WordPress CMS Market Share Statistics 2025

WordPress is an open-source blog publishing and content management system (CMS). Developed by Matt Mullenweg and Mike Little, it was originally released on 27th May 2003 as simple blogging software.

It's traditionally PHP and MySQL based, however WordPress has now grown to support MariaDB databases, offering a new Full Site Editing experience and a React based template system. It is a highly flexible CMS with alternative templating systems like Timber plus headless CMS deployments available by leveraging the API.

When discussing starting a new project; be it a website, web app, mobile app or PWA you're likely to encounter lots of talk about content management systems. If you believe everything you read on the internet you might think more traditional frameworks like WordPress are a thing of the past and that headless content management systems are the only solutions.

Unfortunately, much of the freely available content on the internet tends to be written by juniors looking to build a reputation or by copywriters with little execution experience, also often produced to enhance search engine rankings. In recent years AI has been added to the mix, which has no real-world experience, regurgitating knowledge promoted by said groups. Thus creating a self-fulfilling prophetic cycle of demi-truthful information.

In reality many of the larger companies I've worked with opt for tried-and-tested solutions over cutting-edge ones. The global rollout of new systems can often take years and usually only happens when their current solution is approaching end-of-life. So, while not the newest, WordPress is still a reliable option. It remains a popular choice for CMS-driven sites, powering (at least part of) the websites run by NASA, Sony, Spotify, Microsoft and The White House.

As of 1st March 2025 WordPress remains the most popular content management system (CMS) in the world. It continues to dominate multiple sub-markets, such as e-commerce, learning management (LMS) and community or membership sites. What's more these figures only reflect publicly indexed websites. In reality the number is far higher as many use WordPress for intranets, restricted-access web apps, or as an API for applications.

So then. How does WordPress compare to its competitors in 2025, both the up-and-coming and the traditional? Just how much of the market share does WordPress still hold and what does the future hold? Let's take a look at some stats.

• 43.5% of all websites globally use WordPress
• 61.3% of websites use WordPress, where the content management system (CMS) is identifiable
• 88.0% of WordPress-powered websites are running Version 6
• 60 plus content management systems (CMSs) are listed on W3Techs with at least 0.1% market share each
• 62 WordPress plugins have over 1 million active installations

W3Techs, April 2025.

A Content Management System, abbreviated to CMS, is a simple way to manage your website's content. It makes it easy to add or update a website without needing to touch any complicated code. CMS frameworks usually come with lots of ready-made themes, plugins and tools that help you add new features or change how your site looks. Often no technical skills are needed once the CMS is up and running, sometimes none at all, so it's a popular option for designers, small business owners or even cost-savvy larger businesses.

User-friendly

The dashboard, or admin area, makes it easy for most users to create and manage content without needing much technical knowledge. Even before the transition to Full Site Editing, WordPress provided an intuitive experience. Now, with block-based editing, it's even more accessible to beginners and non-developers.

Designer-friendly

There's a vast selection of drag-and-drop builder themes, starter themes, and the native Gutenberg block theme, allowing for no-code website creation. Whether you prefer full design control or a quick-build solution, WordPress accommodates a wide range of design preferences.

Customisation

Along with thousands of free and premium themes, WordPress boasts a massive library of plugins, allowing for virtually limitless customisation. From SEO tools to e-commerce functionality, membership sites to automation workflows — there's a plugin for almost anything.

Developer-friendly

For developers, WordPress is highly extensible and well-documented. It follows standard web technologies like PHP, JavaScript, and MySQL, making it approachable while also integrating modern tools like REST API and React-based development for headless CMS setups. Whether building custom themes, extending functionality with plugins, or creating API-driven applications, WordPress offers flexibility.

Support

With a large, active community of developers and users, WordPress support is readily available through online forums, tutorials, official documentation, and countless third-party guides. Whether troubleshooting an issue or learning best practices, help is never far away.

Versatility

WordPress can suit the needs of businesses of all sizes, from personal blogs to corporate websites, membership platforms, and full-scale e-commerce stores. Its modular architecture makes it adaptable to different industries and project types.

Global Reach

The software is at least partially translated into around 200 languages and fully translated into about 50. This broad language support makes WordPress a truly global platform, enabling businesses and individuals to build websites for diverse audiences. (WordPress)

A note on statistics: "99% of all statistics are made up." Different data analysis tools have been used to determine the number of times WordPress has been searched every month in search engines. Statistics like these can be difficult, especially with a website-building resource as popular as WordPress.

The Moz Top 500 Websites

The adoption of WordPress has impressively surged since January 1, 2013, with a 17.4% usage across all websites. By March 1, 2025, its market share has climbed to 43.5%. There's also been a noticeable decrease in websites operating without a recognised CMS, dropping from 68.2% in January 2013 to 29.5% by March 2025.

WordPress's market share has been growing steadily over the years, winning the title of the most popular content management system (CMS) in the world around 2011. The W3Techs graph summarises WordPress's growth over the years.

