From Payload to Wordpress

We are the Payload to Wordpress migration experts

Challenges with Payload

Key pain points

Payload’s biggest issue is how quickly it hands you the responsibility baton. Because it leans so heavily on self-hosting, you’re suddenly running databases, managing infra, dealing with scaling, and debugging auth quirks at 11 pm. And since the platform is still maturing, updates can feel unpredictable, and the surrounding ecosystem isn’t quite deep enough yet to soften the landing when something breaks. The recent Figma acquisition didn’t help either. Support has felt a bit lighter, and some priorities clearly shifted, alongside pricing.

Payload feels flexible on day one, the moment your project grows you’re either engineering around gaps or paying more than expected. If you're debating whether Payload fits the future of your stack (or you’re already feeling the cracks), we’re always happy to help you plan a cleaner path or a migration that won’t come back to bite you.

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Steep learning curve

Payload’s code-first approach means you need solid dev experience to use it effectively. Non-technical teams will struggle, and onboarding takes longer compared to more guided CMSs.

Smaller ecosystem of plugins

There aren’t many ready-made extensions, so you’ll end up building features yourself. This adds development time and increases long-term maintenance.

Potential performance overhead

Because it’s a full JavaScript backend, Payload can get resource-heavy under high traffic. You’ll need to optimise your server setup and monitor performance more closely.

Gaps in documentation

The docs are improving, but there are still missing pieces and unclear sections. New users often have to dig through GitHub issues to find answers.

Small community

The community is growing but still small, so there’s less shared knowledge, fewer tutorials, and slower troubleshooting compared to bigger CMS ecosystems.

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Requires separate hosting

Payload doesn’t come with built-in hosting, so you’re responsible for setting up and managing your server. That adds extra cost, extra setup, and extra operational overhead.

Benefits of Wordpress

Key advantages

We're trying our hardest to think of good reasons to move to WordPress, but outside of "I like PHP errors" or trying to build a website for under £500, I honestly can't think of a good reason. If you're trying to do things on the cheap, we would highly recommend using a template from Framer or Webflow. They're better solutions in almost every way.

But if you're hell-bent on building a WordPress website, we can't stop you. For that reason, we'd highly recommend SiteGround for hosting to keep it cheap and optimize the hell out of it with their performance plugin. Avoid installing tons of plugins if you can; keep it lean and simple.

Plugins for everything

You want a form? A store? A booking system? A horoscope generator for cats? WordPress has a plugin for it. Half the internet runs on “someone already built that.”

Strong community support

If something breaks, someone online has already fixed it, documented it, blogged about it, and made a YouTube tutorial with dramatic background music.

Easy to use

You can be a writer, founder, or intern, you can easily build a website using WordPress. It doesn’t demand a CS degree. Click, type, publish. Done.

Vast theme selection

You might need a corporate website, minimal, or even a neon-purple-cyber-punk ecommerce store; just pick a theme and ship. Some even look good straight out of the box.

Ideal for beginners

One of the easiest ways to get a site live without knowing the difference between HTML and “the thing that makes the text bold.”

Flexible configuration options

Layers of configuration, widgets, design settings, and custom plugins will only let you shape WordPress into something that actually fits your use case.