Interested in some WordPress statistics to show if the platform is worth your time?
WordPress is one of the most popular content management systems (CMS). Over the past 2 decades, WordPress has helped revolutionize the world. And we’ve got the WordPress statistics to prove it.
In this article, we’ll share some of the most important and interesting WordPress statistics to give you a clear picture of the state of WordPress.
In This Article
- A Brief History of WordPress
- Interesting WordPress Statistics
- WordPress Usage Statistics and Market Share
- WordPress SEO Statistics
- WordPress Plugin and Theme Statistics
- WordPress E-commerce Statistics
- WordPress Security Statistics
- Fun WordPress Statistics and Facts
- WordPress Statistics: Your FAQs Answered
- WordPress Statistics: Proof that the Platform’s Here to Stay
A Brief History of WordPress
WordPress is an open-source software that enables users to easily build websites. It is available for download as free software and can be installed on any WordPress hosting company.
It’s important not to confuse WordPress (the software) with WordPress.com, which is a hosted solution. To learn more, see the difference between WordPress.com and WordPress.org.
How did it all begin?
It all started when 2 users of a then-popular blogging software called b2/cafelog decided to take the software in a new direction. The idea was coined by Matt Mullenweg, who was then joined by Mark Little. Together, they released the first version of WordPress on May 27, 2003.
Since then, WordPress has evolved from being a simple blogging software to a robust CMS, website builder, eCommerce platform, and more.
Today, WordPress is a community software (open source), with thousands of users from all over the world contributing to it by:
- Submitting code
- Building plugins
- Fixing bugs
- Translating
- Testing
- Helping others use it
- And more
To learn more, check out this comprehensive article about the history of WordPress.
Let’s take a look at some WordPress stats and facts to see how WordPress is helping people do great things on the internet.
Interesting WordPress Statistics
1. According to Semrush, the word “WordPress” gets around 2.4 million global searches a month.
2. India and the USA are the 2 top countries that search for “WordPress,” accounting for 246K searches each.
3. 71% of WordPress.com sites are in English, with Spanish and Indonesian following with 4.7% and 2.4%, respectively.
4. With over 416K members, WPBeginner – WordPress for Beginners is the biggest WordPress Facebook group for beginners and veterans (excluding developer groups).
5. As of writing, over 61% of users are using the latest version of WordPress. The rest haven’t updated their WordPress core.
6. About 7.7% of WordPress websites are still running WordPress 4.9 or earlier, meaning they’re still using the Classic editor.
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WordPress Usage Statistics and Market Share
7. WordPress had a 63.1% share of the global CMS market in 2023.
8. WordPress powers a whopping 43.1% of the internet.
9. Over 70 million blog posts are published on WordPress.com every month.
10. It is estimated there are 38,000,000 live WordPress websites.
11. Over 409 million people view WordPress.com-built sites every month.
12. There are almost 4 million WordPress blogs and websites in the US alone.
Examples of the top sites that use WordPress include:
- TechCrunch
- CNN
- Microsoft
- CBS Radio
- Zoom
- The New York Times
- Bloomberg
- Nike
13. WordPress’s market share growth continues to increase, going from 55.3%-63.1% between 2011 and 2023. That’s a 7.8% increase.
14. WordPress’s market share growth translates to 2 million new websites every year.
15. WordPress has been translated into 208 languages (and counting).
16. 77 million comments are left on new WordPress pages every month.
WordPress SEO Statistics
17. Of the top 1 million sites with the most traffic, 29.13% of those sites use WordPress open-source software.
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18. An impressive 35% of all product searches begin with Google.
19. On average, 53.3% of business revenue comes from organic visitors. This is the free traffic that’s the most desirable for businesses.
20. 70-80% of consumers ignore paid ads in favor of organic results.
