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17 Best Site Builders: Wix, Squarespace, and More (2021)
Choosing 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 make a web site based on cost, reliability, web hosting solutions , technical support, website speed, SEO, features, ease of use, template design, and more.
We will also compare:
The best website builders for small companies.
The ideal free and affordable options.
Those with the best SEO.
The best platforms with online shop capabilities.
The top builders for agencies.
And the best options for photographers and artists.
What is the Best Website Builder?
Using a website builder is a fast and effortless way to build a presence for your brand or online business. These tools simplify your website management by combining domain registration, hosting, and website design into one platform.
If you’re not too knowledgeable about web design and development, you will want to go with a simple drag and drop editor.
The choice is up to you.
Here are my top picks for the best website builder to use this year.
Wix.
Best Site Builder for Small Business ($13/month)
Wix is the most popular website builder available on the current market, with over 100 million users.
They have 500+ ready-to-use templates to design your website in any business. These templates are mobile-optimized and have 100 fonts to choose from (or you can upload your own).
Their designs also look beautiful, with scroll effects, and advanced design features like video and animation backgrounds.
In case you already have a domain on GoDaddy or need to register one at Wix.com, they make it super easy. Additionally, if you want to add e-commerce to your site so that you can sell online, plans begin a $20/month.
If you are a small company, I urge Wix as the best online store builder. You don’t necessarily require a platform with more advanced options like BigCommerce and Shopify. Wix website owners that want to bring an e-commerce store can find these excellent new features.
Wix is the most user-friendly website tool on the market. You can almost always customize the look and feel of your website with no coding knowledge.
They also have a tool named Artificial Design Intelligence (ADI) — the first artificial intelligence site builder. Wix ADI learns about your website and uses that information to design a website tailored to your specific needs.
This tool leverages AI selecting from billions of combinations of pictures, text, layouts, and contact forms.
Ultimately, if you’re seeking the best site builder for small companies, Wix is your very best choice.
Read my full Wix review for more in-depth analysis.
Get started with Wix.
Greatest Modern Website Builder with Free Plans (free — $3.49/mo)
Zyro is a website builder with a mission to help local businesses to tell their unique stories on the web.
Overall, they’re best known for simplicity and speed.
With Zyro, you can create a company website quickly and easily with no coding required. Your website also loads fast because of its light frame and looks great on all apparatus.
With a strong 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 choose from.
One of the standout features is their AI Content Generator, which offers SEO-friendly content ideas based on your industry and specific business type.
To get started with this tool, you pick your type of business, then write 2-3 sentences describing your brand and circumstance. Then you correct your AI settings and customize them based on duration, expertise, and creativity degree. Lastly, you click the Create button and see your uniquely created content.
Since content generation is a challenge for many site owners, this tool generates new paragraphs for you which can rank better in search and increase conversion rates.
Some other excellent features include:
Built-in SEO tools to increase your search rankings.
A free SSL certificate and custom domains.
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 designs.
Free website design templates for various industries like creative agencies, startups, fashion brands, wellness companies, bakeries, and more.
Zyro offers three main pricing plans — a free plan, a mid-tier”Basic” program at $1.99/month, and their high-tier”Unleashed” plan at $3.49/month.
Their free program does not include a custom domain name but does provide 99.9% uptime, an SSL certificate, 500MB of bandwidth and 500MB of storage.
Next, their “Basic” program permits you to connect your domain name, increases bandwidth and storage, and includes extra features like ad removal and integrations with tools like Google Tag Manager, Google Analytics, and Facebook pixels. This is a very popular plan that is most acceptable for small and medium-sized businesses.
Finally, their “Unleashed” program provides every Zyro feature and gives unlimited storage and bandwidth. At this affordable price of $3.49/month, it is sensible to go with this plan and enjoy the unlimited features if you’re planning to get a great deal of content on your website.
Overall, Zyro is best for small businesses seeking to create and develop a site quickly, save money on writing and logo-making with their AI tools, rank higher on search engines, and increase conversion rates with high quality, mobile-friendly design templates.
You can begin with Zyro for free to test out their platform, then upgrade to a paid program when you’re ready to grow your internet business.
Get started with Zyro and start building your site today.
Best Website Design for Personal Sites ($12/month)
When I think of Squarespace, my mind goes directly for their beautifully designed home page. They truly know how to make beautiful, high-quality sites 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 vision all mesh perfectly for any site.
Besides design, their platform is great for bloggers. I tested out their WYSIWYG blog editor, and it is very intuitive.
You drag elements like images, headings, and text onto the page and place it where you want. They also offer multiple user permissions, Google AMP functionality, and you can schedule your posts:
A few small search engine optimization limits hold Squarespace back from being #1 on this list. To begin with, my XML sitemap pulled two versions of every page with and without a trailing slash”/.” This dual indexing may potentially result in SEO and duplicate content problems later on. They didn’t have a simple fix the last time I checked.
Secondly, your blog headlines always become your meta names, so be careful when adding your headlines for SEO. You can read more in my full Wix vs Squarespace review.
Other terrific features make up for these drawbacks. Their ease of use is topnotch — websites are elementary to assemble with their editing tools. In-built analytics tools provide continuous data onsite traffic if you are not using Google Analytics. Plus, it’s hard to go wrong with a beautifully-designed site for just $12/month.
Monthly prices 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 plan provides a free domain name, unlimited storage and bandwidth, free SSL, and 24/7 customer service.
Overall, if you are a small business that needs first-rate web design or a blogger that wants your articles to look great, Squarespace is a reliable choice.
