Kinsta
The managed host to put real WordPress on: Google Cloud with a London data centre you choose per site, staging, daily backups, Cloudflare Enterprise CDN and firewall on every plan, ISO 27001, 4.8 on Trustpilot and 24/7 chat in eight languages, from $30 a month for one site. What to know: Kinsta prices in US dollars only, sells through a configurator rather than a price list, has no phone support, adds paid extras for hourly backups and update testing, and leaves you to bring the WordPress knowledge or the freelancer.
How we testKinsta Inc. was founded in 2013 by Mark Gavalda, who chairs it, with Jon Penland as chief executive; it is private, describes its operations as distributed with a Los Angeles base, and names one institutional investor, M-One Capital. It states 230,000 customers in 128 countries. We found no Russian or Chinese link in ownership or engineering. There is no UK entity and no UK pricing.
Prices are in US dollars excluding tax, read on 16 September 2026 from a configurator rather than a list. The plan we score is the single-site entry tier, Kinsta's cheapest plan hosting one production site with free staging and 14-day backups: $30 a month on annual billing, $40 billed monthly, with 10 GB of storage, 20 GB of server bandwidth and 125 GB of CDN bandwidth, and a first month at $0. Multi-site plans run from WP 2 at $59 or $70 a month to WP 40 at $375 or $450; Agency starts at $284 and Enterprise at $417 with a 99.99 percent SLA and SOC 2. Extra sites are $30 a month each, extra storage $20 per 20 GB, and the add-ons show where the model earns: hourly backups $100 a site a month, Redis $100, premium staging $20, and Kinsta Automatic Updates, which tests plugin updates with visual regression and rolls back failures, $3 an environment a month. There is no free plan; a 30-day money-back guarantee stands in for a trial.
Every plan hosts on Google Cloud with 30 data centres you pick per site, London among them, behind Cloudflare Enterprise with a managed firewall, DDoS protection and free malware removal. The MyKinsta dashboard handles staging, backups, PHP versions, redirects, SSH and SFTP, and there is a documented REST API. Editing, SEO, forms and everything else are WordPress's, so the profile records those as the platform's rather than Kinsta's. Users are unlimited, with SAML SSO. Certifications are ISO 27001, 27017 and 27018 with a SOC 2 assessment, and a DPA is published. The only MCP server is a community project wrapping the Kinsta API, not one Kinsta publishes. Leaving is standard WordPress: SFTP and a database dump, with unlimited free migrations in. Support is 24/7 human chat in eight languages with no phone channel. Trustpilot is 4.8 on 1,141 reviews with no recent history of asking for them, the strongest trust signal in this category.
Not yet tested by Saaskly: assessed on published pricing, vendor documentation, the vendor's own help centre and status pages, and third-party reviews.
Pros
- +Google Cloud with a London region chosen per site, Cloudflare Enterprise CDN and firewall, free staging and daily backups on every plan
- +ISO 27001, 27017 and 27018 with a SOC 2 assessment, a published DPA, a documented API and 4.8 on Trustpilot without invited reviews
- +Unlimited users with SAML SSO, unlimited free migrations in, and standard WordPress portability out
Cons
- −US dollars only with tax added, a 33 percent premium for monthly billing, and a configurator instead of a price list
- −The extras add up: hourly backups $100 a site a month, Redis $100, premium staging $20, update testing $3 an environment
- −No phone support, no first-party MCP server, and you still need WordPress skills or someone who has them
Pricing
Minimum commitment: $30 ($30/mo × 1 seat × 1 months). The least you can spend before walking away; excludes numbers, minutes and add-ons.
Single site (entry tier)
$40/mo · month-to-month
$30/mo on an annual commitment
Month-to-month costs 33% more
- ✓$30 a month on annual billing, $40 billed monthly, USD excluding tax, first month $0 (read 16 Sep 2026). One WordPress install, 10 GB storage, 20 GB server bandwidth, 125 GB CDN, free staging, 14-day backups, unlimited users, Cloudflare Enterprise CDN and firewall, 30 data centres including London. 30-day money-back guarantee.
WP 2 (two sites)
$70/mo · month-to-month
$59/mo on an annual commitment
Month-to-month costs 19% more
- ✓$59 a month on annual billing, $70 monthly. Ladder to WP 40 at $375 or $450; Agency from $284; Enterprise from $417 with a 99.99% SLA. Add-ons: extra site $30, hourly backups $100 a site, Redis $100, premium staging $20, Automatic Updates $3 an environment.
