Wix vs Squarespace vs WordPress: Which Is Best? (2022)
In today’s article, we will introduce you to a comparison that we have made between some of the most famous website builders on the market – Wix, Squarespace, and WordPress. If you want to build your dream website, but you are still wondering which platform will suit your purposes, then you are in the right place.
First of all, we should warn you there are ups and downs, no matter which platform you choose. We will introduce you to the most essential areas of creating a successful website – the flexibility of its design, ease of use, and pricing. Let’s check out how each of these website builders fared.
Having so many selections out there makes choosing the best website builder a complicated task. We are comparing three of the best platforms on the market Wix, Squarespace, and WordPress, and this makes it even harder. Each of them is very good and has many features that will make you even more confused when it comes to picking just one of them. Keep reading if you need help. We aim to make your choice easier. We have done independent research to find out how each of these well-known platforms works.
Wix vs. Squarespace vs. WordPress: Pros and Cons
Wix Pros and Cons
Wix Pros
- One of the best website builders
- Very easy to use
Wix Cons
- After you publish your website, you can not switch themes.
- It can be very hard to make the right choice.
To be honest, our research has found that Wix is the winner when compared with other website builders on the market. It is one of the best platforms in terms of geat value, superb package, and ease of use – it offers a full package with everything you need. They even have outstanding customer support.
It has a useful drag-and-drop design. There is only one small disadvantage -you can not change the chosen theme.
Squarespace Pros and Cons
Squarespace Pros
- Some of the most beautiful templates
- Best for creative industries
Squarespace Cons
- This platform is not for beginners
- You get a limited choice of pricing plans
When it comes to design, Squarespace easily stands out. We have found the design of their templates is perfectly suitable for different types of creative industries. But keep in mind, the best-looking website leads to a steeper learning curve.
WordPress Pros and Cons
WordPress Pros
- Unlimited customization.
- Access to all kinds of third-party plugins.
WordPress Cons
- Requires a serious knowledge base of coding.
- Need to set up web hosting yourself (we recommend Bluehost)
You can do everything with WordPress. Well, this means everything depends on your imagination and your coding knowledge base. WordPress is a reliable software, but you will need web hosting and coding skills. Otherwise, we would highly recommend you to look for another website builder that will suit your needs.
What’s the Difference Between Wix vs. Squarespace vs. WordPress?
In order to find which website builder will suit your purposes best, you will need to know the difference between each of them.
Wix is one of the best platforms that uses a drag-and-drop builder, which you can use to customize your website according to your taste. You do not need to have experience or knowledge on how to code. Wix is perfectly suitable for beginners who want to have creative control.
We have found that Squarespace is just like Wix but more fashionable in some ways. It is probably best suitable for design since it has some of the most beautiful themes compared to other web hosts. Our research also found that it takes a bit more effort.
Next on our list is WordPress. It is a self-hosted software that is suitable for people with a technical knowledge base of how to code. With this platform, you have total freedom to find web hosting for yourself and code everything you need. You rent a space on the internet for your website by using it.
Find out which are The Best Drag and Drop Website Builders in 2022
Ease of Use
We think building a website and accessing the latest web design features should be something for everyone.
Wix
When it comes to Wix vs. Squarespace vs. WordPress – Wix is the most comfortable website hosting platform to use. The drag-and-drop builder allows you to build a website according to your taste with ease. No special knowledge is required making it the perfect choice for tech beginners. Wix makes your work even more manageable with Wix ADI. This artificial design intelligence builds the website for you based on a few questions and your answers to them. By going with Wix, you will be able to create a website that can make you proud.
Squarespace
Squarespace can be a bit harder to use at first, but it provides nice designs for those of you who do not mind a small learning curve. Beauty is the second name of Squarespace. There is no need to know how to code, making it very easy to use. Squarespace offers handy tools. You can use them, but we should note that you will need to spend some time to acquire some basic knowledge. You will find it is trickier compared to Wix because it takes more time, but the final product will definitely make you proud. Squarespace will make your site look like it was designed by professionals.
WordPress
WordPress is really useful software, which means that you should find a web host for your website. Using your coding skills, you can customize everything according to your taste. So far, this is the most challenging platform to go with on our list because it requires you to have some special knowledge of coding.
