Best Website Builders In 2025: Choose The Ideal Platform

Are you ready to build a stunning website but don't know where to start? Finding the perfect website builder can feel overwhelming with so many options flooding the market. Whether you're a small business owner, creative professional, or aspiring blogger, choosing the right platform is crucial for your online success.In this comprehensive guide, we'll explore the best website builders of 2025, comparing their features, pricing, ease of use, and unique selling points. By the end, you'll have all the information you need to make an informed decision and create a website that truly represents your brand.Oh, and if you're wondering about finding great leads for your new website? That's a conversation for another day (hint: Emelia.io might just have the perfect solution for that).Let's dive in!

Gone are the days when you had to know how to code to launch a professional-looking website. Today, there's an array of easy-to-use, worthy website builders ready to take the difficult and technical job of building a website off your plate. These website-building platforms are today's DIY answer to web development.Using a website builder like Squarespace, Wix or Shopify is the best way to build a website in 2025—especially for a personal website, small business website, an online store and much more. If you're a beginner, you might choose a website builder because they have powerful functionality and intuitive drag-and-drop editors. If you're an advanced user, you might choose a website builder because they just work.

You don't have to spend time setting up a web host, configuring a domain name or keeping a content management system up to date. Everything just works.The shift to AI-powered features has also revolutionized how quickly and effectively you can create a polished online presence. With automated builders, content generators, and design assistance, it's never been easier to establish your digital footprint.

Before we dive into the detailed reviews, here's a quick comparison of the top contenders:

Now, let's explore each platform in detail.

Overview

Wix came out on top as the all-round best website builder in our most recent round of testing, maintaining the top spot for the fourth year in a row. What keeps Wix on top is that it's suitable for a wider range of users and businesses, compared with competitors, while still delivering quality features.Based on 2025 research, Wix remains the best AI website builder to use. It's a well-rounded platform, offering high-quality support and templates – and Wix's growing suite of AI tools complements its existing built-in features well.

Key Features

Wix has some of the most sophisticated templates on the market with over 800 to choose from. The Wix App Market includes hundreds of add-ons which can add all kinds of new design features and integrations to your site. Wix has launched new AI tools that aim to take website personalization to the next level. The Adaptive Content application allows users to automatically adapt website content based on factors such as return visits and geographical location. In April 2025, Wix launched its dedicated AI agent, Astro, designed to help users track and optimize their websites.When it comes to SEO features, Wix provides a better SEO website builder experience overall. When testing Wix's SEO, I was impressed by the personalized SEO checklist it created for my website – this is especially useful for beginners, since it helps you identify issues and areas to optimize.

Pricing

Wix's pricing ranges from $17 to $159 per month (billed annually). You can choose between four premium plans. To accept payments and sell products, you'll need Wix's Core plan – an option that's slightly more expensive than Squarespace's cheapest ecommerce plan. That said, Wix offers more sales tools at this price point, such as abandoned cart recovery.Wix has a free plan that you can stay on for as long as you'd like, but it comes with ads and limited features, such as 500MB of storage and no custom domain name. I recommend upgrading as soon as possible to remove ads and unlock additional features to help your site grow.

Perfect For

• Small to medium businesses looking for versatility

• Users who want complete design control

• Those needing powerful marketing tools

• Beginners who appreciate AI assistance

Blogging Capabilities

Wix's blogging tools are ideal for businesses and online stores. Squarespace is a better option for media-focused and creative blogs. Wix's dedicated blog dashboard makes it easy to add new posts, set categories and tags, and optimize content for SEO.If you're planning to create content that drives leads for your business, Wix's robust blogging platform integrates perfectly with email marketing tools. This seamless connection makes it easy to convert blog readers into newsletter subscribers—something we at Emelia.io know is crucial for growing your customer base.

Overview

Squarespace remains the easiest website builder to use in 2025, beating out the competition thanks to its beginner-friendly editor, stylish templates, and booking tools. Squarespace is the perfect home to bring your brand vision to life, particularly if you're looking to build a portfolio.

