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Transanction: WordPress

How WordPress makes money

The business model of Automattic is to sell WordPress related services such as hosting, backup, and others, so we won’t spend too much time on that.

In short, Automattic makes money on WordPress.com by selling advertising on your free sites. If you choose to pay for their hosting plans, then you get additional premium upgrades such as the ability to hide ads, purchase domains, additional disk space, commercial themes, etc.

Our goal in this section is to explain the business model behind the open source WordPress software and answer common questions like how do WordPress developers make money if they’re voluntarily contributing to a free non-profit project.

Let’s start with the question on why do developers contribute to WordPress if they aren’t getting paid?

While there can be altruistic reasons, we’re going to focus on the two primary monetary reasons:

• They sell WordPress products or services (custom plugins, themes, web development, consulting, etc.)
• They work for a company that sell WordPress products or services.

In other words, they are making money, but they are not getting paid by the WordPress foundation.

As WordPress has grown in popularity, there have been an increase in the number of businesses that sell WordPress related products / services. This has increased the commercial interest in the further development of the open-source WordPress software.

Think of what Automattic was able to do in the beginning, except now there are multiple companies hiring dedicated staff who contribute in the development of WordPress because they understand as the WordPress project grows, so will the revenue opportunities.

So where does the WordPress foundation fit in the picture?

WordPress foundation is a non-profit organization, so it’s primary source of revenue is through donations.

These donations are made by individuals like yourself and also corporations who’re using WordPress to make money.

How does this all apply to you as the user?

While you are not directly paying for WordPress, you could be indirectly paying for it.

For example, if you host your website on Bluehost, Siteground, WPEngine, or any other major WordPress hosting company, then you are indirectly paying for WordPress. Because all these companies regularly contribute back to WordPress.

If you are using Yoast SEO, BackupBuddy, Sucuri, or any of WPBeginner family of products (OptinMonster, WPForms, MonsterInsights, etc) then you are indirectly paying for WordPress. Because all these companies regularly sponsor WordCamps and/or contribute to WordPress.

Hopefully, this helps you better understand the WordPress business model and clear up all the concerns regarding that matter.