There has always been confusion among beginners about who owns WordPress? It’s a bit unreal to think something can be 100% free. If you have ever wondered who owns WordPress and how does WordPress make money, then you’re in the right place. In this beginner’s guide, we will answer these common questions along with covering how does that impact the ownership rights of your WordPress site and blog content.
Understanding the Differences between WordPress.com vs WordPress.org
Before we can answer the question about the ownership of WordPress, it’s important that you understand which WordPress you are talking about.
The #1 root cause for confusion is that often people don’t know that WordPress.com and WordPress.org are two fundamentally different products with different owners.
WordPress.org is the popular content management system (CMS) that you always hear about. This is the real WordPress, and it is 100% free. It is often referred as self-hosted WordPress. When you hear things like you can create any type of website in WordPress with plugins and custom themes, this is the WordPress people are talking about.
WordPress.com is a web hosting service that offers a stripped down version of WordPress to make it easy for you to blog. You don’t get all the WordPress goodies like plugins, custom themes, etc.
To keep this article focused, we will not go into the feature comparison of the two. You can learn more about that in our WordPress.com vs WordPress.org chart.
Understanding the difference between the two is essential for understanding the ownership and business models behind the two products.
Who owns WordPress.org and the popular WordPress software?
WordPress is an open-source software. This means that anyone can see the code and contribute to the software to make it better. It’s the contributions by thousands of independent people from across the world that built WordPress to what it is today.
WordPress is licensed under GPL, and it’s important that you understand the benefits of the GPL license because that will help you better understand the ownership.
We will summarize the GPL in three main benefits:
- You can use WordPress in whatever way you like without any restrictions.
- You can customize, add or remove anything in WordPress that you don’t like without any restrictions.
- You can repackage, rebrand, sell and distribute WordPress without any restrictions except that it is also released under the GPL license.
The last part usually blows people’s mind away. Yes, you can indeed take WordPress, change the logo and the name, and start selling it (100% legal).
In other words, the code base of WordPress belongs to the community (you). The thousands of people who contributed to this non-profit project did it without any direct compensation. We will explain this in more details in the business model section of this article.
Summary: Any website you create using the self-hosted WordPress software is 100% owned by you. The content you upload to these sites is also 100% owned by you.
The WordPress trademark and the WordPress.org domain is owned by the WordPress foundation, a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization, whose sole purpose is to ensure that WordPress is freely available, maintained, and developed.
Who owns WordPress.com
WordPress.com is owned by a privately held company called Automattic.
You have to understand a little bit of history of the open-source WordPress project to understand Automattic’s contributions and the reasons why they get favorable treatment such as the ability to use the WordPress trademark and the coveted WordPress.com domain as part of their paid product.
Automattic was started by the co-founding developer of the open source WordPress software, Matt Mullenweg.
Matt created Automattic in 2005, almost two years after WordPress, with the primary purpose to make WordPress hosting easier and allow people with little technical knowledge to start a blog with WordPress.
Since WordPress.com platform was powered by the open source WordPress software, Automattic had a vested interest in the further development of the free WordPress software.
Several of the early Automattic employees were contributing developers of WordPress prior to the company, so it should go without saying that financial interest wasn’t the only reason why Automattic invested in WordPress.
Because the open-source project didn’t really make any money in the beginning, Matt first registered the WordPress trademark through Automattic.
As WordPress grew in popularity, Automattic donated the WordPress trademark to the WordPress Foundation in 2010 to ensure long-term sustainability of the non-profit project.
It’s important to note that Matt Mullenweg is the CEO of Automattic and also serves in the board of the WordPress foundation.
Now that you are familiar with the history, let’s talk about ownership of content on WordPress.com.
When you build a site using WordPress.com, you have to adhere to their Terms of Service policy. Although it clearly states that it’s designed to give you as much control and ownership of your content, someone can still shut down your site if they believe it’s in violation.
While you have 100% control over your site, you’re limited to the feature-set that’s offered to you which does not include plugins, custom themes, etc.
Hopefully by now you should have the answer to your question about who owns WordPress.
Now let’s take a look at how does WordPress make money.
Business Model of Automattic vs Business Model of WordPress
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.
What can we do to improve and clear up some of the confusion?
There is very little that can be done about the domain situation due to the business models involved.
The only real way to solve it is through education which has to be two part.
The first and foremost is the role of media.
Major tech media outlets like TechCrunch, Recode, TheNextWeb, etc need to do a better job at fact-checking to avoid articles that claim Automattic as the parent company of WordPress. It could be as simple as saying the parent company behind WordPress.com.
