WordPress alternatives – making website building simple

WordPress is a free Content Management System that allows you to create just about any kind of site. So why would anyone look for WordPress alternatives?

The truth is that WordPress is not for everyone. WordPress actually requires some level of skill – a level not everyone has because they’re too busy growing their business or following their passion which doesn’t include coding.

If you find yourself among those people, don’t worry. There are ways you can create and run a successful website without having to bump your head against a wall because you don’t know which plugin to use to do design changes, make a contact form, or add an analytics tool. I’m here to show you those ways.

I’ve looked into 6 of the best WordPress alternatives currently on the market – whether you’re looking for a platform suitable to publish your writings or a place to build a business website. Surely one will be good enough for you.

Best WordPress alternatives – overview

Here are some of the best alternatives for WordPress:

1. Hostinger Website Builder – cheap and easy-to-use WordPress alternative
2. GoDaddy website builder – WordPress alternative for businesses
3. Wix – website builder almost as flexible as WordPress
4. Squarespace – simple website builder with unique templates
5. Webflow – WordPress alternative for design professionals
6. Ghost – excellent WordPress alternative for bloggers

Now, you’re presented with 3 options: read the article as a whole, use the links in this list to navigate throughout the article and read about the builders you care about the most, or click here to read my summary of these builders and find out about places where WordPress falls short.

1. Hostinger Website Builder – cheap and innovative alternative to WordPress

Price range	From $2.99
Features	AI tools, intuitive grid building system
Templates	130+
Best for	Beginners and people looking into experimental features

Visit Hostinger Website Builder

Hostinger Website Builder is designed for people who want ease of use and really low prices. You can create a decent-looking website with minimal effort and in no time, and that, sadly, can’t be said about WordPress.

Using Hostinger Website Builder

Hostinger Website Builder has a great visual editor. It’s very intuitive and makes website building a breeze – you’re free to play with your pages, add or remove elements, and you can change the style of your site. All these options are located in the top-left menu of your Hostinger Website Builder editor.

When using the editor it’s pretty clear that Hostinger Website Builder was built with beginners in mind, and you’ll notice it the moment you start playing with it. Immediately after signing up, you had to choose a template and go explore the editor, leaving no room for wandering around the site like a lost puppy.

Either way, you can always choose from the 130 templates Hostinger Website Builder puts at your disposal. They all look professionally made, and all major niches are covered. They’re pretty too. Plus, once you select one, you can edit it in your Hostinger Website Builder drag-and-drop editor.

One cool feature I found while playing with Hostinger Website Builder is its AI writer. Now, don’t expect professional content created in a blink of an eye, however, this feature is great for creating a temporary About page.

Hostinger Website Builder offers a ton of other interesting AI features, and you can read more about them in our Hostinger Website Builder review.

Pricing

Since I advertised Hostinger Website Builder as dirt cheap, let’s talk about its prices. There’s one plan and three different billing rates for you to choose from – 12, 36, or 48-month ones. They’re all priced the same, yet the renewal prices will be different.

The plan allows you to build and host 100 websites. It also gives you 100 professional email accounts, unlimited SSL, unmetered bandwidth, and other freebies. Not to mention that you get a market-leading hosting service together with a free custom domain for a year in the package.

I think it’s pretty clear why Hostinger Website Builder is an excellent alternative to WordPress for people on a budget – its plan costs even less than Wix’s cheapest option.

Bottom line? Hostinger Website Builder is a worthy competitor when it comes to many website builders. Sure, it may not be as flexible as some, and it doesn’t have thousands of templates, however, for what you’re paying, you get great stuff.

Visit Hostinger Website Builder

2. GoDaddy website builder – fast and business-centered WordPress competitor

Price range	From $9.99 to $16.99
Features	Excellent marketing features
Templates	20
Best for	Businesses looking to find new audiences

Visit GoDaddy Builder

GoDaddy is an admirable hosting provider, but over time, it decided to go into the website builders business as well. And it’s a good thing too because GoDaddy’s builder is one of the best on the market. The built-in business tools alone that this builder offers make it a satisfying competitor to WordPress, not to mention its great ease of use which results in a wonderful website in minutes.

Using GoDaddy website builder

If you’re a business owner and want to create a website fast, GoDaddy might be the right fit. Why? For one thing, it has a simple editor that won’t give you too much trouble. The website creation process is streamlined, and it all starts with you choosing a template.

The GoDaddy website builder allows you to play with several elements. You can change the color schemes and the fonts, and in the same editor, you can add or remove elements.

