Advertiser Disclosure In order to keep all this information FREE for everyone, WebsiteSetup.org earns affiliate commission for some of the products/services recommended on this website. It’s called affiliate marketing and is widely used by many popular websites on the Internet. You can read more about it here: When you’re using our affiliate links, you’ll be able to purchase some of the services or products at a discounted rate. We only recommend the products/services that we’ve personally used or find useful to our visitors. For more information, email rob(at)websitesetup(dot)org Robert & WebsiteSetup.org team. Last update: January 1st, 2018. To be honest, I had never used website builders before Having developed websites for a while, I’d rather dive straight into coding HTML, CSS and PHP; avoiding those drag and drop functions that website builders have. I was pretty sceptical. However, I was positively surprised by the ease-of-use and flexible customisation options that 1-2 website builders have. Especially for the cost. Unfortunately, I also ended up trying website builders that were just outdated or used sketchy billing strategies (hint: #10). Website builders vs. Hiring a web developer? ![]() ![]() A good custom website could easily cost $2000 (on the low end). Making changes or ongoing updates could still require a freelance designer or developer to help you continually update your site (additional $$$). Yet for only a few dollars each month, some of these website builders below could give you almost everything you’d ever want at less than 1% of the cost. Not to mention, you can easily login yourself and change copy, upload images, or add new pages within seconds (and without calling for tech support). Website builders for Who? Website builders are the perfect solution for individuals or small businesses with low budgets. Just to name few of them: • small business owners • writers • musicians • artists • photographers • wedding planners • and so on Here’s What I Did To Uncover Website Builders: As I stated before and unlike many other blogs you might read on the same topic, I really spent some money and signed up with them – so you know which ones are the best website builders. My goal is to provide an unbiased review, by actually going through each product in detail, to help you make the best decision. Here’s the process I took: 1. I signed up with the top 10 website builders (I paid for them). Those that are recommended by the major ‘Review Websites’ like SiteBuilderReport.com, Reviews.com, PCMag.com and many others. Setup a simple ‘5-minute’ test website. After signing up with them, I decided to make a quick ‘5 minute’ website on my own domain name, like websitesetup-wix.com and websitesetup-yola.com etc. Monitored each site’s uptime and page load times (6+ months, ongoing). Over a period of 6 months (still ongoing) I monitored my websites uptime and page load times via PingDom.com tool. Some of my sites had more than 24 hours of downtime(!) 4. Uncovered the TRUE cost of each website builder. Many of these website builders trick you with their low introductory prices, like letting you set up a website for free. But once you want to launch it, you’ll need to pay. That’s why it’s VERY important to check pricing before you set up a website with them. This last point is especially important because most website builders will claim to be ‘free’ even though you’re gonna be forced to take out that credit card at some point. So before we dive into the detailed review of the top ten website builders, here are the gory pricing details. ![]() With that said, today's tutorial is specifically for those who are just diving into web development. If you've one year of experience or less, hopefully some of the tips listed here will help you to become better, quicker! You may also want to check out some of the HTML builders on Envato Market, such as the. Want to learn a little HTML? Sounds like a great idea. Hence the reason I've put together this HTML tutorial for beginners. There are at least 1.2 billion websites in the world today, and practically all of these websites use HTML in one way or the other. P.S: If you don't want to learn HTML and start building. See our free Website Builder Comparison chart on the 6 best website. The Best Portfolio Website Templates. As a novice who was previously steered in. ![]() ![]() Why MOST ‘Free’ Website Builders Aren’t Free Most of these website builders reviewed claim to have some ‘free’ option. Sounds perfect, right?! That’s what I thought too initially. However, it’s also a little too good to be true. Here are three problems I ran into. Problem #1 – No domain name. You’ve spent minutes (or hours) putting your brand new ‘free’ website together and you’re almost ready to hit the Publish button to make it live to the world. Only problem is, you still need a domain name. The ‘free’ option that most website builders provide you with are the amateurish looking web addresses like: • YourBusiness.My-Free-Site.com • YourBusiness.Weebly.com Professional? Think people will take you seriously? Assuming this website is for some commercial or professional reason (i.e. You want to make money from it), credibility is key, and you’re going to want something that instead looks like: YourBusiness.com or YourSite.com. Some of these website builders below do provide some ‘free domain name’ offer. But there are restrictions which we’ll explore soon. Problem #2 – Plan Limitations. ‘Free’ versions sounds great. Until you read the fine print. Basically, you’re going to be forced to pony up some cash for basically any type of extra or upgrade. For example: • Want to choose more than 10 themes/layouts? You need to pay. • Want to have a personal email account like [email protected]? You need to pay for that. • Want certain features like contact form, search box or videos? You need to pay. • Want to add a small eCommerce shop? You need to pay. • Get stuck or need help from their support? • Want to add more than X number of images or see your site statistics? Unfortunately, the list goes on and on and on. Website Builders commonly claim they’re free, only to then up-sell and cross-sell you to death until eventually you’re paying more than their cheapest plan in the first place. You’re not alone. I learned all this stuff first-hand. At first, I didn’t plan on spending a single penny in order to write this review. But I quickly found out that it was going to be an expensive review when all’s said and done. Problem #3 – No control over your site. This last problem is also the worst. Let’s say you spend endless nights adding content, writing new blog posts or adding products to your eCommerce shop. Everything’s finally starting to fall into place and look perfect. Until one day you go to check in on your site and it’s gone. Not just ‘down’. But gone, gone. Panicking, you quickly reach out to customer support (and after waiting on hold for an hour), get a ‘canned response’ like the following: “ We’re very sorry, but your site violated our terms and TOS for free accounts, thus we had to disable it. If you want to get it live, you’ll need to pay for it.” Don’t believe me? A good website builder might set you back anywhere between $5 to $20 a month. However, there are a few other considerations to make besides just pricing when choosing the next home for your new website. Let’s take a look at how they all compare, which ones you should choose, and which ones you should avoid like the plague. Best Website Builders 2018 (Review) Keep in mind that the usability is the most important factor of a website builder. Second is uptime, third is speed and the least important factor (for me) is price. WEBSITE BUILDER PRICE SPEED UPTIME USABILITY RATING 1. $7.68/mo 510ms 99.96% BEST ★★★★★ 2. $12.50/mo 436ms 99.96% GOOD ★★★★ 3. $16.00/mo 546ms 99.91% GOOD ★★★★ 4. BoldGrid $4.19/mo 801ms 99.96% DIFFICULT ★★★ 5. Weebly.com $12.00/mo 316ms 99.90% AVERAGE ★★★ 6. Jimdo.com $7.50/mo 404ms 99.96% TOO LIMITED ★★ 7. Doodlekit.com $10.00/mo 439ms 99.90% OUTDATED ★ 8. Webs.com $12.99/mo 973ms 99.26% TERRIBLE ★ 9.Yola.com $9.95/mo 307ms 99.99% TERRIBLE ★ 10. Web.com – – – BAD BILLING ★ Without further ado, let’s dive into a detailed review of each website builder. Starting with the best, narrowing it down until we reach the ones to avoid. Disclosure: Some of the links in this post may be referral links. I’ll earn a commission if you make a purchase. This is how I keep WebsiteSetup.org up and running and there are no extra costs to you at all. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will add value to my readers. I’ve always believed in integrity and transparency on the internet. #1. SITEBUILDER Review (Easy to use, Professional & Reliable) CONS of SiteBuilder.com: #1. If you want an eCommerce store, you’ll need to choose the business account which starts at $18.45/month. It took 3 hours to activate my account on a weekend. Should be faster. PROS of SiteBuilder.com: #1. You get a FREE domain name and one email account #2. There are to choose from. That’s A LOT – compared with others, especially with Jimdo that has only 17 templates/themes. #3. SiteBuilder’s website builder was relatively easy and simple to use. It’s fairly intuitive, and the templates appear to be WAY more modern than previously reviewed options. You can simply click on a page element to bring up customization options. #4. They have „Save History“ feature and ability to build a blog as well. Not many website builders have those features! SiteBuilder provides good customer support: Tech support, billing support, FAQ’s page, Live Chat and a Contact us section. They also have a really convenient search button on their support page. The search button pulls up all related