What is best website builder
The 6 Best Website Builders! [2020]
I've reviewed tons of different website
builders in fact these are all website
builders that I've reviewed but for this
video instead of talking through each
individually I'm just gonna skip ahead
and walk you through the six that I
recommend of these six square space and
Shopify are my top recommendations but
the other four each have unique
strengths that will probably work well
for the right type of user watch to the
end of the video we're all compare the
costs of each if you'd like to try one
of the website builders you can find a
link to them in the video description my
work is supported by affiliate
commissions so I may earn a commission
if you click one of these links okay
let's start with Squarespace Squarespace
is the best all-around website builder
it's what I'd recommend for most small
websites I use it for my personal music
website my mom's therapy business and my
band Squarespace has the best themes of
any website builder which sounds
subjective but honestly there's no other
website builder that matches their clean
modern themes they do tend to have a
specific look and feel bold typography
and lots of room for photos Squarespace
is easy to use but among website
builders it's not the easiest
I'd say Weebly is the easiest which I'll
get to later in this video
so instead of easy to use I describe
Squarespace as intuitive everything is
just thoughtful you can say Squarespace
is like the Apple of website builders
let me give you an example let's say you
have a photo gallery and you want your
thumbnails to be perfect squares that
probably means the photos will need to
be cropped most website builders just
crop automatically around the center of
the photo and leave it at that
but that can be frustrating if the
subject the photo isn't in the exact
center that's why Squarespace includes a
handy focal point tool that adjusts the
crop it's a small thing but it shows you
the attention to detail you'll find
throughout Squarespace when it comes to
features Squarespace has some of the
best features of any website builder
there iOS and Android apps are great
they have excellent ecommerce and a
great forum builder they have the best
donation system for nonprofits of any
website builder which I can really shows
their attention to detail most website
builders say they have a donation system
but really it's just an embed
PayPal button not Squarespace
Squarespace lets you customize the
checkout ask for suggested amounts and
they even let you customize email
receipts that their donor friendly
Squarespace also has the best blogging
of any website builder it's really the
only website builder that can compete
with with WordPress for blogging also
Squarespace is the only website builder
that lets you syndicate a podcast just
to briefly explain other website
builders say they can host podcasts but
all they mean is that you can embed your
podcast in an audio player they don't
let you syndicate the podcast which is
what is required to submit your podcast
to Spotify and Apple podcasts which is
kind of important this is the kind of
attention to detail
I just appreciate about Squarespace
Shopify is what I recommend for
e-commerce websites the other website
builders in this list can all build
ecommerce websites but they're also
designed to build other types of
websites portfolios blogs small business
websites and a bunch more Shopify is
just for e-commerce that's it it's
designed purely for e-commerce so as a
result they put a lot more time and
energy into e-commerce features now
Shopify is not the only website builder
to focus exclusively on e-commerce
there's actually a whole class of these
e-commerce website builders but of them
Shopify is the industry leader and it's
the one I recommend this is Google
Trends it shows interest in the top five
ecommerce website builders Magento
WooCommerce Volusion baked Commerce and
Shopify right now we're looking at 2010
to 2015 watch what happens to Shopify
from 2015 to 2020 Shopify pulls away
from the pack and becomes the industry
leader how did this happen
well it happened because Shopify kept
shipping innovative features while also
keeping their software easy to use other
e-commerce website builders have
struggled to keep up with the pace of
their innovation an example of this is
Shopify's app store you see all
ecommerce websites have basically the
same core needs products orders
discounts analytics customers that kind
of thing
Shopify score covers these really well
then there are the things that only some
ecommerce websites will need digital
downloads gift wrap up sales back in
stock notifications order mapping and
just a ton more if you want these
features you just go to Shopify's app
store and add them and because Shopify
was the first e-commerce website builder
to launch an app store they also have
the largest amount of apps available by
far third party app developers typically
develop their apps for Shopify because
that's where the users are but the app
store also does something else something
less apparent the app store means
Shopify doesn't have to shoehorn
unnecessary features into the core the
core stays clean tidy and intuitive this
is kind of the secret to why Shopify is
easy to use all I have to do is try
another ecommerce website builder like
Volusion to see what happens when you
don't have an app store Volusion has to
squeeze everything into the core the
interface is bloated and disorganized
users are stuck waiting through pages of
forms the app store is just one of the
innovative features Shopify has launched
there's honestly more than I could cover
in this overview for example Shopify is
