Ten interesting facts about WordPress

Recently WordPress turned 15 (27th May 2018) and here I am sharing with you some interesting facts about WordPress in the same spirit. WordPress is the world’s most popular content management system (CMS) and it powers around 33% of the web. You may or may not know the facts I am going to share below. So, take a deep breath and here you go! 😀

WordPress is older than Twitter and Facebook

The first version of WordPress was released on May 23, 2003, whereas Facebook and Twitter were founded in 2004 and 2006 respectively.

The term ‘WordPress’ was coined by a lady

The name ‘WordPress’ was suggested by Christine Selleck, a friend of lead developer Matt Mullenweg (WordPress co-founder).

WordPress powers more than 33% of all the sites on the internet

According to W3Techs – Web Technology Surveys, as of February 2019, WordPress is used by more than 33.0% of all the websites they have come across on the internet.

WordPress is free and open source

WordPress is an open source project released under GNU GPL license. Moreover, there are hundreds of people all over the world working on it (more than most commercial platforms). It also means you are free to use it for anything from your recipe or portfolio site to a Fortune 500 website without paying anyone a license fee and a number of other important freedoms.

WordPress is not owned by anyone

Since it WordPress is an open source project, it is not owned by a company rather it is supported by volunteers from across the globe. Moreover, anyone can request for new features, submit bug reports and fixes, improve documentation, volunteer in the support forums, etc.

WordPress generates billions of US dollars

There are so many individuals, agencies, and businesses that have based their source of income around WordPress – the wonder software. There are many companies which develop large-scale professional WordPress sites for large clients (Fortune 500 companies), develop premium WordPress themes and plugins, maintain and manage online marketplaces, and provide specialized WordPress hosting. Many of these companies generate millions to billions of US Dollars worth revenue each year.

There are more than 54,500 free WordPress plugins

Plugins help us extend the functionality of WordPress by allowing us to add new features without touching a single line of code.

65+ translations of WordPress is available

If you are not comfortable with using WordPress is English, there are high chances that it is available in your native language. Do check out this page for more information. Though it is fully translated into 65+ languages, there are many other languages that WordPress has partially been translated into.

WordPress loves Jazz

Since WordPress core developers share a love of jazz music, all major WordPress releases are named in honor of jazz musicians they personally admire. From Miles Davis, Charles Mingus, Billy Strayhorn to Pepper Adams and Sarah Vaughan, every version of WordPress honors its own Jazz artist.

WordPress has got siblings

The same community behind WordPress is also responsible for running sister projects like bbPress and BuddyPress. They are also open source software built on top of WordPress. bbPress is a forum software whereas BuddyPress helps you to build any type of community website using WordPress, with member profiles, activity streams, user groups, messaging, and more.

Conclusion

Thus I hope this post helped you in getting to know some interesting facts about WordPress. You may also want to read my guide on how to choose the best hosting for WordPress. If you liked these interesting facts, please do share it with your friends on Facebook and Twitter.