Key Features

It is an excellent choice for all types of websites: small businesses, bloggers, portfolios, online stores, and more. In a sense, Squarespace is like the Apple of website builders — it's intuitive and thoughtfully designed; all features are polished; the templates are beautiful; it's a secure platform; and the editor is flexible and customizable enough to meet most people's needs. Squarespace is known for its clean, modern, and mobile-friendly templates. They have nearly 160 of them—all free, all beautiful. It's not just beauty! Squarespace has lots of features—many of which are better and more powerful than competitors. For example, Squarespace has the best template customization, blogging, scheduling software, donation system, photo galleries, restaurant menus, podcasting features, and more. Squarespace has the best-looking templates in the market, making it a shoo-in for creative businesses like bespoke retailers, photographers, or graphic designers, – especially if they're building an online portfolio. Shopify, on the other hand, offers the best cake when it comes to sales features.

Pricing

Squarespace's pricing ranges from $16 to $52 per month (billed annually), divided between four premium plans. Squarespace has reliable set pricing, with the cheapest plan costing $16 per month. This comes with your free template and hosting included in the overall price. Though WordPress is cheaper from the get-go, Squarespace performed exceptionally well in pricing tests, and all of Squarespace's plans provide an excellent range of features and tools for creatives.

Perfect For

• Creative professionals and portfolios

• Restaurants and service-based businesses

• Content creators who prioritize aesthetics

• Users who value simplicity and elegance

Blogging Capabilities

The blogging platform from Squarespace is robust. With the blog editor, which gives access to all the elements known from the builder, you can design posts quite freely. However, it's not possible to move elements via drag-and-drop or add sections. You can organize blog posts using categories and tags. There are also useful monetization features: By creating subscription models and placing posts behind paywalls, you can earn money with your blog. For businesses looking to establish thought leadership in their industry, Squarespace's elegant blog layouts make your content look incredibly professional. The visual appeal combined with solid SEO tools can help you attract and engage high-quality leads—which can later be nurtured through Emelia.io's advanced email outreach sequences.

Overview

If you're looking for a no-frills website builder that won't cost you an arm and a leg, you just found it. During the latest round of research, Hostinger was found to be the best cheap website builder on the market. Its pricing is very competitive, it offers a few advanced features, including an AI logo maker, and it provides a lot of very easy-to-use templates that make website building simple.

Key Features

Thanks to the drag-and-drop feature, you can flexibly adjust your page layout. However, the selection of elements is limited - and section templates aren't very flexible. Hostinger gives you more creative freedom than other quick-start website builders. But compared to all-rounders like Wix or Squarespace, the customization options are limited. You can create the basic visual structure of your Hostinger website either by using AI generation or by choosing a classic design template. There are plenty of templates to choose from: Hostinger offers more than 150 templates that you can filter by categories like website type and industry. Most templates are well-made, featuring attractive designs that look professional and modern. Many templates use large, eye-catching images and sleek layouts - with clean lines, well-matched color palettes, and modern typography. Hostinger integrates seamlessly with Google Analytics, providing in-depth insights into your site's traffic and user interactions. Its mobile-responsive design templates are specifically designed to ensure optimal performance on all devices – a critical factor for SEO in today's mobile-first world. If you're specifically focused on mobile performance, exploring top mobile website builders could provide additional insights. To further optimize performance, Hostinger also includes automatic image compression, which helps reduce page load times – an essential factor for SEO.

Pricing

Hostinger caters to beginners and budget-conscious businesses with its easy-to-use and cheap website builder. But cheaper plans don't mean you miss out on any key SEO features, and Hostinger performed the best in site speed tests, so you can rest assured that your website is fully optimized for both search engines and visitors.Out of all of Squarespace's competitors, Hostinger is the cheapest website builder alternative. You'll need the $3.99 Business Website Builder plan to unlock ecommerce features and Hostinger's AI tools – though the AI website builder is available with both plans. Hostinger doesn't have a free plan, but you can take advantage of the 30-day free trial to try the AI website builder out for yourself.

Perfect For

• Startups and small businesses on a tight budget

• Users who need fast website creation

• Those who value speed and performance

• Beginners looking for AI-assisted design

AI Features

While most website builders now include AI features, few have implemented them as extensively as Hostinger. Beyond the website, section, image, and blog generators we mentioned, they also offer an AI-powered logo maker and AI heatmap. The heatmap analyzes your website design and predicts where visitors will focus their attention. This helps you adjust your design to guide readers' eyes exactly where you want them. Hostinger goes all-in on AI. Not all AI tools are equally helpful, and AI-generated content is often easy to spot.The AI heatmap is particularly useful for optimizing your lead generation forms—a feature that pairs wonderfully with Emelia.io's lead nurturing capabilities. Understanding where visitors are most likely to engage with your page helps you place call-to-action buttons strategically for maximum conversion.

