How to choose the best website creator 2018

Website builder is a perfect solution for individuals and small businesses, to start a website without hiring an outside developer. The problem is finding the best website builder can be a difficult task for beginners. With so many website builders online, how do you know what is the right solution for you? This article will help you choose the best website builder by reviewing the pros and cons of today's most popular options.

1. Instructions for creating a website for beginners

What do you look for when choosing the best website builder?

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Before comparing the top website builders, you should write down what you want to do with your website. What your goal is and what features you want to appear on your website.

For example, you can write down things like: There are blogs, photo galleries, online stores, booking systems, contact forms, sliders, etc.

If you are unsure about what you want, check out competitors' websites or other websites for inspiration.

Most website builders provide a drag and drop user interface to build websites. You can take advantage of trial accounts to test drivers before making a final decision.

Next, you need to consider your growth options. Do you add regular updates to your website? Do you need a blog? Do you sell more products on your website in the future?

You need to make sure that the website creator of your choice is able to handle your needs, as your business grows.

Now, consider the foundations of top website builders, helping you to avoid outsourcing developers.

Top web builders

1. WordPress.org

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WordPress.org (also known as self-hosted WordPress) is the world's most popular website building platform. More than 28% of Internet sites are now powered by WordPress.

1. Instructions for creating websites with WordPress from A to Z

Note : There are two versions of WordPress available. Have WordPress.org and WordPress.com self-hosting. WordPress.com will be mentioned at the end of the article.

1. WordPress.com and WordPress.org - Which one is better?

WordPress self-hosting tops the list of the best website creators in this article due to its popularity, powerful features, scalability and ease of use.

WordPress is a free and open source website builder. This means you have maximum control over your site compared to any other builder on this list.

Unlike other website builders, you will need a WordPress account to host your own website (this is very simple).

Advantages:

WordPress gives you full control over every aspect of the site. It can be used to build any kind of website, for example, e-commerce stores, community forums, social networks, member websites and more.

There are thousands of pre-created WordPress themes that you can use for your website design. It also has great drag and drop page builders like Beaver Builder and Elementor, allowing you to easily create your own page layout.

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You will also have access to over 50,000 free WordPress plugins. This is like the application for WordPress, which adds additional features and functions to your site.

WordPress is completely translated into dozens of languages, and can easily be used to create multilingual websites.

Defect:

You will have to manage your own website, which means you will need to familiarize yourself with a new system. This can easily be overcome by most users, but it seems a bit difficult for beginners.

You will also have to update WordPress updates, update plugins and create backups.

Price:

WordPress software is available for free, but you will need a domain name and web hosting usually costs about $ 14.99 / year or $ 7.99 / month.

Fortunately, you can start a website for just $ 2.75 / month with Bluehost, an official WordPress hosting service provider. They are providing services to 60% of users, with SSL and a free domain name.

2. Wix.com

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Wix is ​​another popular cloud-based website builder. It is very easy to use, combined with a set of powerful features to easily build your website.

Advantages:

Wix is ​​a fully hosted platform, so you won't have to pay for hosting. You have access to hundreds of templates to choose the right website design for you. Each template is fully editable using their intuitive drag and drop website builder.

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It also comes with dozens of free or paid apps, which you can install on your website. These applications allow you to add new features and functions to the site. Some of them are created by Wix and others are created by third-party developers.

Wix offers a free package with limited capacity and bandwidth. However, you can use this package to check the drag and drop feature of Wix website. It does not include domain names, so if you decide to keep your site, you may want to upgrade to a premium package.

You also get a free SSL, which comes with all Wix packages, but you will need to turn it on for your site.

Defect:

Free and Connect Domain packages will display Wix-branded ads on your site. You will need to upgrade to the Combo or Unlimited package to remove those ads.

If you decide to move your site from Wix, you'll find it quite complicated.

Wix's Connect Domain package costs $ 9.16 / month, allowing you to connect custom domains only, so you still have to buy a separate domain name.

Price:

Wix offers a limited free package with Wix-branded subdomains. You can connect to a domain for $ 9.16 / month. Wix's combo package costs from $ 14.95 / month and will help you get a free domain name. E-commerce packages cost $ 26.25 per month.

3. Shopify.com

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Shopify is a website builder designed specifically for online stores and e-commerce websites. It owns more than half a million businesses with 1 million active users. The Shopify platform has earned more than $ 40 billion in product value.

Advantages:

Shopify is a fully archived 'all in one' solution, which means you don't have to worry about software management, installing updates or keeping backups. Shopify will do everything possible for you.

It provides an integrated payment solution called Shopify Payments. You can also add a third-party payment gateway to accept payments.

As an ecommerce website builder, Shopify comes with unlimited inventory and product management features, powerful statistics, and easy marketing solutions. All are packed in Shopify. There are hundreds of designs available, and you will never need to add them.

