Did you know that around 4.93 billion people, out of the estimated 7.8 billion people worldwide, have access to the Internet and use it frequently? This is 63.2% of the entire world’s population using the Internet.
Considering how many people are online, you need to have a strong online presence if you’re running a business. That’s why you need a website for your business. If you’re considering building one, you’re probably asking the question:
“When it comes to WordPress vs Wix, which website builder is best for my business?”
It can be confusing to know where to get started. After all, these are both popular website builders, with pros and cons to each.
That’s why we’ve put together this article. In it, you’ll learn all about the pros and cons of WordPress and Wix.
That way, you can decide which is the best website builder for you, build your website, and make your business even more successful. Read on to learn more.
The Pros and Cons of WordPress
If you value versatility and flexibility, WordPress is a pretty good choice. This is a content management system that’s a little bit complicated, but once you get the idea of how to use it, you have many plugins and themes available to you.
The Pros of WordPress
The pros of WordPress include unlimited design options, full ownership of your data, unrivaled customisability, a strong blogging platform, many available plugins, functionality that’s scalable for e-commerce, better visibility when it comes to searches, and more.
Unlimited Design Options
Even when you aren’t paying for WordPress, you have many theme options available to you. If you want to get a paid theme, there are over 5,000 available through third parties, usually costing from as little as $25 to $299.
But your options don’t stop there. Additionally, if you want your own developer to design a theme for you on WordPress, you can do this.
You can also switch themes later on, which isn’t possible with Wix after your site has gone live.
Full Ownership of Your Data
WordPress is open-source software. Because of this, you can easily transfer your website from your original host to another. All the files are yours, so as long as you use a hosting provider that has WordPress support, you should be good to go.
WordPress has tools that make this transition simple. Wix doesn’t, so if you ever wanted to switch your site over to WordPress, it would be a complicated process.
Unrivaled Customisability
Because WordPress is open-source, you can do many different things when it comes to its design. If you have a programmer on your business team, they’ll know how to build a website on WordPress that looks exactly like you want it to.
Even if you stick to using WordPress themes, you can easily change your website and even switch themes later on. With Wix, you don’t have these options after your site has gone live.
No WordPress Ads
The only things you have to pay for when you build a WordPress website are your hosting plan and domain name. The WordPress platform itself is free. If you want to put ads in yourself, you can, but WordPress won’t do this.
With Wix, there are many ads that pop up, in large part because so many of their plans are free. You have to pay more not to have them show up.
A Strong Blogging Platform
WordPress was, for a long time, the website everyone chose for blogging. For this reason, even though WordPress offers all kinds of themes, their blogging platform is incredibly impressive. Features include page and post visibility and comment management.
Additionally, you can use the Gutenberg editor. If you want a seamless blogging experience, WordPress is the way to go.
Many Available Plugins
If you want a huge amount of plugins, you should use WordPress. Plugins available include creating your landing page, collecting the emails of your visitors, optimising for SEO, and adding a table. There are more than 50,000 plugins available to you.
Scalable for E-Commerce
Even though WordPress itself isn’t built for e-commerce, you can easily adapt it to an e-commerce website by using the WooCommerce plugin. With this plugin, you can calculate tax, receive payments in a variety of currencies, fulfil orders, and display products.
Better Visibility in Searches
Because WordPress has so much flexibility, you can do all the fixes needed in order to improve your website’s SEO. For example, if you find that your website is slow, you can fix this and show up higher in search rankings.
You can also use the Yoast plugin, which improves the SEO of the content on your site.
The Cons of WordPress
The cons of WordPress include DIY maintenance and security, a big learning curve, variation of costs, and a lack of phone support. As you can see, even though you have many options with WordPress, you need to have a little more ability to work on your own.
DIY Maintenance
If there are any changes to the WordPress software, you have to adapt to those changes yourself. You’ll also have to update plugins and themes if there are any bugs in your website. This can all be challenging unless you have a developer on your team.
Big Learning Curve and Lack of Phone Support
WordPress can be a bit tricky to use. It isn’t intuitive the way that Wix is, so if you’re a beginner when it comes to website-building, you might face some challenges. You’ll have to learn a lot on your own.
It doesn’t help that there isn’t any phone support. However, many people online post free content on how to set up your business website and work out any issues.