articles and links to your question/keyword with detailed explanations to all. I also tested Live Chat and answers came instantly. Do I recommend it? YES. I really like their platform. Their website editor is intuitive. Very intuitive! Template options were at an acceptable level (compared with many others), appearing modern while still easy to customize. SiteBuilder is simple, too: You can drag and drop the elements anywhere on the site. They’re reliable (good uptime and load time). They’re somewhat affordable (around $80/year). Should you give it a go? (best you can do in 5 minutes) #2. WIX Review (‘go-to’ website builder, easy to use) CONS of Wix Website Builder: #1. An email account will cost you an extra $5 bucks EACH! #2. If you want to create an online store, you’ll need to choose the more expensive package which is around ~$20. PROS of Wix Website Builder: #1. Wix has around, perfect for small businesses and freelancers alike. #2. The website builder is pretty simple and easy to use overall. It’s pretty flexible, meaning you can make a substantial amount of site customizations. It’s also highly visual, which means changes can be made by simply pointing-and-clicking on a site element (i.e. No sticky back-end options to mess with). #3. Very user-friendly and easy to use. Signup and activation was instant! Cheapest ‘Ad-free’ package is $8.50/month (VAT included). #6. Super reliable (with fast load times & only minor downtimes) Support: Comprehensive support articles and videos and a help center: You can type in your question(s) in their search box. They also have an active forum and phone support across all their plans. No live chat, though. Do I recommend it? Yes. Wix is widely suggested as the ‘go-to’ website builder. The template options and website builder were the best. It was ONLY let down by the numerous annoying upsells and high email costs. For example, assuming I want 5 email accounts, I’d need to fork over $25 each month (and that’s just ridiculously high compared to other options). (not too bad, huh?) #3. SQUARESPACE Review (Another ‘good’ website builder. Best for photographers.) CONS of SquareSpace Website Builder: #1. SquareSpace costs around $18.00/month for a fully loaded site (which is on the expensive end of these sites listed). The SquareSpace themes are great to look. And the website builder itself is actually pretty good. However, they can be a little difficult to edit for newbies so there’s a bit of a learning curve. They also require a lot of photography to look right, which is perfect for people with visual businesses (think bloggers, photographers, artists, restaurants, musicians, weddings, etc.) but not great for people lacking high-quality image assets. Each email account is $5/month (extra). PROS of SquareSpace Website Builder: #1. SquareSpace has a variety of. These are probably the highest quality designs, with everyone being extremely contemporary and beautiful overall. Free domain name and privacy. #3., website or e-commerce site (with no limitations). Account signup and activation is instant. ‘Live by default’: #5. Decent page loading times and uptime. Support: FAQ, live chat support and email support 24/7. Do I recommend it? YES. If your have tons of images that you’ll use on your website ( hint: photographers). SquareSpace looks looks great from the outside, but when compared with the rest of this list, can become very expensive. Each of these templates require the help of a photographer or design touch in order to look the best too. It’s a GREAT option for a certain type of person or business case, such as photographers for example. Check out my. (To be honest, I kinda like it.) #4. BOLDGRID Review (cheap & very flexible, but too steep learning curve) CONS of BoldGrid Website Builder: #1. Signup and activation took 2 hours for them to activate my account, which was a bit slow. Biggest learning curve you’ll probably have. Takes a bit time to fully master it (but worth it). PROS of BoldGrid Website Builder: #1. BoldGrid boasts the largest template database in this review, with around to pick from (WordPress themes that are HIGHLY customizable). BoldGrid technically runs on-top-of WordPress. So while most of the other options we’ve reviewed so far are limited, the sky’s the limit with BoldGrid. There is a bit of a learning curve for beginners, but the upside is that you get almost unlimited customizations too. Pricing was as advertised as $4.17/month (CHEAPEST!), I paid exactly $57.53 for one year. You can create almost anything, including a standard website, blog, or e-commerce shop. You also get a free domain, unlimited email accounts and the ability to set up an eCommerce store. All the necessary stuff! Support: Support packages offered by Bold Grid Varies depending on the type of key connect you purchase. Do I recommend it? Yes. BoldGrid is probably the cheapest and most