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Wordpress.com is useful for very simple sites, but it's quite limited, and if you have aspirations of a high-traffic or money-earning website, then a self-hosted Wordpress installation is often a better option. Rocket.net offers very impressive value for high-traffic wordpress sites and they use Cloudflare Enterprise. Their prices are significantly lower than most of the high-end managed wordpress hosts.
Wordpress.com is useful for very basic websites, but once you want to get to any decent level of customization or have high-traffic requirements, then a host like Rocket.net would be a much better option.
Wordpress.com effectively run a type of wordpress multisite, which is quite locked-down and you can't do an awful lot with it. That said, it's very easy to use. Rocket.net is a better option for high-potential or high-traffic sites.
WordPress.com vs Rocket.net (2024) – Which is Better?
Verdict - At a Glance
Wordpress.com has a free plan, which can suit to purposes of very simple projects but it's very limited, doesn't allow you to use a custom domain, doesn't include installation of {separate |]plugins, and it also includes ads on the site.
Rocket.net has one of the best pricing plans of any managed wordpress host online in 2023. They offer high-speed wordpress hosting which supports 1 million monthly visitors for just 60 dollars a month, which is pretty incredible. They have good support and overall their uptime has been very good. The one thing to keep in mind is that they have not been established for quite as long as many of their competitors, however, they are gaining popularity pretty fast.
Monthly Pricing Based on Number of Visitors
We always try to quote the monthly fee for each host not including discounts that might apply if you pay yearly. Wordpress.com's plans renew at the same rate (No introductory discounts). Rocket.net's very low prices actually renew at the same rate.
Prices listed below is the price of our recommended PLAN based on number of visitors for Wordpress.com and Rocket.net. We also may include figures in brackets accounts for overages. Sometimes it's cheaper to use a lower plan with overage fees if your host includes this in their pricing structure, but the performance of the lower plan might not be as strong.
Monthly Pricing Based on Number of Websites
The pricing below shows the closest PLAN based on the amount of websites at both Wordpress.com and Rocket.net. These plans will also include an allowance of disk space and visitors. Some hosting companies allow additional wordpress installs for an extra fee. This can sometimes work out as more affordable than using a higher plan, if it works out as more affordable then we will list these in brackets below
Remember, hosts often include discounts when you pay on a longer basis such as yearly or over multiple years, so make sure to check these offers out if applicable.
Monthly Pricing Based on Disk Space
This is pricing per gigabyte of disk space for both Wordpress.com and Rocket.net. As previously mentioned, if it works out as more affordable to use a cheaper plan and pay overages then we'll list that below in brackets.
Keep in mind that if you have a large amount of disk space usage for your site then you could alternatively host these externally using another service
($30 + 10GBs at $2/GB)
($30 + 30GBs at $2/GB)
Comparison Between Main Features
Other Features Compared
Hosting Speed
Some managed wordpress hosting companies have an SLA (service level agreement) where they commit to a certain percentage of uptime on a monthly basis. The uptime listed below is a general figure for Wordpress.com and Rocket.net. but it's not necessarily an SLA, see the host's T&Cs for more info. SLAs often include conditions where you get a refund of a portion of monthly fees if the service drops below a certain amount of uptime for that month
Content Delivery Networks are widely distributed networks of servers that can serve your visitors important files such as images and CSS files from a server close by to their location, which can significantly increase your site speed.
Security
Website security is extremely important and all websites should be considered to be at risk. It's important to pick a host that takes security seriously. Below are some of the key security features that are offered by Wordpress.com and Rocket.net.
Conclusion
To find out more about the offerings from each of these hosts, then you can use the following links to check out Wordpress.com and Rocket.net.
That's our detailed comparison between Wordpress.com and Rocket.net Thank you for reading, we hope this will help you to choose between them!