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With an intuitive drag and drop interface, Shopify makes it easy to create an official e-commerce store. Shopify also offers POS at the store, allowing you to sell products on the spot, and accept all credit cards and take advantage of Shopify's inventory, shipping, marketing and statistics tools.

You can even integrate Shopify into WordPress, allowing you to use both of these great solutions at the same time.

Defect:

If you're just starting out, you might find Shopify's price a little higher than some of the other website builders on this list.

If you want to move your site from Shopify, you will find it difficult to do so.

Price:

The basic Shopify package will cost $ 29 / month. You can upgrade it to $ 79 / month package or Advanced Shopify package for $ 299 / month. Shopify also offers a Shopify Lite package for $ 9 per month, basically allowing you to add a buy button on any website.

If you want a simple e-commerce website builder, Shopify might be the perfect choice for you.

4. BoldGrid.com

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BoldGrid is a new kind of website builder, built on WordPress. It is available as a standalone WordPress plugin, as well as a fully hosted website builder.

Advantages:

BoldGrid is built on WordPress, so you get the full advantage of WordPress, with a custom user experience. The BoldGrid website builder allows you to choose a professional design from its theme library.

Then, you can customize those designs with a custom drag and drop tool. You can point and click any item in the preview to edit its properties. You can also change colors, fonts, layouts, navigation menus and gadgets easily.

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Do you need a staging website? BoldGrid will create one for you with just one click. This allows you to test your new designs, layouts, plugins and themes before turning it into a product for everyone to see.

It also comes with a full WYSIWYG page editor. There is no need to anticipate too much when editing your pages in WordPress, because you will get exactly what you see on your page editor window. You can also use GridBlocks to simply drag and drop elements to your page, and create your own layout from scratch.

All BoldGrid themes are ready for WooCommerce. This allows you to easily create 'shop fronts' using BoldGrid's drag and drop tool.

Defect:

BoldGrid runs on WordPress, so you'll still need a self-hosted WordPress.org website to use it.

But the advantage is that backups are included through BoldGrid backups, so you don't have to worry about that.

Price:

BoldGrid basic plugin is available as a free download. You will need a WordPress account and domain name to install and use it. You should use InMotion Hosting (https://www.inmotionhosting.com) because this is the official hosting provider of BoldGrid.

This means you can easily set BoldGrid with a few clicks, on the platform of InMotion Hosting.

If you want to use WordPress, but with the ease of drag and drop website builders, BoldGrid will be perfect for you.

5. Weebly.com

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Weebly is an easy-to-use website builder tool with lots of great designs. It includes a beautiful page builder, allowing you to edit web pages without learning any programming skills.

1. Build a professional website with Weebly

Advantages:

Weebly is a fully hosted platform, so you don't need to install and manage any software. Weebly also manages the hosting of your website and all software running in the backend.

It comes with dozens of website designs to use as a starting point for your website. These beautiful designs can be completely edited by Weebly's live page editor.

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Weebly also comes with integrated support for e-commerce. This allows you to easily create online stores and start selling.

Each Weebly website comes with built-in features of contact forms, photo galleries, sliders and more. This allows you to easily add features to your site without any complicated setup process.

Defect:

Weebly is a full hosting platform, which makes you limited to the features it provides. You cannot hire developers or outside designers to add new features or features to your site.

Weebly charges 3% for every purchase made through your e-commerce store. You will need to upgrade to the business package to avoid these additional fees.

Price:

Weebly comes with a very basic free package. Paid packages cost from $ 8 / month and pay by year. Pro packages cost $ 12 / month and business packages cost $ 25 / month.

6. Squarespace.com

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Squarespace is a completely popular web page builder, known for its excellent design and ease of use.

Advantages:

Squarespace comes with enterprise-class infrastructure, to host your website. This powerful and secure platform allows you to focus on developing your business without worrying about storage.

Squarespace includes a lot of website design to get started. All of these designs are available for all types of content. They are fully editable and Squarespace even lets you use multiple templates for a website at the same time.

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Adding content to your site is easy on Squarespace. Just point anywhere on your website and start typing. You can easily drag and drop items on pages to create a layout in minutes.

Squarespace also has an e-commerce package, allowing you to add an online store to your website. It provides a beautiful interface to manage products, inventory, orders, coupons and more.

Defect:

Squarespace provides limited integration with third-party services, which can be an obstacle to developing your business.

Squarespace e-commerce packages only allow Stripe, Apple Pay and PayPal to process payments. You cannot add additional payment gateways.

Price:

The Squarespace website costs from $ 12 / month to $ 18 / month. Online stores cost between $ 26 and $ 40 per month.

Squarespace is a beautifully designed platform that provides features that are easy to use. It may be the perfect option if you want to quickly build a website.

7. iPage.com

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iPage is another easy-to-use tool to build your website. It is sold as an add-on for storage services provided by iPage.

