Webs.com Website Builder Review 2023

At the beginning of 2001, Freewebs was a free site-building company that quickly became one of the largest and most preferred ones. Years later, the company changed its name to Webs, and around 50 million website owners used their hosting services.

Unfortunately, after Vistaprint took over the company in 2011, things had changed significantly (in a bad way). Since the acquisition of Webs.com, Vistaprint decided to do some things differently. Here are some of the changes:

Vistaprint made only one major update back in 2012
In 2017, they officially closed down the Webs blog
Product development has stopped since then
The free version allows you to create only five pages
Put in Vistaprint advertisement

Although it is marketed as a free website builder, some will find the cost-free version very limiting and not worth the time. We can understand why it is that, but we also think it can work for others that look for an easy-to-use site builder. In the name of helping you make the right choice for your web hosting services, read our full Webs com review.

Without further due, let’s discuss the pricing. Webs offer paid plans. The cool thing is, if you don’t like how your websites turn out, you have a 30-day money-back guarantee. Webs will provide decent web store pages for a reasonable price and many minimalistic themes.

The pricing is per month, based on a 2-year membership. The Starter plan, suitable for basic sites, costs $5.99, while the Pro plan, offering features for an online store is $22.99. A custom domain name is included in all premium packages.

Webs Pricing

There are four pricing plans. Let’s check them:

$0 Free Version

With the $0 website builder provided by Webs com, you get a maximum of 40 MB of storage, five pages limit, and Webs branding advertising for their site. A free domain name is not included.

$5.99 Starter plan

This paid plan allows you to create unlimited pages, and the annoying ad is removed. Overall you pay for a decent mobile-friendly website, passport-protected pages, and basic statistics. The storage goes up to 1GB, which is acceptable depending on your site’s purpose and its desired appearance. The possibility of customer support is only through emails.

$12.99 Enhanced plan

If you are looking for a budget-friendly website builder for your small business and web store, the Webscom Enhanced plan might be the one for you. You can add to up 20 items in your online store. Apart from the unlimited pages and the mobile-optimized site features, you will receive advanced statistics, premium themes, and a maximum of 5GB.

Password protection of pages is included. Regarding customer support and customer service, there is an option for email support and live chat support. You can get three easy to set up custom email addresses.

$22.99 Pro plan

This paid plan by Webs com is ideal if you have an online store or any e-commerce business and want to level up your selling game. You receive an unlimited number of pages, web store items, and of course, limitless storage space.

The mobile version of your site would look great on many different devices. Password-protected pages feature is included. What’s different? You get 25 custom email addresses that can match your custom domain name, SEO booster, search engine optimization, and an option for phone support as a customer service feature (in addition to email and live chat support).

Pros and Cons of Webs

Unfortunately, the pros in this Webs review will be less than the cons. This is because Webs.com is one of the website builders that are slightly outdated. The good news is that it requires no technical skills or coding knowledge.

Pros

Easy-to-use website editor with drag-and-drop builder

Cons

Lately, Webs.com has received a lot of negative feedback and negative users reviews

After Vistaprint entered the scene, many disappointed users expressed their frustration with terrible Webs.com reviews and sharing their opinion on social media. This had a significant impact, and many people decided to abandon it for other website builders on the market.

Product development has been stopped

All these years later, Webs com hasn’t developed any new features, which is a pity because, initially, the company had a leading role among the technologically advanced website builder platforms.

You get only 5 free pages

Using Webs com might be way too limiting if you stick to the free version. There are better options that will allow you to create more pages for your site without paying a dollar for it.

Many site builders offer more stylish template designs

Although some are free of cost, Webs com template designs are simply old-fashioned and far away from modern web design standards.

Rating Details

Ease of use 4/5

Webs is one of the website builders with an understandable process, and the ease of use is appropriate for a complete beginner. Webs com is an intuitive website builder, but some features are complicated to incorporate in places. Also, there are some bugs since the release of SiteBuilder 3 in 2012 that are still not resolved and can be annoying for a newbie.

Choice and flexibility of design (templates) 2.5/5

As we already mentioned in our Webs.com review, many of their templates look outdated. You can change the background and some colors, but the source code can’t be adjusted. However, mobile optimization is one of the best features of this website builder.

Advertisement-free

Unless you pay extra for a fee or upgrade to a Pro plan, you will have the Webs branding ad at the bottom of each page, including on the mobile site version.

Languages 3/5

Webs support eight languages on their marketing website, but the interface is only in English. There are no features to build a multilingual site.

Features

You can purchase a domain through the Webs website builder. You get a custom domain name (using .net or .com). This is included in the premium packages.

Depth of navigation 4.5/5

This is vital information if you plan on building a larger site. Webs offer a drop-down menu and two hierarchical sub-levels.

Widgets 2/5

Web widgets are tools that can be added to a third-party website for additional functionality. Videos and photos can be displayed on your site, but you might need a paid plan for additional storage. Webs used to have an app store that is no longer available.

Monetization

You can add banner ads, use affiliate links, or Google AdSense to make money from your website.

E-Commerce 2/5

An online store is available, but you get the most of it if you pay for the Pro plan. The payment method is from Paypal, so your users can use a credit card for purchases.

Related: Best E-commerce Website Builders Compared – 2023

Search Engines Optimization (SEO) 4/5

SEO functions are vital if you want to improve your Google ranking. Users should be able to find your site easily. Of course, for some of them, you need to pay.

Blog 3/5

If you want to be a proud member of the blogging community, you should know that you will get fundamental options with Webs. As far as HTML widget possibilities are concerned, only youtube videos are available. The comments can’t be moderated before publishing. However, you can schedule your posts for later and can assign categories.

Visitor statistics 5/5

You can add Google Analytics easily if you don’t like Clicky as a default internal tracking tool.

Contact form

It is easy to personalize with many field types.

Password-protected areas

It’s always useful to be able to keep some pages protected from the common user. Those private areas could be entered only with legitimate user login. People could sign in with their accounts and use your Webs site as a social network.

Newsletter tool

Email marketing is included in the Webs website builder. Through emails, members of your site can receive information about new promotions, deals, etc. The Premium plan offers pictures and formatting elements.

Add HTML code

External features like Widgets and tools are available to add with Webs site builder.

Storage space

You get 40MB for free Webs site; the Starter plan gives you 1GB and the Enhanced one 5GB. If you buy to Pro plan, the maximum memory is 10GB.

Backups & Restore (none)

This feature allows you to save your website and roll it back later to restore your content. However, there is no possibility to create such backups.

Support

Webs include FAQ, Live Chat, and ticketing system. Premium users can insert a responsive Live Chat.

Fun Factor 1.5/5

Nowadays, a lot of Webs reviews of their regular customers show disappointment. In the beginning, it was intuitive, but now Webs gets more and more frustrating to work with. It’s not really enjoyable nor fun.

Overall Rating 2.2/5

Webs com is easy to use and can do the job for some unpretentious folks. There is no information on Vistaprint investing any time or efforts to make it better that has been a bump in the road for website progress. Sadly we don’t see a fantastic future for the websites running on their host services.

Conclusion

The bottom line is that Webs has lost many loyal customers over the years, and there is no reason to say that this will change soon. We don’t recommend paying for a premium account if you just have started with website building. Definitely check out some other no-cost website builders and what they offer.

But if you still want to try it out, give it a go; there is nothing wrong if you decide to use Webs services, just bear in mind you can receive more from million websites on that matter. If the 5 free pages Webs offers are enough for materializing your site’s ideas, you want decent mobile optimization, and you struggle with other complicated builders, it may work for you.

Read further: The Cheapest Website Builders in 2023