Every idea needs a supporting website builder. And what better than a No-code platform? But multiple choices bring confusion and you end up choosing nothing.
With this article, we will settle the battle between Webflow and Squarespace once and for all. We'll compare the two leading and widely used No-code website builders, looking at their features, advantages, disadvantages, and ideal use cases to help you pick the best platform for your next project.
Why use No-code platforms for website development?
The answer is quite simple, it is easier and faster.
It is the perfect blend of your needs and a platform that is easy to use and customise. These No-code builders are versatile due to their ability to empower even non-technical folks to build websites without writing any line of code. Some other benefits include -
1. Cost-effective and time-saving
When you think about creating a website from scratch you want a skilled developer who knows how to use custom code for website development with at least 2 years of experience. If you know this, you pretty much have an idea how expensive hiring an in-house developer for custom development is with all the other expenses included such as health insurance, promotions, and others. The complete hiring process takes a lot of time and it will take at least 2 to 3 months for the employee to get settled and accustomed to the culture of the company. This process is eliminated when using No-code builders and taking help from an outsourcing agency.
2. No training required
When a person joins the company, it will be your responsibility to train him or her for the role. This means, spending money for approx 3 months for pretty much no result but hope. But with no code, the learning time is short so anyone will be able to get accustomed to the interface within 1 to 2 days. Not to forget, the money you save.
3. Faster development and deployment
As there is no coding required, it means you will be able to start building quickly without having to get into the discussion required when using custom code development. You’ll be able to iterate on the feedback received and then launch it to the market.
4. Build MVP in less than 3 weeks
The best part of using No-code builders is that you can see your idea come to life early within 3 weeks. This way you get to enjoy the current market opportunities without having to wait for the product to get developed as in the case of custom website development.
No-code website builders are the real deal when it comes to ease, quick development, and user satisfaction. Now, we will look at both the website builders, Webflow and Squarespace to figure out the best one for you.
As a trusted No-code web development company, we can help you break down your requirements and assist you in selecting a platform.
Why choose Webflow for website development?
Webflow is a powerful web development tool that allows you to build responsive, modern websites visually without needing to write code. The visual editor, built-in CMS and ecommerce, animations, prototyping, and SEO optimisation provide a powerful website-building experience for designers, small businesses, agencies, and more. For those without technical skills, Webflow is a flexible and user-friendly alternative to traditional web development. Here are some of the main benefits of using Webflow:
Pros of using Webflow are:
1. Creation is quick
Webflow makes it possible to create modern, responsive websites for any purpose quickly and easily without needing coding expertise. You get to resize and adjust every single aspect of your website’s look and feel.
2. Built-in animation tools
Animation can make websites more engaging, and Webflow includes powerful animation tools to add transitions, scrolling effects, and interactions without coding. You can animate elements entering the page, adjust timing and easing, and create micro-animations for buttons, menus, and more.
3. CMS and ecommerce functionality
Webflow offers a built-in content management system (CMS) and ecommerce functionality, allowing you to manage dynamic sites and online stores with custom content types, collections, member accounts, and more. The visual CMS editor makes it simple for anyone to update content.
4. Hosting options
Webflow offers hosting plans starting at $12/month for basic sites, including a custom .webflow.io domain. For unlimited hosting, the Business plan is $36/month. Webflow sites can also be exported and self-hosted.
Although Webflow is easy to learn and use for basic and even advanced websites, building complex web apps requires learning advanced interactions, animations, CMS structures, etc.
Hosting can be expensive for large websites
Webflow's managed hosting scales in price with website visitors and bandwidth usage. For large enterprise websites, it might be cost-effective to opt for other hosting options such as Hostinger.
Why choose Squarespace for website development?
Squarespace is an all-in-one website building and hosting platform that allows anyone to create professional-quality websites without coding. It provides beautiful templates, an intuitive drag-and-drop editor, seamless ecommerce features, integrated blogging tools, responsive design, and automatic hosting, security, and optimisation.
