Which is Better: WordPress or Squarespace? We Evaluated Each Web Builder Based on 14 Key Aspects.
Let us start this by saying we are a Squarespace affiliate and Circle Member, that has also designed plenty of WordPress websites. WordPress is still the leader in today’s digital market with an impressive 810 million active sites, whereas Squarespace only has approximately one million active sites. We’re going to walk you through what we find to be the pros and cons of each web builder. In the end, as a business owner, it’s up to you to decide which one is the best option for your business, your brand, and your goals. Switching from one web builder to another can be a daunting process but sometimes it is necessary to save time, money, and resources. We took feedback from our clients and peers to compare WordPress and Squarespace. With the results, we compiled what we believe to be the most unbiased review of the two platforms that we could make. Check it out!
Ease of Use
Ease of Use Of Use: WordPress vs. Squarespace
Squarespace is the clear winner here. They recently released their Fluid Engine option which is an extremely user-friendly, drag-and-drop website builder. You can build a fully functional, mobile optimized website without knowing how to code or hiring any help. However, if you do know basic CSS and HTML, you can customize your Squarespace just like a Wordpress.
WordPress is really not fun to dive into as a beginner. You need to know how to code and be technically savvy. There is no straight path with WordPress. Every template, site, and plugin is going to have a variety of different requirements, compatibility, and setup options.
Design Options
Design Options: WordPress vs. Squarespace
Squarespace not only takes the cake for ease of use, but when it comes to design options, they truly do offer inclusive design options. You can build a beautiful, fully functional, award-winning website in Squarespace without having any coding knowledge.
WordPress has endless options when it comes to themes, but none of them are straightforward. Elementor is the preferred design plugin that most people add to their sites when using WordPress as their web builder. Elementor can help make customizing any WordPress template you choose a little bit easier to finagle. However, that being said, you will need some coding knowledge and an understanding of compatible and incompatible plugins with both your theme and your Elementor design plugin.
Pricing & Value
Pricing & Value for Your Money: WordPress vs. Squarespace
Squarespace offers four tiered plans, ranging from $16 per month to $49 per month. There is a 14-day free trial to help you get started initially. You can purchase a website template from any Squarespace designer and get a 6 month free trial to build your website. The average business needs the $23 a month plan to truly take advantage of the benefits of Squarespace. The average cost of annual hosting with Squarespace $220.80.
WordPress itself is free, but you pay for hosting, themes, plugins, hiring help and more. You can find very cheap options for hosting but they may come with slower website speeds. On average, it is comparable to Squarespace at around $200 per year. However, hosting can cost as much as $10,000 annually depending on what your site needs.
SEO
SEO: WordPress vs. Squarespace
Squarespace does have SEO features already built-in to the platform. You can begin optimizing from the moment you select and start a new template with Squarespace. The extra nice thing for true beginners is that Squarespace does have some automatic-SEO features. This is great for someone who may be new and not ready to dive into website optimization, but would still like a quality website for search.
WordPress offers a much smaller range of built-in features. They are much more reliant on third party plugins for extra functionality. Don't forget when choosing plugins you need to check for compatibility with your particular WordPress theme and other plugins you are using.
Features
Features: WordPress vs. Squarespace
Squarespace has an impressive range of built-in features covering a variety of areas from design to marketing. New features are regularly added and updated and the majority of Squarespace plugins and add-ons are one times fees.
WordPress often has monthly or per transaction fees associated with any advanced plugins or features you may want to add. WordPress does have a significantly smaller range of built-in features and is more reliant on advanced coding or third party plugins for extra functionality.
Security
Security: WordPress vs. Squarespace
Squarespace manages security and updates for you. If there is a security issue, Squarespace’s experts will deal with it.
WordPress you are responsible for managing the security of your website. If it goes down, you better have a backup. If you update or do not update anything, you can be putting your website security at risk.
Mobile Editor
Mobile Editing Options: WordPress vs. Squarespace
Squarespace mobile editing options are built-in to the platform. You get different optimization options from standard, to drag and drop, to coding items to fit. You can tailor the experience to suit your site’s needs. The fluid engine editor allows you to simply drag and drop and move items as you see fit on mobile. It may take some finagling but you have got this!
