Auto Install via Bluehost Failed. MySQL required — $30k software?!?

No – WordPress is (and always has been) free. Which site are you looking at?

When I went to do the auto install with bluehost, it failed. It said I needed my SQL. I went to the website https://www.mysql.com/ , and the option to purchase the software there ranged from $4,000 to $30,000

No – your hosts will have already installed MySQL onto their servers. It’s not something that you need to do. Perhaps you did not purchase the correct hosting package from Bluehost? Try contacting them and asking.

Bluehost already comes with MySQL, as do most all hosts. That must be a false error. Agreed that you should contact Bluehost support.

MySQL is free software. All software needed to install WordPress is free – Linux, Apache, PHP and MySQL.

If you need a simple website with very low expected traffic, you can use Platform as a Service (PaaS) like AppFog, Red Hat OpenShift like PaaS. They provide a free quota enough to have 200 pageviews per day.

https://openshift.redhat.com/app/

https://www.appfog.com/

Search on Google web search with How to install WordPress on AppFog (or Red Hat Open Shift) to get guides and tutorial for more help.

It is not possible to tell what your present webhost can do for you. It depends on the hosting plan you are using, thereby the Service Level Agreement (SLA) of the package.

All Bluehosts accounts come with at least one MySQL database. The simple solution is to contact their support and ask them to troubleshoot your account for you. They’ll be able to find the problem, while we can only guess. Good luck!

Thanks everyone, bluehost cleared up the issue for me.