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Platform comparison

WordPress vs Next.js + Sanity:
what you rent, what you own.

Quick answer

WordPress is one application that both edits and serves your site, extended by plugins you keep patching. Next.js + Sanity splits it in three: pre-built pages for visitors, an editing studio for your team, and Sanity's hosted content backend holding the words. You give up running the content database yourself and start paying per editing seat; you stop running twenty other people's plugins on your public site. WordPress still wins when a plugin is doing the actual work.

· LastPatch · 12min

WordPressNext.js + Sanity

WordPress

  • 40.3%of all websites run WordPress, so help is everywhere
  • 11,334vulnerabilities disclosed in its ecosystem in 2025, up 42%

Next.js + Sanity

  • $15a month per editing seat on Sanity's Growth plan; viewers are free
  • 10,000documents and 20 seats on Sanity's free plan, at no cost

Vulnerability figures are for 2025. Sanity's prices and plan limits are its published list prices, which change. Every figure is sourced

At a glance

What you'd notice as the owner.

WordPress vs Next.js + Sanity
Editing day to day

WordPress

wp-admin and the block editor - familiar to almost anyone who has written for the web, along with the update notices, the plugin banners and the pause before clicking Update.

Next.js + Sanity

Sanity Studio: a private editing app holding exactly the fields your content has, with drafts and version history built in. It lives on its own address or inside the site at /studio, and it never asks to be updated.
Two people in one document

WordPress

One writer at a time, in practice. Real-time collaboration was built for core and then pulled from WordPress 7.0 in May 2026, with no date given for its return.

Next.js + Sanity

Real-time editing with presence on every plan, the free one included. Two editors in the same document see each other working instead of saving over each other.
Seeing a change before it is live

WordPress

Preview, or a staging copy somebody keeps in sync. Page builders show the layout as it is dragged around, which is most of their appeal.

Next.js + Sanity

The presentation tool shows the real site with drafts applied, and clicking a headline on that page opens the field behind it. Included on every plan, including the free one.
What the internet can reach

WordPress

The whole application: the login page, every plugin's code and the database behind them, on the same server that shows visitors your homepage.

Next.js + Sanity

Pre-built pages from a CDN, plus one login for the studio. The content sits in Sanity's backend, and worth knowing: a dataset is readable by anyone who knows the project by default, and private datasets start on the Growth plan.
Monthly patching

WordPress

Core, theme and every plugin, each on its own maintainer's schedule. Auto-updates help, and occasionally take the site down with them.

Next.js + Sanity

No plugin layer, and no CMS server of your own behind the editor - Sanity patches that. Your side is one dependency tree a developer updates and deploys deliberately.
Speed

WordPress

Pages are assembled on every request unless a caching layer is added; heavy themes and page builders make good scores hard work.

Next.js + Sanity

Pages are built ahead of time and cached at the edge, so a normal visit touches neither a database nor the content API. Fast is the default rather than an add-on.
Recurring cost

WordPress

Free software, paid upkeep: managed hosting, security, backups, premium licenses and usually a care plan - $100 to $600 a month for a typical business site.

Next.js + Sanity

Hosting for the site, usually tens of dollars a month, plus Sanity: free for a small team, or $15 per editing seat a month on Growth, where viewer accounts cost nothing.
Your team's logins

WordPress

As many accounts as you want, at no extra cost, with the WordPress roles you already know.

Next.js + Sanity

Seats are the billing unit - every account except a Viewer counts. The free plan carries only Administrator and Viewer, so giving a writer an Editor account means being on Growth.
Adding a feature

WordPress

Install a plugin in minutes, often with no developer involved. Each one is more code to keep patched for as long as the site is alive.

Next.js + Sanity

A developer builds it into the site once - slower on day one, and it arrives without its own update schedule or renewal invoice.
Ownership and lock-in

WordPress

Open source, and every host in the world runs it. Your posts are portable; the way page builders and plugins store your layouts usually isn't.

