Kinsta vs WPEngine? What is the most powerful managed WordPress hosting platform? Are you looking for a detailed comparison of these two web hosts? You are in the right place.

Kinsta is a cloud-based web host offering lightning-fast managed WordPress hosting solutions, while WPEngine is a fully managed, reliable and affordable WordPress platform.

So which one to choose?

In this comparison, you will discover;

  • Their functionalities, as well as interfaces
  • Pricing plans offered 
  • Kinsta and WPEngine uptime
  • Pros and cons
  • Customer Support Options and More

Are you ready to discover the RIGHT managed WordPress host in 2023? Let's move on to details.

Kinsta vs WPEngine: Which is the Ultimate Host?

Kinsta vs WPEngine

FeaturesKinstaWPEngine
PricesStarting at $ 35 / monthStarting at $ 20 / month
Free backupsYesYes
24/24 assistanceYesYes
Money back guarantee30 days60 days
Data centers3511
Availability guarantee99,99% availability99,95% uptime

Features: Kinsta vs WPEngine 

Kinsta Features:

Here are some of the fantastic hosting features Kinsta offers:

  • Daily automatic backups
  • Free SSL Certificates
  • Free Website Migrations
  • 29 data center locations worldwide
  • One-click staging
  • 24/24 network monitoring
  • Detection of DDoS attacks
  • Cloudflare Firewall
  • Offers a 30 day money back guarantee
  • Integrated application performance monitoring
  • 24/24/7 WordPress Support

Looking for more details about Kinsta? Check out this unbiased Kinsta review to find all the details.

WPEngine Features:

WPEngine powers 1,5 million WordPress websites in over 150 countries. Here are some of the amazing hosting features offered by WPEngine;

  • Free SSL
  • Automated updates
  • Access to the global CDN 
  • Proactive threat blocking and security
  • Automated WordPress and PHP updates
  • Free access to WordPress themes customizable
  • daily backups
  • One-click staging 
  • Automatic plugin updates for site security
  • 99,99% uptime SLA
  • Comes with a 60 day money back guarantee
  • Expert WordPress support 24/24/7  

Kinsta and WPEngine UI

This is what the Kinsta interface looks like;

Kinsta interface

As you can see above, from the Kinsta control panel you can do almost everything, including:

  • Manage your websites and their analytics and bandwidth
  • Billing Details
  • Connect actively
  • Migration and more

This is what the WPEngine interface looks like;

wpengine interface

WPEngine also offers an intuitive interface where you can find all the details of your website, including:

  • CDN
  • Focus Areas
  • Backup Options 
  • Site migration and more

verdict: In terms of ease of use, Kinsta is better because it has a clean and elegant interface.


Pricing: Kinsta vs WPEngine

Kinsta offers FOUR pricing plans in managed WordPress hosting, listed below.

  1. Starter 
  2. Pro
  3. Business
  4. Enterprise

Let’s briefly talk about these pricing plans now.

1. Choke: This is Kinsta's cheapest plan, costing $35 per month (if paid monthly) or $350 per year (that's $30 per month) and offers the following features. 

  • 1 WordPress installation
  • 25 000 visits
  • 10 GB of disk space
  • Free SSL, CDN and staging
  • Free migrations

2.Pro: If you want to install more than one website, Pro is a great choice because you can install 2 websites. This plan costs $70 per month (if paid monthly) or $700 per year (that's $58 per month) and you'll get the following.

  • 2 WordPress installs
  • 50 000 visits
  • 20 GB of disk space
  • Free SSL, CDN and staging
  • Free migrations

3. Business: If you run an agency or are looking to manage multiple websites under a single hosting account, go with Kinsta's Business plan. 

You will have access to four different pricing options in the Business plan and the price starts at $115 per month and goes up to $450 per month. You will get the following list of features.

  • Up to 40 WordPress installs
  • Up to 600 visits
  • Up to 60 GB of disk space
  • Free SSL, CDN and staging
  • Free migrations

4. Business: This plan is perfect for large agencies. It also offers four different pricing plans in the Enterprise plan and the price starts at $675 per month and goes up to $1 per month.

  • Up to 150 WordPress installs
  • Up to 2 visits
  • Up to 250 GB of disk space
  • Free SSL, CDN and staging
  • Free migrations

All Kinsta plans come with a 30-day money-back guarantee. 

WPEngine offers the following hosting packages.

1. Choke: This is WPEngine's cheapest plan as it only costs $20 per month ($24/month if paid monthly) and offers the following features. 