• WordPress market share increases by about 1–4% annually.
• By March 1, 2025, its market share has climbed to 43.5%.
• From January 2024 to January 2025, WordPress's market share grew from 43.1% to 43.6%.
• In 2024, WordPress had a market share of 62.7% of all websites.
• In March, WordPress is used by 61.7% of all websites whose content management system is known. This is 43.5% of all websites.
• As of March 1, 2025, Elementor is used by 27.4% of all WordPress sites.
• WooCommerce, the eCommerce plugin for WordPress, was used by 20.9%.

As of February 2025, BuiltWith reported 76,302,082 detected live websites across the entire internet were using a CMS. With WordPress being the most popular technology in the CMS category, indexing 30,462,105 websites using WordPress.

WordPress is used to power everything from websites and blogs to apps. Suitable for businesses, small businesses, and bloggers.

According to the data on Ahrefs, WordPress is searched 2.4 million times every month. In comparison Drupal is only searched 134,000 times a month.

Additionally you can see the Google Trends for comparing WordPress to other CMS platforms.

WordPress is used by 61.7% of all websites whose content management system is known. WordPress powers over 2 million new websites per year.

BuiltWith holds data on 66,560,458 websites that are WordPress powered. Currently reporting 30,462,105 live websites using WordPress and an additional 36,098,353 sites that used WordPress historically. 1,084,957 of the WordPress websites detected are in the United Kingdom.

According to the data on WordPress.com stats, WordPress.com hosted site users publish 70 million posts a month, or 27 new WordPress posts published every second.

Let us begin with the elephant in the room and address the click-bait question: "Is WordPress Dying?" No. Performance concerns, lack of innovation and outdated information are regularly cited, but the data does not support the narrative.

Is WordPress's market share still growing? BuiltWith's WordPress Usage Statistics does show a decline in popularity when examining the Top 10K, Top 100K and Top 1M data points. However no noticeable decline is seen for the entire internet.

Paradigm Shifts

Looking at the data, it's impossible to infer there is always an impact of change.

"Gutenberg" is the codename for the new paradigm for creating with WordPress, that aims to revolutionise the entire publishing experience as much as Johannes Gutenberg did the printed word. The project is following a four-phase process that will touch major pieces of WordPress — Editing, Customisation, Collaboration, and Multilingual.

Following the introduction of block editing in December 2018, Gutenberg later introduced full site editing (FSE) in 2021, which shipped with WordPress 5.9 in early 2022.

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Growing Competition

Other CMS platforms are gaining ground. W3Techs also records data for market share trends for content management systems, both monthly and yearly.

Competition from no-code and low-code site builders and the rise of remote working has contributed to the democratisation of web publishing, lowering the barrier to entry for non-technical users and expanding the addressable market beyond traditional CMS territory.

Compared to some modern site builders, WordPress has a steeper learning curve. However, once you get the hang of it, WordPress can be a powerful and flexible tool for building websites. It may take some time to learn how to use WordPress effectively, especially if you're not familiar with coding or web development.

Recent CMS market share statistics show that 64 content management systems claim at least a 0.1% market share each in the global market. Despite the expanding choice of CMS available, only Shopify, Squarespace and Wix have achieved a market share greater than 3.0%.

The Rising Stars

Shopify

Shopify has grown from 0.1% to 4.3% since 2014. Shopify is one of the newer players on the CMS market, relatively speaking. Though it was founded in 2006, just a few years after WordPress, it's only really taken off with the boom in eCommerce of the last 5–10 years.

Today it's the most popular CMS for eCommerce websites. Like WordPress, it makes it easy for non-technical people to build a professional and functional website. However, it does so with a specific focus on the tools needed to run online stores.

Millions of eCommerce websites across 175 countries use Shopify, due to the way the platform holds your hand through building an online store. Things like product collections, blogging features, and the backend tools you need to manage orders are all built in to the platform.

Like WordPress, Shopify also has an extensive range of third-party apps, plugins and themes that allow anyone to publish a powerful website, while also allowing you to make edits to your site's code should you want or need to.

Squarespace

Squarespace has grown from 0.1% to 2% in the last ten years. Squarespace is another beginner-focused website builder along the same lines as Wix. It's template-based, with visual website building tools and built-in functionality to let you build and publish a website in minutes.

Squarespace has a lot of the same pros and cons as all website builders. Compared to Wix, it's a bit more feature-rich. It's more expensive than Wix as well, and caters more towards professional websites, whereas Wix tends to be a better fit for individuals, small eCommerce businesses, and personal blogs.

Wix

Wix has risen from a share of 0.1% to 2.3% in almost a decade. Wix is a website builder positioned more towards beginner site owners. It comes with a drag and drop editor to use to design the front-end of your site, along with built-in templates and modules that you just fill in with your website content.

Compared to WordPress, Wix has a shorter learning curve, and does more to help you get set up. You don't need to figure out how to host your site, how to connect a domain to your site, find the right themes or plugins, or spend as long customising your site design within your chosen theme.

Everything's baked into the platform, including web hosting, and it comes with templates that let you get started much quicker.

The payoff is you don't have the flexibility you would have with open-source content management systems like WordPress (or Joomla), so you may run into issues when scaling your website. Wix is also a paid CMS, with plans ranging from $4.50 to $35 per month.