straightforward website builder. It also boasts features that most other options we reviewed simply can’t compete. The only thing that worries me is the learning curve that some beginners might have to deal with. I was also glad that additional domain or emails didn’t come at an added cost too. Overall, I’m pretty positive and hopeful as it’s super-cheap and highly customizable.. (Looks OK.) #5. WEEBLY Review Just an average website builder CONS of Weebly Website Builder: #1. There are around to browse, which are simply OK-looking (but nothing special). If you want an eCommerce store with over 25 products, you’ll need to pay $24/month which is pretty steep. #3. While Weebly performance was on the good side (only 10 minutes of downtime). For some reason, Weebly reported fake (or error-prone) site statistics: PROS of Weebly Website Builder: #1. $12.00/month, I paid $144.00 (12 months upfront). It’s pretty cheap. #2. Free email. #3. Instant account signup and activation. #4. Weebly features drag-and-drop customization options from pre-built features (like one for adding an image + text, slideshows, and more). Changing these elements is pretty easy, but also fairly basic and limited. You can add images or text in a few seconds (really simple). Support: They have a help center where you can read articles/guides that can help you possibly answer your questions. Also have a forum and support ticketing system. Availability to call them. No live chat, though. Do I recommend it? Weebly is one of the most popular website builders, and the intuitiveness is a huge positive. However, theme or template options are merely so-so. While they also charge extra for email accounts (each one will set you back $3.75/month) which can quickly add up. And after you signup, you’ll be constantly bombarded with up-sells that quickly become annoying.. (not too bad, huh?) #6. JIMDO Review (Too limited, only 17 themes) CONS of Jimdo Website Builder: #1. Jimdo comes complete with ONLY 17 themes. Yup, you need to pay $90/year to get access to ONLY 17 themes. You can easily change colour and add text or images. However, anything more sophisticated than that is difficult. Otherwise, the templates themselves are fairly rigid, making it difficult to make large-scale changes. #3. If you’d like unlimited eCommerce product options, be prepared to pay $20/month (or $240/year). PROS of Jimdo Website Builder: #1. Pricing was advertised as $7.50/month and I paid exactly $90 for one year. #2. Up-and-running in 30 minutes. Best performance Just take a look at the graph below (fast & stable loading times with over 99.96% uptime) Support: Knowledgebase. Contact Form. Do I recommend it? Unfortunately, no. The initial design is very clean and neat, making it appear more contemporary than some of the ones we’ve already reviewed here. I’m even OK with one email account and 15 eCommerce product limitation in the short-term. But it worries me that they only have 17 templates and your customization options are limited to only relatively basic changes. Not recommended, unless you want to create a one-page-website.. DOODLEKIT Review (Very outdated experience) CONS of Doodlekit Website Builder: #1. Doodlekit comes with around 170 themes, but again most of them are old and outdated. #2. I’ll be honest: it’s hard to find ANYTHING positive with this builder. The templates are horrible. Editing them is horrible. I couldn’t create a simple work gallery or portfolio. Pretty much the only thing I could do was add a few pictures (and even that was complicated as hell). #3. If you want to build an eCommerce shop, you’ll need to pay $24.99/month (which is on the more expensive end). My account was activated instantly, but domain verification (which is free) took 48 hours. That’s slooooooow. PROS of DoodleKit Website Builder: #1. It comes with a domain name and unlimited email accounts (nice perk!). Pricing was as advertised at $10.00/month, I paid exactly $120. Support: FAQ page. Support ticket system. Do I recommend it? Using Doodlekit seems like I flew back in time (and not in a good, Marty McFly kinda way). Their design is outdated and I highly doubt you can create anything meaningful out of it. Everything is extremely dated, which doesn’t make sense when there are MUCH better options available for just a few more dollars. However, for the sake of this review I paid for 1 full year upfront, so I’ll keep my test site up. Again, not worth your time/money. But if you really want to dig, use their free trial to test the waters.. (How does it feel to be back to 90s?) #8. WEBS Review (Slow and unreliable) CONS of Webs Website Builder: #1. Webs has 500 themes, but most (again!) look old and outdated. #2. The drag-and-drop menu makes things very easy to edit. However, the templates themselves are extremely outdated. Changes almost resemble word processor style editing, with clip art and