What Is The Difference Between WordPress.com & WordPress.org?
I have been asked the question several times in the past month: “What exactly is the difference between WordPress.com and WordPress.org”?
WordPress.com Is:
WordPress.com is a blog hosting service. You can host your blog there for free or you can host it there as a paying customer. Paid hosting provides you with various upgrades, such as the ability to add third party applications and shopping carts. They have themes for you to pick from (about 75 right now). You cannot upload a theme or customize your code on WordPress.com.
WordPress.org Is:
WordPress.org is a free blogging software (same company) which you can download into your computer, then upload into another hosting company’s server. This option gives you the ability to have a totally customized theme built for your site or to buy a pre-made WordPress theme (there are 1000′s) and upload it into your hosting server. You can also upload plugins that you cannot use on WordPress.com. Having your WordPress blog on another server, using the free WordPress software, gives you more freedom if you decide down the road to get really fancy with your theme.
Unique WordPress Themes
The links below are two blogs that have a unique theme. These themes would not be possible on WordPress.com. Notice how truly unique they both are. You will never see another WordPress blog like them again anywhere on the web.
Healthy Living – Weight Loss Recipes
When I first started my blogs, I chose to go with GoDaddy hosting and download my WordPress software from WordPress.org because it gave me more control in the future. With that also comes more responsibility because at a WordPress.com site, WordPress takes care of everything. I need to remember to upgrade myself! I do not know what the premium package at WordPress.com costs, but the GoDaddy economy hosting is only about $68 per year. It is not a good idea to move a blog that is well-established, so it’s a worthy investment early on if you may want to grow and improve your site later.
Awesome Set Up Guide
{ 6 comments… read them below or add one }
Have you had any trouble with godaddy? I found them to not be very wordpress’s friendly. You have to be sure to get the wordpress specific package.
I find GoDaddy to be not only user friendly but also to have excellent customer service. They answer their phone 24/7 and have a well trained helpful staff.
I have 4 wordpress blogs all of which are hosted on GoDaddy. When one of them got a virus last week, they removed it in an hour. I know someone else who had a WordPress blog who got a virus and spent 9 hours removing it themselves. I am hosting all 4 blogs on the delux account. I also have extra WordPress folders to do installations on and I find it perfect.
I would recommend GoDaddy to anyone looking for affordable hosting with a smile.
FYI – It is easy to set up a WordPress site in GoDaddy.
I have many wordpress and drupal sites hosted with godaddy and I can confirm that they are offering exellent service. 24/7 support, great uptime, fast servers…
With them you can host you site very cheap.
I also use Wordpress.org and Godaddy. I didn’t have any problems with it once I was using the Linux system and the deluxe hosting through GoDaddy. I did find that if I used the wordpress plugin that Godaddy offeres that I had less control and more bugs, so I just opt to manage it myself. Only problem I’ve found is when Wordpress releases upgrades it doesn’t upgrade automatically.
Just my 2 cents Ü
Yes, having a website has some responsibilities including keeping it up to date. One of the reasons you do not want the updates to happen automatically is that if you have a custom theme, like the one I have on my other site: http://www.CreateACashFlowShow.com you want to be sure that the updates do not conflict with any of your customizations. The recent update to WordPress 3.01 had some conflicts in the redirects so, I have opted to skip the update and wait for the next version. Many people use WP on a different hosting service so that they can have custom themes. Updates can cause theme problems or plugin problems especially for custom created themes.