Best Free Website Builder (Free — $25/month)
Weebly powers over 530,000 domains and is called the simple site builder of choice for people without much technical expertise. They offer a lot 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 own text, pictures, and articles.
They also have a mobile program to track your site’s performance on the go. And email marketing tools allow you to send newsletters to your subscribers from within their tool.
They have a free plan which comes with 500 MB of storage, a free SSL certificate, and a domain with Weebly branding. You can use a custom domain name with this plan but are forced to have Weebly branding throughout your website. Additionally, the free program only includes chat and email support, but no phone service.
Weebly’s paid programs vary from $5 to $25 per month. On the high end, their Business Strategy gets you innovative e-commerce performance, a free domainname, and $200 of Google ad credits.
Their e-commerce features include product options/variants, coupon codes, inventory management, a shipping calculator, shipping labels, and the ability to accept payments via Square and other suppliers.
The degree of customer support you receive is based on your subscription level. You can find assistance yourself in many locations, including their site, service center, community forum, social media, and programmer documentation. They also have live chat, email, and telephone support.
If you’re looking for a simple site creator to get up and running, I recommend you begin using Weebly.
Best Website 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 due to their simple dashboard and integrations with thousands of app partners.
While not every website owner needs product-selling functionality, I added Shopify to the list because almost any small business could use them to set up their site.
Have a salon for instance.
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+ professional topics, a free SSL certificate, and promotion and SEO features.
They also supply mobile commerce, 100+ payment gateways, automatic carrier shipping rates, automatic tax rates, and the complete checkout experience. Besides, you can enjoy omnichannel selling across Facebook, eBay, Amazon, Instagram, and 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 begin with Shopify rather than another instrument that does not take online shopping as seriously.
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 full website, an internet store with unlimited products, blog features, 24/7 support, and more.
If you’d like to give Shopify a try, they offer a 14-day free trial with no credit card required.
Best For Professional painters ($16 a month).
Some of its other key features include:
You can edit and add content to your live site.
Invite other team members to collaborate on a single dash.
Add up to 100 pages to your site.
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 center.
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.
Best WordPress Themes for Photography and Creative Websites ($279 one-time).
Flothemes is a business that provides customizable WordPress themes. These templates help you 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 options.
All the templates and themes include premade layouts and content blocks. You may also customize colors, fonts, the arrangement of the webpage, and more.
Flothemes help you build your site in a few measures, including:
Register a domain name and hosting service provider for your site. You can also check Flothemes cloud hosting services, starting at $26 per month.
Install WordPress.org and connect it to your website hosting. Fortunately, most hosting services offer a one-click WordPress installation.
Finally, pick a theme for your website or portfolio.
You can see several how-to tutorials by Flothemes or contact the customer care team.
If you need help setting up the whole site, you can drop a message, and their team will do everything for you.
Flothemes will help you set up your website for only $499-$1999. Besides setting up your site from the start, they also offer services like page loading speed optimization, SEO, styling, etc.. In addition, you get two display sharing sessions of 45 minutes each with experts and one SEO consultation call of 45 minutes. In general, you get six rounds of implementations.
Additionally, Flothemes provides features like SSL implementation, WordPress installation, Typography, color scheme stylization, and much more. You also find complete design freedom, SEO options, and a dashboard.
Pricing:
While their themes cost a one-time $279, Flothemes offers three pricing plans for their website setup services, including:
Simple Setup Package: $499
Advanced setup packages: $999
Pro Installation packs: $1,999
The Simple Setup Package can help you skip the technical components and jump straight to adding content and personalizing your theme. It offers features like WordPress installation, website layout setup, theme setup, WordPress transfer, site launch, etc..
The Advanced Setup Package incorporates full assistance with website setup, styling & launching, site speed optimization & an SEO consultation. Additional features include typography & color scheme stylization, SSL implementation, speed optimization, etc..
Pro Setup Package contains all 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 which also includes a full-featured CMS and website builder. Using their platform, you can create website pages, blog posts, landing pages 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 wide range of marketing applications, including tools to manage email marketing, 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 leads. Then, when you understand your visitors, you can dynamically create content unique to site visitors based on their location, device, language, traffic source, or any other detail you choose to capture in your HubSpot CRM.
This integrated marketing suite covers all parts of the customer lifecycle:
Types, live chat, and conversational chatbots capture leads.
Email advertising, retargeting, and messenger integrations send customized messages to your leads.
Their contact builder, analytics tools, and list segmentation help you understand your leads.
Personalized experiences, calls-to-action, and smart content turns leads into clients.
Overall, if you’re seeking a site builder that also includes a full-featured set of CRM and marketing tools, HubSpot is your best choice.
The World’s Most Popular CMS
Easiest Free Website Builder for Small Sites
Best Digital Advertising Website Builder for Local Businesses
A Personalized Website with the Power of AI
Best for Enormous Online Stores
Great for Photographers and Artists
Best for startups that want to make bootstrapped sites
Best Site 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 application to help you build a web site.
In the old days of the web, programmers needed to understand HTML and CSS to make a website. Today, if you want to code a site, there’s 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 businesses and bloggers to news sites and ecommerce companies 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 company?
There you have it — my list of the top website builders. Because there are 74 options out there, I’ve condensed the listing down to the top so you may choose the option that is perfect for your business or online brand.
If you’re looking for the very best website builder overall, I recommend you get started using Wix.
For the best designs and templates, check out Squarespace.
If you will need an e-commerce site to sell products online, Shopify is a good choice.
What website builder do you use?