You can simply google the term “WordPress parent company” and you’ll find tons of articles from major tech media outlets that report false information (example: here, here, here, here, and here).
The second role is enforcement by the WordPress foundation as well as Automattic.
These media outlets are usually pitched these press releases, so if there were some re-enforcement with the top outlets, the rest will follow.
Often at blogging events when you see a WordPress booth, it’s usually an Automattic (WordPress.com) booth. While the marketing verbiage can be improved, having personally seen the employees answering questions at the booth, they are extremely helpful and almost always explain the difference.
At TBEX North America 2015, while we visited their booth, at least two people asked the question regarding of ownership of WordPress and the Automattic employees did an excellent job clearly explaining the difference.
Conclusion
We hope this article helped you answer the question about who owns WordPress, how does WordPress make money, and what that really means for your website’s control and ownership. You may also want to read our article on 15 most frequently asked questions by WordPress beginners.
If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.
You wrote that some hosting companies and others such as Yoast SEO, BackupBuddy, etc “regularly contribute back to WordPress”. Are you referring to monetary contribution? Is it mandatory for the hosting companies to pay some amount to WordPress (I can see only 4 of them advertised on the hosting page) or are you saying they voluntarily make some monetary contribution?
You’ve also added a link to WordPress Foundation’s donations page in your article and wrote it’s their “primary source of revenue”. However I couldn’t find this link or any mention of WordPress Foundation on WordPress.org home page or in their About or Get Involved pages. There is no “donate” button visible anywhere on their site – well at least it should be on their home page if it is their primary source of revenue.
I’m just trying to understand this whole thing more precisely. Thank you.
When we say companies like Yoast SEO, BackupBuddy, WPBeginner, etc regularly contribute to WordPress, we do so by sponsoring WordCamps. These companies also help out contributing to the WordPress core software (i.e finding bugs, submitting patches, etc).
We are not certain about the criteria for hosting companies listed on the official WordPress.org page because that’s decided by Matt Mullenweg, the founder of WordPress.
What I do know is that we as a company are not required to sponsor any WordCamp or contribute at all. But we do so because we want WordPress ecosystem to grow. I believe others do it for the same reasons.
Yes the foundation’s primary source of revenue is donation. When companies sponsor WordCamps, they’re basically donating the money to the Foundation which then distributes it to the respective WordCamps for organizational expenses and so-forth.
Thanks for the article Syed. You provided a clear separation between the two organizations. I also appreciated the points brought up in the exchange between you & Jeff that provided some additional information and perspective.
We are a new video technology company that is looking at potential options to offer our technology to the WordPress community (we are leaning towards building a free plug-in with some of the basic functionality and offer a premium version that would be based on a paid subscription, that included additional functionality, hosting of video content, enhanced tech support.). A couple of your other articles also provided valuable information to help us get a better understanding of the WordPress environment. I would certainly welcome the opportunity to connect if you are interested in providing some additional feedback/guidance offline.
At last a site to teach beginners! Brilliant. Good article, I never had a clue about the two sites so thanks for clearing that up. I have a small online shop selling products built on 1&1mywebsite bit need a more flexible site, what’s the suggestion? .com or .org
Thanks
Ray
Definitely, self hosted WordPress.org site is the way to go.
Thanks for the awesome clarity! I don’t know if this is the best place for a question, but I’m wanting to use a blog to cover local politics. My demographic is primarily my township. I do enjoy customization, but I am not sure I want to spend significant amounts of time learning to manage my site when my aim is to impact my environment politically/educationally.
With this in mind, would you have a suggestion as to which (.com or .org) I should employ?
We assume that you would want to reach out to as many people as you could. In that case, you should start with WordPress.org. It does come with slight learning curve but its not that difficult. You may also want to see the limitations of WordPress.com
This was an information that I wished I knew but was too lazy to find out. :), Thanks a lot, WPbeginer!
You’re welcome
Thank you, WPBeginner. I have been using WordPress.com for my food blog, and knew – vaguely – there was a difference between that and WordPress.org…until now. Thank you for clear explanation!
great piece
Hang on, Soliloquy and Envira are owned by WP Beginner? When did that happen?
That happened quite a while ago (July 2014).
I wrote about it on my personal blog:
https://syedbalkhi.com/how-to-choose-the-right-business-partner-7-tips-i-have-learned-overtime/
-Syed
I currently pay Go Daddy to host my site and I am using WP.org ‘s themes and plugins. Is there any advantage to try and host myself? My am a real estate agent.