Pros of using Squarespace are:
1. Professionally designed templates
Squarespace offers a wide variety of beautifully crafted templates across various industries and styles that can be used as is or customised. This makes it easy to get a polished, stylish website design quickly.
2. Intuitive drag-and-drop builder
The editor allows you to drag and drop elements like text, images, and galleries to create pages visually without coding, and rearranging or deleting elements is simple.
3. Built-in ecommerce
Squarespace has native tools to create online stores, manage inventory, collect payments, and track orders. No need for third-party plugins.
4. Integrated blogging and SEO
Robust blogging, comments, social media integration, and SEO tools like metadata editing and sitemaps help optimise and promote sites.
Some of the cons are:
1. Limited design flexibility
While templates can be customised, you are limited as you cannot create entirely new as is with custom development from scratch.
2. Limited integration options
Connecting external tools and databases takes development work for which you might even need a developer on your side.
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Now that we are familiar with the two platforms, let's get down to business.
Comparing Webflow and Squarespace
Here in this section, we will be taking a look at seven different factors and then comparing what each platform offers in terms of factors.
Ease of use:
When you start building a website, you ask which path should you choose development-wise. So, you chose a No-code website builder. This begs the question that there are so many of them which website builder would be the easiest for me to learn and use.
Getting started
Webflow requires going through some upfront learning before actually starting to build the website, including taking product tours and watching help videos, which is more overwhelming.
When it comes to getting started, Squarespace makes it extremely simple to launch your site quickly by providing templates and straightforward drag & drop tools to start customising right away.
Learning curve
Webflow’s toolkit for designing websites asks you to upgrade your knowledge and skills to leverage its customisation capacities at an expert level. Webflow has excellent tutorials and manuals, so you should be ready to invest serious dedication in studying to master Webflow’s full feature set.
In terms of an overall learning curve, Squarespace minimises the complexity to help complete beginners without much effort needed to learn.
Visual editor and maintenance
Webflow has a complex architecture which can sometimes make certain edits challenging or you would need to take the help of a developer to manage.
Regarding ease of editing and maintaining websites once launched, Squarespace’s simplified editor framework pays dividends by making routine website updates like adding blog posts or pages very straightforward even years later.
Customisation and flexibility
When evaluating capabilities for customising or flexibility of website designs, Webflow helps users with immense precision to fine tune styles through directly editing CSS code within its Style Manager panel which means you can change the typography elements, colours, spacing, and layouts.
Squarespace limits what degree of style adjustments are possible within its web editor, and only allows changes to fonts, colours palettes, and layouts from dropdown preset options aimed at simplicity.
Hosting
Webflow gives the users more control and flexibility. It lets you host your client websites on Google Cloud servers or any other infrastructure you prefer. You can easily connect custom domains, activate wildcard SSL encryption, and use global CDN for fast asset delivery.
On the other hand, Squarespace only lets you host on their own servers, limiting your options and flexibility compared to Webflow.
Code control
When it comes to owning and controlling your website code, Webflow takes a customer-first approach by allowing you to easily download your entire site codebase with just a click of a mouse. This gives you the freedom to make tweaks, revisions, or even migrate your site as needed.
In contrast, Squarespace locks down its code, making it impossible for users to export any of it. This means that once your site is on Squarespace, it's stuck there. This design choice limits customisation options and shows a lack of transparency when it comes to code.
Winner: Squarespace is the clear winner, provided that you are a complete beginner and want to build a basic website.
Plans and pricing
You have to be mindful of the budget you dedicate to these platforms. You can start with a free plan and as your company scales you can go for premium plans. By comparing the pricing of the two platforms you’ll have a better idea, of which platform is ideal for you.
Free plan
When it comes to trying your hand at making a website it might be a good option to start with a platform that offers a free plan. Webflow helps you get started on a free plan to build an entry-level website. Here, you publish on the Webflows domain and then can move to a custom one. It allows you to build 2 pages, 50 CMS items form submissions, etc.
