WP Engine and Elementor are two big brands in the WordPress ecosystem that have impressive stats in term of number of users. According to the stats on BuiltWith, there are over 600,000 live websites hosted on WP Engine. While for Elementor, it has over 13 million installations. These stats are enough to prove that both WP Engine and Elementor are the leader on their respective market. WP Engine is the leader in the managed WordPress hosting market, while Elementor is the leader in the page builder plugin market.
Pairing WP Engine and Elementor could be the best option to create professional websites in WordPress. WP Engine has great PHP configuration – memory limit in particular – to run Elementor. You can use all features available on Elementor without any issue, including form builder. WP Engine also offers a bunch of useful features such as built-in CDN, cache, and scheduled backups.
No product is perfect, though.
One of the major WP Engine drawbacks is that it has no decent built-in analytics. While you can still monitor basic stats like bandwidth usage, there is no chance for you to monitor the CDN usage. You can’t even see the remaining storage capacity on your hosting plan. Sometimes, simple details like this one can lead to frustration and can be a trigger to start thinking of another alternative.
If you have Elementor websites hosted on WP Engine and consider using another alternative for the next project due to the above reason – or any other reason – here are some WP Engine alternatives you can try:
HostPapa
HostPapa is known for being eco-friendly. They offer shared hosting, VPS hosting, and reseller hosting. HostPapa’s easy-to-use interface and great customer service make hosting easy. Their plans all come with unlimited bandwidth and storage, a free domain name, and a website builder. HostPapa hosting provider is reviewed in detail here.
Starts at $2.95 a month.
Here are some key features:
- We’re eco-friendly
- UI that’s easy to use
- Exceptional customer service
- Unlimited bandwidth and storage
- You get a free domain
- Website builder
Bluehost
WordPress recommends Bluehost as a well-established hosting provider. Their hosting options include shared hosting, VPS hosting, and dedicated servers. In addition to a free domain name for the first year, Bluehost offers a user-friendly interface and one-click WordPress installation. Their uptime is reliable and their loading speeds are fast.
A monthly plan with Bluehost starts at $2.95.
Key features:
- Recommended by WordPress
- Free domain name for the first year
- User-friendly interface
- One-click WordPress installation
- Reliable uptime
- Fast loading speeds
DreamHost
Hosting provider DreamHost is known for its commitment to open-source technologies and privacy. You can use unlimited storage and bandwidth with their hosting services. A variety of hosting plans are available from DreamHost, including shared hosting, VPS hosting, and dedicated servers. They offer a user-friendly control panel, free SSL certificates, and automated backups. Additionally, DreamHost offers a 97-day money-back guarantee.
The monthly price starts at $2.59.
Key features:
- Commitment to open-source technologies
- Unlimited storage and bandwidth
- User-friendly control panel
- Free SSL certificates
- Automated backups
- 97-day money-back guarantee
A2 Hosting
Speed and reliability are the hallmarks of A2 Hosting, a high-performance hosting provider. Their hosting options include shared hosting, VPS hosting, and dedicated servers. SSD storage, unlimited bandwidth, and free site migrations are all offered by A2 Hosting. There is a user-friendly interface and a 99.9% uptime guarantee.
Plans at A2 WordPress Hosting start at $11.99 per month.
Key features:
- High-performance hosting
- SSD storage
- Unlimited bandwidth
- Free site migrations
- User-friendly interface
- 99.9% uptime guarantee
Liquid Web
Premium hosting provider Liquid Web specializes in managed hosting solutions. A variety of hosting options are available from them, including dedicated servers, cloud hosting, and VPS hosting. With Liquid Web, you get excellent performance, security, and scalability. Their uptime guarantee is 100% and they offer 24/7 customer service.
Monthly plans start at $199 with Liquid Web.
