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17 Best Website Builders: Wix, Squarespace, and More (2021)
Picking the best site builder can be difficult, because there are 74 popular choices to select from.
In this guide, I ranked and reviewed the best website builders to create a website based on cost, reliability, web hosting services, technical support, site speed, SEO, features, ease of use, template design, and much more.
We’ll also compare:
The ideal website contractors for small companies.
The ideal free and affordable options.
Those with the best SEO.
The best platforms with online store capabilities.
The best builders for agencies.
And the best choices for photographers and artists.
What’s the Best Website Builder?
Using a website builder is a fast and effortless way to build a presence for your brand or internet business. These tools simplify your website management by combining domain registrationhosting, and site design into one stage.
If you’re not too savvy with web design and development, you’ll want to go with an easy drag and drop editor.
The choice is all up to you.
Here are my top picks for the best website builder to use this year.
Wix.
Best Website Builder for Small Business ($13/month)
Wix is the most popular website builder on the market, with over 100 million consumers.
They have 500+ ready-to-use templates to design your site in any business. These templates are mobile-optimized and have 100 fonts to choose from (or you can upload your own).
Their designs also appear beautiful, with scroll effects, and advanced design features like video and animation backgrounds.
In case you already have a domain name on GoDaddy or need to register one at Wix.com, they make it super easy. Also, if you’d like to add e-commerce to your website so that you can sell online, plans start a $20/month.
If you’re a small business, I urge Wix as the best online store builder. You don’t necessarily need a platform with more advanced options like BigCommerce and Shopify. Wix website owners that are looking to add an e-commerce store can get these excellent new features.
Wix is the most user-friendly site tool on the market. You can almost always customize the look and feel of your website with no programming knowledge.
They also have a tool called Artificial Design Intelligence (ADI) — the first artificial intelligence website builder. Wix ADI learns on your website and uses that information to design a site tailored to your precise needs.
This tool leverages AI choosing from billions of combinations of pictures, text, layouts, and contact forms.
Finally, if you’re seeking the best site builder for small companies, Wix is your very best choice.
Read my whole Wix review for more in-depth analysis.
Get started with Wix.
Best Modern Website Builder with Free Plans (free — $3.49/mo)
Zyro is a site builder with a mission to help local companies to tell their unique stories online.
Overall, they are famous for simplicity and speed.
With Zyro, you can create a business site fast and easily with no coding required. Your site also loads fast due to its light framework and looks great on all devices.
With a powerful set of tools, Zyro helps grow your online business with pre-made design templates, AI-driven text, an intuitive drag-and-drop grid tool, mobile-readiness, and over one million stock images to select from.
One of the standout features is their AI Content Generator, which provides SEO-friendly content ideas based on your industry and specific business type.
To get started with this tool, you choose your type of organization, then write 2-3 sentences describing your brand and circumstance. You then adjust your AI settings and customize them based on duration, expertise, and creativity level. Last, you click the Create button and see your distinctively generated content.
Since content creation is a challenge for many site owners, this tool creates new paragraphs for you which can rank better in search and increase conversion rates.
Some other excellent features include:
Built-in search engine optimization tools to improve your search rankings.
A free SSL certificate and custom domain names.
An AI-driven logo and slogan maker.
24/7 customer support via email and live chat.
AI heatmaps to improve website conversions and forecast visitor behaviour.
Mobile-optimized, fast-loading website layouts.
Free website design templates for different industries like creative services, startups, fashion brands, wellness businesses, bakeries, and much more.
Zyro offers three primary pricing plans — a free plan, a mid-tier”Basic” program at $1.99/month, and their high-tier”Unleashed” program at $3.49/month.
Their free plan does not include a custom domain name but does provide 99.9% uptime, an SSL certificate, 500MB of bandwidth and 500MB of storage.
Their “Basic” plan allows you to connect your own domain name, increases bandwidth and storage, and includes extra features like ad removal and integrations with tools such as Google Tag Manager, Google Analytics, and Facebook pixels. This is a very popular plan that’s most acceptable for small and medium-sized businesses.
Finally, their “Unleashed” plan provides every Zyro feature and gives unlimited storage and bandwidth. At such an affordable price of $3.49/month, it makes sense to go for this program and enjoy the unlimited features if you plan to have a great deal of content on your website.
Overall, Zyro is best for small businesses looking to create and develop a site fast, save money on composing and logo-making with their AI tools, rank high on search engines, and increase conversion rates with high-quality, mobile-friendly design templates.
You can begin with Zyro free of charge to test out their platform, then upgrade to a paid plan when you’re ready to grow your internet business.
Get started with Zyro and begin building your site today.