poor stock photography options. They have some extra widgets and other elements available, but most have an amateurish look or feel. #3. eCommerce stores are limited to 25 products. If you want no limitations, you’ll need to pick their more expensive package which is $22.99/mo – pretty expensive in my opinion. #4. Took 4 hours to activate my site. Kinda on the slow side. #5. The average load time came in at 1128ms (around twice the average!), with 26 minutes of downtime alone in June! Also, every site tweak/change takes 5+ seconds to load. More than 24 hours of downtime during last 6 months Pros of Webs Website Builder: #1. Webs throws in a free domain name and three email accounts. Pricing isn’t too bad at $12.99/month. I paid $119.80 for 1 year (10% off the monthly price). Support: Knowledgebase. You can submit support tickets. 24/7 Chat support (requires a premium account). Do I recommend it? The annual discount was a nice surprise. However, their admin panel is VERY slow, with each action taking 5+ seconds to load. The outdated design, limited customizations, and SLOW page loading times were also problematic. You’re better off looking somewhere else.. (Again, pretty awful) #9. YOLA Review (Outdated and very weak) CONS of Yola Website Builder: #1. While Yola has about 215 templates, most of them look old and outdated. Like really old – 2006 stuff. #2. The design template options look very similar to Web.com (not in a good way). Customizations are also very limited. For example, I wanted to remove the website menu while building out the site, but it wouldn’t let me delete this option. Instead, I had to to start all over again with a different template. If you want to build an e-commerce shop, you’ll need to pay $10/month additionally (so it would be approximately $200/year). That’s a lot of money. #4. If you want email accounts, you’ll need to pay $9.96/year for EACH email account. Sneaky marketing tactic that many website builder companies use. PROS of Yola Website Builder: #1. Advertised as $8.33/month and I paid exactly $99.95. On the cheaper side. #2. Signup and site activation was instant. Always a good sign to start with! Support: 24/7 live chat support (also includes tutorials). Do I recommend it? To be honest, I don’t like the Yola design templates and the website builder isn’t adequate. I also found the excessive up-sells and ‘extra add-ons’ frustrating. While I initially was looking for an all inclusive package, I soon realized after signing up that there was no way around paying for extras, such as email accounts and the e-commerce feature.. (nothing to be proud of) #10. WEB Review (Bad billing practices, difficult to cancel) Web.com was added to this list largely because of its wide promotion online. However, it’s the only service I did NOT personally sign up for. They have sketchy billing practices. The plan details are crystal clear (see #2 below), there were tons of upsells, and the only way to eventually cancel your plan is to (yes, this is still 2016). There are NO plan details. The ‘ ‘ option doesn’t tell you exactly what you’re signing up for, which is worrying considering how difficult it might be to back out of this decision in the future. Despite having almost 2,500 website templates to choose from, virtually all of them look extremely dated (borderline Geocities for you Web 1.0 peeps). Their website builder used to adjust or tweak each template looks very rigid and fairly primitive (think MSpaint-level customizations). Finding these issues got me a little worried. So I decided to check around to read reviews from a few real customers to see if I was just being paranoid. I wasn’t. Here’s one that accurately summed up my worst nightmare: How do I get any Senior Executive at web.com to figure out what is going on with my website? It has been down for more than 2 weeks. 31 trouble tickets. Simple domain name changes and now no website, and apparently no archive, cache, or even record that I have been a customer since 2001! At $22.00/month, Web.com is ALSO one of the most expensive website builder options available. Conclusion: I decided not to test them. Website Builders Conclusion Phew. Made it to the end! Time for a quick recap. Overall, website builders are great for beginners or small businesses looking to get a professional (and affordable) option off the ground in a matter of days (instead of the weeks or months it would take for a custom site). While there are a ton of good ( & ), reputable options out there to choose from, there are also a ton of terrible ones too. I put this review together to provide an unbiased look at what your best options are. I signed up for each of the most popular ones, paying for annual accounts in most cases while setting up a test site to try out the service and monitor it’s performance over the course of a few months. So which website builder is your best