Documentation-based comparison
Cloudways versus WordPress.com
Compare documented scope and conditions. Unknowns remain unknown; different billing units do not establish a cost winner.
What the evidence answers
A reading of reviewed official documentation for Cloudways and WordPress.com. It is not a hands-on test, a ranking or a recommendation of one product.
Price
- Cloudways From $14/mo
- Micro: $14.00 monthly
- Small: $28.00 monthly
- Medium: $54.00 monthly
- Large: $99.00 monthly
- WordPress.com From $2.75/mo
- Personal: $9.00 monthly
- Personal: $48.00 annual ($4/mo equivalent)
- Personal: $2.75 monthly
- Business: $40.00 monthly
- Business: $300.00 annual ($25/mo equivalent)
- Business: $17.50 monthly
Both list prices on the same basis. Compare what each plan includes; the lower amount alone does not make the better choice.
Documented for both
- Storage
- Cloudways Micro: 25 GB NVMe storage, 1 GB RAM, 1 vCPUSmall: 50 GB NVMe storage, 2 GB RAM, 1 vCPUMedium: 80 GB NVMe storage, 4 GB RAM, 2 vCPULarge: 160 GB NVMe storage, 8 GB RAM, 4 vCPU
- WordPress.com Personal: 6 GB storageBusiness: 50 GB included; storage add-ons are listed from +50 GB to +350 GB
- Traffic or visits
- Cloudways Micro: 1 TB transfer bandwidth; unlimited visitsSmall: 2 TB transfer bandwidth; unlimited visitsMedium: 4 TB transfer bandwidth; unlimited visitsLarge: 5 TB transfer bandwidth; unlimited visits
- WordPress.com Unrestricted bandwidth and unlimited visitors, without extra fees or slowdowns
- Commitment
- Cloudways Charged by the hour and invoiced in arrears in the first week of each month; plan changes show on the invoice immediately, and AWS and Google Cloud prices vary by region.
- WordPress.com Annual and multi-year plans include a free domain for the first year; monthly plans do not.
- Backups
- Cloudways Offsite backup storage costs $0.033/GB per server.
- WordPress.com Business and higher list real-time backups.
- Restores
- Cloudways One-click restore from automated or on-demand backups
- WordPress.com Business and higher list one-click restores.
- Migration
- Cloudways Cloudways engineers migrate your first website free from any host.
- WordPress.com Built-in import tool for Wix, Squarespace, GoDaddy, Medium, Blogger and self-hosted WordPress sites; the Website Design Services team can help.
- Staging
- Cloudways Staging is listed.
- WordPress.com Business: Staging site on Business and higher
- Support
- Cloudways 24/7/365 live chat and ticket support on every plan; paid Advanced and Premium support add-ons give quicker responses.
- WordPress.com Business: Priority 24/7 support, plus SFTP/SSH, WP-CLI, Git and GitHub deployments
- Overage charges
- Cloudways DigitalOcean: USD 0.02 per extra GB, AWS: USD 0.12 per GB, Google Cloud: USD 0.10 to 0.17 per GB by region
- WordPress.com No traffic overage: the cost does not rise with traffic.
Limits to check
- Cloudways The number of sites is limited by server capacity: you can launch as many applications as the server can support.
- WordPress.com Real-time backups and one-click restores are only on Business, Commerce and Enterprise.
Not verified yet
No reviewed evidence for either product on renewal rate.
Documented for one product only, shown in the table below: Cloudways: websites and introductory rate.
Not verified means our reviewed sources do not establish it. It does not mean a product lacks the capability or that it costs nothing.
Next steps
- Ask Cloudways about renewal rate; our sources do not establish it yet.
- Ask WordPress.com about renewal rate, websites and introductory rate; our sources do not establish them yet.
| Requirement | Cloudways | WordPress.com |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing | From $14/mo | From $2.75/mo |
| Who it is for | Managed cloud servers for WordPress and other PHP apps, with control over server size and cloud provider. Verified Oct 11, 2026 · Cloudways pricing page, rendered Flexible plan cards | A fully hosted WordPress platform where hosting, security, backups and updates are managed for you. Verified Oct 11, 2026 · WordPress.com plans and pricing with FAQ |
| Coverage limits | The number of sites is limited by server capacity: you can launch as many applications as the server can support. Verified Oct 11, 2026 · Cloudways pricing page, rendered Flexible plan cards | Real-time backups and one-click restores are only on Business, Commerce and Enterprise. Verified Oct 11, 2026 · WordPress.com plans and pricing with FAQ |
| Websites | No limit on the number of applications on one server Every Flexible card lists "Unlimited Websites". Verified Oct 11, 2026 · Cloudways pricing page text with billing FAQ | Not verified |
| Storage |
|
|
| Traffic or visits |
| Unrestricted bandwidth and unlimited visitors, without extra fees or slowdowns Verified Oct 11, 2026 · WordPress.com plans and pricing with FAQ |
| Introductory rate | 3-day free trial of Flexible without a credit card Verified Oct 11, 2026 · Cloudways pricing page, rendered Flexible plan cards | Not verified |
| Commitment | Charged by the hour and invoiced in arrears in the first week of each month; plan changes show on the invoice immediately, and AWS and Google Cloud prices vary by region. Verified Oct 11, 2026 · Cloudways pricing page text with billing FAQ | Annual and multi-year plans include a free domain for the first year; monthly plans do not. Verified Oct 11, 2026 · WordPress.com plans and pricing with FAQ |
| Backups | Offsite backup storage costs $0.033/GB per server. Verified Oct 11, 2026 · Cloudways: official product and plan documentation | Business and higher list real-time backups. Verified Oct 11, 2026 · WordPress.com: official product and plan documentation |
| Restores | One-click restore from automated or on-demand backups No separate restore fee is stated. Verified Oct 11, 2026 · Cloudways pricing page, rendered Flexible plan cards | Business and higher list one-click restores. Verified Oct 11, 2026 · WordPress.com: official product and plan documentation |
| Migration | Cloudways engineers migrate your first website free from any host. Verified Oct 11, 2026 · Cloudways pricing page, rendered Flexible plan cards | Built-in import tool for Wix, Squarespace, GoDaddy, Medium, Blogger and self-hosted WordPress sites; the Website Design Services team can help. Verified Oct 11, 2026 · WordPress.com plans and pricing with FAQ |
| Staging | Staging is listed. Verified Oct 11, 2026 · Cloudways: official product and plan documentation |
|
| Support | 24/7/365 live chat and ticket support on every plan; paid Advanced and Premium support add-ons give quicker responses. Verified Oct 11, 2026 · Cloudways pricing page text with billing FAQ |
|
| Overage charges | DigitalOcean: USD 0.02 per extra GB, AWS: USD 0.12 per GB, Google Cloud: USD 0.10 to 0.17 per GB by region Bandwidth beyond the plan allowance is pay-as-you-go. Verified Oct 11, 2026 · Cloudways pricing page text with billing FAQ | No traffic overage: the cost does not rise with traffic. Verified Oct 11, 2026 · WordPress.com: official product and plan documentation |
1 requirement without reviewed evidence here
Not verified means the reviewed sources do not establish it; it does not mean a product lacks it or that it costs nothing.
- Renewal rate Cloudways: not verified · WordPress.com: not verified