How Many Websites Use WordPress?

WordPress remains the most widely used content management system in the world. In 2026, it powers around 42% of all websites, covering everything from personal blogs and small business sites to large e-commerce stores and high-traffic media outlets.

When focusing only on sites that use a recognised CMS, its share rises to close to 60%, which is more than all other platforms combined. This level of dominance has held for more than a decade, even as hosted builders and specialist e-commerce platforms have grown.

Part of the reason for its popularity is flexibility. WordPress handles a simple brochure site just as well as a large corporate presence or an international online store. With thousands of themes and plugins available, you can customise how your site looks and works without starting from scratch. Whether you’re creating the site yourself or working with a professional in WordPress website design, you can build the kind of site your business needs and change it as you grow.

Quick Answer: How Many Websites Use WordPress?

The most accurate answer is that WordPress powers tens of millions of confirmed live websites, and potentially hundreds of millions when broader internet-wide estimates are used.

For percentage-based usage, W3Techs currently reports WordPress at around 42% of all websites and close to 60% of websites with a known CMS. BuiltWith tracks tens of millions of live WordPress websites, while wider estimates use total website counts from sources such as Netcraft and apply WordPress’s market share to that larger number.

That is why you will often see different figures online. Some sources count live detected sites, while others estimate against the total number of websites, domains or hostnames on the internet.

What Percentage of Websites Use WordPress?

The proportion of websites running on WordPress has more than doubled over the past decade. In 2014, it accounted for around 21% of the internet. By 2026, that figure had risen to around 42%.

During the same period, the share of sites without a recognised CMS fell significantly. As more businesses, publishers and independent creators moved to CMS platforms, WordPress claimed the largest share of that migration. Its ease of setup, large plugin library and broad feature set are the main reasons it kept pulling ahead of newer platforms.

Today, there is a strong chance that any website you visit is powered by WordPress, especially if it is a content-led website, company website, blog, publication or WooCommerce store.

Number of Websites Using WordPress

The total number of websites running on WordPress varies depending on the source. Netcraft tracks the total number of sites, domains and hostnames on the web, while BuiltWith focuses on detected technology usage across live websites.

How you measure changes the answer. Apply WordPress’s market share to every website online and you can reach a figure in the hundreds of millions. Count only the live installs that detection tools confirm and it is far smaller, though still well ahead of any other CMS.

Some services track only active sites with current content and visitor activity. Others include inactive, parked or low-value domains. The difference between these figures comes from whether the source is measuring live usage, detected technology, CMS market share or the total size of the web.

Regardless of which measurement you use, no other CMS comes close to matching WordPress in active site numbers. Its scale means there is a large ecosystem of developers, agencies and service providers to support both small sites and enterprise-level projects.

Why Do WordPress Website Totals Vary So Much?

There is no single perfect way to count every WordPress website. Different research tools measure different parts of the web, which is why one source may report tens of millions of live WordPress sites while another estimate suggests several hundred million.

When clients ask whether WordPress is a safe long-term bet, the percentage figure tells them more than a single headline total. It shows that WordPress still powers a very large share of the visible web and remains the dominant CMS by a wide margin.

What Is the WordPress CMS Market Share?

When focusing only on websites that use a recognised CMS, WordPress accounts for close to 60% of the market. Its nearest competitors are far behind, with Shopify, Wix, Squarespace, Joomla, Drupal and Webflow all holding much smaller shares.

This dominance has created a large and mature ecosystem. If you search for themes, plugins, or WordPress hosting, you will find thousands of service providers catering to businesses of every size. The sheer number of sites on the platform means there is real competition in hosting, design and support, which usually keeps prices sensible and quality high.

WordPress Market Share by Country

WordPress is used in more than 200 countries, with large numbers of installations across major markets including the United States, Germany, the United Kingdom, Brazil and France.

The United Kingdom is a particularly active WordPress market, and that matches what we see in London, where most of the businesses we work with run content-led websites, service pages, blogs, WooCommerce stores and local SEO landing pages. For many UK companies, WordPress offers a practical balance between cost, ownership, design flexibility and search performance.

Some countries have even higher adoption rates by percentage. In Japan, for example, WordPress has historically held an unusually high share of CMS usage.

WordPress also handles other languages well. It is available in hundreds of locales, and its ecosystem includes translation plugins, multilingual content tools and development approaches for international websites. This makes it easier for businesses to run sites in their own language or manage content across multiple regions.

WordPress Use in E-Commerce

WooCommerce, the most widely used e-commerce plugin for WordPress, is installed on millions of websites. It turns WordPress into a full online store system, with support for products, payments, shipping, tax settings, subscriptions, memberships and custom checkout journeys.

Its main strength is how adaptable it is. You can run a complete online store on the same system you use for your blog, portfolio or company site.

