Flywheel
Design-agency-focused managed WordPress hosting owned by WP Engine, running on Google Cloud Platform infrastructure with a client-friendly billing dashboard, free staging sites, and a lighter-weight alternative to WP Engine's own pricing.
Pricing Plans
| Plan | Price/mo | CPU | RAM | Storage | Bandwidth | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Tiny | $15.00 | Shared (isolated) | Shared | 5GB SSD | 20GB | 1 site, 5K visits/mo, free SSL, daily backups |
| Starter | $30.00 | Shared (isolated) | Shared | 10GB SSD | 50GB | 1 site, 25K visits/mo, free staging |
| Freelance | $115.00 | Shared (isolated) | Shared | 20GB SSD | 200GB | 10 sites, 100K combined visits/mo, client billing tools |
| Agency | $290.00 | Shared (isolated) | Shared | 50GB SSD | 500GB | 30 sites, 400K combined visits/mo, white-label options |
· Updated
Flywheel was acquired by WP Engine in 2019 but continues to operate as a separate, actively maintained product with its own dashboard, brand, and pricing, now running on the same Google Cloud Platform infrastructure that powers WP Engine itself. Its target customer has always been design agencies and freelance web designers rather than enterprise WordPress operations.
Built for Client Work
Flywheel’s dashboard is organized around managing multiple client sites rather than a single property: built-in client billing tools let agencies invoice clients directly through the platform, and demo sites can be shared with clients for approval before a project goes live, without needing a separate staging tool.
Local Development
Flywheel ships Local, a free local WordPress development app used well beyond Flywheel’s own customer base, that lets developers build and test sites offline before pushing them live to a Flywheel-hosted environment with one click.
Performance and Infrastructure
Since moving to WP Engine’s Google Cloud Platform backend, Flywheel sites benefit from the same isolated-container architecture and global network as WP Engine, while retaining a simpler, more design-focused feature set and generally lower price point than WP Engine’s own plans.
Verdict
Flywheel suits freelance designers and small agencies who want WP Engine-grade infrastructure with a friendlier, client-facing workflow and lower entry pricing. Larger agencies with heavier traffic or advanced enterprise requirements will likely outgrow it faster than they would WP Engine directly.