Saurespace on the other hand offers no free plan which might make the decision-making a little difficult as before buying a plan, you want to see if this is something you want to definitely opt for.
Starter plan
The basic plan is the stage where you have taken the decision to invest in the platform because you deemed it suitable for your needs. Webflow’s basic plan starts at $14 per month with multiple features with respect to building a basic static website, localisation, and moderate traffic.
Many of the founders use these website builders specifically for blogging or content-specific websites. Webflow offers a specific CMS plan which is available at $23 per month. It offers a lot of features such as the creation of 150 pages with content edit access to 3 users in the Webflow editor.
Squarespace doesn’t have a specific pricing for the CMS on their website but it is a well-known CMS platform for creating blog posts and managing them easily. It has some particularly beautiful templates for blogging-specific requirements. The basic plan offers these features as well.
Advanced plan for bigger enterprises
When you are scaling your business or are an established company, you need something extra. Webflow has two plans one is business which starts at &39 per month for creating larger websites and companies that need a customised plan catered to their business can opt for the last plan, enterprise. As it is a customised solution, you would need to get in touch with the Webflow team to have a discussion about it.
Squarespace offers the advanced plan at $55 per month. It gives you the option to completely integrate eccomerce and doesn’t charge you anything. It offers features like advanced shipping, advanced discounting, and sell subscriptions.
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Winner: In case you want to get the hang of the platform first, Webflow will prove to be a better option for you.
Templates
An impactful factor to weigh when reviewing both platforms is the templates each platform provides for starting website builds. Evaluating template availability, customisation potential, and cost economics helps select the best platform match.
No. of templates,
Webflow offers more than 2,000 website templates that users can start from and customise. There are templates across many industries created by Webflow themselves and also their user community.
Squarespace seems to have 100 to 400 templates available based on browsing their template galleries and filter options. Squarespace provides plenty of options to begin designing from.
Template customisation abilities
A key Webflow template benefit is extensive customisation capabilities. With Webflow, users can go beyond surface-level changes to completely remove and remake templates using Webflow's visual tools, even creating unique websites. However, this does require technical skill and design experience.
Squarespace templates enable modifying layout, text, and images, but redesigning extensively requires reaching the customisation limits faster. Squarespace templates have more limitations.
Template pricing
Webflow relies on a paid marketplace, with certain templates costing $30 or more plus subscription fees. However, investing in premium Webflow templates can pay dividends through improved conversions for those able to afford the development time savings they provide.
Squarespace has the advantage when it comes to template pricing. Most Squarespace templates are free to try and use, making it a great option for individuals and early-stage companies looking to experiment with website creation without breaking the bank.
Winner: Webflow is the clear winner, in terms of choosing from a wide range of templates if you have the budget to buy the templates.
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Animations and interactions
When evaluating Webflow versus Squarespace, assessing the animation and interaction functionality each platform provides is essential for achieving website creativity goals.
Animations
Webflow's Animation Editor allows for highly customisable animations. You can combine different triggers like scroll, click, hover, etc. with effects like parallax and reveal to create complex animations. The timeline editor gives you precise control over each animation. You can adjust timing, sequence animations, and add custom code.There's a learning curve to using the advanced animation features. It takes time to get comfortable with them.
Squarespace has simpler preset animations like fade in or fade out, move, and scale. You just toggle them on and adjust basic settings.The animations are easier to add since there aren't as many complex options. This makes it better for beginners. But the downside is you have much less control compared to Webflow. The animations can't be heavily customised.
Interactions
Webflow lets you create intricate interactions using various triggers like scroll, click, hover, etc. You can combine these to make unique interactive elements. The previously saved interactions can be reused across projects which saves time. Some coding knowledge can help enhance Webflow interactions further, but it's not required.
Interactions in Squarespace are limited to simple toggling of animations. There aren't complex triggers to work with. The simplicity makes basic interactions easy to add, but advanced interactions aren't really possible. No coding skills are needed to add interactions but you're limited by the platform's capabilities.