Key features:
- Premium managed hosting solutions
- Excellent performance, security, and scalability
- 24/7 customer support
- 100% uptime guarantee
- Flexible hosting options
- Advanced features for customization
Flywheel
Flywheel provides managed WordPress hosting for designers and agencies. Among the features they offer are easy site cloning, collaboration tools, and local development environments. To ensure optimal performance, Flywheel provides automatic backups, free SSL certificates, and caching. Their user-friendly interface and excellent customer service make them a great choice.
Monthly plans at Flywheel start at $13.
Key features:
- Managed WordPress hosting for designers and agencies
- Streamlined workflow
- Easy site cloning and collaboration tools
- Local development environments
- Automatic backups
- Free SSL certificates
HostGator
HostGator is popular among hosting providers due to its affordable plans and high level of performance. Their hosting solutions include shared hosting, VPS hosting, and dedicated servers. HostGator offers unlimited bandwidth, free website migration, and a website builder as part of its plans. Their 45-day money-back guarantee is backed by 24/7 customer support.
The monthly price starts at $2.75.
Key features:
- Affordable hosting plans
- Unmetered bandwidth
- Free website migration
- Website builder included
- 24/7 customer support
- 45-day money-back guarantee
Cloudways
Cloudways is a managed cloud hosting platform that lets users deploy websites on cloud providers such as AWS, Google Cloud, and DigitalOcean. It provides excellent performance and scalability as well as a user-friendly interface. With Cloudways, you can run multiple applications, including WordPress, Magento, and Laravel. SSL certificates, automated backups, and staging environments are all included for free.
Monthly plans at Cloudways start at $14.
Key features:
- Managed cloud hosting platform
- Deploy websites on popular cloud providers
- User-friendly interface
- Excellent performance and scalability
- Support for multiple applications
- Free SSL certificates
Elementor Hosting
Elementor once had a service called Elementor Cloud. But later the service was renamed to Elementor Hosting. Be it Elementor Cloud or Elementor Hosting – the current name – refers to the same service. It is a cloud hosting service from Elementor. Elementor adopts the Google Cloud technology for this service – paired with Cloudflare for the CDN. Yes, Elementor Hosting comes with built-in CDN. No extra setting needed to use this feature. Also, it also comes with other handy features just like most managed WordPress hosting services out there. Including SSL, cache, and scheduled backups.
The major advantage of using Elementor Hosting is that you will be prioritized when new features are available. Normally, Elementor released its newest features on Elementor Hosting first before making them available on Elementor Pro plugin.
Key features offered by Elementor Hosting:
- Elementor (Free and Pro) pre-installed
- Built-in CDN powered by Cloudflare
- Scheduled backups
- File access via FTP
- Database access via phpMyAdmin
Kinsta
If analytics feature is the main reason that make you want to switch from WP Engine, Kinsta could the best option to go to. Kinsta is far ahead of WP Engine in this area. Not only you can monitor basic stats like bandwidth usage, but you can also monitor other resource usage like disk space, cache and CDN. You can even monitor the usage of AJAX, average response time of PHP and MySQL.
Apart from its sophisticated built-in analytics feature, Kinsta also offers handy features, including CDN. Unlike WP Engine which doesn’t offer an option to disable CDN, Kinsta offer a full control over CDN on your website. You can manually disable it in case you need to. The PHP configuration of Kinsta is also great for Elementor. It already meet the minimum requirements demanded by Elementor. You can use all Elementor features on Kinsta, including form builder.
Another worth mentioning highlight about Kinsta is its flexible contract. While most hosting services have a fixed contract – be it monthly or yearly –, Kinsta will only charge you based on usage duration. For instance, if you subscribe to a certain Kinsta plan today and cancel it a week later, you will get a refund for the remaining days on your contract. If you pay monthly, for instance, you will get a refund for the remaining 23 days.