We have found that you can use Bluehost’s services to power your WordPress website. We have rated it as one of the most suitable hosting providers. They even have the approval of WordPress. Their services are very cheap for new customers. Prices start at just $2.95 per month – pretty affordable. If you choose Bluehost as your web host, you will access lots of features. This will simplify the whole setup process by making the installation just one click away.
- WordPress-centric user dashboard
- Free domain name and SSL security certificate
- Automatic WordPress updates
- 24/7 support from in-house WordPress experts
We highly recommend WordPress to people with technical knowledge of coding. They will have total freedom to customize their website the way they want with WordPress. We recommend it o people who are curious and keen to learn more about hosting and coding.
We should note that WordPress does not have a dedicated customer support team. You are on your own if you have any trouble or issue that concerns you.
Try BlueHost web hosting today!
Wix vs. Squarespace vs. WordPress – Ease of Use: Verdict
Among many other web hosts, we have found that the easiest one to use is probably Wix. It is simple, fun to use, and you never feel confused when building your Wix website. It has a very useful drag-and-drop design that can boast its ease of use. You can use it to customize everything the way you want to.
You may find Squarespace more difficult at first, while WordPress is for those of you who have the proper coding knowledge base.
Are you a Total Beginner?
Wix is the best website builder to start with if you are a total beginner. You do not have to be a professional to create your dream site.
Design Flexibility
If your priority is to make your visitors happy, you should emphasize your website’s design.
Wix
Wix offers so many beautiful themes to choose from. They cover sixteen categories – business, portfolio, cv, and more industries. All themes from Wix are fully mobile responsive – they look as impressive on a phone as on a laptop screen. So do not worry about anything, just make your choice and be creative. It is important to note here that you can not change the theme of your website once you have chosen it. You get to choose only one to publish.
Squarespace
Does Squarespace have many templates too? Yes, of course, it does. All their templates are categorized. They are all professional-looking, you will definitely love them. There is an advantage of using their templates since you can customize them as many times as you want. They are mobile responsive too, and you can edit your template to make it look even better. In terms of flexibility, Squarespace is better than Wix.
Related: Beautiful Examples of Squarespace Websites
WordPress
Related: 52 Best Free WordPress Themes for Blogs in 2022 (Expert Pick)
WordPress is an entirely different thing. It offers so many WordPress themes to choose from- hundreds of thousands, and you can customize them the way you want with no limitations. With enough knowledge, you can add plugins or use your coding skills to make each theme do or show whatever you like. When it comes to building a WordPress website, you are pretty much unlimited. Everything depends on your knowledge and imagination.
Wix vs. Squarespace vs. WordPress – Design Flexibility: Verdict
The best-looking website builder so far is Squarespace. It offers professional-looking themes that you can code or just use a drag-and-drop editor for your purposes. When it comes to flexibility, both WordPress and Squarespace perform well, but in terms of templates, Squarespace is a total winner. On the other hand, we have found that Wix is not as flexible as we would like it to be, and you can not switch between different themes.
Do You Want a Stunning Website?
Squarespace has many designs made for everyone’s taste. It is perfectly suitable for beginners. Using Squarespace’s features, they can create a professional-looking site.
Tools and Features
Tools and features always need to be considered as the most critical factors. The more tools you have, the more significant opportunities you will have to achieve your dream site. Carefully choose the website builder with better tools because you will be able to do more.
Ecommerce
In 2017 the global e-retail sales reached $2.3 trillion. Why did we tell you this information? Well, you need to have powerful features on your site to make it reach this growing trend.
There are three eCommerce price plans which you can choose from if you go with Wix. All of them give you extra storage, an option of over twenty different payment getaways, and the ability to sell without transaction fees. We have found that Wix is one of the website builders with the best eCommerce functionality.
Related: Wix Ecommerce Review 2022
Squarespace is one of the best platforms that offer high-quality eCommerce functionality features. You can zoom the image of a product, abandoned cart recovery, coupon generation, and no transaction fees.
When it comes to WordPress, things are a bit different since they do not have built-in features, and you will need to add a separate plugin to get eCommerce functionality.
There is a unique eCommerce plugin for WordPress that offers refunds with just a click and gives you the ability to embed products in different store pages – WooCommerce.
