Why are people leaving WordPress?

People are leaving WordPress mainly over maintenance: plugin updates, security patches, PHP versions, and page builders that slow sites down. Every install becomes a small IT job. The pattern shows up in every migration survey.

Hosted rivals removed that job. Webflow, Framer, and Shopify ship hosting, security, and design in one subscription, which is where much of the migration goes. The Gutenberg editor also pushed away long-time users who preferred the classic flow.

WordPress is not outdated in 2026, it still runs about 40 percent of the web and ranks fine. The downside of using WordPress was never capability. It is the upkeep, and small teams feel it most.

For businesses staying on WordPress without staffing it, an SEO agency replacement for WordPress businesses automates the content half of the workload.