When it comes to hosting your WordPress website, or really any website, you have a ton of options. Over the years, I’ve moved closer to managing my own servers, but I’m realistic: I don’t want to be a server admin. What I do want is complete control over my data, an affordable solution, and top-tier performance.
After a lot of searching, I finally landed on something I absolutely love: CloudPanel. In this post, I’ll share what it is, how it works, my experience using it, and why I think it’s a game-changer, not matter how many sites you host.
What is CloudPanel?
CloudPanel is a server control panel that sits on top of the infrastructure you rent. This isn’t a revolutionary concept since there are plenty of similar solutions like GridPane, RunCloud, and xCloud. In fact, I was a GridPane customer for two years, but I found it too expensive for what I was getting. I wanted something feature-rich, yet affordable for running a small WordPress agency and hosting my own sites and my clients.
That’s when I found CloudPanel.
One of the standout features? It’s free. That naturally raises the question, though, how can something this good be free? The answer is that CloudPanel is owned by a company specializing in high-level Magento e-commerce solutions. They originally built it for internal use, and now they offer it for free. While there are a few minor limitations, they haven’t negatively impacted my experience at all.
Choosing My Hosting Provider: Why Vultr?
For my CloudPanel setup, I’m using Vultr as my server provider. I had experience with them in the past through Cloudways and GridPane, so I knew their infrastructure was solid.
Currently, I’m running a Vultr High-Frequency server with:
- 2 vCPUs
- 2GB RAM
- 80GB NVMe SSD storage
This costs me about $22–$24 per month, and I’m hosting 10 client sites and three of my own. The performance has been incredible. The server handles 72GB of bandwidth across all those sites without breaking a sweat, and everything feels lightning fast.
Setting Up CloudPanel on Vultr
Deploying CloudPanel is straightforward. You can either:
- Manually install it on a fresh Ubuntu server via SSH.
- Use the Vultr Marketplace, which allows you to deploy CloudPanel with a single click.
I tested both methods and found them equally effective. The Marketplace option is great if you’re not comfortable using the command line.
Exploring the CloudPanel Dashboard
Once set up, CloudPanel provides a clean, intuitive dashboard where you can:
- Monitor CPU, memory, and disk usage.
- Easily add new sites (WordPress, PHP, Laravel, Magento, etc.).
- Manage multiple PHP versions and settings.
- Control SSL certificates (via Let’s Encrypt or Cloudflare SSL).
- Access database management through a built-in phpMyAdmin link.
- Utilize a built-in file manager (no need for FTP!).
- Set up server crons for reliability.
Everything runs incredibly smoothly, and I’ve experienced zero performance bottlenecks.
Real-World Performance and Optimization
One of my biggest surprises was the raw speed of CloudPanel. Even without advanced caching like Varnish or Redis, my sites achieve:
- 98–100 scores on PageSpeed Insights
- Blazing-fast load times
My setup includes only Cloudflare and Perfmatters, yet the results are phenomenal.
Security Features & Backups
Security is another area where CloudPanel shines. It allows you to:
- Restrict access to Cloudflare traffic only.
- Enable basic authentication for extra protection.
- Use automatic backups (I send mine to Google Drive).
- Leverage Vultr snapshots for additional fail-safes.
The One Drawback: No Native Cloning
The only minor downside is that CloudPanel doesn’t have a direct site cloning feature. However, I work around this using All-in-One WP Migration to copy sites when needed. Since I often use block visibility and URL parameters for client previews, I rarely need a traditional staging-to-production workflow anyway.
Support: Surprisingly Good for a Free Product
Since CloudPanel is free, they don’t offer direct support. Instead, they have a Discord community, which has been surprisingly effective. I’ve received better support from community members than I did from my last two paid web hosts combined!
Final Thoughts: Why I’m Sticking With CloudPanel
CloudPanel has been a game-changer for me. Here’s why:
- It’s free (yet packed with features).
- It’s incredibly fast (even without aggressive caching).
- I have full control over my server.
- It’s significantly cheaper than managed WordPress hosting solutions.
If you want to take control of your WordPress hosting while cutting costs and boosting performance, check out CloudPanel.
Want to Learn More?
Because of how much I love this platform, I’m creating a mini-course on CloudPanel, launching Summer 2025. It will cover everything from setup to advanced usage, plus the few quirks you should be aware of.
Here’s the link: https://jonathanjernigan.com/cloudpanel-mastery/
As always, thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next post!