  • Install 1 website
  • Manages up to 25 visits
  • Up to 10 GB of local storage
  • Up to 50 GB bandwidth

2. Professional: This plan lets you install multiple sites, costs you $39 per month ($47/month if paid monthly), and offers the following features. 

  • Install up to 3 websites
  • Up to 75 visits
  • Up to 15 GB of local storage
  • Up to 125 GB bandwidth

3. Growth : This plan is ideal for small business owners and growing professionals because it allows you to set up up to 10 sites. It costs you $77 per month ($92/month if paid monthly) and offers the following features. 

  • Install up to 10 websites
  • Up to 100 visits
  • Up to 20 GB of local storage
  • Up to 200 GB bandwidth

4. Scale: This plan is perfect for agencies and teams. It costs you $193 per month ($232/month if paid monthly) and offers the following features. 

  • Install up to 30 websites
  • Up to 500 visits per month
  • Up to 50 GB of local storage
  • Up to 500 GB bandwidth

Apart from these plans, WPEngine also offers a “Dedicated Custom” plan with the following features.

  • Install 30+ websites
  • Manages more than 400 visits/month
  • Over 50 GB of storage
  • More than 500 GB of bandwidth/month

This is a custom plan, so you need to contact their support team for the exact price.

WPEngine offers a 60-day money-back guarantee.

verdict: WPEngine is the winner because it is cheaper than Kinsta. Additionally, WPEngine offers a better 60-day money-back guarantee compared to Kinsta's 30-day money-back guarantee.


Uptime: Kinsta vs WPEngine

Availability is one of the main considerations when choosing a platform.Web hosting.

Uptime is how long the server hosting your website is up. Uptime rates are usually reported as a percentage, such as 99,9%, 99,5%, 99%, etc.

Here is the availability of Kinsta hosting;

availability of Kinsta

As you can see above, Kinsta offers a solid 99,9% uptime.

Kinsta also offers a 99,9% uptime guarantee. Otherwise, it adds “SLA Credits” to your hosting account, which are applied to subsequent invoices.

Here is the availability of WPEngine hosting;

availability of wpengine

As you can see, WPEngine is available and working normally most of the time (99,9%).

Similar to Kinsta, WPEngine also offers a 99,95% WPEngine uptime guarantee. If this fails, you will receive an SLA credit of 5% of the applicable monthly fees for each full hour of downtime.

verdict: Both Kinsta and WPEngine offer similar uptime and SLA guarantee. So it’s a tie in terms of availability.


What about backups?

Backups of your website are essential. 

Your WordPress updates may go wrong or you may make mistakes while customizing your website design.

Whatever the reason, it is mandatory to have COMPLETE backups of your website. Backups are like having insurance for your website. 

backups

The best part about using these web hosts is that they both offer free backups to all their users.

Both Kinsta and WPEngine offer different types of backups, including:

  • Automated backups
  • System generated backups
  • Manual backups 

WPEngine stores the most recent 40 checkpoints for up to 60 days which you can use to restore your website backups in case of data loss.

If you want to restore previous backups (older than 60 days), you can simply connect with their support team and they will help you.

Kinsta automatically creates a backup every day. You can also create up to 5 manual backups, which are kept for at least 14 days.

Depending on your plan, you will benefit from appropriate backup retention, listed below. 

  • Starter to Business 2 plans include 14 days of backups
  • Business 3 and Business 4 plans come with 20 days of backups
  • Enterprise 1 and above plans include 30 days of backups

verdict: When it comes to backups, Kinsta has a head start by offering hourly backups.


Pros and Cons: WPEngine vs Kinsta 

Advantages of WPEngine:

  • WPEngine is affordable as its Starter plan only costs $20 per month ($24 per month if paid monthly)
  • Offers you LIVE WordPress expert customer support 24/24
  • Free daily automated backups
  • Offers one-click preparation that you can use to create a website one-click preparation, quickly and securely test new plugins, themes, website customizations, etc.
  • Free access to premium themes 
  • Provides automated website maintenance as you will get automatic WordPress core updates, automatic plugin updates, etc.
  • It gives you a 60-day money-back guarantee, which is better than Kinsta's 30-day money-back policy.  
  • It offers WordPress themes premium themes, including Genesis Framework and 30+ StudioPress themes, so you don't have to spend money on website design (if you're okay with premium SEO-optimized themes).
  • Provides platform-level protection to block most cyberattacks
  • Automated WordPress and PHP updates
  • Eliminate cart fragments with Live Cart
  • Automatic plugin updates for site security
  • Offers you a 99,99% uptime SLA
  • Advanced DDOS mitigation