Best Website Design for Personal Sites ($12/month)
When I think of Squarespace, my mind goes right to their beautifully designed home page. They truly know how to make beautiful, high-quality websites that look great for both small businesses and personal websites alike.
With over 100 design templates to choose from, they lead the pack in regards to design. Squarespace templates appear excellent down to every detail. The fonts, color schemes, and imagery all mesh perfectly for any website.
Besides design, their platform is great for bloggers. I tested out their WYSIWYG blog editor, and it’s very intuitive.
You drag elements like images, headings, and text on the page and position it where you would like. They also offer multiple user permissions, Google AMP functionality, and you can schedule your posts:
A few small SEO limitations hold Squarespace back from being #1 on this list. First, my XML sitemap pulled two versions of every page with and without a trailing slash”/.” This double indexing may potentially result in SEO and duplicate content issues down the road. They didn’t have an easy fix the last time I checked.
Secondly, your blog headlines become your meta titles, so be careful when incorporating your headlines for SEO. You can read more in my full Wix vs Squarespace review.
Other great features make up for these drawbacks. Their ease of use is topnotch — sites are elementary to assemble with their editing tools. In-built analytics tools provide steady data on-site visitors if you’re not using Google Analytics. Plus, it’s tough to go wrong with a beautifully-designed website for just $12/month.
Monthly costs range from $12/month for their private plan up to $40/month for their Online Store (Advanced) plan. Monthly prices are based on a one-year contract, and Squarespace includes a free domain. The Personal program provides a free domain name, unlimited storage and bandwidth, free SSL, and 24/7 customer support.
In general, if you’re a small business that needs first-rate web design or a blogger who wants your content to look great, Squarespace is a reliable choice.
Best Free Website Builder (Free — $25/month)
Weebly powers over 530,000 domain names and is called the easy website builder of choice for people without much technical experience. They offer a great deal of great features. If you are a blogger, you can use Weebly.com to select a domain name and use their editor to add your text, pictures, and content.
They also have a mobile program to track your website’s functionality on the go. And email marketing tools let you send newsletters to your subscribers from inside their tool.
They have a free program which includes 500 MB of storage, a free SSL certificate, and a domain name with Weebly branding. You can use a custom domain name with this plan but are made to have Weebly branding throughout your site. Also, the free plan only includes chat and email support, but no phone service.
Weebly’s paid programs range from $5 to $25 per month. On the high end, their Business Strategy gets you innovative e-commerce functionality, a free domain, and $200 of Google ad credits.
Their e-commerce features include product options/variants, coupon codes, stock management, a shipping calculator, shipping labels, and the ability to accept payments via Square and other providers.
The degree of customer support you receive is based on your subscription level. You’ll find assistance yourself in many locations, including their site, service centre, community forum, social media, and programmer documentation. They also have live chat, email, and phone support.
If you’re searching for a simple website creator to get up and running, I suggest that you begin using Weebly.
Best Site Builder for Ecommerce ($29/month)
Shopify is a favorite ecommerce platform used by over 800,000 online businesses so sell products online. They were founded in Canada in 2004 and quickly became a powerhouse because of their simple dashboard and integrations with thousands of program partners.
While not every website owner needs product-selling performance, I added Shopify into the list because any small business could use them to install their site.
Have a salon for example.
With Shopify, not only could you set up a quick site including a blog, a map of your location, contact information, and appointment scheduling (with a program ), but you could also sell hair care products online. This creates not only a website but another online source of revenue for your business.
Shopify has a lot of features you’d come to expect from other tools on this listing, including hosting, your own domain name, 70+ specialist themes, a free SSL certificate, and promotion and SEO features.
They also supply mobile commerce, 100+ payment gateways, automated carrier shipping rates, automatic tax rates, and the complete checkout experience. Plus, you can enjoy omnichannel selling across Facebook, eBay, Amazon, Instagram, and much more.
If you’re establishing a new website and believe that you might want to sell products online in the future, it’s far better to get started with Shopify instead of another tool that does not take online shopping too.
They offer three plans ranging from $29/month to $299/month. The $29/month Fundamental Shopify Plan should give site owners everything they want, including a complete website, an online store with unlimited products, site features, 24/7 support, and more.
If you want to give Shopify a try, they give a 14-day free trial with no credit card required.
Best For Professional painters ($16 per month).
Some of its other Important features include:
You can edit and add content to your live website.
Invite other team members to collaborate on a single dashboard.
Add up to 100 pages to your website.
99.9% uptime guaranteed and SSL certificate.
Automated backup.
Custom fonts available.
Create custom 404 pages.
Customer support via email, Webflow community forum, and help centre.
Integration with Zapier enables you to connect with tools like Slack, MailChimp, and Asana.
