 5.5 (Features and Screenshots) appeared first on WPBeginner.

July 16, 2020 at 05:15PM