WordPress Hosting, Domain Names, a Website Builder, Blogging Features, and Professional Email
Wix vs WordPress.com: Quick Summary
After testing both, WordPress comes out on top overall. It’s more powerful, flexible, and scalable, which makes it ideal for users who want full control and room to grow.
With over 55,000 plugins and endless customization options, you can build just about any kind of site, from a blog to a full online store.
Wix, on the other hand, is perfect for beginners who want something quick and hassle-free. Its drag-and-drop editor and AI website builder make setup easy, and its support team is far more accessible than WordPress’s community-based help.
What Is Wix?
Wix is a cloud-based platform that provides all the services one might need for their website in one place. Everything, including web hosting, a website builder, drag & drop editor, a domain name, templates, and more, comes built-in with Wix. With it, you can create fully-functioning and effective websites, eCommerce websites, and blogs.
Wix offers a unique option for its users to get online with its Wix ADI, with which users do not even have to create their own website, they only have to answer a few questions related to what they want their website to have and how they want it to look, and Wix’s ADI technology will build the entire website for them. If you’re interested more in Wix in general and the quality of its services, you can check out our Wix review, where we cover all of that and more.
What Is WordPress?
WordPress is a website-building platform that was initially created to serve as a blogging tool. There are two different versions of WordPress – hosted WordPress and Self-hosted WordPress. However, to be able to compare WordPress more accurately with Wix, we will focus on the self-hosted version of WordPress – WordPress.com. WordPress.com allows users to freely modify the code behind it and have absolute freedom to customize their website as much as they want. WordPress.com has also recently introduced its drag-and-drop tool Gutenberg, allowing beginners to use the platform and create a website. Check out our WordPress review if you want to learn more about WordPress and everything it offers.
Wix vs. WordPress: Quick Glance
Now, before we dissect each provider and dive into the Full Comparison, here is a quick look at what’s to come from Wix vs. WordPress:
Wix
WordPress
Value for money (Pricing)
Winner: WordPress
Seven different premium plans start at $4.50 a month and go up to $35 a month based on annual subscriptions. There is also a free plan, which is limited in features but is suitable for testing out Wix.
You can install and download WordPress for free, and the price solely depends on the hosting plan you choose and the features that you need. Thus, you can fit WordPress into low, medium, and high budgets.
Ease of use
Winner: Wix
An extremely beginner-friendly drag-and-drop website builder that also offers ADI functionality which is ideal for beginners. Wix is built specifically for those who do not have a tech background.
WordPress has a steep learning curve, and even though beginners can go through it and learn, WordPress is a better option for more experienced users.
Templates (Design flexibility)
Winner: WordPress
There are more than 800 designer-made templates to choose from, but you cannot switch or change them once your website is online.
There are virtually limitless opportunities for customization and control over your website’s design and layout (if you know how to code). There are also WordPress themes built by the platform itself you can choose from for your website.
Features and Tools
Winner: WordPress
Wix offers powerful unique features, including the Wix Editor, Wix ADI, and Velo by Wix. It also has an App Market where users can find more than 300 different apps.
WordPress offers more than 55,000 plugins and allows users to customize their websites as much as possible and add as much functionality to their websites as possible.
Performance
Winner: WordPress
While testing our Wix website, it performed exceptionally well with a load time of 778 ms and a performance grade of B 85 for a 1MB-sized website.
Our WordPress website performed very well during the speed test, with a load time of 3.04 seconds and a performance grade of B 90 for a 3.5MB-sized website.
Help and support
Winner: Wix
Wix offers excellent customer support via phone and email. It also has numerous tutorials, guides, and helpful articles available in one place – its website.
WordPress only offers certain articles on its website and links to WordPress forums which are not as organized as Wix’s written tutorials and guides.
Overall rating
Winner: WordPress
Based on the overall rating, Wix takes a total of two wins out of the six categories we used to compare the providers.
WordPress is the winner based on overall rating, falling behind Wix in only two categories: Ease of Use and Help and Support.
Wix vs. WordPress: Full Comparison – Who Will Take the Win?
Value for Money (Pricing): Which Is Worth Your Money?