As for ease of use, GoDaddy caters to both experienced and inexperienced users. If you’re a beginner, the editor includes a suggestion box that tells you what you have to do next. I think it comes in handy when you have no idea what else to do.

The editor also includes options for SEO, social media links, and analytics. If you’ve been around the block for a while, then you already know how to handle them. If not, access GoDaddy’s help center, and you’ll get the assistance you need.

It’s not a surprise that GoDaddy’s website builder is represented by its business tools. The most renowned one is GoDaddy InSight, which is a smart learning system that delivers data and suggestions based on your goals and the industry you’re in.

Based on your answers to a given questionnaire, this tool sets goals for you – after achieving them, it gives a score, based on how well you did.

And while my score isn’t the best, this tool is honestly one of a kind, and you can read more about it in our GoDaddy review.

GoDaddy’s dashboard is not complicated either. From there, you can access your billing information, domain details, products, and services. Moreover, if you click on your website, you’ll be taken to another dashboard. This one allows you to access options related to your store, appointments, marketing, settings, and so on.

When talking about templates, GoDaddy is yet another website builder that values appearance. The templates are very well put together, and they look great both on desktop and on mobile devices. Plus, you’ll find one that suits your needs because there are 14 categories covering all major niches.

Pricing

All I mentioned above come at a price, obviously. GoDaddy’s website builder is not the cheapest, but it’s not the priciest either. You can choose between 4 premium plans:

• Basic ($9.99 a month) – guidance, and analytics
• Standard ($9.99 a month) – one-time appointments, SEO optimization
• Premium ($14.99 a month) – one-time group events, connect an unlimited amount of social media networks, receive payments for appointments
• Ecommerce ($16.99 a month) – full eCommerce features – product listings, discounts, and promotional features

The plan that you should choose depends highly on what kind of site you’re looking for. The Basic plan is great if you just want to make a personal site, for example, a portfolio. If you want to sell online, you’ll have to shell out for the most expensive plan – Ecommerce, since it’s the only one that allows selling. The Standard and Premium plans are great for small businesses, that don’t plan on selling online – they have SEO optimization, making it easier for you to grow your business’s online presence.

Overall, I think GoDaddy makes for an excellent WordPress alternative if you find the latter a bit too complicated. It’s not exactly the cheapest, but the templates look great, the builder is easy to use, and the business tools are among the best.

Visit GoDaddy Builder

3. Wix – limitless website builder as a WordPress alternative

Price range	From free to$16.00/month
Features	Two website editors, excellent customizability
Templates	900+
Best for	Design and editing freedom

Visit Wix

Wix is mainly known for its crazy flexible website editor which is surprisingly easy to use. While most website builders on the market limit what you can do design-wise, Wix sent those limits into oblivion, just like WordPress. But different from WordPress, all the changes with the editor can be done effortlessly.

Using Wix

Wix, as it was said in our Wix review, is that one website builder that decided design limitations are for amateurs. When you create a website with Wix, you’ll come across over 1000 design elements.

Before all else, you should know that WordPress’s editing focuses more on themes. To make any major design changes, you’ll have to do a lot of advanced editing by coding or opening your wallet to buy a premium theme. Wix, on the other hand, offers all the editing tools you might need on a silver platter, they’re all easy to use and over 900 free templates act as a perfect starting point for all of your site-building needs.

Here, for instance, you have Wix’s options for just one image. Filters, borders, backgrounds, and anything you can think of are waiting for you among the editing tools. You won’t see as many design options with any other builder.

Another thing that makes Wix a strong WordPress competitor is that it’s easier to use. Creating an account is a piece of cake, and the dashboard is easy to navigate. Here’s how it looks:

The difference between Wix and WordPress can be found in how you handle different aspects of your website.

From your Wix dashboard, you can control pretty much anything. You can set up an online shop, create a blog, access analytics, and manage marketing and SEO. While Wix does have an app store, it doesn’t rely on it as much as WordPress relies on its plugin library. So, for many features, you don’t need to install anything.

The last thing I have to say about Wix is that it comes with gorgeous templates. The library features more than 900 themes.

These themes were made by professionals, and Wix has high standards when it comes to looks. As for the niches the templates cover, you’ll find pretty much anything from business & services and online stores to community tabs and blogs.

Pricing

Since Wix seems to be the whole package in the website builders world, the prices are, as you’d expect, a little high.