bet? Best all around option? Go with if you don’t want to be disappointed and over pay. Best option for Beginners or those needing eCommerce? Is your best bet. Best for photographers, designers, or other visual businesses? Chances are you’ll love beautiful templates. Hi Robert, I’m currently searching for a website builder to help me make a site for my husband’s small business (plumber) and am very glad I found your article. I’ve run into Wix before but have been put off by many people claiming that it’s hard to get a Wix site listed high on Google as Google doesn’t like the technology it used. I really like Wix mainly because of the ready to go templates, but it seems a little pointless using Wix if potential customers can’t find the site in search engine. I do understand that all websites need “optimizing” and I’ve purchased a course to help me achieve this. I would love to hear your thoughts on this given your experience. Thank you in advance. Thanks, Robert. I guess it is what you get used to. I went to Weebly several years ago from both Yola and Wix. At the time they were the only one that could easily do drop down menus which was important to me. Also have found them very innovative and have rarely suffered any downtime. Their tech support is excellent. While their selection of templates may be limited, they work closely with another company, Baamboo Studios who produce impressive templates for their users. Have just started to use their e-commerce features and agree they are awesome. By comparison I have just built an e-commerce site using BigCommerce and it has been a chore using their site builder. Also have a Shopify site on standby, but I think Weebly will end up being my site of choice, mainly because the guys listen and make every effort to accommodate the users. While I can’t argue with your 4th placing I was surprised. Great article. Hello Robert. Thanks for the write up – you exfoliated the competition out there. Yet I am poor at developing and building sites. Do you ave your own design studio? If you do and if you do not cost an arm and a leg I would love to work with you. Is it possible that you could send me your price chart for site from one-page crowdfunding type site up to e-commerce? I am a writer with many project I could have up on the page but held up by my inability to be comfortable with mastering web building. Having a reliable specialist like you or associates that work for you, who is agile with affordable prices will give me a good, long collaboration. Thank you so much – your evaluations will save my artist group members so much time and frustration. Wix and Weebly were my short list too. I recommended Weebly to them last year, as most members are not tech-literate and Weebly seemed the least frustrating for a first timer. Also, fewer and simpler templates were a plus in this case, rather than a problem. I will have another look at Wix now to see if the issues I had in my test site have been fixed. I agree with your comment on the Weebly statistics (e.g. It counted my edit tweeks as hits) and the constant upsell ads. As noted here by others, Weebly’s support by phone or online chat are excellent. I will have another look at Wix now and see if that might work better for us now that more members have some online experience. Thank you again for your excellent and well-written research. I’ve always been curious about building my own website for personal use. I see commercials and banners saying how “THEY” are ‘free’ or ‘are easy to use’ or ‘best web builder around’, etc, etc. Not knowing who to believe, I, like many others, used the best resource that money can buy i Googled! Your site was one of the links that I decided to explore and was impressed off the back. I liked your unbiased thoughts and personal 10+ experience in the field so you know what you’re talking about. So thank you for making our research, any potential pitfalls, future headache, possible regrets that we could’ve suffered by making the the selfless sacrifice by exploring these website building companies for the masses. Are any of the top three you recommended, also viable for non commercial use, i.e. Personal use? Just looking to share information with friends and family, or would you recommend that one take web development classes at a local community collage? Thank You, in advance! Hello Robert, thank you for the comprehensive review. I would really appreciate your recommendation for my specific case (I have studied your review carefully and still I’m not sure). I am an artist and want to build a website showcasing my paintings (photographed high resolution), and an online store selling paintings. It is essential that I can add items to the store on weekly basis. It is also essential the site loads quickly to get high google ranking. Cost is an issue, and I don’t mind a learning curve. I want a clear and clean