the only e-commerce builder with their
own payment gateway basically you need a
payment gateway to accept credit cards
for a long time you had to use a
third-party provider like Braintree or
PayPal
Shopify took that entire step away by
launching their own payment gateway it's
just one less thing for you to think
about all of this is in an effort to
reduce the hurdles necessary to starting
a store that's the big vision of Shopify
Shopify CEO Toby Luce has said that
before Shopify the e-commerce industry
was like what mp3 players were like
before the iPod competitors had tons of
advanced features but they just sucked
they were bulky hard to use and looked
horrible honestly he's not wrong Shopify
is innovative features and intuitive
software have made it the best
e-commerce website builder
but flo wants to give you the power of
coding even if you don't know how to
code that's their big promise it's why
their homepage says that you can break
the code barrier it's why they started a
no code conference and it's why their
CEO habitually proselytizers the no code
movement on twitter which kind of
remarkable is that web flow actually
lives up to this promise as weird as
this is to say web flow feels almost
magical at the heart of web flow is
their designer tool the designer is what
gives you the power of coding even if
you don't know how to code the interface
roughly matched a front-end code these
are HTML elements and these are CSS
Styles though you don't need to
understand this to use web flow at first
a designer might seem a bit intimidating
and that's kind of the point because web
flow isn't shying away from complexity
instead it's about embracing complexity
let me explain
when we add a paragraph element to this
blank page it'll just sit there lamely
spanning the width of the screen web
developers will understand what's
happening here but non coders probably
won't
basically to constrain the width of this
element it needs to be placed within a
container
this is what's called the box model it's
a fundamental concept of web design and
web flow doesn't want to abstract you
away from concepts like the box model
web flow is a categorically different
tool than the other website builders in
this list for example Squarespace isn't
designed for you to have complete
freedom you don't design a theme from
scratch and Squarespace instead
Squarespace provides templates and smart
defaults it purposely abstracts you away
from the complexity of code well web
flow purposefully embraces the
complexity of code because of this web
flow has a steeper learning curve but
it's also much more flexible you can
design just about anything with web
globe in fact there is a community of
designers who will rebuild websites just
to show that you can do it in web flow
here's an example of someone rebuilding
the airport's website with web flow
where I think web flow starts to get
really interesting is when you mix in
the web flow CMS the CMS is made up of
collections which are basically like a
database collections are made up of
fields for example like a plain text
field an image field dates colors rich
text and under like a bunch more so for
example we could create a collection
called articles with a headline date
permalink and content then we could add
a few articles finally we go back to the
designer and add a list of articles
using the collection list element this
is honestly really crazy the
groundbreaking thing isn't necessarily
the CMS CMS is like pretty typical the
groundbreaking thing is that you can
integrate the CMS into the web flow
designer that's honestly crazy to be
able to design a website from scratch
and scaffold up a CMS without ever
touching code it splits like remarkable
the main thing to acknowledge is that
web flow has a learning curve it's not
nearly as easy to use as Squarespace or
Wix you will need to understand the
fundamentals of web design but if you
put in a couple hours of learning in the
web flow university you might be
surprised at how far you get card is for
building one-page websites one-page
websites can be a simple about page or a
landing page or sometimes something just
a little bit longer but basically all
the content is on one page because card
is only for one page websites it's also
the easiest way to build one-page
websites you just add elements style
them and you can create links between
sections technically you can make
one-page websites with other website
builders but they often feel like you're
hacking the editor in order to do it
since card is made exclusively for
one-page websites it's actually a more
intuitive way of building them plus card
is also way way cheaper than competitors
here's what the cheapest plan with no
ads costs for one year for each of the
website builders on this list and this
is what card comes in at now of course
you'll only want to use cards that makes
sense for your website to be one page
but you might be surprised at what you
can do with one page if you're on the
fence I'd suggest just trying card for
15 minutes why couldn't a band's website
one page or our restaurants what I'm
saying Weebly is not as sophisticated as
like say Squarespace but it is a little
bit friendlier if you're not
particularly tech savvy you might want
to try Weebly
it's easy to use the interface is always
simple and it's clear it starts with the
website editor pages are built by
dragging elements from the side drawer
into your page elements are then edited
within the page easy right
now let's try something more complicated
let's edit this background image notice
how the drawer slides out and the
background editor slides in these are
the kind of thoughtful touches that I
appreciate about Weebly they keep the
