Ideal WordPress Setup in 2025

Goal

The author seeks to replicate Ghost’s user experience within WordPress, prioritizing:

1. Fast editing and management experience
2. Security against hacking
3. Quick load times

The setup should provide a “snappy” environment for both viewing and maintaining the site without worrying about backups or data loss.

Theme Recommendations

The author evaluated four popular WordPress themes based on editing experience, ACF support, and performance:

Bricks: Praised for clean code output and complex customization handling. Strong ACF support but bare-bone starting point requires foundation setup (header, footer, styling). “Best for developers building websites professionally.”

Astra: Offers excellent starting point with minimal customization needed. The accompanying Spectra page builder manages CSS efficiently at page/post level rather than accumulating to single stylesheets.

WP Kadence: Similar to Astra with superior ACF support and effective “Row Layout” block. Handles advanced layouts better than Astra/Spectra, though cannot manage nested ACF repeaters.

GeneratePress: Receives strong user reviews but wasn’t tested by the author.

Mainstream builders like Elementor and Divi were deemed unnecessary for the stated goals.

Recommended Plugins

WP Rocket (Performance): Offers image optimization and lazy loading out-of-the-box, unlike traditional caching plugins that merely cache static content. Notable performance improvements observed immediately after installation.

The SEO Framework (SEO): Lightweight alternative to Yoast, avoiding “nagware” while effectively handling SEO tasks.

WPvivid (Backups): Provides hands-off backup management with incremental backup support.

Wordfence (Security): Free edition recommended alongside basics like Cloudflare, database table prefixing, avoiding common usernames, disabling XML-RPC, and deleting readme files.

Hosting Options

Managed WordPress Hosting:

• Rocket.net
• WPEngine
• Pressable
• Hustly.website (most affordable)

Other Providers:

• Siteground (watch renewal fees)
• Cloudways (with DigitalOcean or Vultr)
• Hostinger

The author selected DreamItHost (Australia) for datacenter proximity, noting that geographic distance from Auckland, NZ previously caused admin area lag.