WooCommerce websites are popular with both independent sellers and larger brands because it allows full control over hosting, data and design. This suits businesses that want ownership and customisation without being locked into a single hosted platform.

Shopify is a good fit for many retail businesses, especially where speed of setup is the priority. WooCommerce is often better suited to businesses that need more control over content, SEO, custom functionality or deeper integration with an existing WordPress website.

Are WordPress Sites Outdated?

People sometimes assume WordPress is dated technology. In practice it has had regular major releases since 2003, along with hundreds of smaller updates to features, performance and the editing experience.

One of the biggest changes came with the introduction of the block editor in WordPress 5.0, which transformed the editing experience. Today, you can build complex page layouts visually without touching code, or work directly in HTML and CSS if you prefer. See the block editor guide for details.

Modern WordPress also supports REST API connections, headless builds and integration with JavaScript frameworks like React. This makes it suitable for everything from marketing sites to SaaS platforms.

Major brands and publishers still run on WordPress. These are high-traffic sites backed by experienced WordPress development, solid hosting and current security, which is what keeps the platform viable at that scale.

What’s the Next Most Commonly Used CMS After WordPress?

The closest mainstream competitors to WordPress include Shopify, Wix, Squarespace, Webflow, Joomla and Drupal. Each of these platforms serves a different audience.

Shopify focuses entirely on e-commerce and includes hosting in its plans. Wix and Squarespace are all-in-one site builders that prioritise simplicity but offer less scope for customisation compared to WordPress. Webflow appeals to design-led teams and marketing sites. Joomla and Drupal provide greater developer control in some cases, but they have smaller communities and far fewer extensions than WordPress.

WordPress Compared With Other Website Platforms

WordPress is not the only popular website platform, but it serves a broader range of use cases than most of its competitors. This is one reason it continues to dominate CMS market share.

Why WordPress Remains the Most Commonly Used CMS

WordPress holds its dominant position for several clear reasons. It is open source, so there are no licensing fees for the core software. The main costs are your domain, hosting, design, development and ongoing maintenance, making it an affordable option for personal sites, small businesses and large organisations alike.

It can handle almost any type of website. A freelancer can launch a single-page portfolio, while a retailer can run a full-scale WooCommerce store on the same platform. That range is a big part of why we build most of our client sites on WordPress.

The theme and plugin ecosystem is unrivalled. With thousands of free themes and plugins available on WordPress.org, plus thousands more from independent developers, site owners can add almost any feature without building it from scratch.

Then there is ownership. With self-hosted WordPress, you keep full control of your data and how your site is configured, and you can move to a different host at any time without losing your content.

Support is easy to find, from official documentation and community forums to video tutorials and specialist agencies. With a community this large, there is almost always someone who has solved the problem you are facing.

The Future of WordPress

WordPress is continuing to evolve to meet modern web requirements. The Core Performance team is working on built-in speed improvements, helping sites load faster without relying entirely on extra optimisation plugins or complex server setups.

The editing experience keeps improving too, across collaboration, publishing workflows, design control and block-based editing.

Headless WordPress is becoming increasingly popular. In this configuration, WordPress manages the content while the front end is built with frameworks such as React or Vue. This setup supports advanced apps and interactive sites while keeping the familiar WordPress admin interface.

Artificial intelligence is also starting to appear throughout the ecosystem. AI-assisted content creation, automated SEO analysis and layout suggestions are already available in some themes and plugins. The quality is mixed. In our experience they help with drafting and auditing. The design and editorial judgement a project needs still comes from people.

What These WordPress Usage Figures Mean For Businesses

The size of WordPress’s market share does not mean every business should automatically use it. It does mean WordPress is proven, widely supported and unlikely to disappear any time soon.

For businesses, the main advantage is control. You can choose your hosting, own your content, customise the design, extend the functionality and optimise the site for search, page speed and conversions.

The trade-off is responsibility. A WordPress website needs good hosting, the right plugins, regular updates, security checks and disciplined development. A poorly built WordPress site gets slow and hard to maintain. Built well, the same platform can stay workable for years.

That is why WordPress works best as a long-term platform, not a quick template choice.

Conclusion – Will WordPress Keep Its Lead?

WordPress powers around 42% of all websites and close to 60% of those using a recognised CMS. Its closest competitors trail far behind, while its community, plugin library, hosting options and development ecosystem continue to support a huge range of websites.

For new projects, the combination of control, low running costs and room to grow is hard to find elsewhere. Whether you are running a personal blog, a membership site, a business website or a global e-commerce store, WordPress has the tools to handle it.

If results matter, working with an experienced WordPress agency means the site is planned around your goals and built to perform for real visitors.

FAQs About WordPress Usage