Can ‘static’ be fantastic or tragic? Let us count the ways of how a static WordPress hosting be of good use to all of us. What it is, all its bells and whistles, and go through its pros and cons to help you figure out whether you’ll become its #1 fanatic or you’ll end up distressfully spastic.
What is Static WordPress Hosting?
WordPress is coded in PHP. And, when someone enters your server, your web server executes that PHP and sequentially put it all together with the HTML content and delivers it to your visitor’s browser.
To deliver the content to your visitor’s browser, it must ‘fall in line’ from the database as the page loads. It would take milliseconds for your visitor to wait as it loads and flattens the content and make your website static before it delivers to your visitor’s browser.
Static WordPress hosting takes things by removing completely the WordPress backend without PHP and Database.
Once you’re done adding content and managing your website, your web host will generate the static on HTML Files and deploy those files to the front-end environment that your website visitors will see.
There are two things that static WordPress hosts will do:
- A static site generator to turn your WordPress site into static HTML
- A host (this is what serves those static HTML files up to visitors)
Advantages & Disadvantages of Static Word Press Hosting
Let’s start with why static WordPress hosting is right for you.
Advantages
Using static WordPress hosting makes your website more secure and perform better.
In terms of speed, since your website is static, this removes vulnerabilities such as SQL injections (SQLi), and Cross-site Scripting (XSS). Still, you have to make sure the domain where your WordPress installation sits is adequately protected. If you want to increase speed but do not want to go static, this video guide might help you.
Performance-wise, there are no server-side processing or database queries to make it load faster.
Through the use of static WordPress hosting, you can save a lot of money since it eliminates too much loading on your server. A benefit for you, right? Your $5 per month in subscribing in Digital Ocean as a host allows you to serve tons of requests per month.
There are also a lot of WordPress plugins that are compatible with static WordPress unless you choose to use the Elementor Pro’s dynamic content element.
Disadvantages
A static WordPress hosting also has its disadvantages.
WordPress is popularly known to create a straightforward, dynamic content. But when static comes, that fades away.
One of the major disadvantages of using static is that some features of your website will stop working, including WooCommerce, Site Search, bbPress or BuddyPress, native comments, contact form plugins, and many more.
If you want to have a static website, instead of using the above mentioned, you can use Wufoo, Typeform, Formspree for forms, Disqus for comments, and Google Site Search for search.
Another disadvantage of using this kind of hosting is that, instead of quickly editing the content of your website, you’ll feel the hassle as they require to re-deploy the site whenever you want to edit or add content on your page, rather than simply clicking the ‘Publish’ button.
Should you use a static WordPress hosting?
Static WordPress hosting is still a suitable choice for the site creators who
But, if you do rely on the dynamic content of your website, then static WordPress is definitely not for you.
3 Static Word Press Hosts That You Can Choose
The easiest way to convert to Static Website is to choose a suitable hosting provider for your need. We listed down for you the Dedicated Static Word Press Hosts that might help you.
1. Shifter
Shifter is a SaaS hosting provider that is popular in hosting static websites. It also offers a free plan. However, limited features only can be accessible to users.
One of the great deals on their plans is that it allows you to see whether you like the static setup for your website before proceeding on publishing. When you deploy your site on Shifter, the end result is entirely static and cached.
Shifter also includes integrated CDN and SSL certificate with all of its offered plans.
It’s free for a single site with 1GB storage. It’s premium plans start at $15 per month.
2. HardyPress
HardyPress is a static hosting provider that gives your site security by providing an option to store your website in a very secure location that only you can access. With the help of HardyPress, visitors can access your site within milliseconds.
HardyPress supports Contact Form 7, which means you can still create forms with this plugin. They make cool features of tweaking where you have to configure Contact Form 7 more refreshingly.
What makes HardyPress cooler? It has its own search feature that lets your visitor search your site.
3. Strattic
Strattic is newly invented host where it is a serverless hosting platform that optimizes WordPress websites by making them static, which means there are no queries to the database.
This gives an optimum level of security where they separate the live website from the dashboard to avoid database tracking and hacks. SQL Injections and XSS are being removed as vulnerabilities.
DIY-ing Your Own Static WordPress Website
Did you know that you can create your static website and host the files anywhere you want?
Yes, you can! With the help of WP2Static Plugin, you can keep using WordPress but publish a static HTML website.
You can deploy the static version of your website through one of the following methods:
- FTP
- ZIP
- Amazon S3
- BitBucket
- BunnyCDN
- GitHub
WP2Static’s free version lets you deploy your static site. If you have a large website, I encourage you to get a premium version as it lets you only to send files that have been updated.
A yearly subscription is at $150, while lifetime subscription is $400.
Another option is Simply Static Plugin, which is also a hack-proof plugin that you may choose from and available at WordPress.org for free.
Conclusion
Static WordPress Hosting is not for every website owner. But, it’s a good option for a lot of non-dynamic websites and in making your WordPress website faster and more secure. Otherwise, you can consider these cheap GoDaddy Hosting alternatives or get to know the advantages of managed WordPress hosting.
If it’s static is what you think is best for you, you have three dedicated hosts at hand that you can choose from, if you decide to make a static website: Shifter, HardyPress or Strattic can be a great friend to you!
If you want to be more hands-on in creating your statics, you can use WP2Static or Simply Static would be an excellent plugin for you.