WordPress only comes with one option for each device – which is ideal if you’re looking for a straightforward solution. As always with WordPress, there are additional tools and plugins you can add to help add more advanced options.
E-Commerce
E-Commerce: WordPress vs. Squarespace
Squarespace has built-in sales features, including great inventory options, advanced shipping, and more. However, Shopify still takes the lead for built-in features and functionality for e-commerce stores.
WordPress is difficult to navigate and lacking in customer support for e-commerce options. But, if you can spend the time, energy, and resources on it, WordPress can be a fully custom and customizable e-commerce platform.
Blogging
Blogging: WordPress vs. Squarespace
Squarespace has an adequate amount of blogging templates and tools to get you off the ground. There are lots of design choices and layout options for displaying and sorting your blogs. Using both the blogging design options and the summary block design options, you can accomplish quite a bit with your Squarespace blogging journey.
WordPress was invented at the height of blogging, so it was originally designed with bloggers in mind. WordPress does have a wide variety of plugins and built-in features. There is also a strong community of WordPress bloggers. However, as time passes they are still heavily reliant on add-ons for some key SEO features bloggers may be interested in.
Ongoing Maintence
Ongoing Maintenance: WordPress vs. Squarespace
Squarespace has very minimal maintenance. Squarespace is a “closed” environment, meaning they control all aspects of the platform while managing all the basic site updates and maintenance work for you.
WordPress requires frequent maintenance, especially if the platform, theme, or plugins are updated by their developers. You are responsible for maintaining all aspects of your website. This can be very cumbersome and costly. Additionally, any time you need WordPress support, you will need to pay.
Apps & Plugins
Apps and Plugins: WordPress vs. Squarespace
Squarespace the most important apps you need for basic functionality to build a WordPress site are all fully integrated features in Squarespace. However, that being said, there are an adequate amount of high-quality Squarespace apps and plugins you can add to your site. The nicest aspect is that the majority of these add-ons come with one-time fees vs reoccurring.
WordPress has literally thousands of plugins to choose from to install on your WordPress site. There are endless extra functions available. However, this can be risky due to outdated and poor quality plugins. In order to add plugins you need a deep knowledge of the plugin and how it will work with your chosen WordPress template.
Content
Content Ownership: WordPress vs. Squarespace
Squarespace will not claim any rights over your content. In the fine print, it does state that Squarespace can use your content to promote or feature your website. If that doesn't interest you, you can fully opt out.
WordPress won’t gain any rights over your content, and does not have any similar licensing terms to Squarespace. However, you’ll need to use a hosting provider, which will most likely have fine print similar to Squarespace.
Site Migration
Site Migration: WordPress vs Squarespace
Squarespace allows you to migrate your site if you want to. It is also easy to import from WordPress.
WordPress allows you to migrate your site if you want to. They also make it easy to export content in a variety of formats and if you are moving from Wordpress to any other site builder, there is probably a plugin that will make the migration even better. If that plugin, doesn’t break your site, that is.
Help & Support
Help and Support: WordPress vs Squarespace
Squarespace provides a dedicated support team with organized tutorials. You can also get help through live chat or email. They are available 24/7 to help you troubleshoot via email.
WordPress has a huge and thriving community with resources and tutorials, but it is not well organized. Most WordPress users end up paying developers for help. Honestly, they pay a lot in monthly maintenance or pay a lot in one-off fees to different developers to fix broken things throughout their WordPress experience.
Are you one of the companies that have been led to believe that spending 100k a year on a WordPress designer is the only way to have a fully-functional, optimized website? That’s just not the case anymore. In short, WordPress has been a great tool and a leader in the industry for decades past. That being said, there are a multitude of more user friendly, affordable, and stress free options in the market today, and Squarespace is one of them. The digital tools and assets in today’s marketplace are continually advancing. You can have a very large and robust Squarespace site that outranks leading competitors in todays market. If you are on the fence about whether or not Squarespace is the right option for you, schedule your free consultation with us! We’d be more than happy to spend that time diving into your website’s functionality and upgrading your WordPress site to a Squarespace site.