You can add up to 3000 products on your site with eCommerce support.
Finest WordPress Themes for Photography and Creative Websites ($279 one-time).
Flothemes is a business that offers customizable WordPress themes. These templates enable you to build sites inside of WordPress without the need for custom coding. It’s powered by Flex block, a potent free flow page builder, providing limitless customization choices.
All the templates and themes come with premade layouts and content blocks. You can also customize colors, fonts, the arrangement of the webpage, and more.
Flothemes help you build your site in a few steps, including:
Register a domain name and hosting service provider for your site. You can even check Flothemes cloud hosting services, starting at $26 a month.
Install WordPress.org and join it to your web site hosting. Luckily, most hosting services offer a one-click WordPress setup.
Finally, select a theme for your website or portfolio.
You can watch several how-to tutorials by Flothemes or contact the customer care team.
If you need help setting up the entire website, you can drop a message, and their staff will do everything for you.
Flothemes can allow you to set up your site for only $499-$1999. Besides setting up your website from the start, they also provide services like page loading speed optimization, SEO, styling, etc.. In addition, you get two screen sharing sessions of 45 minutes each with experts and one SEO consultation call of 45 minutes. All in all, you get six rounds of implementations.
Additionally, Flothemes provides features like SSL implementation, WordPress setup, Typography, color scheme stylization, and much more. You also get complete design freedom, SEO options, and a dash.
Pricing:
While their themes cost a one-time $279, Flothemes offers three pricing strategies for their site setup services, including:
Simple Installation Bundle: $499
Advanced setup packages: $999
Pro Setup packages: $1,999
The Easy Setup Package can help you skip the technical components and jump directly to adding content and personalizing your motif. It provides features like WordPress installation, website layout setup, theme installation, WordPress transfer, site launching, etc..
The Advanced Setup Package incorporates full assistance with site setup, styling & launch, site speed optimization & an search engine optimization consultation. Additional features include typography & colour scheme stylization, SSL implementation, speed optimization, etc..
Pro Setup Package includes all of the features from the Advanced Setup Package together with the tailored mockup & execution for your homepage.
Best Site Tool with Integrated CRM Tools
HubSpot is a topnotch CRM tool that also has a full-featured CMS and website builder. Using their platform, you can create website pages, blog posts, landing pages either from scratch or using their pre-built templates.
Their drag-and-drop editor uses responsive design to assist you create webpages that look great on any device. Where HubSpot stands out is its personalization and integrations.
Unlike other tools on this listing, HubSpot comes integrated with a broad range of marketing applications, including tools to manage email advertising, get found online, and catch, engage with and understand prospects.
By way of example, when you make a webpage, you can add calls-to-action and forms that convert visitors into prospects. Then, when you understand your traffic, you can dynamically create content unique to site visitors based on their location, device, speech, traffic source, or some other detail you choose to capture in your HubSpot CRM.
This integrated marketing suite covers all parts of the customer lifecycle:
Forms, live chat, and conversational chatbots capture leads.
Email marketing, retargeting, and messenger integrations send personalized messages to your leads.
Their contact builder, analytics tools, and record segmentation help you understand your leads.
Personalized experiences, calls-to-action, and smart content turns leads into customers.
Overall, if you’re looking for a site builder that also comes with a full-featured pair of CRM and marketing tools, HubSpot is your best alternative.
The World’s Most Popular CMS
Easiest Free Website Builder for Small Websites
Best Digital Advertising Website Builder for Local Businesses
A Personalized Website with the Power of AI
Best for Large Online Stores
Great for Photographers and Artists
Best for startups that want to create bootstrapped sites
Best Website Builder for Agencies and Multilingual Websites
What’s a Website Builder?
A website builder is a tool that allows anyone to manage a website and domain name without manual coding. In other words, a site builder is a tool or software program to assist you build a web site.
In the old days of the net, programmers needed to know HTML and CSS to make a website. Today, if you want to code a site, there is a steep learning curve — you want to have extensive knowledge of JavaScript and PHP. Not so with website builders.
These tools help everyone from small companies and bloggers to news websites and ecommerce businesses easily create websites in minutes.
How much does it cost to build a website?
Is Wix better than WordPress?
How much does a website cost monthly?
Does Google have a website builder?
Can I get a free site for my business?
There you have it — my list of the greatest website builders. Because there are 74 choices out there, I’ve condensed the list down to the top so that you can choose the option that is right for your small business or online brand.
If you’re looking for the best website builder complete, I recommend you get started using Wix.
For the best designs and templates, take a look at Squarespace.
If you need an e-commerce site to sell products online, Shopify is a fantastic choice.
What website builder do you use?