website, no confusion / getting lost elements. Would you recommend Bold Grid? WebsiteSetup is a free resource site for creating websites. WebsiteSetup was founded in 2013. The main goal of this website is to provide step-by-step instructions for setting up a website, blog or e-commerce site. We also cover WordPress related questions, such as or how to. We’re Hiring We’re looking for web development experts to join WebsiteSetup. We’re mostly interested in content that helps people build better websites. If you’re interested in contributing for WebsiteSetup, contact us. Not everyone wants to hire a company or avid programmer to make their website for them. Some of us would rather tackle it as DIY project, whether merely for the challenge, or simply because we can’t pony up the cash necessary to hire a fully-fledged professional. Choosing among the best website builders isn’t easy though. The features can be varied, and the pricing structure complex. To help you figure out which is the best website builder for you, we’ve put together a regularly updated list of our favorites to walk you through finding the right one. Keep in mind nearly every free website builder on our list also offers a set of premium packages, many of which include expanded storage and bandwidth, as well as features often lacking from their freemium counterparts. The premium plans also remove unwanted ads on your page and the subdomain housed in your website URL, which is a must if you’re breaking into a professional field. In most cases, you get what you pay for. While that doesn’t necessarily mean you need to spend a lot to have a great site, it’s important to consider how professional you want your website to look. More often than not, spending that little bit extra can go a long way. Photographers should check out the we’d most recommend, as that list looks specifically at how website builders handle and present large image galleries. The best free website builders Wix is one of the best free website builders out there. The hundreds of HTML templates are extremely user-friendly and reliant on the software’s drag-and-drop interface, which makes building a website a similar experience to crafting a PowerPoint presentation. While Wix offers more flexibility in terms of customization over other website builders, the unbridled freedom also makes it easier to create lackluster designs if you don’t know what you’re doing. Wix does allow you to revert to older stages of your website via “Site History,” though, and includes robust integration with a wide array of third-party services like calendars and Instagram feeds. Moreover, the service allows you to separately customize an accompanying mobile site. However, Wix doesn’t allow you to switch templates if you’ve already started a project and only offers 500MB of storage and 1GB of bandwidth if you opt for the freemium package. Upgrades to more bandwidth and storage space include domain tools, ranging from $5 to $25 a month. Build your website using: Weebly is an old favorite among those who use template-based website builders. It’s easy to use, clean-looking, and offers plenty of customization options. Drag and drop features for adding images, text, and other elements are stored within the left-hand sidebar, though you can only insert elements into designated areas of your page. That said, limiting the customization options also allows novice users to grasp the platform quicker than others on our list, regardless of the theme they opt for. Moreover, Weebly provides the ability to add maps and download your entire website as a ZIP file in case you want to move your information to a standard Web hosting service. Although Weebly doesn’t boast the best image-editing tools on the market, it does let you to seamlessly add audio and video to your site, along with a wealth of commerce tools for putting up a storefront. You can customize your mobile site too, and the Weebly iPad app even lets you build your site on the go. The free package grants you 500MB of storage space and unlimited bandwidth, with options for expanded storage and features ranging from $8 a month up to $25 a month paid annually. Build your website using: Webflow isn’t your typical website builder. The software is aimed at well-versed designers and agencies looking to build an interactive site on behalf of their clients, and as such, it places the full power of HTML and CSS directly beneath your fingertips. The static site builder isn’t tied to a content management system like others on our list, but instead, offers you a means of building a site you can then carry over to WordPress or other related services. Webflow offers a limited set of charming themes to choose from, along with an intuitive and responsive interface that comes lined with an assortment of web components for inserting links and adding text. A selection of drag-and-drop widgets