Overview

WordPress isn't as beginner-friendly as Wix or Squarespace, but it's trusted by large companies, such as NASA and Rolling Stone. Because of its nature as a CMS, rather than a website builder with everything built-in, users have to be more self-sufficient. You'll need to source and manage your own web hosting, security, and overall website maintenance. So, it's not for the faint of heart. However, because of its blogging tools and large plugin library, I recommend WordPress for individuals looking to create a content-heavy website.

Key Features

Across various theme sources, as many as 20,000 third-party themes can be used with the hosted version of WordPress — probably more than any other website builder on the market today. So in terms of the total quantity of available themes, it's definitely a win for WordPress.com.WordPress has tools for blogging, image galleries, ecommerce, email marketing, and more—all included in your plan. It doesn't rely on third-party apps as much, so everything works smoothly together but is less customizable. WordPress has the largest plugin ecosystem—over 60,000 plugins. You can add features for SEO, security, ecommerce, learning management, membership sites, and more. It requires more setup and maintenance, but you can build anything you want.

Pricing

This cost will vary based on your website traffic and popularity. You can start as low as $2.99 per month with the SiteGround Startup Plan, which comes with WooCommerce pre-installed, a free SSL certificate, daily website backups, free CDN, auto-updates, and enhanced security. Alternatively, you can also use the Bluehost Premium WooCommerce plan, which costs $7.45 per month, but it comes with several premium WooCommerce extensions such as subscriptions, online booking & appointments, and other premium features (valued at over $1000 if you purchased separately). Really high-traffic WooCommerce site owners often end up using WP Engine for managed WooCommerce hosting, and their pricing starts at $20 per month.

Perfect For

• Bloggers and content creators

• Businesses needing extensive customization

• Users comfortable with a steeper learning curve

• Websites that need to scale significantly

Blogging Capabilities

WordPress was built with blogging in mind. Every WordPress site includes commenting abilities, plus helpful plugins to achieve creative, content-heavy blogs. A blog is a great way for creatives to connect to their audience, as well as offer a bit of monetization. If you are interested in finding the best blogging platform, then WordPress should certainly be in consideration. WordPress is a CMS that lets you create multiple blog templates, schedule hundreds of posts at a time, and have access to hundreds of blog-specific apps and plugins.If content marketing is a significant part of your lead generation strategy, WordPress offers unmatched blogging capabilities. For businesses focused on thought leadership, the platform's robust content management makes it easy to create, organize, and optimize blog posts that attract potential customers—who can then be engaged through Emelia.io's outreach tools.

Overview

Shopify is a robust eCommerce website solution for small businesses that want to scale their online stores. The platform offers advanced sales features like inventory management, shipping options, and other relevant selling tools. Its intuitive and user-friendly interface makes it easy for beginners and experienced users alike to set up and manage an online store without needing coding skills. The Shopify app store supports 8,000 apps to integrate additional features, like reviews, pop-ups, countdown timers, and more.

Key Features

Shopify is a new addition to the list of the best AI website builders, claiming its spot thanks to its AI product tools and AI-powered support for business owners. Like Squarespace, Shopify doesn't offer many AI features (for now), but Shopify continues to make steady improvements in this area, making it one to watch. Shopify introduced its AI store setup in March 2025, so it's a recent feature for the builder. It's easy to miss, but you can find it under "Themes", which sits below the "Online Store" heading in the sidebar. Shopify's example prompt is very short and focuses on the products – "modern handmade jewelry" – so I kept things snappy as well.Wix offers ecommerce plans with features like product pages, coupons, digital downloads, and inventory management. It's great for small online stores but not as scalable for large or complex stores. Squarespace includes stylish product pages and built-in tools for managing orders, shipping, and inventory. It supports services, digital and physical products, and integrates with Stripe and PayPal.

Pricing

Shopify offers various pricing plans to accommodate different business sizes:

• Basic: $29/month

• Shopify: $79/month

• Advanced: $299/month

• Plus: Custom pricing for enterprise-level businesses

Perfect For

• E-commerce businesses of all sizes

• Retailers requiring inventory management

• Brands looking to sell across multiple channels

• Businesses needing robust payment processing

Integration with Marketing

For e-commerce businesses, integrating your store with powerful marketing tools is essential. After you've built your beautiful online store with Shopify, Emelia.io can help you take it to the next level by automating personalized email sequences to nurture leads, recover abandoned carts, and turn one-time buyers into loyal customers.

