The name “WordPress” has made an outrageous response in the world of web. One of the most popular blogging tool and content management system (CMS), WordPress forms the backbone for most websites. We all know about it very well, but do you know its start-up was not that smooth? Initially starting with a fund of $1.5 million, WordPress has come across many economic gambles and structural changes since its inception. There are many facts that are still unknown to most of us. It started its journey as an open source software. The rapid advancement it made in the past decade is simply unbelievable. Let’s unfold the interesting history of WordPress.
It’s history
History of WordPress dates back to 2003 when it was launched by creator Matt Mullenweg and Mike Little. It originated in the replacement of existing blogging software b2/ cafelog. First launched as WordPress.org having a support forum, schematic documentation, and a development blog, it did not take too long to expand Matt’s vision. In the year 2004, Mullenweg and his fellow partner Dougal Campbell launched a new tab for modifying the search named Ping-O-Matic.
The year 2015 is remarkable in the history of WordPress
- WordPress is powering more than 25% of all websites.
- 70% of the agencies state that the traffic of the WordPress site is growing.
- 60% of the agencies state that the WordPress budget is being increased in a few years.
- 90% of the agencies prefer WordPress mostly due to the ease of use.
- Three primary factors why agencies prefer using WordPress includes:
- 64% prefers it for security, 58% of Performance and 52% for its latest path breaking features
WordPress Industry usage
- 79% local business
- 55% individuals
- 53% Brands
- 44% Education
- 36% Media
- 30% Public Companies
- 22% Government
- 13% Nonprofits
Do you know
- Its CMS market share is 60.7%
- Version 4.0 was downloaded 850 times on an average per minute in the first hours after its release
- More than 80% of the 40,000 most popular websites use WordPress
- 60% of Internet users use WordPress
- 20% use it as a blog/ CMS combo
- 6% use it for blogging only
- 7% use it as an application manager
A brief analysis of WordPress evolution
- Consisting of 35,640 plug-ins, and 829,825,409 downloads WordPress history though not very old, is varied
- It was named by the business coach Christine Tremoulet.
- Currently, WordPress runs more than 66 million websites
- WordPress enables money making to more than 20,000 people by its endless features.
- This is the best platform for freelancers and bloggers
- WordPress has been translated into 51 dialects till date
- WordPress was initially introduced as a platform for building blogs but developed slowly to an extraordinary platform for making e-commerce websites
- WordPress powers more than 1 billion sites
The first WordPress version consisted of a new admin interface, new templates and also generated XHTML 1.1 compliant themes.In 2004 WordPress introduced a new mechanism called Plug-ins, allowing the users to extend the functionality by writing their Plug-ins and sharing with the community.
At that time blogging industry was being dominated by Moveable Type. However, the licensing terms used by them were not liked by many users. The users then started looking for another blogging platform.WordPress 1.2 made an ambitious approach by offering a good platform for blogging. With the development of the new version, its user rate expanded rapidly.The year 2005 marked a new trend in the history of WordPress.
WordPress launched its first theme named Kubrick and a new admin dashboard in the same year. In this version, the users need not load the page every time for adding simple features. It enabled the users to add several categories or tags to the post. It does not need reloading the comments on screen.
Apart from this, the year also marked the official launch of WordPress.com.A commercial entity named Automattic was also launched in the same year. Automattic is renowned for making excellent contributions in WordPress. In the year 2006, it filed the trademark registration for WordPress and logo.In the year 2007, the 2.1 version of WordPress developed a new user interface, autosave and spelled checking.
The year 2008-2009 introduced some high-end development in WordPress. Happy-Cog led redesign is to name one.By the end of the year 2009, WordPress made a steady place in the minds of the developers. But the market share was still low and the scenario was to change very soon.In 2010, Automattic, the organization that was pioneered by WordPress co-founder Matt Mullenweg transferred the ownership of WordPress trademark and logo to WordPress Foundation. This was a notable moment in the WordPress history that clearly proved that the growth of WordPress is not dependent on a company or a group of developers.
With the advent of 2012 three new features like theme customizer, theme previews and new media managers were introduced in WordPress. With these new features, WordPress enabled users to create a new image gallery and theme preview, before setting it.
In 2013 WordPress came up with its newest version 3.7. This enabled the users to opt for automation of updates of the minor releases of the site’s software.
WordPress 3.8 that was released in the same year introduced MP6, a new user interface. This improved the user experience on any device irrespective of the screen size.
WordPress 3.9, introduced in the year 2014 focused on improving the visual post editor in WordPress. This helps to drag and drop images directly in the post editor and allows preview of the galleries.
Though now looks like a natural occurrence, WordPress has faced a lot of commercial uncertainty in the beginning. WordPress exhibited high profile development within a short span of time with its tremendous effort and dedication.
It’s future
After history of WordPress, lets look towards the future of WordPress. This year in 2016, WordPress turned 13 ! With the steady and rapid growth, WordPress now has plug-ins that exceed about 40,000. To predict its future it is better to listen to the words of the founder Matt Mullenweg “I see the future of WordPress as the web operating system.”
Some must know facts about WordPress
- Technorati, one of the top-ranked U.S advertising platforms uses WordPress for its blog management purpose
- Only the keyword “WordPress” accounts for more than 37 million searches
- WordPress has number of unique visitors than Amazon in U.S.
- WordPress publishes 342 posts per minute
- World’s most popular business website is WordPress
Useful statistics about WordPress
- About 48% of top 100 blogs are running on WordPress platform
- Akismet is the most favorite plug-in of WordPress. Its average download rate is 18,000 per day
- More than 70% of websites are using WordPress version 4
- WordPress is the product of only 283 brains
- WordPress is visited by 14.7 billion people
WordPress themes
The enormously wide WordPress community comprises of thousands of designers and developers, writers and users. It is with their joint contribution that WordPress growth is so vast.
WordPress themes are an excellent way to attract users. This reduces the cost and energy of a custom site design. CyberChimps’ Free WordPress Theme – Responsive ,is world’s most popular Free Responsive WordPress Theme. Updated regularly and based on an intuitive foundation. Responsive automatically adapts to any device your readers use to access your WordPress blog. With over 100,000+ active installs, CyberChimps is proud of this theme.
Here is a small infographic to summarize the history of WordPress
4 Comments on “History of WordPress”
Yes, wordpress has been one of the most reliable upcoming content management system, though we had been trying to use Drupal too but wp wins in many a ways, Hope there are enough HIGH END contributors to WP just like drupal and it gets more advanced moduling features too.
Stacey, True that!
very nice and detailed piece written on the subject, keep up the good work Pooja.
Thank you :)