Related: Best E-commerce Website Builders Compared – 2022
Good to know
In case you need to take offline payments with any of these site builders, you will simply need to add an integration to Square. If your aim is to sell online, at fairs or pop-up shops, we highly recommend you buy a basic Square card reader, which is only $49. This card reader immediately synchronizes with the online inventory of your website, and you are ready to use it.
Blogging
Further Reading: How to Start a Blog in 2023
Having a blog is great, especially if you use it to grow your online community and keep your site’s visitors well informed. You can use it to announce new information, products, or deals.
If you use Wix as your blogging platform, we recommend you to incorporate it with the Wix Blog app, which has many useful features and is completely free. It allows you to create galleries, add comments, etc., to your blog. The only disadvantage that we have found is that you can not archive posts, meaning valuable content will be lost over time.
Another excellent blogging platform is Squarespace. You can use it to create a good-looking blog or portfolio where you can add sharing to social networks, likes from users, and multiple author support.
When it comes to blogging, WordPress stands out as one of the best. It helps millions of people to get their blogs online, which makes WP very popular. WordPress offers many blog features, and numbers get even more impressive when we tell you it powers almost 25% of all websites today.
Related: Best Blogging Platforms in 2023
If you use WordPress for your dream site, you will be able to customize everything with code, and you can add any plugin you like. It is a self-hosted software perfect for people with knowledge of coding.
Marketing
You can promote your dream website in many different ways- by creating newsletters, adding banners, running email campaigns with just a few clicks. There are marketing apps like Wix Shoutout, which you can use or pick a third-party app – there are many options available on the market.
Squarespace offers various built-in features that you can benefit from. The only small disadvantage about this is that you are restricted only to the features they offer. In case you want to boost your website, you can go to the Squarespace Extensions app and find the apps that will suit your needs the best.
On the other hand, we have WordPress, where they offer everything for your promoting and sharing purposes. There is a plugin for everything. There are more than fifty thousand plugins to choose from; some of them are the best marketing apps. You have a lot to choose from, but you should know that it requires a lot more effort and technical knowledge.
Social Media Integration
Your website will flourish if you have many retweets and likes. If you want to integrate social media live feeds, Wix offers share buttons. There is a special panel for promoting social media posts.
Squarespace is not very different. It offers you link account from more than twenty-five different social media accounts such as Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Spotify, etc.
WordPress is very flexible in terms of social media needs; you can integrate as many plugins as you would like to – social comments, share buttons, auto-posting, etc.
Wix vs. Squarespace vs. WordPress – Marketing Tools: Verdict
Wix and Squarespace have some of the best tools within their built-in features, while WordPress does not have many built-in tools but allows you access to more than fifty thousand plugins. You can use them to boost your website, but you will also need to have technical knowledge.
App Markets
When it comes to the app market, Squarespace has the smallest app store. They have the Squarespace Extensions store. Go and check it – they have more than twenty apps there. Some apps cover shipping and fulfillment, sales and marketing, inventory and products, etc. Squarespace offers you many built-in features you can benefit from. Wix has more than two hundred apps that cover different categories, such as social media, eCommerce, business, etc. The Wix app market offers simple installation with user reviews and pricing breakdowns.
WordPress has the biggest app market that you will ever see. Compared to Wix and Squarespace, it is sort of a mall. As we mentioned above, you can choose from more than fifty thousand plugins. When choosing a plugin for your needs, we recommend you go with the larger user base since they are updated regularly and supply customer support.
Wix vs. Squarespace vs. WordPress – App Markets: Verdict
WordPress is the definite winner. Wix offers more than fifty thousand plugins to choose from, whereas Wix provides you with only two hundred. Currently, they have plugins for all the important key areas that will help you build your dream site. WordPress always gets new apps added to their store, so they easily win this competition.
SEO
Do you know what SEO is? The abbreviation stands for Search Engine Optimization. This is a very important process that is being used to rank your dream website higher on search engines like Google. If you have good SEO skills, your future customers will be able to find your website more easily.
In terms of SEO, Wix helps you a lot with their special SEO Wiz that will guide you through the overall process and help you create a strategy. In order for this to happen, you will need to pick a few important keywords that best describe your website. Wix and Squarespace both have features that will help you improve the SEO of your site. These features include:
- Updating URLs – every user will be able to find each of your web pages more easily
- Customizing meta descriptions – what Google displays on the results page
- Editing image alt tags – helps Google identify what an image is and how to categorize it
Unfortunately, Squarespace does not have many specific apps in terms of SEO, while Wix has. In such cases, it is better to go with Wix if you want your site to scale search engines more effectively.