also come standard, meaning you can add social components, maps, videos, and other facets without coding knowledge. Furthermore, Webflow lets you switch the canvas to customize your design for any resolution, whether it be desktops, tablets, or smartphones. You’ll need to toggle on some of the more advanced HTML and CSS tools if you want to take full advantage of what the service offers, and you only have two static pages, and a limit of 500 visits for free users. Thankfully, premium packages start at an affordable $12, and there’s even a student discount for those with a college email. Build your website using: WordPress is the website builder Digital Trends is based on, though we have our own set of professional programmers behind the scenes. The service is arguably one of the most capable given its open-source nature (especially ), which allows for an extensive amount of templates, themes, and plugins which can be downloaded for free or bought for a premium price. The platform has a relatively steep learning curve, which isn’t surprising given its long-term capabilities and sheer level of customization, the latter of which will likely require you to invest some time learning its various functions. Nonetheless, WordPress excels when it comes to ready-made themes, mobile-optimized templates, and widgets that allow you to include everything from comments to images. WordPress will also give you traffic information, which can help you cater your website to your audience, as well as 3GB of storage space and unlimited bandwidth. However, the platform’s exhaustive tools also require you to have at least a baseline knowledge of coding at times. If you want to rearrange the layout of a particular template, for instance, you’ll have to modify the code to do so. While there are, their sheer number means there are more than a few terrible ones in the mix, so be careful. Given WordPress powers roughly 24 percent of the Web, you’re often going to find fixes and answers to any questions you might have via the robust community of developers and users. The possibilities are endless, if you know what to do. Build your website using: Tumblr is the least complex tool on this list, and with only a fairly limited selection of built-in tools, it’s not fit for something like a web storefront or a forum. But if all you need is a few static pages or a basic blog, the service might be just what you need. For handling simple text and images with periodic updates, Tumblr works just fine. Though its toolset is similar to competitors like Blogger, the interface is much more user-friendly. Despite a simple setup, Tumblr themes are surprisingly customizable. There are thousands of free and paid options available across the web, including those posted on Tumblr’s native service and others available for manual installation. Users can customize any theme, including the default ones, though you’ll need a working knowledge of HTML and CSS (or the ability to do a little research) to make any extensive modifications work. Tumblr is completely free, including hosting and bandwidth – the service has no premium tiers. Analytical tools are lacking, but users can connect individual Tumblr sites to a custom domain for free. We even have a. Build your website using. Window.dt_multistitch_data = {'post_id':503983,'page':1,'url':'https: / /www.digitaltrends.com /computing /best-website-build-websites-free /','pages':[{'page':1,'url':'https: / /www.digitaltrends.com /computing /best-website-build-websites-free /','html':' Not everyone wants to hire a company or avid programmer to make their website for them. Some of us would rather tackle it as DIY project, whether merely for the u00a0challenge, or simply u00a0because we can’t pony up the cash necessary to hire a fully-fledged professional. Choosing among the best website builders isn’t easy though. The features can be varied, and the pricing structure complex. N To help you figure out which is the best website builder for you, we’ve put together a regularly updated list of our favorites to walk you through finding the right one. Keep u00a0in mind nearly every u00a0free website builder on our list also offers a set of premium packages, many of which include u00a0expanded storage and bandwidth, as well as features often lacking from their freemium counterparts. The premium plans also u00a0remove unwanted ads on your page and the subdomain housed in your website URL, which is a must if you’re breaking into a professional field. N In most cases, you get what you pay for. While that doesn’t necessarily mean you need to spend a lot to have a great site, it’s important to consider how professional you want your website to look. More often than not, spending that little bit extra can go a long way.
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March 2018
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