Define what 100 students means
A hundred enrolled learners, a hundred open browser tabs, and a hundred people submitting a quiz together are different planning scenarios. Start with your busiest scheduled session. Record how many students sign in, open lessons, save answers, and submit work during the same interval. Include the theme, LearnDash add-ons, payment plugin, and video delivery arrangement in the brief.
Use 100 only as a planning target unless you have measured it. This is a documentation-based buying guide and proposed test plan, not a load-test result. No named hosting plan has been demonstrated by this publication to support that target.
- Normal class: staggered login, reading, and lesson navigation.
- Burst: many learners sign in or submit a quiz together.
- Background work: imports, scheduled tasks, backups, and reports running during class.
Ask about requests, not just visits
Kinsta documents PHP threads as processes handling web requests; the PHP memory limit controls memory available to an individual script. These are different constraints. More threads do not by themselves repair a script that exceeds its memory allowance. Ask the host to explain which limit was reached during your observed incident.
Have the provider examine your slow operation and the proposed configuration together. Ask about request queues, database delays, and the cost of additional capacity. A plan's marketing visitor count does not answer those application-specific questions.
| Ask the provider | Useful evidence |
|---|---|
| What happens during simultaneous quiz submissions? | An agreed staging workload and recorded errors or response times. |
| Which capacity limit can we observe? | Monitoring for busy PHP processes, memory, and slow requests. |
| What is the next upgrade? | A written capacity change, billing impact, and migration requirement. |
| Who troubleshoots a slow plugin? | A support-scope answer naming the responsible team. |
Agree a rehearsal before buying capacity
With the provider's permission, use an isolated staging copy and synthetic student accounts. Keep live payment processing, outbound class emails, and production webhooks disabled there. Reproduce your chosen class actions at a modest load, then increase toward the target within the agreed limits. Record the same actions and settings for each candidate.
Set the acceptance thresholds before the exercise: allowable error rate, response-time target, and correct saving of progress or quiz results. A fast response is not a pass if a student's work disappears. Retest correctness with individual accounts after the simulated class. These are proposed checks, not measurements already completed.
Keep the app workload explicit
If you also use the LearnDash App, include its API activity in the workload description. LearnDash's app-specific hosting guidance discusses frequent API calls and concurrent usage. That guidance concerns the app and is not a guarantee for every LearnDash website.
Shortlist a provider only when its quote, operational support, and agreed test fit the actual class. Kinsta, WP Engine, and Liquid Web are candidates for investigation in our hosting comparison; none is a tested winner. Bring the completed worksheet to the discussion so the quote refers to your course rather than a generic website.
Compare your options
Liquid Web
A hosting candidate to investigate when you can specify the workload and support responsibilities you need covered.
Configuration-dependent; obtain the full upfront and renewal quote
Management scope and extras vary. No universal compatible plan price or tested performance result is claimed.
Ordinary provider link. No affiliate partnership claimed. Link disclosure
Kinsta
A candidate for WordPress course and membership sites with a documented workload and a need to discuss PHP capacity.
Plan-dependent; confirm the full invoice, renewal, and required capacity
No plan is verified here for a specific learner count. Confirm capacity, plugin compatibility, and extra charges.
Ordinary provider link. No affiliate partnership claimed. Link disclosure
WP Engine
A managed WordPress candidate to evaluate against your course plugins, member access rules, and migration plan.
Plan-dependent; confirm billing term, renewal, and extras
Confirm the proposed plan's compatibility, support scope, and destination cache behavior. No measured speed advantage claimed.
Ordinary provider link. No affiliate partnership claimed. Link disclosure
Questions before you decide
How many PHP threads do 100 students need?
This guide cannot establish a number. The request mix, processing time, cache behavior, database work, and background jobs change the requirement. Agree a workload test with the host instead of translating students directly into threads.
Can I use my monthly visitor count to choose a course hosting plan?
Use it for billing context, but also describe the busiest class and its actions. It does not establish capacity for simultaneous login or quiz submissions.
Sources & verification
Product details and prices can change. Check the linked provider before buying.
- Kinsta: PHP threads and memory Accessed 2026-09-13
- LearnDash: hosting recommendations for the LearnDash App Accessed 2026-09-13
Sources link directly to providers. Product buttons may use separately labeled affiliate links. Read our disclosure.