Key features offered by Kinsta:
- Flexible contract
- Sophisticated built-in analytics
- Built-in CDN powered by Cloudflare
- Scheduled backups
- File access via FTP
- Database access via phpMyAdmin
- Staging environment
Rocket.net
It’s rare to find a managed WordPress hosting service that offers a built-in file manager. WP Engine and Kinsta, for instance, offer no built-in file manager feature. If this feature matters to you, then you may want to give Rocket.net a try. The built-in file manager of Rocket.net has the ability to edit WordPress files so that you don’t need to download them first.
If you plan to create a customized WooCommerce website with Elementor, Rocket.net is a great option. It offers WordPress website with WooCommerce pre-installed. The overall features that Rocket.net offers are not much different to WP Engine. It also comes with built-in CDN powered by Cloudflare.
Rocket.net can be a solution in case you want to run the old versions of WordPress as it still support PHP 5.4
Key features offered by Rocket.net:
- Built-in file manager for easier file access
- Built-in CDN powered by Cloudflare
- Scheduled backups
- Database access via phpMyAdmin
- Staging environment
Pressidium
In case you didn’t know. The hosting infrastructure of WP Engine is powered by Google Cloud, Microsoft Azzure, and AWS. If you are looking for an alternative that has its own hosting infrastructure, Pressidium can be a great solution. Instead of relying on third-party service, Pressidium built its hosting infrastructure in-house. It has four main data centers in US, Europe, North America, and Asia. Even so, Pressidium still use a third-party service for CDN. The CDN feature of Pressidium is powered by StackPath.
Pressidium comes with an intuitive control panel to control the offered features. One of the menus you can access on the control panel is Analytics – which you can use to monitor stats like server response time, HTTP requests, caching requests, and so on.
Key features offered by Pressidium:
- Intuitive control panel
- Built-in CDN powered by StackPath
- Schedule backups
- File access via FTP
- Database access via phpMyAdmin
- Staging environment
Pressable
Want to create an e-commerce website with WooCommerce? Pressable is definitely worth trying. It is a managed WordPress hosting service owned by Automattic, the company that also owns WooCommerce. In Pressable, you can create a new WordPress pre-installed with WooCommerce.
In addition to WooCommerce, Pressable is also great to run Elementor. You can even use the WooCommerce Builder feature of Elementor Pro to create custom templates for WooCommerce. From single product page to product archive pages. Pressable has the default memory limit of 512MB. Higher than the minimum requirement demanded by both Elementor and WooCommerce.
Pressable has four data centers located in Europe (Amsterdam), Los Angeles, Washington, and Dallas. It also has built-in CDN which you can disable manually. Unfortunately, there is no chance to monitor the usage.
Key features offered by Pressable:
- Built-in CDN
- Schedule backups
- File access via FTP
- Database access via phpMyAdmin
- Staging environment
SiteGround
If price is the reason why you want switch away from WP Engine, SiteGround is one of the best alternatives. Compared to other hosting services on this list, SiteGround offers the most affordable plans. Even so, SiteGround also offers features that other hosting services on this list offer. Including CDN. This feature is not enabled by default. You can manually enable it via the control panel. All sites hosted on SiteGround can use free CDN with the total capacity of 10GB. If you need more, you can pay extra fee.
SiteGround comes with a built-in analytics tool that you can use to monitor the number of visitors on your website, just like Google Analytics. Its built-in file manager feature makes it easy for you to access your WordPress files or edit them without needing to download.
A feature offered by SiteGround that is not available on other hosting services on this list is email hosting.
Key features offered by SiteGround:
- Built-in file manager for easier file access
- Built-in email hosting
- Built-in CDN powered by Cloudflare
- Database access via phpMyAdmin
- Staging environment
The Bottom Line
WP Engine is a well-known web hosting service. It has great PHP configuration to run most WordPress plugins, including Elementor. Despite its popularity and reputation, you may want to make a switch from WP Engine due to certain reasons. All hosting services on the list above be great alternatives if you plan to use another hosting service for your Elementor projects.
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