editor uncluttered and focus you on the
task at hand honestly this is the type
of thing you might not even notice but
it's also these details that make me be
easy to use this really hits home when
you try other website builders who just
stack additional interfaces on top of
one another and it quickly gets
overwhelming even though Weebly is easy
to use it's not just simple it's
actually quite powerful there's good
ecommerce a membership system a good
form builder and an app store the App
Store includes apps like multi-language
which lets you add pages with different
languages and paid members as an app
which lets you sell memberships I should
point out though weebly's app store
isn't anything like Shopify's it's been
around for a few years but it hasn't
really taken off in the same way if
there's a shortcoming to Weebly it's in
theme customization you can only choose
one color for your theme and it's
applied scattershot through at the
website there's no way to customize
where or how it's applied this is a bit
lame I have complicated feelings about
Wix which has a long list of strong
features tons and tons of design
elements booking system good e-commerce
a good form builder and an app
marketplace plus when you look at market
share it's also the most used website
builder but which is a blank canvas
editor basically this means you can drag
any element anyone on a page you can
even nudge this one pixel over if you
wanted to it's sort of like how you
might edit a PowerPoint presentation
this is fundamentally different from
other website builders for example
Weebly lets you drag elements but
snap within a preset grid you don't have
that with Wix Wix lets you drag and drop
without any constraints which sounds
nice
but it does come with challenges for
example watch what happens when I add
more text to this page the image below
the text also moves down handy that's
what you'd expect to happen well you
might not notice is that the image no
longer retains the same distance from
the footer let's rewind and watch it
again
see what happened that's kind of
annoying here's another example I'm
gonna move this image to the top of the
page now if I switch to the mobile view
of my website you might notice the image
hasn't moved there just at the bottom
that's because I also need to make the
change in the mobile editor this is not
obvious having to make the same edit
twice is tedious and worse it relies on
you to catch the error in the first
place
Wix is blank canvas editor creates more
knock on issues like this Wix does its
best to stay ahead of these issues but
it often feels like they're playing
whack-a-mole with these bugs and not
addressing the underlying problem all
this being said if what you want is a
blank canvas editor like this which is
what I'd recommend you use so what does
this all cost
what about pricing well let's take a
look at the cheapest annual plan of each
website builder Squarespace is cheapest
plan is their personal plan it costs one
hundred and forty four dollars and
includes a domain name OneNote we're
looking at annual plans here for some
reason every website builder advertises
the annual plan as a per month cost
which is so confusing
so like Squarespace says $12 per month
but really you're gonna be billed one
hundred and forty four dollars per year
let's keep going web flows cheapest plan
is their basic website plan it costs a
hundred and forty four dollars and
includes a domain name cards cheapest
plan is pro-lite but it doesn't let you
connect a domain name the cheapest card
plan to let you connect a domain name is
pro standard it costs $19 per year but
doesn't include a free domain name so
let's say you buy the domain name from
Namecheap for ten bucks which means the
annual cost for card comes to twenty
nine dollars wait wait an any other
website builder on this list but
remember it's for one-page websites
Weebly has a $72 personal plan but it
includes an ad that Scrolls along your
websites so we're not going to count
that the cheapest plan with no ads is
the professional plan cost 144 dollars
and includes a domain name
wix's cheapest plan is their combo plan
it costs $156 and includes a domain name
technically Shopify's cheapest plan is
Shopify delight but it's not really for
websites it's more for embedding a Buy
button on an existing website their
cheapest website plan is basic Shopify
at three hundred and forty eight dollars
it doesn't include a domain name so
let's put it at three hundred fifty
eight come on so Shopify is clearly the
most expensive but it's it's for
e-commerce websites
Squarespace Weebly Wix web flow they
don't include ecommerce and they're
cheapest plans instead those are usually
higher paid plans for example
Squarespace is ecommerce plan is basic
commerce and it costs three hundred
twelve dollars per year let's recap
Squarespace is the best all-around
website builder Shopify is the best
e-commerce website builder web flow
gives you the flexibility of code
without requiring you to learn how to
code card is the best website builder
for one-page websites Weebly is good for
ease of use and the thing to know about
Wix is that it has a blank canvas editor
now just remind you these six are not
the only website builders in the world
far from it you can find my thoughts on
a whole bunch of other website builders
at my website site builder report com
but these are the six that I recommend
if you'd like to try one of these
website builders you can find a link to
them in the video description my work is
supported by affiliate commissions so I
may earn a commission from these links
thank you for watching and good luck
making your website
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