Variation of Costs
With WordPress, you don’t always immediately know what you’re going to end up paying for. The costs of a hosting plan and domain name can vary. On top of this, if you want to buy a theme, that could be an unexpected cost.
The Pros and Cons of Wix
If you’re a beginner at website-building, then when it comes to Wix vs WordPress, Wix might be better for you. This software is intuitive and easy for anyone to use. If you don’t think you’ll need to use advanced features or change your website later, it can be the right choice.
The Pros of WIX
The pros of building your website on Wix include simple registration, no cost with the free plan, an intuitive editor, additional apps, a variety of free templates, maintenance and security that’s handled for you, a variety of customer support channels, and more.
Simple Registration
When you use WordPress, you have to go through the complicated steps of registering your site’s domain name and getting a hosting provider. With Wix, you don’t have to worry about this. You simply choose the plan you want, and then you can get to work on building your site.
No Cost With the Free Plan
Even though both WordPress and Wix have free options, when you start a WordPress site, you still have to pay for hosting and your domain name. With Wix’s free plan, you don’t pay anything at all. Of course, if you want a better plan with Wix, you’ll have to pay.
All these plans have straightforward pricing. This can’t be said for WordPress, where you have to a bit of guessing of how much everything will cost in the end.
An Intuitive Editor
The editor you get with Wix is one of its main selling points. You can easily drag, drop, and type in whatever content you want to include in your website. You’ll see it right in front of you, which means you’re basically seeing your end result while designing.
Wix also offers a tool powered by ADI (Artificial Design Intelligence). This means you can have the site built for you after you’ve answered some questions about your site.
Additional Apps
Even though WordPress has more plugins than Wix has apps, Wix’s apps are easier to use. There are around 250 apps available, and in addition to being easier to use, they tend to be of higher quality. It will also be easier for you to choose the right one for you.
A Variety of Free Templates
If you want templates that are pre-made, Wix is the place to go. They have the largest number of them out of any website builders, with more than 500 of them available for free. Once you’ve chosen a template, you can play around with it to customise it.
Maintenance and Security Handled for You
If you have any issues with your website, such as bugs or glitches, you don’t have to deal with it yourself when you’ve built your website on Wix. They have a dedicated team who will help you get to the bottom of the issue and fix it.
A Variety of Customer Support Channels
In fact, Wix is always there for you. You can put in a request for a call, which means that someone can be on the phone with you while you fix website issues. You can also email Wix if you need to or access their online help center, where you’ll find tutorials and articles.
Migration from WordPress is Easy
If you want to migrate your WordPress website to Wix, this is an easy process. All you have to do is use the blog import tool. With a simple paste of your URL and a click, your WordPress blog will now be a Wix blog.
The Cons of WIX
There are some cons that come with using Wix. These include less impressive SEO, not all plans being ad-free, and less impressive blog features and flexibility. Additionally, once you’ve started a website with Wix, it can be hard to get out.
Less Impressive SEO
Wix websites are a little more complicated than WordPress sites, which means that it’s more difficult for Google to crawl your site. Additionally, you can’t fix SEO issues as easily as with WordPress. As a result, the SEO is less impressive with Wix.
Not All Plans Are Ad-Free
With Wix, not all plans are ad-free. If you don’t want Wix pop-ups showing up all over the place when your customer visits your website, you need to invest in a paid plan. Speaking of plans, Wix could have a little more transparency when it comes to what you get for each plan.
Less Impressive Blog Features and Flexibility
Even though you get post scheduling, cover image options, tagging, and categories when you set up a blog with Wix, you still won’t have as many blog features as you would with WordPress. Additionally, you have less building flexibility overall.
It’s Hard to Get Out
Finally, it’s hard to get out of your Wix website once you have it. If you want to migrate to another website builder platform, this takes a lot of effort. You’re also stuck with your hosting provider since hosting is part of Wix’s infrastructure.
WordPress vs Wix: the Verdict
As you can see, when it comes to WordPress vs Wix, choosing the right website builder depends on what your needs are. If you want more flexibility and the ability to change your website, you’re probably better off with WordPress.
However, if you want to build a website to be a little easier, Wix might be right for you.
Once you’ve built your website, you should consider getting a free website audit. This way you can ensure it’s working properly. We offer free website audits at Build Digital Growth. Get your free website audit today.
