Looking for some examples of big brands using WordPress? You can find a lot of these posts littered around Google. But one thing that I noticed in browsing them is that a lot of them are out of date.

To fix that, I wanted to collect examples of big brands that are still actively using WordPress (as of May 2018). By actively – I mean WordPress is a real player in their ongoing digital strategy.

You can find lots of big publishers who still have WordPress installed on their server. But that doesn’t necessarily mean they’re still using it. For example, while CNN and The New York Times used WordPress to power their blog sections at one point, none of those blogs have been touched in years, so I didn’t count that as actively using WordPress for this list.

So, without further qualification, let’s dig into some of the best examples of big brands using WordPress in 2018…

1. AMC

The channel behind one of the greatest TV series of all time (that’s Breaking Bad), AMC uses WordPress to power their main website – including their homepage.

A quick look at their source code says they’re using plenty of custom plugins to accomplish their functionality.

Visit AMC Website

2. The Wirecutter/New York Times

When The New York Times acquired The Wirecutter for over $30 million in 2016, The Wirecutter officially cemented itself as a brand worthy of the “big” adjective.

The Wirecutter has always used WordPress to power its functionality, and that has stayed true through The New York Times acquisition, even after The Wirecutter underwent a full redesign in 2017.

Visit The Wirecutter

3. Whitehouse.gov

While the Obama administration used Drupal to power the Whitehouse.gov site, the Trump administration made Whitehouse.gov great again by opting to switch the site’s content management system from Drupal to WordPress.

Visit Whitehouse.gov

4. TechCrunch

TechCrunch is a neat example of a big brand using WordPress because its latest redesign utilizes a headless approach based on React. Headless design means that TechCrunch is using WordPress behind-the-scenes, but relies on React for the front-end display.

Visit TechCrunch

5. Sony Music

Sony Music uses WordPress to powers its corporate website. Yes – record labels still exist in 2018.

Visit Sony Music

6. University of Washington

The University of Washington uses WordPress to power its website. With an active student body of over 46,000, that’s no small fry!

Visit University of Washington

7. IZOD

IZOD uses WordPress and WordPress.com VIP to power its site. It’s worth noting that IZOD doesn’t have any eCommerce functionality – instead just opting to list retail locations where people can purchase IZOD clothing.

Visit IZOD

8. Dallas Mavericks

Mark Cuban knows about technology, so it’s no surprise that the Dallas Mavericks team website is powered by WordPress. The Mavs also host with WP Engine, in case you were wondering!

Visit Dallas Mavericks

9. Georgia State University

With over 51,000 students, Georgia State University is another massive public university that opted to use WordPress to power its website.

Visit Georgia State University

10. BBC America

While the BBC doesn’t use WordPress for its UK site, the BBC America website does use WordPress.

This isn’t surprising, as BBC America is a joint venture between AMC and BBC Studios (AMC was first on this list, if you recall).

In fact, you’ll see a lot of similarities between the AMC website and the BBC America website. The two even use some of the same custom plugins.

Visit BBC America

11. Creative Commons

Creative Commons, the non-profit that helps create more transparent licensing for people to share their works, uses WordPress to power its site.

Visit Creative Commons

12. The Mozilla Blog

Mozilla, best known for the Firefox web browser, uses WordPress to power the official Mozilla Blog. Like the Mavs, The Mozilla Blog is also hosted at WP Engine.

Visit The Mozilla Blog

13. The Rolling Stones

The Rolling Stones, one of the biggest bands in the world, uses WordPress to power their band website, including tour dates and news.

Visit The Rolling Stones

14. Harvard Blogs

While Harvard doesn’t use WordPress to power its main website, it does use WordPress to power its blog section. This blogs section allows anyone with a Harvard email address to create their own blog (as such, it includes blogs from both faculty and students).

Visit Harvard Blogs

15. Variety

Variety, a popular entertainment magazine, uses WordPress and WordPress.com VIP to power its digital website.

The Variety team does need to get their developer to switch their site over to HTTPS, though!

Visit Variety

16. NGINX

NGINX (pronounced engine-X, not N-jinx, in case you were wondering) is a popular alternative to the Apache web server that’s especially used by high traffic sites. The main NGINX website is powered by WordPress.

Visit NGINX

17. Etsy Journal

Etsy, a popular eCommerce marketplace for creative products, uses WordPress to power its Etsy Journal blog. The Etsy Journal is a great piece of content marketing that showcases featured shops, as well as strategies to get more from Etsy.

Visit Etsy Journal

18. Facebook Newsroom

Obviously the main Facebook website isn’t powered by WordPress, but Facebook does use WordPress and WordPress.com VIP to power its Facebook Newsroom blog that features all kinds of news, including news about the new Oculus Go pricing!

Visit Facebook Newsroom

19. Lollapalooza

Lollapalooza, a massively popular music festival in Chicago, uses WordPress to power its entire site (though it does outsource the ticket sales to a third-party provider).

Visit Lollapalooza

20. Chicago Sun-Times

As the name suggests, The Chicago Sun-Times is a popular Chicago-based newspaper. It publishes tons of journalism every day, and everything is powered by WordPress and WordPress.com VIP.

Visit Chicago Sun-Times

21. Microsoft/Skype Blogs

Microsoft uses WordPress in a couple different places that I could find. First, they use it to power the official Microsoft Blog. Second, they also use it to power the official Skype Blog.

Visit Official Microsoft Blog Visit Official Skype Blog

Know Any Other Big Brands Using WordPress?

Given that WordPress powers over 30% of the Internet, as well as over 20% of the web’s 10,000 most popular websites, this is by no means a complete list of big brands using WordPress.

Instead, it’s just me trying to collect some of the best active examples from a smattering of industries.

But if you know a great example of a famous brand using WordPress that wasn’t on the list, please share it in the comments so that we can all go check it out!