Local is excellent and free — and pushes to exactly two hosts. The tools below are grouped by that question first, then by whether they need Docker.
Checked September 2026 · prices and host lists change; the links go to each tool's own page
Each of these is the right answer for someone. This is who.
You deploy to Hostinger, SiteGround, a VPS, shared hosting — anything that isn't WP Engine — and want push and pull without a plugin on the server.
Your clients host at WP Engine or Flywheel. Local's one-click connection there is first-party and free; nothing beats it on its home turf.
Your clients host at Kinsta and you're fine running Docker Desktop for it.
You publish to WordPress.com. Note it runs WordPress on WASM PHP with SQLite, not MySQL — fine for content, different from what most hosts run.
You're comfortable in Docker, want a docker-compose.yml in the repo, and will wire up deployment yourself.
You want throwaway cloud sandboxes in seconds — demos, plugin trials, per-PR previews — rather than a local copy of a site that already has a host.
DDEV and Lando are free and deploy anywhere — because they don't deploy at all; you script it. Every tool with built-in push targets its own host, except SiteShift, which targets any SSH host and costs €9 a month.
Local is funded by WP Engine as a funnel into WP Engine hosting. SiteShift sells no hosting, so the subscription is what funds the host-agnostic sync, the integrations and support.
Yes. SiteShift keeps everything under ~/.siteshift and touches no system PHP, so it coexists with Local, MAMP, XAMPP or Docker on the same machine. Sites don't share databases between tools, though — move a site by pulling it from the host, not from another tool's folder.
Local sites that can go to any host. €9 a month, cancel anytime.
Get SiteShift — €9/mo