The average internet user spends 6 hours and 38 minutes online every day browsing one of the world’s more than 1.2 billion websites.
But for all the time that spent online, how often do people think about the infrastructure underneath websites?
Setting up or managing a WordPress website for your small business might be the first time you’ve had to think about the nuts and bolts of how a website is served up.
And, as you dig into your website hosting and maintenance options, you may become overwhelmed by the various choices you have to make and the jargon that reads like R2D2’s dialogue.
In this guide, we provide deep dive into WordPress website hosting and maintenance to give you the information you need to make the best choices for your small business in 2026.
What is WordPress website hosting?
All websites exist on servers, which internet users (clients) can request access to in order to view your content.
But running and managing a server is a major undertaking, and so most small-to-medium businesses using WordPress purchase website hosting from a WordPress website hosting provider—effectively renting the server and other necessary services and technologies—to keep their website running smoothly.
A website hosting provider will also often take responsibility for the security of the server that your website is stored on, protecting your website and its databases from malicious attacks.
Of course, there’s a fair amount more to web hosting than this explanation offers—but this gives you a general overview of what website hosting is and why you’d consider purchasing your WordPress website hosting rather than hosting your website yourself on your own server.
What should I consider when choosing a WordPress website hosting provider?
As with any service, WordPress website hosting comes in all sorts of shapes and sizes to match the wide variety of needs that website owners have.
Needless to say, there’s a huge difference in what it takes to run a small website where you store your vacation photos to share with your family vs. running a major e-commerce site.
When you’re choosing a WordPress website hosting provider, you’ll need to be clear on what you need.
Here are some things you should be considering:
- Performance: What do you need in terms of performance? Your answer to this question will depend on how much traffic you generate, and how you want users to interact with your website. If improving your SEO is part of your business strategy, you’ll also want to consider how poor performance will impact your search engine ranking. One metric to look out for is a hosting company’s uptime score: ideally you’d want a company that has an uptime score of above 99.5% and should avoid companies that have a score below 99%. Other performance factors to consider include loading speed, storage and monthly traffic caps.
- Security: As many high-profile cases have proven, any company (small or large) can find itself the victim of a cyberattack. In 2026, we now have AI-driven attacks to worry about too, and each week there are new WordPress theme and plug in vulnerabilities. Security should be a concern for every organization, even small ones. When assessing your website hosting options, consider what requirements you need as well as how hands on you want to be. If you do get hacked or there’s a breach, what happens? Good security features to look out for include information redundancy systems and regular back-ups.
- Support: When something goes wrong with your website, you want to get the issue resolved right away. That’s why you should explore what support options your website host offers. Do they have a ticket system or are there live/chat support options? When is support available—during limited hours or 24/7? And is the support in-house or outsourced?
- Options Included: Different web hosts will offer different packages. Do you plan to have email linked to your domain? Do you need the option to purchase additional space as you grow? Take a careful look at what different hosts are offering you when you sign up, even if you don’t think you’ll need all the bells and whistles from the get go.
- Cost: Of course, your budget will always be a consideration. Many web hosts offer discounts if you agree to lock in your plan for a longer period, but that has its own trade offs. You will also want to explore beyond the initial registration costs and look at what it will cost to resubscribe at the end of your term—these costs can be substantially higher. If you are on a tight budget, don’t lose heart: good hosting options can be found in the lower price ranges, too.
Remember, there’s no “one-size fits all” checklist that can tell you whether a hosting option is right for your business or not.
The best hosting solution for you will be the one that meets your needs (and, conversely, that doesn’t have you paying for extras that you won’t use).
That means that you may need to put in a little extra work into determining those needs and comparing hosting plans, but given the importance of your website to your business, it’s worth the effort to find the right solution.
Should I hire someone to handle my WordPress website hosting?
Deciding whether to hire a professional for WordPress hosting depends on your technical expertise and the amount of time you have to manage the hosting yourself.
“DIY hosting” (aka, using shared or unmanaged VPS) is cheaper but requires you to configure server security and firewalls.
“Managed WordPress hosting” costs more but includes server-level caching, automatic backups, and expert support, making it the better choice for businesses prioritizing fewer headaches and better uptime over cost savings.
Although it might be tempting to choose a low-cost DIY hosting option (e.g., $5/month hosting from one of the major hosting companies), the tradeoff is that your website performance will be slower, you’ll receive less support, and you’re likely to encounter more headaches.
In the long run, this can lead to more costs, poorer SEO, and more visitors bouncing from your slow-to-load website.
On the other hand, if you hire an agency to manage your WordPress website hosting, you’ll have someone looking out for your website and a person to turn to if you need a hand (e.g., troubleshooting, restoring a previous version of your website, a staging site set up, CDN integration or specific WordPress server tuning).
Plus, you’ll have better safeguards against hacks and someone to help bring your website back online if you accidently take it down.
Hiring an agency doesn’t have to be expensive and many agencies offer affordable managed hosting plans for small businesses.
What is WordPress website maintenance & why does it matter?
Once you’ve sorted your hosting and built your website, you never have to worry about it again and can just sit back and wait for the money to roll in, right? (If only it was that easy!)