Winner: Webflow outperforms as it has a richer toolkit for creating dynamic and responsive interfaces.
SEO
Search engine optimisation is crucial for driving traffic to any website from search engines like Google. When choosing a web-building platform, it's important to understand how their SEO capabilities compare.
SEO tools and site speed
Webflow comes equipped with handy SEO tools like title and meta description fields to help you optimise your pages. You can also easily add structural markup, such as header tags and schema markup, to boost your SEO game. Plus, Webflow sites load super fast, which is a big win when it comes to page speed ranking factors. The platform is designed for top-notch performance, and you can even add SEO plugins for more advanced features.
On the other hand, Squarespace also offers on-page SEO tools, like title tags, meta descriptions, and alt text. The platform automatically generates structural markup for header tags and lists. Image optimisation and compression tools are available to help speed up your site. However, keep in mind that you'll have less control compared to Webflow. If you want additional SEO features, you'll need to use plugins.
Customisation and hosted
Webflow give you complete control over your site's structure, URLs, and markup, allowing for optimal SEO practices. You can customise CSS and HTML to enhance your site's SEO. Webflow sites are hosted on dedicated servers that can be optimised as necessary.
However, the ability to customise site architecture and markup is somewhat limited in Squarespace. CSS and HTML adjustments are restricted to the available settings. Sites are hosted on shared Squarespace servers, so hosting settings are standardised.
Winner: Webflow is much better when it comes to SEO as it has multiple options to optimise your website for organic reach.
Integrations
Webflow has some awesome integration options like Zapier. This means you can link up Webflow with tons of other apps like email marketing, social media, analytics, payments, and more. It's easy to connect popular platforms like MailChimp, Google Analytics, and Stripe to your Webflow website. You can even add plugins for more advanced integrations. And you can use the Webflow API to create your own custom integrations from scratch. With Webflow's CMS collections, you can display content dynamically from all your integrated sources.
Squarespace connects you with integration options like MailChimp. Squarespace even offers add-ons like calendars, booking systems, and surveys. The only downside is that the custom code support is limited, so you might run into some roadblocks with advanced integrations. But, Squarespace does have an API that lets you create your own custom connections. And if you're running an online store, Squarespace helps with seamless integration with inventory and order management systems.
Winner: Webflow is the better choice because of its expansive integration options.
Community support and resources
Having an active community and robust learning resources are important factors when choosing a web-building platform. Both Webflow and Squarespace offer community forums, events, and educational materials for users.
Community support
Webflow has cultivated a large and thriving community over the years. There are numerous forums, including the official Webflow forums, where users can engage in discussions, ask questions, share tips, and showcase their work. The topics include design, development, business, and more. Webflow also hosts local meetup groups globally, as well as the annual conference, which fosters a great sense of community and shared learning amongst users.
Squarespace also provides community forums where users can help each other out. However, the discussions tend to cater more towards entrepreneurs, artists, small businesses, and creatives building sites on Squarespace. An interesting initiative is Squarespace Circle, which offers extended free trials, optimised customer care, and exclusive content for web design professionals using the platform.
Learning resources
In terms of educational materials, Webflow provides Webflow University, which contains a comprehensive library of instructional videos, articles, courses, and more covering everything from basics to advanced topics. There are also numerous third-party tutorials, courses, and videos focused on Webflow.
Squarespace offers a wide range of help guides, video tutorials, webinars, and getting-started content. However, there seem to be more limited third-party learning resources compared to Webflow.
Winner: Webflow is the better choice between the two platforms for superior community support and depth of educational materials.
How to choose a suitable No-code website builder?
When you're looking for a No-code website builder, start by jotting down the must-have features for your website, like blogging, selling stuff online, or booking systems. Take a look at both the builders, Webflow and Squarespace to see which one fits. Think about how customisable the designs are, how user-friendly the platform is, and what templates they offer. Make sure they have good support options and active community forums in case you run into any issues. Check out reviews and real website examples to get a feel for the quality. As we have already discussed each platform in detail you are completely equipped to take the final call.
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