Wix differentiates the price between different kinds of websites a person would like to make, which is why you’ll find different pricing for all plans:

• Free – suitable for testing, because it’s plastered with Wix ads and has a .wixsite.com domain – not suitable for anything more professional.
• Light ($16.00/month) – great for personal use, no Wix ads on your site.
• Core ($27.00/month) – 50GB storage, 5h of video time, basic site analytics, basic eCommerce.
• Business ($32.00/month) – 100GB storage, 10h of video time, standard site analytics, standard eCommerce.
• Business Elite ($159.00/month) –unlimited storage, unlimited video time, advanced site analytics, advanced eCommerce.

Now with that out of the way, I think this website builder will suit you perfectly if you want to create something genuinely beautiful, but you have no skills when it comes to web development. As an alternative for WordPress, Wix is an excellent fit.

Visit Wix

4. Squarespace – visually appealing WordPress competitor

Price range	From $16.00 to $49.00
Features	AI tools, intuitive grid building system
Templates	110+
Best for	Small businesses

Visit Squarespace

Another alternative to WordPress is Squarespace, a website builder that gives you everything on a silver platter. It doesn’t rely much on third-party apps, it’s easy to use, has beautiful templates and fantastic baked-in business features. Your business website can be up and running in no time.

Using Squarespace

If you’re a beginner, you’re going to love Squarespace. Its editor is minimalistic, and you have access to everything you need in one place. Whether you want to edit your website’s pages or access the settings, it’s all located in the left menu.

The editor itself is pretty simple. For instance, you can change the fonts and colors, add animations and buttons, display images, and so on. Style and layout options are available as well. The point is that you’re given a chance to make something truly beautiful.

Another thing I liked is that if you want to create an online store, you answer Squarespace’s questions when you sign up, and bam! Your website is designed as an online shop right from the start, with all the features you might need.

Since the editor is straightforward and the dashboard is integrated within the editor’s menu, ease of use is not an issue. Even if you’re an absolute beginner, you shouldn’t experience any difficulties using Squarespace. Most apps are integrated, and Squarespace has a rich knowledge base if you have any questions.

Or, you know, just read our Squarespace review and receive all the answers in a nice little package.

Of course, if you feel like you need something extra, you can go to Squarespace’s app library. Sadly, Squarespace provides only a tiny app library, and some of the apps are really expensive.

The reason I recommend this website builder to businesses is that Squarespace delivers excellent business tools. Sure, they’re simple, but they’re already integrated. SEO, marketing, and analytics are all present when you sign up.

Moving on to templates, Squarespace provides only free themes – there are over 100 of them, and all of them are professionally made and look fantastic. All major niches are covered, and I’m pretty sure you’ll easily find a theme to suit your website.

If you feel like this comparison isn’t enough for you to make your decision, check out our comparison on Squarespace vs WordPress.

Pricing

Squarespace offers four premium plans with a 14-day free trial:

• Personal ($16.00/month) – basic plan for simple personal websites
• Business ($23.00/month) – advanced analytics and eCommerce functionality with a 3% fee
• Basic eCommerce ($27.00/month) – HTML and CSS code optimization with eCommerce functionality without any fees
• Advanced eCommerce ($49.00/month) – all-included eCommerce features without any fee, the ability to sell subscriptions, and advanced shipping

While selling online is available with the Business plan, you’ll get better eCommerce features if you opt for either Basic eCommerce or Advanced eCommerce because these plans don’t have that pesky 3% transaction fee.

There you go. Squarespace is a great WordPress alternative if you want to create an online shop, and you don’t want to bang your head against a wall because WooCommerce is too complicated.

Visit Squarespace

5. Webflow – design-oriented WordPress alternative

Price range	From $14.00 to $212.00
Features	Excellent marketing features
Templates	500+
Best for	Designers and freelancers

Visit Webflow

Webflow is an excellent alternative for WordPress if you’re a designer. This builder is a no-code visual website builder, letting you make custom design choices and functionalities, something WordPress could very barely do. This website builder has everything covered, and with all the editing options, you get the advantages of using a visual editor while building a fully custom website from square one.

Using Webflow

The first look at Webflow might create a feeling that it’s more of a tool to create prototypes of websites rather than something for actually building them.

That’s not the case, though – without writing a single line of code, you are able to build the website exactly how you want it, however, it might be a little overwhelming at first.

Why am I saying that? Because here’s how the editor looks.

Looks a bit cluttered, doesn’t it? And that’s just a tiny part of it – there are numerous menus with multiple options, and truth be told, you may get lost at first.

However, don’t let this first impression scare you. All you have to do is go through the initial tutorial and spend some time with the editor getting to know it. As a result, you’ll handle it and create something you can’t with an average website builder. Besides, Webflow is really trying to help you out in the beginning.

