You have probably heard someone say it: “Google loves WordPress.” People repeat this as if it were a law of nature, right up there with gravity. I have heard it at conferences, in Facebook groups, and on countless podcasts over the years. And while I understand why people believe it, the statement is misleading.
Correlation Is Not Causation
WordPress sites do tend to perform well in search results. That is an observable fact. But the question you should ask is this: are these sites ranking well because of WordPress, or because of something else that WordPress happens to facilitate?
If you created two websites with identical content, identical structure, identical speed, and identical backlink profiles — one built on WordPress and one built on static HTML — Google would not care which platform you used. In fact, Google would have difficulty even telling the difference if both sites were built well.
Google does not love WordPress. Google loves well-constructed websites that follow best practices. WordPress just makes it easier to build that kind of site.
What WordPress Gets Right by Default
When you install WordPress with a modern theme and a few essential plugins, you automatically get several things that matter for search performance. Clean URL structures. Proper heading hierarchy. Internal linking between related content. XML sitemaps for search engine crawling. Automatic content indexing notifications. User-generated content through comments. RSS feeds that promote distribution.
Most static HTML sites built by beginners do not include these features, not because the technology cannot support them, but because the builder did not know they were important or did not want to implement them manually.
The 2026 Reality
The landscape has evolved significantly since I first wrote about this in 2010. WordPress now powers over forty percent of the internet, which means Google's algorithm has been extensively tuned to crawl and understand WordPress sites. But the same is true for other popular platforms like Shopify, Webflow, and even custom-built sites on modern frameworks.
What actually matters for search rankings in 2026 has not changed at its core: create genuinely useful content, ensure your site is fast and mobile-friendly, build real authority through quality backlinks and brand signals, and follow Google's webmaster guidelines. These fundamentals apply regardless of what platform you build on.
WordPress remains an excellent choice for most internet entrepreneurs — not because Google has a secret preference for it, but because it makes it easy to do the things that Google actually cares about. Build a good site. Follow the guidelines. The platform is just a tool.
I agree, it is the various SEO factors that matter. If you know what you are doing with HTML you can achieve the same thing, it just takes a little more work. Conversely, if you don’t know what you are doing with WordPress, you can nullify or miss some of the advantages.
One more boost WordPress sites often get is fresh content, because blogs are easier to post to on the fly, and Google likes active sites.
Excellent — ease of use for the user is a great point. Thanks, Garth.
Yes, good info and good comments. I come from more of a static html background and am trying to learn how to best leverage WordPress for use as primary sites, mainly due to the fresh content convenience and flexibility.
There are other good content management systems out there now that can be just as effective as WordPress and possibly easier to learn to manage… two I’ve been looking at are the Adobe Business Catalyst system and also a company called SquareSpace.com If you have any input or feedback on either of these, would love to hear it.
As far as I know, you can’t use something like “pingomatic” on static sites… correct?
Thanks for interesting article.
Christine
Sure — you can use a site called html2rss.com which takes your html and converts it to rss.
Then you can then ping the rss feed, submit it to feed aggregators etc…
Regards,
Mark
I totally agree. WordPress just makes all those things so EASY compared to doing those things with a static site. I never really thought it was WordPress per se. Thanks for putting these nebulous thoughts into very clear words.
My pleasure Carma. You are welcome.
Mark – I am looking at a couple of html pre-sell sites for some new domains I have simply because I’ve had more miss than hit conversions with wp blog sites. Most WP blogs I see are pretty crappy for conversions – including mine. Obviously there is no hard and fast rule here and some of the newer wp themes are much better at presenting a good page for sale conversions. Adsense is obviously a different animal. Lastly – I’m wondering if comments are realistic for niche sites? authority sites – absolutely. Thanks!
I would definately use a special theme with no side bar for sales pages. I love WP for sales pages because you can get up and running really fast, and you can easily add extra pages on the domain for SEO.
I don’t get many comments on my niche AdSense sites that are not spam or backlinking — but I do get some. And I do approve them.
Mark
I’m wondering if the amount of overhead code generated by default in WordPress could be seen as a detriment when compared with a sleekly coded (and well SEO’d) static HTML site.
If Google is weighting site loading speed more heavily now I think the advantage could go to the HTML site.
I don’t see a lot of bloated HTML on a well coded WP site with a good theme. WP is just an engine — all the bloat comes from the theme.
I totally agree. Google does not love a blog just because it’s WordPress but there are other things that are actually contributing to its higher ranking. I have been seeing a lot of blogs that are ranking but on a different platform.
Mark I have had many people ask me that question more than more over the past year, and by doing my research…regular sites rank just as well, but more people are just caught up on wordpress more than ever.
“TrafficColeman “Signing Off”
Good post Mark. I agree with your philosophy on WordPress, it’s more about the way the sites are optimized for SEO. I just found your site through Pat Flynn’s podcast. It seems that I am in your target niche as I am starting my internet business while working full time. When I first started trying to do this it felt very daunting but now that I see success stories like Pat’s and yours it seems somehow more attainable.
You are right, Mark. A lot of people think that having a wordpress or a blogspot blog will just help you with ranking in Google. The thing they don’t know is that Google doesn’t care what platform you’re using, while you’re doing it correctly.
I have never worked with any other forms of website building other than using a wordpress platform. So i cannot comment on building websites using HTML. Initially it was a bit of a learning curve but now i find it so easy to put up a quality wordpress site in no time at all, and it looks very professional as well. There are so many plugins that you can use that enhances the wordpress experience. And the great thing is as long as you set the site up correctly, Google loves them.
I cant get it, Google hates custom sites? Is google push all websites to be in wordpress platform?
The reasons that have been mentioned can also have non-wordpress websites, but the rankings are lower than wordpress websites. Example: many seo comanies uses wordpress platform.
Ok lets stop developing then, like the most seo companies that have their sites in wordpress platform..
Nope. It just that WordPress has many features that custom sites often ignore.
Hmm, I do not believe that, Google loves the web 2.0, blogging with some platforms. When I search something in google usually the first results are blogspot (ohh yea, it is google’s product, coincidence) or wordpress. Usally with unreliable information.