by ROC May 2021
Website development
WordPress vs Wix | Everything you should know!
Finding out the best website to build your website? If yes, you are in the right place. We will provide you with the best website platform. No doubt Wix and WordPress are both great platforms, but they’re not the same. WordPress is a CMS, a content management system, which is more scalable but also demands more technical knowledge. Whereas Wix is a website builder, which means it is easy to use and offers lots of technical support. Still, confused? Well, to help you out we have done a detailed comparison to point out which is a better choice for your needs. Here we are going to discuss all about WordPress vs Wix.
Which Platform to Choose To Build A Website?
If you are planning to build a website, you must be struggling with picking the best website developer. You might be thinking Which platform do you prefer? Wix or WordPress? Relax! Check out our comparison of these platforms and find the right website builder here.
1. Which Platform is Easier to Build a Website With?
In terms of how easy it is to build a website, Wix gets the point. Although Wix isn’t as flexible once you build the basic website, it is a great solution for quickly building out a simple as well as aesthetic website. The whole process of churning a website is quite easy and very suitable for beginners.
On the other hand, WordPress is still fairly easy – but in this case, you will need to jump through some steps when it comes to hosting the website. It is still fairly easy for a non-developer to create a functional, aesthetic website using WordPress.
2. How Much Control Do You Have Over Your Website’s Functionality?
When it comes to flexibility and customizations, out of WordPress vs Wix. WordPress comes out as a winner. With WordPress, you have far more flexibility on both fronts as compared to Wix. First of all, if we start with plugins. WordPress plugins let you tweak existing functionality or new functionality without needing to know any code. Today, for your installation process WordPress has over 53,000 different free plugins with thousands more premium plugins.
Whereas if you want to add functionality to your Wix site, you have to mostly rely on the Wix App Market app. This app market gives you more flexibility than something like Squarespace but remains away from the coverings of the things that you can do with WordPress.
3. Pricing and Value for Money
Wix wins this point as well as it is affordable, easy to budget for, and best of all you can give it a try for free. Wix’s prices give you a better value and sets into the budget as compared to WordPress. Wix charges as per month, whereas WordPress charges can vary, and is likely to have at least some high cost.
WordPress will count all the factors in the extra costs, such as hosting, plugins, and a domain name. If you want to remove ads and get other additional features from their apps market, you’ll have to upgrade any of their premium plans. Even though WordPress itself is free, but the total annual cost to build a live WordPress site is a one-time fee ranging from $0 – $200, with an ongoing monthly cost of about $10 – $40.
4. Quality Factor (WordPress vs Wix)
Wix’s App Market offers a total of over 250 apps, that include both free and paid ones, all of which can be added to your site with just a few clicks. You can also browse different categories to choose your kinds of tools. From media and marketing to e-commerce. These apps are created by Wix and some by third-party developers. But need not worry as the apps available in the market are all approved by the Wix team.
As discussed above, WordPress is an open-source platform which means any developer can use them to create plugins for other users to either purchase or download for free. One of its plus points is that there are over 50,000 WordPress plugins available – so choosing a website tool becomes a lot easier.
The disadvantage is that for creating a WordPress plugin, there is no vetting process, which means that you may have to go through a few junky ones to find the one you need. So It’s a tie between Wix and WordPress as they both are great for plugins, but for different reasons.
5. E-commerce: What’s Better For Selling Online?
WordPress is better for eCommerce than Wix! Get more clarity for your choice of Wix or WordPress here. Wix is suitable For Selling a Few Items. Three of Wix’s plans come with e-commerce completely built-in. With only $23/month, you can have all the tools that you need to sell online, from accepting online payments to automated sales tax and currency conversion.
Wix’s e-commerce features are relatively advanced, but you can’t compare them to the power of other dedicated e-commerce website builders. Their plans are really for people who want a website that’s capable of selling a few products but it is not recommended for the one who prefers full-blown online stores.
WordPress is suitable For Launching an Online Store. E-commerce capabilities of WordPress are far more advanced as compared to Wix’s, but the notable thing is nothing comes built-in on WordPress which means you have to install an e-commerce-specific plugin before selling.
One of the most popular eCommerce plugins for WordPress is WooCommerce. It can function from multi-currency selling to automatic tax calculation by region i.e about everything you’ll need it to.
6. Help and Support: Which Platform Will Have Your Back?
Wix can be called the “Great Helping Hand.” You can contact Wix’s in-house support team from Monday to Thursday, 5 am-5 pm EST directly over the phone or by email or you can request a callback from the Wix team at any time. Additionally, Wix helps you with a ton of helpful articles and video tutorials that are created by the Wix team.
Wix also has a high-quality support system. Moreover, the Wix editor is way easier to use. To use it you probably won’t need to contact support. WordPress: You’re on Your Own, In terms of help and support. As it is open-source, phone support is a lot less useful. You just have to rely on articles that are written by other WordPress users.
The advantage of this is that there are many WordPress sites which increases the chance that someone will surely have the answer to whatever your issue is. The downside is that it can be a lot of frustrating to go through thousands of articles just to find what you need.
Hence, in the battle of Wix versus WordPress, Wix leads with a point.
7. Blogging: Which Is Worth It for Wordsmiths?
Wix offers the most basic blogging features such as supporting articles, includes tagging and categories, and has an archive of free media like videos, images, and GIFs. In short, Wix provides you with everything you need to add to your blog, but you have to look elsewhere if a blog is going to be the main event. Wix does not include a great commenting functionality hence you have to use Facebook comments, which don’t look much cleaner and can even attract spammers.
Dedicated Blogging Site, WordPress is a powerful CMS, to begin with as it has its roots in blogging. It allows you to publish as well as organize practically endless amounts of blog content to your site. It not only offers all of the same blogging features of Wix but also offers you with few more like An optional private mode, a native (not outsourced) commenting section, can backdate the blog posts, and an ability to feature a single image across the top of a blog post.
Check how to start a WordPress Blog?
8. How Does Each Platform Handle Ongoing Maintenance?
Wix’s closed ecosystem isn’t a great deal for data ownership or flexibility, its benefit is that it can virtually eliminate the need for you to handle maintenance and security. With WordPress, you have to do the task yourself or you can find a managed WordPress host such as Kinsta with an emphasis on security and maintenance.
Who Wins The Battle – Wix or WordPress?
Your search ends here! Now it’s your time to choose the right platform to build your website according to your requirements. If you are looking for a powerful solution that will scale over the years, then you must opt for WordPress. Coming to the Wix, if you are planning to build an informative and small website, it can be the right choice. For better understanding, you can try Wix for free. We hope that the discussion about Wix versus WordPress has been helpful to you! Now it’s over to you guys that you might fall on which side of the Wix vs WordPress spectrum. If you still have a doubt, do let us know in the comment box!