Since the editor is a head-scratcher at first, ease of use is a bit questionable. But, as soon as you get used to everything, you’ll find your way around the editor in no time. You can read more about Webflow’s ease of use in our Webflow review.

Next, let’s talk about templates. Webflow has an impressive library, and while you have access to some free templates, most of them are paid. The cheapest I’ve come across was $24, while the most expensive was $129. The good news is that they look beautiful and cover all major niches.

In my opinion, this is no different from what WordPress is doing. It gives you a few free templates, which are not much to look at, and then it provides you with thousands of paid templates that look good. And while Webflow doesn’t have thousands of themes in its library, I could argue that its paid templates are way better than what WordPress has to offer.

Pricing

It seems like Webflow has the most confusing pricing system I’ve ever seen.

Firstly, there are 2 types of plans: site plans and account plans. Site plans are suitable for regular sites, while account plans are more suitable for freelancers and designers – people that build websites not for themselves, but for their clients.

When choosing between Site plans, look into the 3 regular plans, that are suitable for regular sites with no eCommerce functionality:

Basic ($14.00/month) – 25 000 monthly visits, 100 form submissions, 50 GB CDN bandwidth
CMS ($23.00/month) – 3 editors, 100 000 monthly visitors, 1 000 form submissions, 2 000 CMS collection items, 200 GB CDN bandwidth
Business ($39.00 /month) – 10 editors, 500 000 monthly visits, 2 000 form submissions, 10 000 CMS collection items, 400 GB CDN bandwidth

Now, if you need eCommerce functionality, there are also 3 site plans. As you can probably guess, the prices are higher:

Standard ($29 .00 /month) – similar to the CMS plan, allows to add up to 500 items, 2% transaction fee, the yearly sales volume is limited to $50k
Plus ($74 .00 /month) – similar to the Business plan, allows to add up to 1000 items, no transaction fee, the yearly sales volume is limited to $200k
Advanced ($212 .00 /month) – similar to the Business plan, allows to add up to 3000 items, no transaction fee, no limit to the yearly sales volume

Moving forward, account plans – they don’t include hosting and instead focus on letting you build several websites, either for yourself or for your clients. First, there are the individual plans:

Starter (free) – 2 simple projects on one account
Lite ($16.00 /month) – 10 projects on one account, possible to export your site as HTML and CSS code
Pro ($35.00 /month) – unlimited projects on one account

Then we have the Team plan ($35.00/month for a person). This plan is like the Pro plan but allows to add more people to the account for them to work in the same dashboard. The more people you add to this plan, the steeper the price.

Glad I’ve got that out of the way!

Overall, I’d say that Webflow makes for an excellent alternative to WordPress if you’re interested in web design. It can help you create awesome websites. Not just for you, but for your clients as well. There’s a learning curve with it, but the templates are modern-looking, and the editing flexibility is impressive.

Visit Webflow

6. Ghost – WordPress alternative for publishers

Price range	From $9 to $199
Features	Great blogging editor and easy to use interface
Templates	90+
Best for	Writers and publishers

Visit Ghost

Think of Ghost as the ideal combination between WordPress and an easy-to-use website builder. If your project relies on blogging, you need the best platform to build, edit, and plan your content. WordPress is pretty good for that – but Ghost can be even better.

You have all the necessary tools without all the hassle that WordPress can sometimes be, making it the perfect publishing platform.

Using Ghost

Let’s face it – some people are good with words, but they lack in the web development department. If that’s the case with you, then Ghost is what you want. It takes all the good blogging features from WordPress and puts them all together into a simple yet functional publishing platform.

Creating an account is super easy. You need an email address and a password, and once you provide that, you can start your 14-day free trial.

One thing that didn’t sit well with me was that I had to give my credit card details right from the start. Who genuinely always remembers to unsubscribe before a free trial expires?

Now, after you create your account, you have access to your Ghost’s dashboard. It’s pretty simple – from there, you can handle everything related to your posts, schedule them, leave them as drafts, or whatever else you need. It’s pretty similar to WordPress’s dashboard, except there’s not as much clutter.

The dashboard doesn’t focus as much on design as it focuses on content – it’s a professional blogging tool, after all. But you do have a few options to improve your site – Ghost calls these Cards.

As for templates, Ghost has quite a few, both free and paid. They cover all major niches from magazines and photography to travel and lifestyle.

Now, some options are free, but the ones that are paid have quite high prices. I browsed for a while, and I couldn’t find a theme cheaper than $24. As for the most expensive, I found a few at $149.

One aspect that it’s similar to WordPress is that you can find third-party templates for Ghost. Just don’t expect the prices to be lower – they’re in the same price range, averaging around $100.

