Free WordPress: How To Create A Free Website?

Are you a professional, and do you want to promote your activity on the Internet? Are you an individual and want to create a blog? Or are you a merchant and you want to sell products on the Internet? So, it's obvious that the first thing you're going to have to do is create a quality website that will allow you to carry out your project successfully.

To do this, the most widely used tool on the web is the famous CMS WordPress. And if many people are moving towards it, it's because it is really qualitative and it allows you to personalize your site endlessly. Above all, it has the advantage of being completely free (in theory).

So, let's see how to create a free site with WordPress as well as the limitations linked to this way of proceeding and how to go further.

Read more also: Mastering WordPress: Tips and Tricks for Web Designers

What is WordPress?

To begin our article on creating a free site with WordPress, let's first introduce this tool. WordPress belongs to the category of CMS (for Content Management System) . The latter was developed in 2001 , and therefore has many years of experience in the field of website creation.

With WordPress, you will be able to create all kinds of websites: blogs, portfolios, online stores or even showcase sites. To help you in this process and allow you to create a site that really suits you, the CMS provides you with a very large number of themes and thousands of plugins (extensions) to serve all your projects.

But where WordPress stands out, especially compared to online site creators (see our comparison of site creators ), is that its installation and use are completely free. Some online website publishers also offer free offers, but these are very limited, whether in number of pages or functionality. This is not the case with WordPress.

So let's see without further delay how to create a free site with the famous CMS in a few simple steps. We will then review the limitations of this process, and we will give you advice for improving your WordPress-powered website.

The one  web host we recommend:

Create a free site with WordPress: tutorial to get started

To help you in your process of creating a free WordPress site, we will quickly detail the few steps involved.

This way you will know what to expect, and what you can and cannot do. Let's start with the first step in creating any website with WordPress: web hosting.

Web hosting and CMS installation

The first step to creating your free site with WordPress will be to find web hosting. Nowadays, a very large number of web hosts offer their services on the Internet. So you are spoiled for choice. But if you want to create a completely free WordPress site , your choice will have to be limited to hosts offering free hosting plans.

Among the latter, we can cite Hostinger, the market leader, which offers a free offer called 000WebHost. Also, you may be interested in PlanetHoster, another quality host, which offers a free plan called World Lite. You will find more details about these offers in our comparison of 100% free web hosts .

However, this mode of operation will not allow you to access truly quality hosting, whether in terms of security or performance. In addition, no personalized domain name will be offered to you. If this still suits you, you can validate your web hosting and then move on: install WordPress.

While premium hosts generally offer simplified installation of the CMS, this is not necessarily the case for free hosts. You will therefore have to go through some technical manipulations. First, go to the official WordPress website, then click “Get WordPress”.

You will then be able to download the new version of the CMS. You will then need to migrate the WordPress files to your server before finalizing the configuration of your site. You will then have the opportunity to start customizing your free site with WordPress right away.

Choosing a theme and adding content

As soon as you have configured your free WordPress website, you will be able to move on to the creation-focused part.

To begin, you will be able to choose a theme for your website. With WordPress, you will have an infinite number of themes to choose from. However, be sure to visit the free theme store if you want to have a site without spending money.

Here, the choice will be a little more limited than if you explore paid themes. The same goes for the features to add to your theme: paid themes are less advanced. But if it can fit your project, simply choose the theme you are interested in apply it to your WordPress site. Once this step has been completed, you will be able to start adding pages and content to your website.

The WordPress editor is quite simple. Through it, you will be able to write texts, add images and other multimedia content, as well as organize the pages of your site. To do all this, simply go to the left menu on your WordPress dashboard. There you will find a “pages” tab, another “articles”, and even a tab dedicated to the settings of your free WordPress site.

At this level, nothing pays off. You can therefore add the content of your choice freely and for free. Where things may get complicated will be in the next step: adding plugins.

Installing plugins

WordPress is renowned for its numerous extensions, which allow you to create your website in a personalized and almost limitless way. Once you've created your website, you'll probably want to add a few more to personalize it. To do this, it's very simple: go to the “Extensions” menu of your dashboard.

You can then search for plugins based on their usefulness, the features offered or even the price. To take advantage of extensions that are not paid for and therefore remain in your perspective of a 100% free WordPress site, take care to sort everything carefully according to this criterion. This way, you can add some plugins to your website.

In particular, you will have access to the free version of Yoast SEO, a benchmark plugin for the SEO of your website. You will also be able to equip your WordPress site with the MonsterInsights plugin for free, to easily manage Google Analytics. To add these extensions to your WordPress site, simply select them from the “Extensions” menu, then click “Install Now”, then “Activate”.

If it's largely satisfactory, keep in mind that you may encounter some difficulties if you ever want to stay in something completely free. Either way, once you've found the plugins you want to add to your site and installed them, all you have to do is launch your free WordPress site.

Publication and communication

So that your free WordPress site can be seen by Internet users and so that you can develop it and make it known, it is necessary that it can be indexed by search engines. And for your site to be crawled by web crawlers like Googlebot, you need to authorize it. So, it is necessary that you go to the “Settings” menu of your WordPress dashboard.

You will then find a menu called “Playback”. Within this menu, the “Ask search engines not to index this site” box should be unchecked. This operation may take several days to be taken into account by search engines. So don't panic if your site doesn't appear immediately in Google results.

Once your free WordPress site is visible online, you still have a very important part to manage: its promotion. For this, you can use different methods, but if you want to stay with something free, the alternatives are fewer.

You can then focus on your SEO, but also on social networks to relay your content. Use free tools such as Google Analytics can also help you with your strategy by allowing you to study the profile and behavior of your visitors.

