6 of the Best Wix Alternatives to Try in 2024 (Ranked & Reviewed)
Wix has a lot to offer for today’s budding business owners.
If you’re looking for a site building tool that can deliver stunning templates, Wix is for you. It also offers plenty of customization options, and an excellent app market. Plus, Wix is one of the most accessible site builders on the market. Ideal for beginners.
However, while Wix is great for a lot of companies, it won’t be right for everyone.
That’s why it’s so important to know which Wix alternatives are out there.
Why You Need Wix Alternatives
Like any site-building service, Wix has various pros and cons to consider.
For instance, on the one hand, Wix is a compelling and easy-to-use website builder. It has a range of sleek and modern templates to choose from.
On the other hand, Wix is far from the cheapest option around for smaller companies. Wix also lacks some essential features too.
Here are some reasons why you might want to use Wix:
- Great templates: There are plenty of attractive templates to choose from. They’re organized to suit different industries. Plus, you don’t need a lot of coding knowledge to adjust your appearance either.
- Flexibility: Wix gives you the freedom to create anything you like on your website. You get to choose where elements of your site go thanks to the sensational drag-and-drop website editor. The editor offers “pixel perfect” performance.
- Strong app market: Wix makes it easy to extend the functionality of your website. You can experiment with extra integrations and apps from partners. That means that you can unlock plenty of third-party services.
- Automatic backups: If something goes wrong with your website, you can always roll your design back a day or two. Automatic backups protect you from unfortunate mishaps.
On the other hand, you might not want to use Wix if:
- You’re on a budget: Wix isn’t the cheapest solution on the market for beginners. There are cheaper products out there that offer the same selection of features.
- You need more flexibility: Once you’ve published a website with Wix for the first time, you’re stuck. You can’t just switch to a new template. If you do, you lose all of your content.
- You want to run a larger online store: Wix isn’t designed for selling products at a larger scale. It’s better for smaller eCommerce ventures.
- You need some structure: The number of design options available from Wix, and the freedom of the drag and drop editor means there’s a lot to learn. You can easily ruin your website if you’re not careful.
The Best Wix Alternatives
So, which Wix alternatives should you consider?
1. WordPress
If you’re looking for a popular website builder, WordPress may be the top choice. WordPress is everyone’s favorite CMS solution, and it comes in two different flavors.
You can choose WordPress.org if you’re looking for a self-hosted solution. On the other hand, if you want something that’s going to handle hosting, stick with WordPress.com. See the difference between WordPress.com & WordPress.org here.
It’s worth checking out the functionality that you get with both options before making your choice. For instance, WordPress.org gives you more freedom and access to advanced features. However, WordPress.com takes the stress of hosting and security off your shoulders.
Either way, WordPress is one of the best Wix alternatives out there, providing ease of use, flexibility, and countless themes and plugins to take advantage of – particularly if you choose the .org version. You can use it to start a blog, create an online store, build a membership site, or more.
With WordPress.org, you can use drag and drop plugins such as Elementor or Thrive Theme Builder to make changes to your site in seconds, and access as many bits of extra functionality as you choose.
Price: If you choose the WordPress.org version, then the technology is free to use. However, you’ll need to purchase your own domain name and web hosting.
It’s also worth looking for a WordPress host (such as Bluehost or InMotion Hosting) that gives you an SSL certificate too.
If you are looking a managed WordPress Hosting, then you can check out WPEngine (use our 20% off coupon) or Flywheel which is what we use here at eCommerceBooth.
Pros:
- Easy to use software with plenty of community support
- Flexible and scalable, particularly with the .org version
- Free software which you can host yourself
- Expandable with tons of plugins and themes
- Reliable performance
Cons:
- You need to deal with hosting yourself
- There’s not a lot of customer support available
- Installing the right tools can be complicated
2. BigCommerce
BigCommerce is another fantastic option in our list of leading Wix Alternatives. An all-in-one solution for building an effective web presence, BigCommerce comes with everything you need to transform your presence online. This is a hosted platform, which means that there’s a team of experts on the back—end to take care of hosting and security for you.
BigCommerce has a huge community of dedicated fans, and you can even combined features of WordPress with BigCommerce too! Providing tons of regular updates to improve your experience, as well as state-of-the-art features, like an excellent site design tool, BigCommerce has it all.
To improve your chances of making a profit from your online store, BigCommerce also supports a host of great payment options, including Apple Pay, Stripe, PayPal (see our post on PayPal alternatives), Visa Checkout, and Amazon Pay, among others. You also don’t need to pay any transaction fees, which means more profit for you.
Price: You get a 15-day free trial from BigCommerce, so you can check out all the features for yourself before you commit to a long-term strategy. Once you’re ready to dive in, the premium plans start at a price of around $29.95 per month.
If you want more advanced features, then you can upgrade to more expensive versions of BigCommerce as your website grows.
Pros:
- Great for eCommerce with tons of product variation options
- No transaction fees (reducing your overall cost)
- Excellent SEO features
- Lots of good templates to choose from
- Reasonable customer service
Cons:
- Extra charges if you go over your sales threshold
- Not ideal for blogging and regular content marketing
- Requires additional fees for features like cart abandonment functionality
- Themes are remarkably similar to each other
3. Weebly
Weebly started as a pretty basic website building tool. However, it currently stands out as the leading platform responsible for supporting more than 40 million websites. The company is committed to constantly improving its offer, with new technology and tools to explore.
You can build a free website with Weebly and transform it as your company grows to access new functionality. Weebly has a ton of great templates to choose from, and it’s great for beginners too. From the moment you get started with your new site, Weebly will walk you through everything you need to know.