More than 75% of all eCommerce sales are projected to come from mobile devices in 2025. Users expect a fast-loading, mobile-responsive website that is easy to navigate on smaller screens. A site that isn't optimized for mobile leads to high bounce rates and lost conversions.Want your website to look amazing and work flawlessly, whether someone's on a giant monitor or their tiny phone screen? That's mobile-responsive design. It's absolutely essential for SEO now because Google prioritizes sites that offer a great mobile experience, directly impacting your rankings, traffic, and user satisfaction. Think mobile-first for SEO; Google ranks based primarily on your mobile site. Responsiveness is key. Responsive design automatically adjusts layouts using fluid grids and flexible images for easy viewing anywhere. A smooth mobile experience makes visitors happy, which can mean lower bounce rates and more time spent engaging – search engines like this. Mobile site speed is a major ranking factor (hello, Core Web Vitals!). Good responsive practices help speed things up.Let's look at how our top website builders handle mobile responsiveness:

SEO features account for 40% of website builder evaluation. The depth and range of SEO tools offered is a priority. Builders with customizable meta tags, slug modification, automated XML sitemaps, canonical tag support, URL redirect support, and mobile responsiveness scored the highest. Advanced features like schema markup, Google Search Console integration, and access to code for structured data customization were also considered.To get your website ranking on search engines, a website builder should simplify SEO for you and include built-in features that give you a head start. Each platform enables you to tweak aspects of your site's SEO – with each website builder, you can edit important SEO elements like meta titles, meta descriptions, and URLs. They also provide website analytics, mobile-friendly designs, and optimized website speeds.Here's how the top builders compare in SEO capabilities:

1. Wix: Wix is the best SEO website builder, offering great built-in features to get your site discovered on Google. Wix handles the SEO basics with its website builder, such as solid infrastructure to work from, customizable URLs, and automatic creation of a mobile-friendly version of your site. On top of that, Wix lets you create SEO logic and apply it to multiple pages instead of working through them individually. Wix generated a personalized SEO checklist for my test website to help optimize my pages.

2. Squarespace: Squarespace is the easiest website builder that I've tested, making it simple and accessible to optimize your site for SEO. Its intuitive interface and easy-to-navigate backend gave me no trouble, and I was impressed by the advanced built-in SEO features available, such as automatic schema markup and mobile optimization. Squarespace made it easy to edit my test website's SEO settings in the backend, offering handy links to resources too.

3. Hostinger: Hostinger caters to beginners and budget-conscious businesses with its easy-to-use and cheap website builder. But cheaper plans don't mean you miss out on any key SEO features, and Hostinger performed the best in site speed tests, so you can rest assured that your website is fully optimized for both search engines and visitors. Hostinger flagged pages to me that needed further optimization.

4. WordPress: To spread word of your business online, you'll need to put on your marketing caps and create a strategy consisting of SEO, email marketing campaigns, social media, and potentially a blogging platform, too. WordPress is an SEO-friendly platform and gives your website a head start when it comes to showing up on search engines. Though WordPress gives you more control over your SEO, you do need to know what you're doing for it to be effective. This could mean downloading SEO plugins like Yoast ($99 per year), optimizing website speeds, and crafting SEO-friendly URLs to make sure that your website can reach its full potential on search results. When writing up my blog post on WordPress, the Yoast SEO was useful at spotting key things I had missed out. It was useful to know that I'd missed a targeted keyword in the introduction.

5. Shopify: Shopify offers solid SEO features designed specifically for e-commerce. It automatically generates canonical tags, creates a sitemap.xml file, and allows you to edit meta information for products, collections, blogs, and pages. The platform also has excellent page speed, which is critical for SEO.

Website security is not something to be taken lightly. All of the top website builders offer basic security features, but there are important differences:

1. Wix: Provides enterprise-grade security with built-in SSL certificates, DDoS protection, and 24/7 security monitoring. Their dedicated security team works to prevent threats before they happen.

2. Squarespace: Includes free SSL certificates, continuous security monitoring, and automatic TLS encryption. All sites hosted on Squarespace receive the same level of security regardless of plan.

3. Hostinger: Hostinger's plans allow you to build up to 100 websites. This platform is known for providing secure hosting and reliable performance. It enables you to scale your small business with basic eCommerce needs. However, the renewal prices are a lot higher, especially as compared to other website builders on the list.