When it comes to SEO, you have more freedom with WordPress, but as we mentioned earlier, everything associated with WordPress demands far more knowledge compared to the other web hosts. You are pretty much unlimited in terms of customization of your SEO performance.
Related: What is the best website builder for SEO?
Wix vs. Squarespace vs. WordPress – SEO: Verdict
Wix is the winner again. It has all the necessary basic features to help you improve help your site’s ranking. Unfortunately, Squarespace does not offer support for starters, whereas WordPress leaves you to your own devices but gives you so many options.
Need Help With SEO?
For beginners, we highly recommend Wix because it makes it super easy for them to get started with all their basic essentials – you do not even need special knowledge.
Help and Support
WordPress vs. Wix vs. Squarespace – no matter which one you choose, you will always encounter issues that you will have to deal with when building the website of your dream. Customer support is crucial in such cases because it lets you focus on managing your site and making it even better.
In terms of customer support, we would go with Wix. You can reach their support team via:
- Phone and email (Monday to Thursday, 5 am – 5 pm PST)
- Social media
- The Wix Help Center
Squarespace also has a customer support team, but reaching them is not a simple task. There are a few ways to contact them:
- 24/7 email support
- Live chat (Monday to Friday, 4 am – 8 pm ET)
- A comprehensive Knowledge Base
When it comes to WordPress, customer support is not a pressing issue since it is a free platform. They do not have email support, a call center, or live chat. Fortunately, they have a huge support community where you can find tutorials, guides, and answers to frequently asked questions. When you subscribe to a hosting plan with Bluehost, they give you access to their WordPress team of experts. This can be extremely helpful in case you run into difficulty.
Wix vs. Squarespace vs. WordPress – Help and support: Verdict
Wix is our definite winner once again. And this is because it offers excellent support via phone, email, and social media.
Squarespace does not provide help to its customers via phone.
WordPress does not provide any customer support except a forum.
Pricing
For website owners, pricing is an important key factor that plays a massive role in choosing a site builder over another.
Wix
Wix offers a free plan with pretty useful features, but if you need something more like more bandwidth, your own domain name, eCommerce features, etc., you will have to upgrade to one of their premium plans. They have seven premium plans ranging from $13 to $39 per month. Check the prices and plans in our comprehensive review for more detailed information.
Did a Wix Plan Catch Your Eye?
Wix offers various price plans. We recommend you to start with their free plan since it is totally risk-free, and you can check if this is the platform for your needs.
Squarespace Pricing
Unfortunately, Squarespace offers no free plan, but you can easily trial their platform at no cost for fourteen days. That is the period when you can check if their platform is suitable for your purposes, then you can upgrade for something more. Squarespace offers four premium plans; here, they are:
- Personal ($12 p/m)
- Business ($18 p/m
- Basic ($26 p/m)
- Advanced ($40 p/m)
Each web hosting plan has some of the most beautiful designs for Squarespace sites. But you will need to go with the Basic or Advanced plan in case you need to sell online. Check our article for more detailed information on what prices Squarespace offers.
WordPress
In terms of costs, WordPress is quite trickier than the rest because it has different offers for everyone. Their software is free to use, but apart from that, you will need to pay for website hosting, SSL certificates, plugins, different themes, etc., which is around $10 per month. The WordPress hosting package includes a free domain name and SSL certificate.
The Bluehost hosting package starts at just $2.95 per month.
Wix and Squarespace have some of the most manageable plans you can use. You may find some of them are a bit more expensive than usual while pricing, while WordPress has many different plans with different prices for anyone.
Squarespace vs. Wix vs. WordPress – Pricing: Verdict
Our research has concluded that you can have the best experience by using Wix. You can immediately start using it with a free plan; other than that, you get seven reasonably priced premium plans to choose from – we have found that Wix is definitely the best value for the money website builder.
Unfortunately, Squarespace does not offer a free plan, but you can check it with their 14-day free trial. They have a business plan and many others you can choose from if they suit your needs.
Regarding WordPress, pricing varies since they offer pretty-much unlimited customization.
