WP Engine vs Cloudways Pricing (2026)
How do these two stack up on price? Here's what each one costs, what you get, and where the value sits.
Essential
- Edge content delivery with global CDN
- Managed WP, PHP & MySQL updates
- 24/7 WordPress technical expertise
- Real-time WordPress threat defense
- Free automated migration plugin
- Local development tool
Core
Popular- Isolated resources
- 99.99% uptime SLA
- AI-powered plugin & theme updates
- NitroPack
- Fast-track support from senior experts
- On-demand performance investigations
- Advanced uptime monitoring alerts
- Managed bulk site migrations
- Personalized onboarding experience
- GeoTarget to show geographically relevant content
- eCommerce Performance Pack
- Application Performance
- Failover
- High Availability
- Managed Vector Database
- Smart Search AI
Enterprise
- High capacity infrastructure designed for unexpected traffic spikes
- High-availability and single-node solutions
- NitroPack
- Top-tier priority support access
- Dedicated expert team
- Ongoing technical & business alignment
- Incident analysis & proactive performance management
- Collaborative event preparation and real-time event monitoring
- Advanced DDoS & managed WAF
- Proactive account monitoring
- Managed migration planning team
- Consultative business development
- Git-powered CI/CD
- SSH gateway
- eCommerce Performance Pack
- Application Performance
- Failover
- High Availability
- Managed Vector Database
- Smart Search AI
Micro
- 4 Free AI Copilot Credits
- Lightning Stack
- Unlimited Visits
- Unlimited Websites
Small
- 4 Free AI Copilot Credits
- Lightning Stack
- Unlimited Visits
- Unlimited Websites
Medium
Popular- 4 Free AI Copilot Credits
- Lightning Stack
- Unlimited Visits
- Unlimited Websites
Large
- 4 Free AI Copilot Credits
- Lightning Stack
- Unlimited Visits
- Unlimited Websites
8XL
- 4 Free AI Copilot Credits
- Lightning Stack
- Unlimited Visits
- Unlimited Websites
Growth
- True Autoscaling
- Cloudflare Enterprise CDN
- Redis Caching
- Object Cache Pro + Relay
- Free Managed Migration
Scale
Popular- True Autoscaling
- Cloudflare Enterprise CDN
- Redis Caching
- Object Cache Pro + Relay
- Free Managed Migration
Plus
- True Autoscaling
- Cloudflare Enterprise CDN
- Redis Caching
- Object Cache Pro + Relay
- Free Managed Migration
Enterprise
- Optimized resources for your traffic and usage patterns
- Custom resource allocation and baseline capacity
- Expert consultation to match plan to requirements
WP Engine vs Cloudways FAQ
- Which one is cheaper?
- Cloudways is the cheaper option, starting at $14/mo vs $30/mo for WP Engine.
- Can I use either one for free?
- Neither has a free plan. But Cloudways offers a free trial.
- How do they charge?
- Both use a hybrid model, so the comparison is straightforward — it comes down to features and limits at each price point.
- Which one is a better deal?
- Depends on what you need. WP Engine: WP Engine sits squarely in premium territory — this isn't shared hosting pricing, it's managed WordPress hosting for teams that treat their site as business infrastructure, not a hobby. They're competing with Kinsta and Pantheon for agencies and mid-market companies who'll pay for reliability and support over bargain-bin hosts. Cloudways: Cloudways sits in the middle of the managed hosting pack — cheaper than fully managed premium players like WP Engine or Kinsta, but pricier than raw cloud hosting since you're paying for the management layer on top of DigitalOcean/AWS/Vultr costs. They're clearly courting developers and agencies who want cloud flexibility without babysitting servers, not enterprises who'd go straight to AWS.
Still deciding? See the best WP Engine alternatives or the best Cloudways alternatives, ranked with verified pricing.
Keep tabs on both.
We'll monitor pricing changes for WP Engine and Cloudways and let you know when something moves. See how competitor pricing monitoring works.