Sadly, your website isn’t a “one and done” kind of a deal.
WordPress websites require ongoing maintenance in order to ensure they look good and remain functional and secure. At the most basic level, website maintenance encompasses any backend tasks you undertake to ensure your website remains up to date.
This includes checking for and repairing any technical issues on your site, and performing regular backend updates of your WordPress core, theme, and plug ins.
Too many people fail to consider website maintenance as part of their ongoing website strategy.
However, just as a crumbling store-front and burst pipes would deter customers from entering a physical storefront, a poorly maintained WordPress website will ultimately drive away the customers you’re trying to reach. It also leaves you at major risk for security breaches, especially with the growing concern of AI-driven cyberattacks in 2026. (Cybercriminals are increasingly targeting small business websites, not just big ones.)
Here’s why website maintenance is critical:
- Improved security: You’d never leave the doors to your office (and your safe) unlocked and just hope for the best. But when you fail to update your website regularly, you’re essentially leaving potential doors open to hackers and cybercriminals.
- Optimal website performance: A well maintained website is going to load faster, function as expected, and delight your visitors. These factors have real business implications: 42% of people say they would leave a website due to a poor user experience.
- Improved site traffic: Your website’s performance isn’t only important to visitors… It matters to search engines, too. Search engines, such as Google, want to make sure they’re directing users to high-quality, reliable sites. That means you’ll rank better (and thus get more visitors) if your site is well-maintained and high-performing. (Psst… to learn more about technical SEO and why it matters, check out our Ultimate Guide to SEO.)
What’s involved in WordPress website maintenance?
As we highlighted in the previous section, website maintenance can cover a multitude of different tasks.
Some of the common activities that are covered under “WordPress website maintenance” include:
- Performing CMS, theme and plugin updates: In the same way that your phone needs to be updated every so often, the same is true for many components of your website including your content management system, your theme, and any plugins you may be using. Keeping these updated is critical for your website’s security. Unfortunately, hackers and cybercriminals are always working to figure out how to bypass current controls and technologies, which means if you’re not up to date, your website has effectively left its door wide open.
- Monitoring uptime: Your website can only act as your digital storefront if it’s actually “up”: live and visible on the web, so that your visitors can find you and the information they need. Uptime monitoring lets you know asap if your website has gone down, so that you can resolve the issues right away.
- Monitoring performance: Monitoring your performance can let you know how well your website is performing. You can begin to identify your peak traffic times, as well as many other metrics. All of this is critical business information that can help you identify issues and opportunities as you grow your business.
- Taking backups: When it comes to websites, it’s not a matter of “if” things go wrong, but “when.” Human error, updates sending everything haywire, crashes–all can cause you to lose data and content. Backups are your website’s safety net: a guarantee that you can restore your website to a previous, functioning state with ease. If you are regularly updating your website, daily backups are the gold standard.
If you hire an agency to manage your WordPress website maintenance, they will include different services, so make sure you understand what’s included before signing up.
For instance, here at Sparked Digital, we include the following items in our affordable WordPress website maintenance package:
- 24/7 performance monitoring
- 24/7 uptime monitoring
- Daily monitoring for WordPress core, theme, and plugin updates
- Verification of update before deployment
- Critical updates made in 1-2 business day and non-critical updates made weekly
- 90 day backup retention
Should I hire someone to maintain my WordPress website, or do it myself?
You should hire an agency to maintain your WordPress website if your hourly rate is higher than the cost of the maintenance plan, or if you lack the technical skills to fix a “white screen of death.”
Hiring a pro shifts the responsibility of security and uptime to experts, allowing business owners to focus on growth rather than troubleshooting.
In other words, the answer to this question is… it depends. You’ll want to think about the time and resources you have in house to manage your website, and what your budget looks like.
While there is, of course, a cost for paying an agency to maintain your WordPress website, you’ll want to do a cost-benefit analysis that considers the time saved, and gains made in performance, conversions, SEO, etc.
Finally, WordPress maintenance plans may not be as expensive as you might think. For instance, our WordPress care plans are designed to be affordable for small businesses.
Conclusion
Your website is your most valuable marketing asset, and so whether you’re starting from scratch or looking level up your existing site, you’ll want to be sure it’s supported by high-quality hosting and maintenance.
Don’t want to DIY it? At Sparked, we can help. Check out our affordable WordPress website hosting & maintenance plans today, and let us free you from WordPress stress.
Related FAQs
How much does WordPress maintenance cost in 2026?
In 2026, professional WordPress maintenance plans typically range from $50 to $250 USD per month. Lower-tier plans usually cover basic updates and off-site backups, while higher-tier plans ($150+) often include managed hosting, performance optimization, uptime monitoring, and dedicated developer hours for content edits or troubleshooting.
What happens if I don't update my WordPress plugins?
Is Managed WordPress Hosting worth the extra cost?
How often should WordPress be updated?
Can I switch my current WordPress hosting to your agency?
Yes. Most agencies (including ours) offer migration services when you sign up for a hosting and maintenance plan. We handle the technical transfer of your database and files, ensuring there is zero downtime for your customers during the switch.