Specifications
| Rating | 3.5 |
| Shape | Managed WordPress hosting |
| Scored plan* | $30/mo annual · $40/mo monthly (Single site entry tier) |
| Month-to-month | $40/mo (+33%) |
| Free plan | None |
| Visual editor | ✓ |
| Custom code | Full theme code |
| Blog | ✓ |
| Forms | ✓ |
| Commerce | Add-on or higher plan |
| Memberships | Paid add-on |
| Multilingual | Paid add-on |
| SEO controls | Full |
| API | ✓ |
| Headless | ✓ |
| MCP server | No |
| Export your site | Full |
| Open source | No |
| UK or EU hosting | ✓ |
| Owned in** | US-owned |
| Russian or Chinese link | None found |
| Phone support | No |
| Trustpilot (reviews) | 4.8 (1,141) |
| Scored plan name | Single site entry tier |
| VAT basis | Excluding VAT |
| Licence | Hosting subscription (WordPress itself is GPL) |
| Self-hostable | No |
| Vendor hosting | ✓ |
| Free trial (days) | 0 |
| Entry plan | Scored plan is the entry plan |
| Top plan | $417/mo (Enterprise) |
| First-term promotion | First month $0 on the entry tiers; 30-day money-back guarantee instead of a trial |
| Monthly price only at checkout | No |
| Domain free first year | No |
| Domain renewal | Bring your own; free DNS via Route 53 |
| Editor seats | Unlimited |
| Page and item limits | No page cap; plans meter storage, bandwidth or visits |
| Storage and bandwidth | 10 GB storage, 20 GB server bandwidth, 125 GB CDN a month on the entry tier |
| Price changes | Not captured |
| Editor | Whatever WordPress editor or builder you install |
| Switch template after launch | ✓ |
| Form submissions | Plugin-dependent |
| Scheduling | ✓ |
| Roles and approvals | ✓ |
| Bookings | No |
| AI site generator | No |
| AI content tools | No |
| Accessibility tooling | No |
| Redirects | ✓ |
| Structured data control | ✓ |
| Image optimisation | No |
| CDN included | ✓ |
| Injected scripts | None |
| Performance | Not measured; Cloudflare Enterprise edge on every plan |
| Payment providers | WooCommerce or any WordPress plugin |
| UK VAT handling | No |
| Webhooks | No |
| MCP server note | Community project (jacob-hartmann/kinsta-mcp) wraps the Kinsta API; nothing vendor-published |
| CRM integrations | Plugin-dependent |
| Zapier or Make | No |
| App market | Not applicable; WordPress plugin directory |
| Export note | Standard WordPress: SFTP files plus database dump; no packaged one-click export found |
| Import tooling | Unlimited free migrations in via the migration team or Migrate Guru |
| Domain transfer out | Not applicable |
| HQ | US |
| Owner | Independent; M-One Capital minority |
| Founded | 2013 |
| Data location | Google Cloud, 30 data centres chosen per site, London (uk-london-1) included |
| Link evidence | None found |
| Governance | Private; founder-chaired |
| GDPR tooling | No |
| SOC 2 | ✓ |
| ISO 27001 | ✓ |
| Status page | ✓ |
| Major incident on record | No |
| Incident note | Scheduled maintenance only in the window read; SLA published for Enterprise only |
| Live chat | ✓ |
| UK support hours | 24/7 human chat in eight languages; no phone |
| Security updates | Managed WAF and malware removal; plugin updates yours, or $3 an environment a month for tested automatic updates |
| Community | Agency directory and community forum |
| Support channels | Live chat, Help centre, Community forum |
*Scored plan: the business plan the score is set on (the cheapest plan with a custom domain and no vendor branding, contact forms, basic SEO controls and room for a fifty-page site; for a managed WordPress host, one production site with staging and daily backups), per month on annual billing at the renewal price, then per month billed monthly where that is offered, in the currency the vendor shows a UK visitor on the research date. Developer CMSs show the licence plus a stated reference hosting cost. See each profile for the VAT basis, first-term promotions and what the plan above adds.
**Owned in: where the company that owns the vendor answers to. A US-owned vendor is subject to US law (including the CLOUD Act) wherever the site is hosted. "Russian or Chinese link" records ownership, management or engineering links found on the research date, with the evidence on the profile; Saaskly marks these down in the score by editorial rule and says so.
Researched and drafted with AI assistance; reviewed and approved by Tim Meredith. How we use AI
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