What WordPress Agencies Want Most From Hosting Providers in 2026

In today’s new digital era, WordPress agencies are acting as a hosting provider…just at a different kind of level. They’re the ones managing hosting, maintenance, security, and performance across dozens or even hundreds of client sites.

And perhaps most surprisingly, most of them are doing it as a solo operator (43%) or a team of fewer than 10 people (35%).

“What this survey makes visible is a mismatch: a solo operator or a handful of generalists is now responsible for a hundred or more live client sites,” explained Igor Seletskiy, CloudLinux’s CEO and Founder.

According to a new benchmark report from CloudLinux and WebPros, 83% are also the ones actually picking the host for their clients. The client isn’t out there comparison shopping — they’re going with whatever their agency recommends.

So the question is: Are hosts actually giving agencies what they need to do that job?

Here’s what the data actually shows: at 100+ sites, 90% of agencies run at least some infrastructure on self-managed VPS or dedicated servers. That’s not a vote against managed hosting. It’s a verdict on managed hosting that wasn’t built for them.

The economics are real - per-site costs compound fast at scale. But the bigger driver is control: large clients need custom configurations, and agencies can't afford to be told no. When a managed platform can't flex, agencies absorb the operational burden themselves rather than lose the client.

The signal for providers is clear. These agencies aren't chasing raw infrastructure - they're chasing ownership of the outcome. The managed hosting model that wins at this tier is one that gives agencies white-label control, configuration flexibility, and predictable economics, without making them the ones responsible for patching, security, and uptime at 2am. That product exists. The agencies running their own servers just haven't found it yet.

To be completely honest, nobody reading this will be surprised to learn what agencies’ number-one pain in the neck is: 65% say that keeping plugins and themes updated across all their client sites is their main security issue.

Other concerns are worth noting, sure — brute-force attacks, clients not following best practices, and cleaning up malware come in between 27% and 33% — but they’re clearly not as prevalent of a concern.

And yet, 45% of agencies managing 100+ sites are still doing plugin updates manually, one site at a time. Thirty-eight percent say automated WordPress updates with intelligent pre-update testing is the AI capability they want most.

"The work that scales worst — security and patching across the whole portfolio — is exactly where agencies say they most want AI and automation, and exactly where it has barely arrived," said Seletskiy. "That's the single biggest lever in front of this market, and it's where we're focused."

Many agencies are already using AI for content, coding, and SEO…and yet, only 16% use it for site monitoring or maintenance. The report says that there’s a specific wishlist for what comes next: automated updates, automated security, and automated performance.

Which makes sense, right? A three-person shop managing 80 client sites doesn't need another feature, but they do need to stop manually patching WordPress installs every week. And yet, many hosting platforms have yet to build it.

"WordPress agencies are carrying more responsibility than ever with no proportional increase in resources," said Craig Millman, the CCO at WebPros. "The findings reinforce our conviction that hosting infrastructure needs to do more of the heavy lifting through automation, AI and smarter tooling so agencies can focus on what they do best."

It probably explains why only 37% of agencies feel prepared for what's to come in the next two to three years. That’s a whole third of agencies looking for something to hold onto. The hosts that come to the table with what the industry is actually asking for — real solutions, not more features — are the ones that are most likely to get that business.

Speaking of AI: Since agencies are already building with agentic AI — Cursor, Claude Code, Windsurf — the sites they’re asking hosts to help take care of are getting more complex.

Even WordPress itself is going in the same direction, with 7.0 coming with a native AI client, and Automattic created a dedicated AI team last year. Plus, 39% of agencies are already running AI agents for complicated, multi-step development tasks…which really just takes this conversation even further.

It’s not just about hosting WordPress, but about whatever WordPress is becoming, which includes real-time collaboration (eventually, maybe), AI connectors, higher server demands, different security needs entirely.

In other words: Managed WP hosts have to keep pace with WordPress just as much as WordPress is trying to keep pace with every other platform.