Next.js + Sanity

The studio is MIT-licensed code in your repository and the content exports from the command line, but the backend holding it is Sanity's service. You can leave with your content, not with the platform.
Finding help

WordPress

It runs 40.3% of all websites, so freelancers, agencies and answers are everywhere - of very mixed quality.

Next.js + Sanity

A smaller pool: you need a developer comfortable with TypeScript and React. The upside is that the whole setup is written down in your repository, so the next one can read it.

Want the cost row with your own numbers? Run the WordPress tax calculator

Under the hood

For whoever signs off on the stack.

Compare the architecture, row by row
Compare the architecture, row by row
Language and extension model

WordPress

PHP. Behavior is extended with hooks and filters, mostly by third-party plugins and themes loaded at runtime.

Next.js + Sanity

TypeScript. The content model is plain objects in your repository, and the studio is a React app generated from them. Nothing third-party runs on the public site.
Where the content lives

WordPress

MySQL or MariaDB on your server. Posts, pages and custom post types share one table; custom fields are key-value rows in postmeta.

Next.js + Sanity

Sanity's hosted Content Lake, on Google Cloud: structured JSON documents in datasets, queried over an API with a cached CDN in front. Uploaded files can be kept in the EU/EEA or the US.
Rich text

WordPress

post_content is one HTML string with block markup hidden in comments, so the words and the layout are stored together.

Next.js + Sanity

Portable Text: rich text as structured JSON with an open specification, so the same paragraph can be rendered by a web page, an app or an email without being re-parsed.
Querying

WordPress

REST API in core since 4.7. GraphQL needs the WPGraphQL plugin.

Next.js + Sanity

GROQ, an open-sourced query language, over a content API whose version you pin to a date so its behavior doesn't shift under a deployed site. A GraphQL API exists too, deployed per dataset with the CLI and read-only.
Admin panel

WordPress

wp-admin is part of the same PHP application that renders the public site.

Next.js + Sanity

Separate by construction: deployed to a sanity.studio address, or mounted on a catch-all route in the Next.js app with next-sanity, whose domain then has to be allowed in the project's CORS settings.
Rendering and freshness

WordPress

Server-rendered PHP per request; full-page caching comes from the host or a plugin, and cache clearing is its own chore.

Next.js + Sanity

React Server Components on Next.js 16, the current major line, rendered statically or regenerated incrementally per route. Where a page has to be live, the Live Content API streams changes on every plan, replaying the last 15 minutes on Free and Growth.
Schema and migrations

WordPress

Much of the setup - plugin settings, menus, widgets - lives in the database, so it is hard to review, diff or roll back.

Next.js + Sanity

The schema is code in git, reviewed like any other commit, and the store itself is schemaless, so adding a field needs no migration. The trade-off is real: validation runs in the studio, not in the backend, so a script writing content has to check its own work.
Access control

WordPress

Roles and capabilities, site-wide. Per-field or per-document rules come from plugins or custom code.

Next.js + Sanity

Two roles on the free plan, Administrator and Viewer; five on Growth, Editor and Contributor among them. Custom roles and finer-grained access are an Enterprise feature.
Version history

WordPress

Revisions sit in the database for as long as you configure, and restoring one is a click for anyone with the right role.

Next.js + Sanity

Revisions are kept 3 days on the free plan, 90 days on Growth and 365 on Enterprise. The current published and draft versions are always there, and a nightly export is a sensible habit either way.
Scheduling and coordinated launches

WordPress

Scheduled publishing is in core, one post at a time.

Next.js + Sanity

Scheduled drafts begin on the Growth plan. Content releases - a batch of documents that goes live together, up to 1,000 per release - are an Enterprise-plan feature, worth knowing before anyone promises a synchronized relaunch.
Hosting

WordPress

Any PHP host, from a shared plan to a managed WordPress platform.

