What is the Difference Between Wordpress.org and Wordpress.com?

Kirst_W

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Hello everyone,
Here my dumb newbie question.
What's the difference between wordpress.org and wordpress.com
and
can WordPress be installed without me actually installing anything to my PC?

To make it clearer, here is what happened.
I've decided to create a blog. So I've bought a domain, and the hosting company also provided kinda a quick way to install WordPress, but I still struggled, so I contacted the online support, and they asked me to wait, and then said something like "ok, now WordPress is installed".

I feel super dumb now, cause I have no idea what has happened and if I should even worry about it.

Thanks in advance,
Anxious newbie
 
@Kirst_W

WordPress.org is the open-source blogging platform, it's a piece of software that you can install on any web host you choose. You can make all sorts of edits to it, add lots of plugins, and you generally have a ton of control over your site. You can switch hosts and move your site, and so on. You're also more responsible for things like managing your resources when the site grows, ensuring you're keeping the software up to date, and so on. 99.99% of the time when someone mentions WordPress, and 100% of the time on this forum in particular, we're always talking about the software from WordPress.org.

WordPress.com allows you to use a very limited version of the WordPress platform, without having to set it up on your own server, without having to install updates, and so on. They're essentially a hosting platform, but they're not the same as typical hosting companies since they specialize exclusively in their more proprietary, more limited version of WordPress.

What you want to do is to find a hosting company, and not to use WordPress.com.

There are many hosts that come with WordPress practically pre-installed.

The version you'll get from using any host other than WordPress.com gives you a lot more freedom, and it's what you want to go with.

Shared hosting should be good enough if you're just starting out. Knownhost (Buildersociety affiliate link) has shared plans now, which are probabally pretty good, I'm happy with their VPS (a higher-tier of server for when your site gets a little busier.)

Now, I know you've already gone through that step and purchased hosting, but I figured it could be helpful to someone else down the road none the less.

So, what I would do if I were you, is try visiting yourdomain.com/wp-admin and see if you arrive at a log-in screen. If the host provided you with a username and password, you should be able to log in and start working on your site.

If not, I'd email your host and ask them for the log-in credentials and you're off to the races.

Don't feel dumb, it doesn't sound like you've got anything to worry about, you just need to log-in the admin area of your site and get to work. If you visit Yourdomain.com, does it show a barebones WordPress site, give an error, or what?

A lot of stuff you're about to encounter on this journey is going to seem overwhelming and confusing, but it's only confusing until it makes sense - and it'll all make more and more sense as you go.

Cheers, good luck, and don't be shy if you have any questions we're all here to help.
 
@Potatoe, thank you for explaining it in details!
So, do I understand correctly, that the hosting company had WordPress.org installed on their servers so that I didn't have to install it on my own PC? If so, it makes sense to me.
When I go to my website.com/wp-admin, I log in and see the dashboard. Everything seems to be working.
I guess you're right, there is nothing to worry about.

Thank you once again,
Happy to be here.
 
Yep you can ignore it, you don't need to install anything on your computer at all.

You CAN if you want to, and some people DO choose to run an instance of WordPress on their own computers so that they can work on their sites offline, then upload to their servers once they've verified their changes don't cause any issues, but I've never done it, and if your site isn't a big eCommerce monster with huge paid traffic campaigns running to it, mission-critical stuff, I don't think you need to think twice about it.

You're all set buddy, keep us posted and let us know how it goes! @Kirst_W
 
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