Advantages:

iPage is a simple drag-and-drop website builder. The limited version of this web builder is available with a free iPage hosting account for users. You can upgrade it to pro packages or business packages to get unlimited features.

This website building tool includes more than 100 professionally designed templates and is compatible with mobile platforms. You can apply these templates to your website with one click.

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Page editing is very simple with drag and drop tools. All elements on your website can be easily edited, by clicking on them in the live preview. It also has built-in sections that you can drag and drop on your website.

IPage builder has built-in social networking tools, SEO settings and a beautiful set of images. You can also embed videos, add Google Analytics and add ecommerce stores if you wish.

Defect:

This site creator is limited in features. You cannot add a new feature to your site. There is no integration or third-party add-on that you can install.

Price:

The basic website builder is provided for free with an iPage hosting account. You can upgrade it to a pro pack for $ 6.99 / month or a business package for $ 15.99 / month.

iPage is a simple and easy to use tool, perfect for a new site with few pages. It's not really a content management system, so you'll be limited if you try to expand your site in the future.

8. GoDaddy.com

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GoDaddy is one of the largest domain name hosting providers in the world. It provides a simple, elegant and complete website builder with included hosting features.

1. Instructions for creating 2-layer security for GoDaddy accounts

Advantages:

GoDaddy is a simple and easy tool to create professional websites. It is pre-loaded with several ready-to-use blocks, which you can drag and drop to create different layouts.

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It also has a photo gallery integrated with professional images from Getty Photography, which you can use on your website. You can also upload images and create your own image galleries.

GoDaddy website creator also works on smaller screens. This allows you to work on your site on the go, with your mobile phone or tablet.

Defect:

It does not feature as rich and flexible as most other website builders on this list. It offers limited features with fewer design options.

It's difficult to transfer your website from the GoDaddy website creator to WordPress.

Price:

Individual packages cost $ 5.99 / month, business packages cost $ 9.99 / month and business plus packages cost $ 14.99 / month. All packages charge a yearly fee.

GoDaddy website creator can be used for a basic website with a few pages. However, it is not a good option to build sites with rich content.

9. WordPress.com

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WordPress.com is a blog hosting service and website operated by Automattic. It was created by Matt Mullenweg, co-founder of open source WordPress software, so it's named WordPress.com.

However, WordPress.com is not the same as WordPress.org.

Advantages:

WordPress.com is a web hosting service. Built on the same WordPress software but with a completely customizable user experience. You don't have to worry about software and backups because WordPress.com will include all of these.

Free and paid packages of WordPress.com have different features. All packages allow users to choose from hundreds of free and paid WordPress themes. You can then use the built-in customizer to add web page titles, use widgets, add navigation menus, etc.

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It does not provide the same drag and drop functionality as other website builders. However, you can easily customize the design to a certain extent.

Defect:

You cannot install custom plugins or themes unless you upgrade to the business package.

Premium packages do not have e-commerce features or support third-party ad networks. With the business package, you can use WooCommerce and third-party ad networks. However, you will still have to follow the terms and conditions of WordPress.com.

Price:

Basic packages are free, but very limited. Individual packages cost $ 4 / month, pay yearly and include a custom domain. Premium packages cost $ 8.25 / month, giving you the ability to monetize your site and customize advanced design. Business packages cost $ 24.92 per month, providing you with e-commerce features and custom plugins.

10. Webs.com

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Webs provides a simple website building platform suitable for business websites and personal websites. It has an intuitive, easy-to-use builder, with built-in website designs and a powerful set of features.

Advantages:

Webs is a fully hosted platform, so you don't have to worry about software, updates or backups.

It has an intuitive website builder that allows you to choose from dozens of professional website designs. Each design comes with simple customization options that you can configure from Webs right away.

You can edit any item on the page with a simple interface and click. You can also drag and drop commonly used items like images, videos, photo galleries, text, columns, maps and contact forms.

All paid packages will also include a free custom domain for your site. Advanced and professional packages also come with e-commerce features and custom email addresses, using your domain name.

Defect:

It has a limited set of features and integration that cannot be expanded. You cannot hire a developer to help you modify the design, or add new features to your site.

Price:

Webs.com has a limited free package. Paid packages range from $ 5.99 / month, $ 12.99 / month for advanced packages to $ 22.99 for pro packages.

Webs.com can be used to build a small business website, a store with a modest number of items or a photo gallery. However, due to the limited set of features, it is not an ideal platform to build sites with rich content.

After carefully evaluating the different website builders, perhaps WordPress will beat all other competitors, in terms of overall performance, ease of use and flexibility.

It's not only great for beginners, but the world's top brands are also using WordPress for their site.

Hopefully this article has helped you choose the best website builder for your project.

Good luck!

See more:

1. 15 tools to help build a website for beginners (no code required)
2. How to create a free website with Google Sites
3. Basic steps for building a website with Yola