Next.js + Sanity

The site runs anywhere Node.js does - a serverless platform, or a Node server behind a reverse proxy - and the content API is Sanity's to run, not yours to size.
Security and compliance

WordPress

Core, themes and plugins patch independently. Patchstack counted 11,334 new ecosystem vulnerabilities in 2025, 91% of them in plugins and 6 in core itself.

Next.js + Sanity

Sanity patches the backend and is a SOC 2 Type 2 certified provider, with an uptime commitment on Enterprise plans. Your side is one dependency tree, and it still needs an owner: React Server Components had a critical fix in December 2025.
License

WordPress

GPLv2 or later.

Next.js + Sanity

Sanity Studio is MIT. The hosted backend is a paid service under Sanity's terms - there is no version of it you can run on your own hardware.

The honest part

When WordPress is still the right call.

  • A plugin is doing the actual work.

    Bookings, memberships, an LMS, a directory. If one plugin is the product and nothing replaces it cleanly, rebuilding it is a project, not a migration.

  • Your marketers redesign pages themselves.

    Page builders let non-developers move a layout around on a Friday afternoon. Sanity can offer editable blocks, but a developer defines each block before anyone arranges it.

  • Everyone needs a login and per-seat pricing is a no.

    WordPress accounts cost nothing and there is no limit. Sanity bills every account that isn't a viewer, and its free plan's only writing role is administrator - so a real editorial team lands on a per-seat plan.

  • The workflow is WordPress-shaped.

    An editorial SEO plugin, a form builder, an events calendar, a translation plugin - each one gets rebuilt or replaced. When that list is long, the numbers stop working.

And when we wouldn't pick Sanity either

  • It's five pages and a contact form.

    A brochure site doesn't need a content backend, a seat bill or an API. Pre-built pages with a light editor are cheaper and have no login to defend - the Astro comparison covers that shape.

    Better fitA static site

  • The content can't sit in someone else's cloud.

    A policy that says the database stays on your infrastructure, or a team that won't pay per seat as it grows, wants a CMS you host yourself: MIT-licensed, your own Postgres, no plan tiers.

    Better fitNext.js + Payload

  • It's an online store.

    Payments, card compliance and checkout uptime belong to a commerce platform, not to a content system with a shop bolted on - the WooCommerce comparison has that argument in full.

    Better fitA commerce platform

Want the content database on your own servers, with no per-seat bill? WordPress vs Next.js + Payload

FAQ

WordPress vs Sanity, straight answers.

  • For a content-heavy site, usually - and for the same reason it can be worse: the editor is a hosted service instead of code on your server. Nothing on the public site to patch, real-time co-editing, click-to-edit previews. In exchange you rent the content backend per seat and features get built deliberately.

  • Yes. Writing, images, drafts, publishing and version history all happen in Sanity Studio, and two people can work on the same document without saving over each other. A developer is needed to change what the site can do - a new kind of page, a new section - the work a plugin used to do.

  • Its free plan covers 20 seats, 10,000 documents and two datasets, which is enough for plenty of small sites. Growth is $15 a month per seat, viewers free, and adds comments, scheduled drafts, private datasets and 90 days of history. Hosting the site is separate. Prices move, so check the plan page.

  • Sanity if collaboration is the point: several editors in one document, comments, click-to-edit previews, and a backend nobody on your side runs. Payload if ownership is the point: MIT-licensed, your own database, no per-seat fee as the team grows. The audit says which one fits your site, in writing.

  • Rankings follow your URLs and content, not the CMS behind them. Every old address is mapped to a 301 redirect before cutover, titles, descriptions and structured data come across, and Search Console is watched for weeks afterward. Pages come out faster than a plugin-heavy theme, which helps, but the redirect map is what protects rankings.

  • Yes. There is no one-click importer, and Sanity's own migration course teaches a script instead of one-size-fits-all tooling. We export posts, pages, authors, categories, tags and media, convert the HTML into Portable Text, map it onto the new schema, and import it against a copy first. Every old URL gets a redirect.

Sources (27)

Facts checked 11 September 2026. Sanity's plan names, prices and limits are its published list prices and change; re-check them before quoting.

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