WordPress Maintenance Plan: What's Included and What It Costs
A WordPress maintenance plan is the difference between a website and a website that still works in two years. Here is what a good plan includes, what it costs from a freelancer, an agency, or yourself, and the monthly routine if you do it alone.
A WordPress maintenance plan is not exciting, and nobody puts it on a wish list. Then a plugin update breaks the contact form on a Friday, or a hacked site starts sending spam, and suddenly it is the only thing anyone cares about. Most owners discover they needed one on the day the site went down.
I hear the same story from new clients: the developer who built the site disappeared, nobody has logged in for a year, and the site is running software three major versions behind. This guide covers what a WordPress maintenance plan should include, what it costs by route, and how to run a basic one yourself if you must.
In this guide
- WordPress maintenance plan: what it is and what it prevents
- WordPress maintenance plan: what should be included
- WordPress maintenance plan cost: DIY, freelancer, agency, or WaaS
- WordPress maintenance plan: when your developer disappears
- WordPress maintenance plan: a monthly routine you can run yourself
- WordPress maintenance plan: how to choose one
WordPress maintenance plan: what it is and what it prevents
A WordPress maintenance plan is a recurring service that keeps the software, the hosting, and the content of your site in working order. WordPress itself, your theme, and every plugin release updates constantly, and many of those updates fix security holes. Patchstack counted nearly 8,000 new vulnerabilities across the WordPress ecosystem in 2024, and roughly 96% of them were in plugins, not in WordPress itself.
"An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure."
That is the whole case for maintenance. The plan costs a small, steady amount. Recovery from a hack, a lost database, or a broken checkout costs far more, and it arrives at the worst time.
WordPress maintenance plan: what should be included
Plans vary wildly, so compare the contents, not the price. A solid one covers these:
- Core, theme, and plugin updates, tested before they go live.
- Daily or weekly backups, stored off the server, with a restore you have actually tested.
- Security hardening, in line with the officialWordPress hardening guide.
- Uptime monitoring, so someone knows within minutes if the site goes down.
- A speed check each month. Slow creep is a maintenance problem, as I explain in my guide tospeeding up a WordPress website.
- Small content changes, measured in hours, so a phone number does not need a project plan.
- A named person to contact, with a response time you can write down.
The restore test
Ask the provider when they last restored a backup, not just made one. A backup that has never been restored is a hope, not a plan.
WordPress maintenance plan cost: DIY, freelancer, agency, or WaaS
The ranges are typical figures we see in the US market, and they exclude hosting unless stated. Add your hosting bill when you compare. The full three-year math is in my guide to what a business website costs.
WordPress maintenance plan: when your developer disappears
The most common reason people come to us is an orphaned site. The developer moved on, the login is on an old email, the hosting is billed to someone who left the company, and the site has not been updated in 14 months. Three things are usually true: you do not know who controls the domain, you have no recent backup, and one more plugin update could break something.
Start by finding the domain registrar and the hosting account. Then get an independent backup before anything else changes. After that, decide: bring the site under a maintenance plan, or rebuild it. If it is outdated enough that updates are risky, a rebuild is often cheaper than repair. Our redesign guide explains how to do that without losing search traffic.
WordPress maintenance plan: a monthly routine you can run yourself
A four-week rhythm for owners who maintain their own WordPress site.
If you choose to do it yourself, set a recurring calendar event and keep it small. Update in the order of core, then plugins, then theme, and test the contact form after every round. Remove plugins you do not use rather than deactivating them. Keep one admin account for yourself and delete accounts for anyone who left.
WordPress maintenance plan: how to choose one
- Is hosting included, or billed separately?
- How many hours of changes come with the plan?
- What is the response time when the site is down?
- Where do backups live, and when was the last restore?
- Who owns the domain and logins if I cancel?
At Monika, we fold this into WAAS: $99 a month covers hosting, domain, plugins, site management, and two hours of changes, with the build on WordPress and Breakdance. If you want to own the infrastructure and still have someone who understands the strategy behind the site, SYSTEM is $2,000 once. The website as a service guide explains the model, the FAQ covers terms, and you can see the results of our work in the portfolio.
Stop worrying about updates
Monika WAAS handles hosting, upkeep, and monthly changes for $99. Monika SYSTEM rebuilds an unmaintained site on your own infrastructure for $2,000. Both ship in seven days.