4. WordPress: Basic security requires additional plugins and proper configuration. Popular security plugins include Wordfence, Sucuri, and iThemes Security. Regular updates are crucial for maintaining security.

5. Shopify: Offers PCI DSS compliance out of the box, which is essential for e-commerce. Includes fraud analysis tools, SSL encryption, and 24/7 security monitoring.

Choosing the right website builder depends on your specific needs. Ask yourself:

1. What's your budget?

   From free options like Wix's basic plan to premium services like Shopify, your budget will heavily influence your choice.

2. What type of website do you need?

   A blog, portfolio, e-commerce store, or business site will all have different requirements.

3. How important is design flexibility?

   If you want complete creative control, Wix or WordPress might be your best bet.

4. Do you need e-commerce capabilities?

   Shopify is specialized for this, but Wix, Squarespace, and WordPress (with WooCommerce) offer solid options too.

5. How tech-savvy are you?

   If you're a beginner, user-friendly options like Squarespace or Hostinger might be better suited than WordPress.

6. How important is scalability?

   Consider how your website might need to grow. WordPress and Shopify offer the most room for expansion.

Once you've built your website, the real work begins. A beautiful website is just the first step—you also need to attract visitors and convert them into customers.This is where Emelia.io can be an invaluable partner. As a specialized B2B platform, Emelia.io offers powerful tools for scaling your outreach efforts. From automated cold email campaigns to LinkedIn outreach and prospecting, Emelia.io helps you find and engage potential customers after they've discovered your website.Imagine building a stunning e-commerce store with Shopify, then using Emelia.io to reconnect with abandoned cart visitors through personalized follow-up sequences. Or creating an impressive business website with Wix, then leveraging Emelia.io to extract and engage leads from LinkedIn Sales Navigator.The combination of a well-designed website and strategic outreach can dramatically improve your conversion rates and ROI.

Is it better to use a website builder or hire a developer?

This depends on your budget, timeline, and specific needs. Website builders are more affordable and allow you to make changes yourself, while a developer can create a truly custom solution but at a higher cost.

Which website builder is best for SEO?

Wix is the best SEO website builder I've tested, offering great built-in features to get your site discovered on Google.However, WordPress with the right plugins can provide even more advanced SEO capabilities.

Can I switch between website builders after I've built my site?

No, there are no built-in tools to move your website from one builder to another. They are rather different builders, built on very different platforms, and you'll need to do most of the work from scratch.

Do website builders work well on mobile devices?

More than 75% of all eCommerce sales are projected to come from mobile devices in 2025. Users expect a fast-loading, mobile-responsive website that is easy to navigate on smaller screens.All top website builders offer mobile-responsive designs, but the quality varies. Squarespace and Hostinger are particularly strong in this area.

What's the difference between a website builder and WordPress?

WordPress isn't as beginner-friendly as Wix or Squarespace, but it's trusted by large companies, such as NASA and Rolling Stone. Because of its nature as a CMS, rather than a website builder with everything built-in, users have to be more self-sufficient. You'll need to source and manage your own web hosting, security, and overall website maintenance.

Are website builders good for blogging?

Yes, but some are better than others. WordPress remains the gold standard for serious bloggers, while Wix and Squarespace also offer excellent blogging platforms with easier setup.

How much do website builders really cost?

The advertised starting prices often don't tell the whole story. While basic plans start around $16-29/month, you may need more expensive plans to access essential features like e-commerce, remove builder branding, or get adequate storage and bandwidth.

Our research process has determined the top website builders for 2025, and Wix is the best builder for website and business management. It's a real powerhouse, whether you're looking to build a blog or start selling online. Each website builder has its strengths – and weaknesses – so I know Wix won't be the right fit for everyone. If you're unsure of where to start, I recommend checking out the available free plans or free trials to figure out what works best for you.

Remember, the best website builder is the one that aligns with your specific needs, technical abilities, and budget. Whether you choose the all-around capabilities of Wix, the elegant designs of Squarespace, the affordability of Hostinger, the content management powers of WordPress, or the e-commerce focus of Shopify, you're now equipped to make an informed decision.And once your website is up and running, consider how platforms like Emelia.io can help you leverage your online presence to connect with potential customers, automate your outreach, and grow your business.

After all, a beautiful website deserves an equally effective strategy for attracting and converting visitors.What's your experience with website builders? Have you tried any of the options we've covered? Share your thoughts and questions in the comments below!