WordPress powers almost 19% of the Internet, making it one of the most popular content management systems out there. Let’s bust a few myths.
WordPress is a blogging platform
You may have noticed how I referred to WordPress as a content management system, not a blogging platform – well, it’s both. It can be used just as a blogging platform, but it can do so much more than that. It’s so extensible that you can do pretty much anything you want with it, and chances are your idea probably already exists. If it’s not in the core, there’s likely to be a “plugin for that”.
“When you think about it, we’re kind of building a web operating system” – Matt Mullenweg, WordPress Co-Founder
But, isn’t it insecure?
Nope! One of the best things about open source software is that anyone can contribute to the core. If a security hole is found, it’s usually fixed within a few days (including pushing out the update). If anything being open source makes it more secure, think of all the eyes that have glanced over the code. Most of the horror stories you hear about WordPress sites being hacked is down to the host, not the platform.
Lots of plugins will slow down my site
It’s not about the quantity of plugins you have installed, it’s the quality of the plugins that matter the most. Some plugins can have just a few lines of code, which is unlikely to have any performance impact on your site. Not all plugins are front-facing either; if the plugin is adding some extra functionality in the dashboard then this won’t even touch the front-end of your site.
Bad plugins can slow down your website; things like loading from external websites, not enqueuing files correctly or just bad code can affect how your site performs. Inactive plugins don’t run so they can’t affect your site performance, however they can still pose a security risk. If you’re not using a plugin and you won’t need it in the future, it’s best to delete it. You should still keep your plugins updated, even if they are inactive.
WordPress can’t power big websites
Sure it can! WordPress.com (the hosted version of WordPress) has some pretty big VIP clients, including TED, NBC and CNN. If a huge news corporation can run their site(s) on WordPress, why can’t you? WordPress will scale; if you’re servers can handle the load chances are WordPress can too. Be sure to optimise your site; caching is one of the best ways to improve load speeds.
Heard any myths? Let us know in the comments!