You get tons of functionality with Weebly for a tiny price, which makes the solution great for a lot of people. Additionally, unlike with Wix, you don’t have to worry about mobile responsivity, because you’ll know that every template is already designed to work perfectly on every screen.
Weebly also offers much better blogging options than Wix too, so it could be a good choice if you want to share a lot of content.
Price: Weebly has four pricing options, starting with the free plan for most basic websites, and moving to the $9 per month personal plan which allows you to connect a custom domain. You can also pay $116 per month for the professional plan, which is great for businesses.
If you need something more advanced, the $29 per month performance plan is ideal, particularly if you’re launching an online store.
Pros:
- Extremely easy to use for beginners
- Responsive themes that work on any device
- Advanced app centre
- Great for teams
- Membership areas
- Good for large websites
Cons:
- Not the most flexible website builder (grid-based designs)
- No options for multilingual sites
- Limited template options
4. Squarespace
Squarespace is another of the best-known website building tools on the market today. Offering an easy and convenient space where business leaders can build sensational sites, Squarespace is great for those who want attractive websites that focus heavily on pictures and aesthetic elements.
The Squarespace templates are elegant and easy to use, and they’re particularly good if you’re the kind of company that sells a lot of visual products, like artwork, or jewelry. Squarespace is also a good choice if you’re looking for something that you can use to build a powerful blog or online portfolio too.
The blogging features on Squarespace come with access to SEO options, but you still won’t get as much functionality as you do with WordPress. On the plus side, you do get excellent customer service and support from Squarespace, along with plenty of guidance to help you make the most of your site.
Price: There are four Squarespace pricing plans to choose from, starting with a Personal plan for $12 per month, which is fine for individual use. The Business plan, for $18 per month comes with features like a professional email and basic eCommerce tools. The Basic plan for $26 supports online stores, while the Advanced plan for $40 is great for building your online business.
Pros:
- Excellent range of attractive templates and designs
- Easy enough to use for beginners
- Excellent support from the Squarespace team
- Good blogging platform
- Lots of mobile apps to access
Cons:
- Slightly more expensive than other Wix alternatives
- Page speed isn’t the best
- There’s no free plan to get you started
- The usability of the editor isn’t great
5. Shopify
Shopify (see our review) is probably the best-known eCommerce app in the world. Perfect for giving you the tools you need to sell your wares online; Shopify has been around for more than a decade. What’s more, it’s growing bigger all of the time.
Although it’s one of the bigger tools out there for today’s business owners, Shopify provides a very friendly and intuitive way to begin making a name for yourself online. Regardless of the industry that you’re selling in, Shopify can help to make the right impact.
One of the best things about Shopify is that it’s so scalable. The environment comes with one of the biggest app stores around. That means that if you ever want to add extra functionality to your store, you’re free to do so.
At the same time, switching to Shopify is easy, with a migration process that’s supported by your own Shopify experts.
Price: Shopify isn’t the cheapest option on the market, but it’s one of the highest in value. For around $29 per month, you get all of the basics you need to launch your business. If you’re looking for something a little more advanced with features for more locations and different shipping options, you can upgrade to the $79 per month package.
Advanced Shopify, for $299, is one of the biggest packages that Shopify offers, with bigger discounts on Shipping and lower transaction fees. You can also look at Shopify Plus if you have a larger enterprise company. Or there’s Shopify Lite if you don’t mind selling through your social channels.
Pros:
- Easy and intuitive for beginners
- Excellent templates to choose from
- Free trial to get you started
- Fantastic range of apps to extend performance
- Great for growth and expansion
Cons:
- Not the best URL structure for SEO purposes
- Limited for multilingual selling
- Transaction fees
6. Gator by HostGator
Gator is one of the more recent website builders to appear on the market. Created by the HostGator hosting company, this solution ensures that you have an excellent alternative to Wix if you want an easy hosted website.
Providing dozens of customizable website options to help your business stand out, HostGator is brimming with functionality. There are more than 200 templates to choose from, and you don’t have to worry about things like managing your data backups and security yourself. This means that you can focus more on the growth of your business.
Gator comes with social media integrations built-in, including a live Instagram feed. Plus, you get all the support you could want for your eCommerce store. What’s more, with Gator, you can expect a 99.9% uptime, as well as a free domain for the first year.
Getting started with Gator is quick and easy, particularly with things like one-click installation tools that allow you to launch your site in seconds. There’s also 24/7 live support from the team.
Price: With so many options to choose from, and things like free SSL certificates to sweeten the pot, it’s amazing that you can start with Gator at such a small price. The first plan is only $2.75 per month, followed by the Baby plan for $3.95 per month, and the Business plan for $5.95 per month.
The Hatchling and Baby fans are fine, but if you want the best results, you need the Business plan. This comes with a free dedicated IP, SEO tools, unlimited bandwidth, and more.
Pros:
- Very easy to use
- Affordable for beginners
- Lots of designs and templates to choose from
- One-click installations
- Excellent uptime guarantee
- Great customer support
- Hosting included
Cons:
- Limited features for your online store
- Problems with adding heading tags to posts
- Blogging is very simplistic
- Not a ton of widgets to choose from
Which Wix Alternative is Right for You?
If you’ve checked out Wix, but you’re just not sold on the functionality and performance of the website builder, then the best option may be to try one of the Wix alternatives we mentioned above.
While there are a lot of Wix alternatives out there to track down and explore yourself, the ones mentioned above are some of the most popular.
The right website builder for you will depend heavily on the kind of site you’re trying to develop.
If you want an excellent blog solution, for instance, then WordPress is the obvious choice, which is what we use for eCommerceBooth.
On the other hand, if you’re looking for a full-blown eCommerce website, we would recommend Shopify.
We hope you enjoyed our article on best Wix Alternatives, if you did make sure to follow us on Twitter or Facebook.
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