The best WordPress web hosting currently:

Hostinger 

Here are five key features of Hostinger: 

1. Affordable Pricing: Hostinger offers budget-friendly hosting plans with competitive pricing, making it an multiple option for individuals and small companies trying to get online visibility without going over budget.
2. User-friendly Control Panel: Hostinger provides a user-friendly control panel, typically cPanel or its custom hPanel, which makes managing a website easier, including file and domain management, one-click installations of popular applications like WordPress.
3. High Performance: Hostinger boasts high-performance servers and advanced technologies like SSD storage and LiteSpeed caching, ensuring fast loading times and reliable uptime for websites hosted on their platform.
4. 24/7 Customer Support: Hostinger offers round-the-clock customer support via live chat, ticketing system, and extensive knowledge base, assisting users with any technical issues or inquiries they may have at any time of the day.
5. Security Features: Hostinger prioritizes website security by providing features like free SSL certificates, daily backups, and advanced security protocols to safeguard websites from cyber threats and ensure data protection for users and visitors alike. 

The limits of a 100% free WordPress site

As you will have understood, although creating a completely free site with WordPress is indeed achievable, the possibilities offered have significant limits. We will present them briefly below. The goal is to make you realize what this represents.

Performances

The first area where your free WordPress site may fall short is performance. Indeed, if you do not spend any money on your WordPress site, it will not perform as well as if you opt for a few paid options.

For example, as we said earlier in this article, a free hosting plan will perform less well than a paid hosting plan. The servers allocated to free hosting are less qualitative and their configuration is not always the best for optimal use of WordPress. Your free WordPress site will therefore potentially be slower, but also less secure and less available.

For your development as well as user experience, this can be very bad. The same goes for your search engine ranking. Even if you put a lot of effort into the SEO of your free WordPress site, it will not be indexed at best if it is slow, if it is insecure or if the user experience is poor.

Clearly, creating a free WordPress site can correspond to certain projects and can possibly be an interesting method for getting started in the field. However, if you want to create a successful website, you will necessarily have to opt for paid web hosting. It's the minimum.

Functionalities 

If a free WordPress site can prove to be poorly performing, the same is true in statements of the functionalities that you can add to it. When it comes to features for creating your WordPress site, if you want to stay with something completely free, you're going to run into some problems.

First of all, as we said above, free hosts generally do not offer assisted automatic installation of the CMS. You will therefore have to go through sometimes complicated technical manipulations to achieve your goals, which can discourage less experienced users.

Then, as for the actual creation of your WordPress website, you have seen during this article that you risk being restricted on several levels. This could be the case for choosing your design (the theme of your site), as free themes are more limited than paid themes.

Likewise, you probably won't be able to add all the features you want to your free WordPress site. Many of the most quality plugins are paid, so you are likely to find yourself stuck. But rest assured, solutions exist to resolve all these problems... without breaking the bank.

How to boost your WordPress site?

We have just seen that creating a free WordPress site imposes certain limits. If you want to benefit from a more efficient and more complete site without breaking the bank, know that this is entirely possible. We'll explain to you without further delay what you can do to grow your WordPress site.

Web hosting

The first thing to consider for your WordPress site is its hosting. Indeed, if you opt for free hosting, you will not benefit from a high-performance server, as we saw earlier in this article. But rest assured, hosting optimized for WordPress doesn't have to be expensive.

To find this type of hosting, we strongly advise you to go to Hostinger ( our full review of Hostinger is available here ).

The latter offers hosting plans designed for the use of the famous CMS, starting from only €1.99 per month. You will be able to benefit from the automatic and simplified installation of WordPress, but also benefit from a perfectly adapted, fast and secure server.

This will work in favor of your website, whether for its development or for its SEO. Your experience will be much better. If you want to consider another solution, know that you can also turn to the web host PlanetHoster . The latter displays a quality hosting plan, perfectly suited to WordPress.

The plan called “The World” is available from €6 per month. In both cases, know that you will have the possibility of having a personalized and free domain name. You will agree, good web hosting optimized for WordPress can be very inexpensive and will allow you to create a much more quality site.

Extensions

If WordPress is so successful, it is in particular because of the multiple extensions that the CMS allows you to add to your website. However, we have seen that if you want to proceed completely free, your choice will be limited. But once again, rest assured. Adding a few quality extensions will not necessarily cost you a lot, and above all, it will allow you to significantly improve your website.

You can also find our top of the best WordPress plugins on this subject . To give you an idea of ​​what you can do with paid plugins, know that you can really take your WordPress site to the next level.

First of all, although basic plugins such as Yoast SEO or MonsterInsights which we talked about above are accessible in a free basic version, they are more efficient and complete in their paid version.

These cost between $79 and $99 per year for more advanced versions, which can really be worth it in terms of SEO and strategy, to develop and make your WordPress site profitable.

Finally, also be aware that a large number of plugins specialized in multiple areas can be paid for. This is particularly the case with Elementor, an essential page creation plugin ( known as “page builder” ). The latter is available in a free version. Now it's really its paid version that is worth the detour.

Elementor will allow you to access many templates, widgets and features, for a price starting at $49 per year . As you will have understood, spending a little bit on quality plugins will really improve your WordPress site.

Conclusion

Now that you have read our dedicated article, you know how to create a free WordPress site. You also know the characteristics of this CMS, and above all, you are aware of the limits that you will encounter when creating a free website with this tool.

To summarize, we can say that creating a free website with WordPress can be difficult, both technically and in terms of developing your site. However, we can also say, without risk of being mistaken, that a few small expenses can make your WordPress site take off.

First of all, you can opt for paid plugins to boost the functionality of your website. But also and above all, take care to choose quality web hosting. Free hosting will not be up to the task, instead turn to Hostinger and its plans optimized for WordPress, accessible at a low price.