Are You After Good Value for Money?
Wix offers a wide range of price plans. Everything depends on your budget. Read further and find out which is the best website builder for small businesses.
Wix vs. WordPress vs. Squarespace: Conclusion
We could go on forever, but our journey is nearly over, and you have a job to do – your dream website. We will once again recap everything we got out of our survey.
Ease of use
Wix is very simple to use with its drag-and-drop builder.
Squarespace is a bit more challenging than Wix but still very easy to use.
WordPress is not suitable for tec beginners. It requires web hosting knowledge.
Design Flexibility
Wix has more than five hundred themes to choose from. They are mobile responsive, and you can not witch your theme after going live.
When it comes to design, Squarespace is the total winner. It enables you to customize your design with coding.
With WordPress, you are pretty much unlimited, but their themes are not as impressive as Squarespace.
Features and Tools
Wix has many features, no matter the issue. They can only improve their blogging tools.
Squarespace has the best blogging tool and lots of eCommerce tools.
WordPress does not have many built-in features but gives you access to more than fifty thousand plugins.
App Markets
Wix has an app market with more than two hundred apps.
Squarespace has an extension store with twenty-three apps to choose from.
WordPress covers all the industries with more than fifty thousand plugins to choose from.
SEO
Wix has the most useful tool in terms of SEO – SEO Wiz. It also has all the basics that will improve your Google rankings.
Squarespace does not offer enough support for beginners but still has very nice SEO tools.
WordPress also has very useful SEO tools, but you need knowledge on how to code.
Help and Support
Wix has excellent customer support via social media, phone, or the help forum.
Squarespace offers support to its customers via live chat and email, but unfortunately, it does not have phone support.
Unfortunately, WordPress does not offer any customer support.
Pricing
Wix has a free plan which you can choose to explore their features. Other than that, you can choose from 7 premium plans, starting from $5 per month.
Squarespace does not have a free plan, but you can explore it with a free 14-day trial. You also get some premium options to choose from.
As we mentioned above, WordPress is self-hosted software. Due to that fact, prices may vary depending on the costs of web hosting, themes, SSL, etc.
When it comes to comparing WordPress vs. Squarespace vs. Wix, you may have already noticed that Wix has the best themes on the market. It is prevalent because it is accessible for everyone who really wants to be a web page builder. This is why many people go with Wix – because it is simple and perfectly suitable for beginners.
In terms of design, we place Squarespace in second place. Squarespace is the perfect choice if you are after professional-looking templates.
When we compared Squarespace vs. WordPress vs. Wix, e knew that these are the best web hosting providers on the market. Squarespace and WordPress are a bit trickier to get started with for your website building purposes. Your WordPress website will require extensive coding knowledge, which, on the other hand, will give you total freedom to do what you want with your WordPress website.
We have made an in-depth comparison between some of the most famous web hosts, and to be honest with you, we have concluded that Wix is the best one so far.
Are You Ready to Try Wix?
You can build your Wix website with a free plan without any risky payment and time limit.
Still unconvinced of which website builder to choose? Check our review of The Best Website Builders in 2022
FAQs
Which website builder is easiest to use?
If you have read our website builder reviews to this point, then you know Wix is the best web host – they offer a money-back guarantee, drag-and-drop editor, an online store with many apps, beautiful templates, and best of all, requires a lower learning curve.
How much does Squarespace cost?
There are four price plans to choose from with Squarespace – Personal, Business, Basic, and Advanced. The cheapest plan is with a starting price of $12 per month. Higher web hosting plans give you eCommerce functionality, while others give you a beautiful template to build the best website for yourself or your company.
Should I use WordPress?
WordPress is a self-hosted software that is suitable for people with in-depth technical knowledge of coding. It gives you total freedom on how to design your website and domain name. You will just need to have the necessary skills.
Wrap Up
In terms of approach, WordPress is quite different in comparison with Wix or Squarespace. You can install the WordPress software on the web hosting provider you have chosen. WordPress powers over 37% of all websites, making it very famous. On the other hand, Wix and Squarespace – definitely have many similarities since they are both flexible and straightforward, but we think the overall winner is Wix.
Before making your final decision, you can read this article one more time to remember all the pros and cons of each web host, then consider your needs and give it a shot.