Disadvantages of WPEngine:

  • There are a few plugins and WordPress themes which do not work with WPEngine (for security reasons)

Benefits of Kinsta:

  • Kinsta is extremely fast because it uses the fastest processors in the industry
  • Offers free daily backups with ALL plans, so you don't have to worry about data loss
  • Free website migrations, so you don't have to pay anything when migrating from your existing host
  • It comes with a free CDN, allowing for faster loading times 
  • Automatic MySQL database optimizations, which help you improve page performance
  • Cloudflare enterprise-grade protection
  • Automatic weekly database optimization
  • Offers the fastest server-level caching, so you don't need to install any caching plugins
  • You can easily enable authenticator-based 2FA in MyKinsta to secure your websites
  • Uses state-of-the-art technology with Nginx, PHP 8.1
  • Offers you 24/24 customer support from WordPress experts and chat assistance in 7 languages
  • Kinsta offers flexible pricing plans and you can increase your plan's storage space with just one click.
  • Offers a 30 day money back guarantee 

Disadvantages of Kinsta:

  • Kinsta is expensive (starts at $20 per month) compared to WPEngine (starts at $20 per month)

Customer Support: WPEngine vs Kinsta 

WPEngine offers 24/24 customer support from WordPress experts.

To contact customer support, you can log into your account and open a chat with their team. 

You can also contact them by phone:

  • United States: (877) 973-6446
  • UK: +44 808 501 5895
  • AT: +61 1800 531 769

You can also browse articles in their assistance center .

Kinsta also offers 24/7/365 support from WordPress experts.

You can log in to your MyKinsta hosting account to get help from their support team.

You can also call: (+61) 1800 952 470

For any support related queries, you can visit their support center .

verdict: When it comes to customer support, both of these web hosts offer similar support options. So it's a tie.


Who should choose which accommodation?

So which host should you turn to: Kinsta or WPEngine?

If you are looking for an affordable hosting choice, go for WPEngine as its pricing starts at just $20 per month, which is much cheaper than Kinsta (as its pricing starts at $35 per month).

If you are looking for a super-fast hosting platform, Kinsta should be your choice and it also has 35 data centers around the world.

We HIGHLY recommend Kinsta over WPEngine for two reasons: it is very fast and extremely secure (compared to WPEngine).

Yes, Kinsta costs slightly more than WPEngine, but you get what you pay for!

If you don't mind paying a few extra dollars, choose Kinsta because of its simpler, faster and more reliable cloud hosting.

In a nutshell, you can't go wrong with Kinsta or WPEngine hosting platforms, as they are both exceptional. But be sure to take a closer look at their performance and features before making your choice.


FAQ

Here are some of the most frequently asked questions about Kinsta and WPEngine.

Is Kinsta better than WPEngine?

Yes, in most cases Kinsta outperforms WPEngine in terms of speed and reliability. Kinsta also offers a 99,9% uptime guarantee backed by SLA and is priced starting at

Is Kinsta faster than Bluehost?

Yes, Kinsta is much better than Bluehost in terms of speed, maintenance, reliability, uptime, security and more. But Kinsta pricing plans start at $35 per month, while Bluehost's WordPress plans start at just $2,95 per month.

Which hosting is best for WordPress?

If you use WordPress, you should consider managed WordPress hosting because it offers automatic updates, expert WordPress support, better security, and much more. Here are some web hosts that offer managed WordPress hosting.

  • Kinsta
  • WPEngine
  • WPX

Is Kinsta any good?

One of the significant advantages of Kinsta hosting is that it is a super fast and highly secure hosting platform. It also offers a clean and easy-to-use interface to manage all your files, databases and websites in one place.

What are the best Kinsta alternatives?

Here are some of the alternatives to Kinsta;

  • WPX
  • Cloudways
  • pressable

What are the best alternatives to WPEngine?

Here are some of the alternatives to W Engine;

  • WPX
  • Kinsta
  • Bluehost (WP Pro plan)

Is WPEngine the best?

WPEngine is the best choice if you are looking for a fast and reliable hosting service. WPEngine offers best-in-class security with 24/24 expert customer support and is used by over 7 million websites worldwide.

Related Resources:


Latest Thoughts

Web hosts WPEngine and Kinsta offer solutions forWeb hosting highly reliable and faster.

These two web hosts offer managed WordPress hosting solutions with superior features such as 24/24 expert support, WordPress migrations, reliable servers, SSD storage, free backups, and much more .

So, what do you think about WPEngine vs Kinsta? Did you find this comparison article helpful? Do you have any questions? Let us know in the comments.