{"id":10383,"date":"2026-05-07T15:36:35","date_gmt":"2026-05-07T14:36:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/josepgonzalez.com\/wordpress\/"},"modified":"2026-10-31T16:39:35","modified_gmt":"2026-10-31T15:39:35","slug":"what-is-wordpress","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/josepgonzalez.com\/en\/what-is-wordpress\/","title":{"rendered":"What Is WordPress and Why Is This CMS So Successful?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Since the first web pages appeared, new tools and languages have kept emerging to make designing them easier. Even so, one of them stands out above the rest. You will want to know <strong>what <a href=\"https:\/\/josepgonzalez.com\/en\/wordpress-web-designer\/\">WordPress<\/a> is<\/strong>, because one of the most successful tools for creating websites are <strong>CMS or content management systems<\/strong>. These systems let you create and manage a web page easily and <strong>without needing to know how to code<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<h2>What is WordPress?<\/h2>\n<p>WordPress is the most widely used CMS (<em>Content Management System<\/em>) in the world. It was born in <strong>2003 thanks to Matt Mullenweg and Mike Little<\/strong>. It was originally created to make it easier to build and maintain blogs, but today <strong>you can create any type of website<\/strong>, from corporate sites and portfolios to online stores (with plugins like WooCommerce), without needing advanced programming knowledge.<\/p>\n<p>An important clarification: <strong>WordPress.org<\/strong> (the free software you install on your own hosting, which this article is about) is not the same as <strong>WordPress.com<\/strong> (a hosting service with its own plans). The first option gives you full control of your website.<\/p>\n<h2>Its features and keys to success<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Free and open source:<\/strong> the community constantly helps its development, with regular updates and security improvements.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Solid technology:<\/strong> it is built in <strong>PHP<\/strong> and works with <strong>MySQL or MariaDB<\/strong> databases, on servers like Apache or Nginx.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Easy to use:<\/strong> it lets any person or company have a site that is simple to update, with a very intuitive admin panel.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Block editor (Gutenberg) and Site Editor:<\/strong> today you can design pages and templates visually without touching code. And if you want even more freedom, there are <a href=\"https:\/\/josepgonzalez.com\/en\/visual-page-builder\/\">visual page builders<\/a>.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Thousands of themes<\/strong>, free and paid, so you can pick the one that best fits your needs.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Tens of thousands of plugins<\/strong> (more than 60,000 in the official directory alone) that add all kinds of features: SEO, forms, online stores, security, bookings and more.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Very good for SEO:<\/strong> its clean structure and specialized plugins make search optimization easier.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Easily integrates social media<\/strong> into the website, as you can see in my guide to <a href=\"https:\/\/josepgonzalez.com\/en\/add-instagram-wordpress\/\">adding Instagram to WordPress<\/a>.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Adaptable to mobiles and tablets<\/strong> with responsive themes.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Multilingual:<\/strong> with plugins like WPML you can have your website in several languages, just like this one.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>These many advantages explain why <strong>more than 40% of all websites in the world<\/strong> are built with this CMS, and why it has a market share above 60% among websites that use a CMS.<\/p>\n<h2>Does WordPress have drawbacks?<\/h2>\n<p>To be honest, there are some things to keep in mind:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Maintenance:<\/strong> you need to update the core, plugins and themes regularly.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Security:<\/strong> being so popular, it is a target for attacks, so it is worth protecting your website. Here are <a href=\"https:\/\/josepgonzalez.com\/en\/wordpress-security-plugins\/\">3 WordPress security plugins<\/a> that help.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Speed:<\/strong> it depends on the hosting, plugins and theme. A well-optimized website can be very fast.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>Frequently asked questions<\/h2>\n<h3>Is WordPress free?<\/h3>\n<p>The software is. Costs usually come from the domain, the hosting and, if you need them, premium themes or plugins.<\/p>\n<h3>Do I need to know how to code to use WordPress?<\/h3>\n<p>No. You can create and manage your website without coding, although working with a professional helps it turn out better, faster and more secure.<\/p>\n<h3>Does it work for an online store?<\/h3>\n<p>Yes. With WooCommerce you can set up a complete store.<\/p>\n<p>I hope this article has helped you understand <strong>what WordPress is and the keys to this CMS\u2019s success<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>If you want me to design a web project for you, visit my <a href=\"https:\/\/josepgonzalez.com\/en\/wordpress-web-designer\/\"><strong>Freelance WordPress Designer<\/strong><\/a> page.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Since the first web pages appeared, new tools and languages have kept emerging to make designing them easier. Even so, one of them stands out above the rest. You will want to know what WordPress is, because one of the most successful tools for creating websites are CMS or content management systems. These systems let [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10557,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[92],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10383","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-wordpress-en"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/josepgonzalez.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10383","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/josepgonzalez.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/josepgonzalez.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/josepgonzalez.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/josepgonzalez.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10383"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/josepgonzalez.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10383\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10726,"href":"https:\/\/josepgonzalez.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10383\/revisions\/10726"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/josepgonzalez.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10557"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/josepgonzalez.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10383"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/josepgonzalez.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10383"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/josepgonzalez.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10383"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}