HostingSimple vs WP Engine.
The old-guard premium WP host. Strong on enterprise paperwork. Expensive, visit-capped, and the bills sneak up with overages and per-environment fees.
When WP Engine is genuinely
the right pick.
We want you on the right host — even if that's not us. This is when we'd tell you to stay.
favour
WP Engine has earned trust over 15 years and you'll find enterprise marketing teams running on it. If you need SOC 2 paper trails right now and have $300+/mo to burn, it works. The product is genuinely solid; the issue is the pricing model.
What you'd actually pay,
for your workload.
Drag the sliders to your real numbers. We compute the cheapest plan that fits, including WP Engine's renewal hikes and any overage billing. Honest math — show your accountant.
Your workload
Or pick a scenario below. All math is 36 months total cost of ownership in USD.
Same workload, both hosts.
What it costs, what runs.
Three common workloads, run through the same calculator. Numbers are 3-year sticker cost — no estimates, no hand-waving.
Don't switch from WP Engine
if any of these are true.
We'd rather lose a sale than recommend a bad move. If one of these describes you, save your migration energy for a better moment.
You signed an enterprise SLA with WP Engine paperwork your CIO blessed.
The procurement re-review costs more than the savings. Wait for renewal.
You need HIPAA BAA or SOC 2 Type II evidence delivered this quarter.
Our SOC 2 audit is in progress (Q3 2026). HIPAA available on Agency Scale on request — but if it's hard-required now, WP Engine has the paper today.
Your dev team is committed to LocalWP + WPE's deploy ergonomics.
If the workflow is genuinely positive for you, factor the retraining cost. Otherwise: standard Git push works fine on us.
The specific differences,
not the marketing.
Six rows. Concrete values. If something looks stale, tell us — we update within 24h.
Pre-migration questions,
answered by an engineer.
Real questions we get during pre-sales calls — answered the way we'd answer them on chat.
How do I move off WP Engine cleanly?
Send SSH keys (or a backup). We pull the live site, replicate on our staging, run smoke tests, DNS-cutover during your low-traffic window. Median 6 hours, SLA 24.
Do you support Genesis / StudioPress themes?
Yes. They're just WP themes; nothing platform-specific. We migrate as-is.
What about WP Engine's environment workflow (dev/stage/prod)?
Unlimited environments on every plan, same push/pull workflow. No $10/env fee.
Do you have HIPAA / SOC 2?
SOC 2 Type II audit in progress (Q3 2026). HIPAA BAA available on Agency Scale on request. If hard requirements today, talk to us first.
Move off WP Engine. We do the heavy lifting.
Send us your WP Engine credentials. A human engineer migrates your site within 24 hours, with zero downtime. Free, every time.