The advantage is that it will be less expensive and you’ll have much greater control over the look and feel of things.
The disadvantage is that you’ll spend much more time setting it up, comparing themes/plugins/settings, and debugging issues when plugins conflict or your site goes down.
There are tradeoffs. Do you feel like exploring the administration side of WordPress? If not, you may just get frustrated with it, and wish you had left it in someone else’s hands.
If you do decide to host it yourself, I’ve used Digital Ocean before, and it’s been reliable. Not sure if GoDaddy allows you to host your own.
Thanks! That answer is exactly what I needed to hear. I have enough headaches now without adding to them.
your typo
[asked the question in the roam of ownership of WordPress]
ROOM
Nope — in the roam of ownership but I clarified the sentence to avoid confusion
Hey, This post is great…This answer my curious…Great post
Nice post. I hadn’t thought about this before. It sounds interesting.
Excellent article.
YES! great job on this article. When I offer WordPress (.org) to a customer, many times they point me to online platform comparisons between wordpress.com and WIX (and products like it), suggesting that a drag and drop builder is a better fit. Understanding that the full WordPress software is a separate product with features and benefits that may be a better fit for a corporate website is essential. While the .com service and other drag and drop builder services may be great for a small portfolio or blog their is a vast chasm between the two in terms of capability and range. This article made it really clear. Thank you.
It is really informative and it helps people who don’t know that basic thing.
That was almost perfect.
Seriously, really great explanation of the matter; best I’ve ever seen. But your spin on who owns the open source project missed in some critical ways.
Yes, the code is open-source, pursuant to GPL, which is itself a confusing issue. And yes, you almost could release a product with your own branding and “steal the code” to make a new product. But that doesn’t mean the community owns the code. Regardless of who makes it or how, their motivations, or the fact that you almost could get away with rebranding the WordPress core code as your own, that code lives at and is therefore owned by whoever owns wordpress.org.
And that’s the WordPress Foundation, which Mr. Mullenweg is the chairman of and which is mainly tasked, philanthropic efforts aside, with protecting the WordPress trademarks, FOR THE BENEFIT OF AUTOMATTIC, which Mr. Mullenweg is the majority owner of.
So, great story, but you missed a big point: in every meaningful way, Mr. Mullenweg and his venture capital partners own WordPress. “we”, (the community) do not.
Hi Jeff,
Thanks for dropping by. I’m very well aware of your circumstances and situation that you went through trying to fight a trademark violation battle.
This article clearly explains the history of who owns the trademark of WordPress and the favorable treatment of Automattic due to it’s history and contributions. No you’re not allowed to use the WordPress trademark in your for-profit ventures without permission of the Foundation (just like you can’t use Toyota’s trademarks). That’s all I’m going to say about that case. You’re entitled to your own opinion, but let’s not ruin this educational post to spread your personal agenda. I wrote this post in a neutral tone for educational purposes, not to bring out community politics & drama.
You’re absolutely 100% wrong about the ownership of the GPL code. When you rebrand / fork WordPress or any other GPL product for the purpose of re-distribution, you can do so legally as long as you also pass down the same freedoms to your users (in other words someone else should be able to rebrand / fork your project). WordPress was a fork of b2, WooCommerce was a fork of Jigoshop (and the rest is history).
The keyword above is redistribute. If you take the WordPress code, used it as a base for your SaaS project (say to sell a complete restaurant website solution), you DO NOT have to neither open-source nor license it under GPL because you’re not redistributing the software. You’re selling software as a service.
I normally don’t allow links in our comments, but I’m letting the one about your article stay, so others can read up your stance and learn more about your legal case. But my real hope in doing so is to ensure that this article does not get hijacked, and I hope you respect that request.
-Syed Balkhi
Founder of WPBeginner
P.S. For beginners: Forking is a term when a developer takes a copy of an open-source software and start independent development on it to customize / sell / distribute under a new brand.
Syed, actually, I said that as long as GPL rules/guidelines/whatever are followed, you have quite a bit of leeway, in agreement with what the article said, so I’m not sure what you think I was wrong about.
And yes, I have a history with trademarks and WP, which is of course how I came to know about this piece and be interested in it, but I have no axe to grind; our disagreement was settled to the satisfaction of all.
As I said, I thought this was a great article. My only point was that it’s naive to believe that in PRACTICAL terms anyone other than Automattic, MaTT/The WP Foundation owns the whole thing.
Thank you! I was not particulary curious about this, but one can always know more about everything!