Wordfence
Worth it
Confidence: High
If your site runs WordPress, start with Wordfence Free . it's the category default with a real firewall and scanner.
New check
Comparison
Wordfence lands on Worth it, and Sucuri lands on Depends.
If your site runs WordPress, start with Wordfence Free . it's the category default with a real firewall and scanner.
Buy if you run a business site or an agency portfolio where managed malware cleanup plus a WAF is worth $9.99+/month.
| Compare | ||
|---|---|---|
| Verdict | Worth it | Depends |
| Best for | WordPress sites of any size | Business sites needing guaranteed malware cleanup |
| Who it's not for | Non-WordPress websites | Hobby blogs . the free Wordfence plugin already covers you |
| Privacy | No public breaches of Wordfence found; vendor runs active vulnerability research, though CVE databases list some XSS issues under the Wordfence vendor name.13 | No breach of Sucuri itself found, but its free WordPress plugin had a path-traversal flaw (CVE-2026-73033) through version 2.7.3. |
| Support quality | Real support gated to paid plans | Old 'brutally honest' support review; 1.6 Trustpilot |
| Public sentiment | Reviews and Reddit broadly praise the free tier's protection, while debating Premium's value, site speed impact, and paid-only support.⁵ | Users running business and client sites pay for Sucuri's cleanup and firewall, but Reddit is full of people hunting cheaper alternatives like Wordfence, and Trustpilot sentiment is poor. |
| Biggest gotcha | Premium pricing has climbed repeatedly . 20.2% hike in 2022, increases again December 2024.⁴ | Free plugin isn't a firewall; you must pay for the WAF/CloudProxy plan |