Switching my website from WordPress to Ghost

After a lot of internal debate, I switched my website from WordPress to Ghost. I wrote this article to explain my migration to Ghost for my blog.

Background Information

I wrote in my earlier post, Why I don't use Substack or Medium to publish my writing, why I prefer an open-source alternative to hosting my website.

I previously used WordPress, which is open source, to host my site but encountered several problems.

Pain points with WordPress

1.) My website was slow

I spent hours optimizing my website with different plugins, CDNs, and more. I managed to get it decently quick. However, the required effort showed me how much maintenance work WordPress requires for a content-heavy blog.

2.) Sending out emails from my site was not straightforward

This was one of the hardest parts of using WordPress. I would write my post and want to send it out in my newsletter, but it wasn't straightforward.

Without a plugin, I would have to copy my post to Mailchimp or SendinBlue to send an email to my newsletter subscribers.

I eventually found a plugin, Mailpoet, that did help with this, but I did not enjoy how the emails looked nor the experience of using it.

3.) Too many plugins

Because WordPress is so flexible, there are tons you can do with it! The downside is that you eventually stitch together tons of plugins, which can be hard to maintain and overwhelming.

What Ghost solves

1.) Optimized for creating and sending out posts

Ghost is optimized for writing and publishing to followers. It doesn't have as much functionality as WordPress, but it works right out of the box.

You can create a post and instantly send it to your followers.

2.) Memberships

Ghost keeps track of my newsletter, so I don't have to use another service to manage this.

3.) Website Speed

Ghost is quick! Even on my image-intensive posts, it easily scores an A on GTMetrix. GTMetrix helps analyze website speed; on every page, my Ghost website scores an A.

Image intensive post:

Additional Reads

If you want to learn more, ghost created a detailed article comparing Ghost and WordPress.