Pricing

The last thing you’re probably interested in is the prices. Ghost features 4 plans:

• Starter ($9/month) – 1 staff user, up to 500 members, built-in integrations, official Ghost themes
• Creator ($25/month) – 2 staff users, up to 1000 members, custom integrations, and themes
• Team ($50/month) – 5 staff users, up to 1000 members, priority support, high volume traffic handling
• Business ($199/month) – 15 staff users, up to 10000 members, custom authentication

$199 is quite a lot for a blog, but when you turn your thoughts into a prolific business, $199 may not seem so much down the line.

The bottom line is that if you’re a blogger and you don’t want to waste your time on WordPress, Ghost might just be the best alternative for you. You can easily turn your blog into a business, the builder is easy to use, and thanks to Ghost’s template library, your website will be very visually appealing: without any third-party confusion that WordPress might bring.

Visit Ghost

Best WordPress alternatives – final thoughts

WordPress may be the one powering a third of the internet, but website builders are catching up fast. These days, creating a website is easier than ever, and that’s because smarter people thought about a method of avoiding all that coding.

Now, the WordPress alternatives I described above are among the best. They’re not the only ones, but I tested every one of them and saw that they are worthy contenders. Here’s a short recap:

• Hostinger Website Builder is the cheapest WordPress alternative, but low pricing doesn’t mean low quality. It comes with beautiful templates, experimental features, and ease of use.
• GoDaddy website builder is a website builder that caters to businesses. Its business tools and GoDaddy Insight alone are worth what you pay.
• Wix is pricy, but it provides design flexibility like no other website builder. It’s easy to use, and the templates are gorgeous.
• Squarespace is yet another website builder designed for businesses, but it’s easier to use than GoDaddy. The templates are impressive, too.
• Webflow is most suitable for designers, and it’s highly customizable. It does come with a learning curve, but you should get it eventually.
• Ghost is a professional blogging tool, but unlike WordPress, there’s not as much hassle when it comes to design and features.

If these alternatives still don’t seem like the perfect fit for you, check out our best website builders comparison to see other suggestions.

This is pretty much it. I hope you found my list of best WordPress alternatives helpful.

When to look for WordPress alternatives?

WordPress is the most used CMS in the world, powering over a third of the internet. And that is for a reason – it’s free, you can add in tools that you really need, and you can create any type of site with it, making the editing possibilities limitless. While it does sound pretty good, WordPress has pros, that could be cons to some people – in my experience, those features revolve around the following:

You don't want to deal with plugins

Being open-source software, WordPress in itself is pretty bare. While that does have advantages – you can choose the exact features you need for your site, builders are easier to work with since all the tools that you might need are baked-in.

You don't work with text-based content

If your site isn't going to have too many text posts, you might not like working with this CMS. WordPress started its life being a blogging platform, so it’s no surprise that everything regarding content is top-notch. While the blogging editor is renowned for its great SEO optimization and simple content transferring, these features aren't too useful if you don't want to clutter your website with text.

You don't want to deal with coding

Sure, installing plugins to do all the work for you is all fine and dandy, but if you want to have some deeper design changes, coding is the way to go in WordPress. WordPress allows to add HTML and CSS elements to your site to tailor it to your preferences, but builders allow you to do extensive design changes without a single line of code.

You don’t want to deal with hosting

When you go for WordPress.org, you need to find a hosting provider first, and only then can you install WordPress on your hosting account. While managing hosting is not rocket science, some people don’t want to deal with it, in which case a website builder comes in handy – they include hosting.

You’re looking for ease of use

WordPress is not a complicated CMS, but it does have its ups and downs. For one thing, you need a plugin for every little thing you want on your website. The plugin library is full of them, but picking and installing them takes some time. Whereas, website builders include all the necessary apps in their plans. Sure, you can go for extras in their app libraries, but the bare minimum is already there.

You don’t know to work with WordPress templates

When it comes to design, WordPress is not the most accommodating. You cannot edit almost anything from a naked dashboard. The theme you install, however, allows you to, but it’s not as simple as with a website builder. Sure, you have plugins like Elementor, but nothing is as easy as the drag-and-drop editors website builders provide. Besides, they are getting both more flexible and more comparable to WordPress’s limitlessness.

While WordPress is the number one choice for most web developers, that can't be said about regular people with no web building experience. That solidified the fact that WordPress is no longer at the top of the available options – that spot is occupied by website builders.

Another thing, some people could have difficulty choosing between WordPress.org and WordPress.com – if you’re one of them, check out our WordPress.org and WordPress.com comparison.

WordPress alternatives – FAQ