21. Google has the biggest search engine market share with 91.61%.
22. Bing is the second largest search engine, with a 3.38% market share, followed by Yandex with 1.65%.
243. Google drives 93.77% of mobile traffic.
25. Yahoo has the second largest mobile search market share with 3.42%, followed by Bing with 0.36%.
WordPress Plugin and Theme Statistics
26. There are about 60,000 free WordPress plugins on the WordPress.org plugin directory alone.
27. Elementor is the most downloaded page builder plugin, with over 5 million downloads.
28. There are over 11,731 free themes in the WordPress directory.
29. The average price for a premium theme is $57.54.
30. Yoast is the most downloaded SEO plugin, with over 5 million active installations, followed by All in One SEO (AIOSEO), with over 3 million active installations.
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31. Elementor is the most popular subcategory of WordPress and is used by 22.4% of all WordPress websites.
32. WooCommerce is the second most popular subcategory of WordPress, with 21.7% of all WordPress websites using it. This is followed by WPBakery with 11.7%.
WordPress E-commerce Statistics
33. Retail eCommerce sales are projected to reach $7,528 trillion in 2025.
34. If WordPress powers 43.1% of the internet and 21% of that runs on WooCommerce, it’s safe to deduce that $681.36 trillion of eCommerce revenue is generated by WordPress sites.
35. 95% of shoppers check out online reviews to learn more about a product before they buy.
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36. Out of the top 1 million eCommerce sites, 4.75% of them use WooCommerce, a popular WordPress plugin.
37. Shopify is the second largest eCommerce platform, with 2.57% of the market share. This means WordPress powers a large chunk of the top eCommerce stores.
38. Of all the live WordPress sites, 21% use WooCommerce.
39. Over 6 million eCommerce stores use WooCommerce (built on WordPress).
WordPress Security Statistics
40. Wordfence blocked a whopping 159 billion password attack requests on WordPress sites in 2022.
41. Wordfence’s Web Application Firewall (WAF) blocked 3 million attacks from about 14,000 IPs and attackers who were attempting to exploit vulnerabilities in the first half of 2023.
42. Because of its massive user base, WordPress is one of the main targets of hackers. However, most attacks are directed at third-party plugins rather than the platform itself.
43. About 90% of WordPress vulnerabilities are plugin vulnerabilities. Another 6% are theme vulnerabilities, while 4% are core software vulnerabilities.
44. Cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerabilities account for about 50% of plugin vulnerabilities, followed by Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF), which accounts for 15% of plugin vulnerabilities.
45. SEO spam is the most used malware attack type, accounting for 55.40% of attacks.
46. Injected malware is the second most common malware attack type, accounting for 34.14%.
Fun WordPress Statistics and Facts
47. Christine Selleck Tremoulet, a friend of Matt Mullenweg’s (co-founder of WordPress), suggested the name “WordPress.”
48. WordPress doesn’t have a CEO. Since it’s an open-source project, it’s not owned by any company; hence, there is no need for a CEO.
49. WordPress is run by volunteer developers from all over the world.
50. Gutenberg is the codename for the new WordPress editor. It has over 82.7 million active installations.
51. In the past 3 years, over 264.3 million posts have been written using the Gutenberg block editor.
WordPress Statistics: Your FAQs Answered
How often is WordPress updated?
WordPress is typically updated several times a year. Major releases come out about every 4 months, with minor updates in between as needed for security and maintenance.
How can I check my WordPress website’s statistics?
WordPress, by default, provides basic statistics in the dashboard. Additionally, many users integrate plugins like All In One SEO (AIOSEO) and MonsterInsights or tools like Google Analytics for more detailed analytics.
WordPress Statistics: Proof that the Platform’s Here to Stay
WordPress is here to stay. In fact, it’s only set to grow. That’s evident from the WordPress statistics above and more we haven’t looked at.
We hope you enjoyed these eye-opening WordPress statistics and learned a few things from this article. You may also want to check out other articles on our blog, like the beginners’ guide to SEO and our ultimate WordPress SEO guide.
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