Wix Pricing
When it comes to Wix’s pricing, the first thing we need to mention is that it offers a totally free plan. The free plan comes with some features and requires users to accept on-site Wix ads. However, people can use the free plan to start and then scale up to a higher pricing plan when they need to.
You can pay monthly or for one year upfront. As with most website builders, if you choose to pay for an entire year up front, you will save some money by doing so. In Wix’s case, you can save around 13-17% yearly if you choose to pay for one year upfront.
The free plan is best for creating a simple website or for trying out the platform before committing to it. It is not suitable for professional businesses sites as the free plan has limited features and storage. Regarding the paid plans, the main difference between them is in how much storage space and bandwidth they offer and whether they offer eCommerce functionality or not. Let’s see Wix’s price lists and some of the features that are included in the plans.
Regardless of which Wix plan you choose, none of them include any of the apps from Wix’s extensive app store. So, if you want to use one of them, you will have to pay extra.
Wix also offers an Enterprise plan which comes with custom pricing that starts at $500 per month.
WordPress Pricing
Downloading and installing WordPress with WordPress.com is free of charge. You can also upgrade your website without having to pay additional monthly or annual fees with WordPress.
The actual cost you will incur with WordPress depends on the features your website will need. Namely, since WordPress.com is self-hosted, you will have to choose and pay for your own hosting, which can be as low as one dollar and above. Also, you might need to pay for specific themes and plugins if you need them.
With WordPress.com, you will have to buy a domain that costs about $12 a year, a hosting plan, security which can start at $50 and can be an ongoing payment or a one-off charge, developer fees which can range from $50 an hour, a paid theme (if you need it) which usually start from $30, and plugins which can be free or paid.
If you want to sell online, you will also need eCommerce plugins like WooCommerce, Ecwid, etc., and other free or paid features.
Winner
In regards to pricing and value for money, WordPress takes the win. That is because WordPress has more flexible plans compared to Wix, and it is much easier to budget for compared to Wix plans. It also provides better value for money since you can choose the features you need and won’t have to pay for features you don’t need. So, WordPress can be both very cheap and expensive, depending on what you need. Also, Wix’s monthly prices are higher than other website builders out there.
Want to Try WordPress.com?
You can download and install WordPress for free and can add only the features that you need and tailor your plan to your budget.
With Wix, you will get everything in one place. Wix is ideal for beginners due to its What-You-See-Is-What-You-Get (WYSIWYG) website builder and its ADI functionality. Wix’s WYSIWYG builder allows users to drag and drop images, slideshows, buttons, and all other elements onto your website. Users can also resize anything with just a few clicks.
Wix’s ADI functionality is an even better option for those who do not have any experience with website building or any other tech-related activities. Namely, it builds the whole website by itself, and the user will only have to answer questions like what they want their website to have, what they want it to look like, and other similar questions. When you edit with Wix, you are able to see the changes you make as you make them. Thus, you will be able to see what your website will look like in real-time.
Wix was specifically made to help beginner and mid-level creators who do not have any coding or technical experience, and it shows. Wix is the simplest way to get online, and it is also fast, especially thanks to its ADI functionality.
WordPress Ease of Use
WordPress is better suited for more experienced users. Editing with WordPress is entirely different than editing with Wix. Namely, with WordPress, you will have to save and preview all the changes you make if you want to see what they will look like. Also, the editor displays elements in a different way compared to what they will look like when the website is live.
Even though you can install drag-and-drop tools to use WordPress, knowing some HTML will be highly beneficial for you and save you a lot of time when creating your website. However, WordPress offers numerous plugins and blocks you can use to create and edit your website easily. So, even if you are new, you can still get the hang of WordPress quickly and use it without knowing how to code or program.
Winner
Even though beginners can learn the ins and outs of using WordPress quickly, Wix is still the ideal choice for beginners as it offers a built-in drag-and-drop editor and ADI functionality. Also, thanks to its ADI builder, users do not have to go through the process of creating a website at all and can get a fully-functioning website with only answering a few questions. WordPress, on the other hand, is more complicated than Wix and requires users to go through a learning process to be able to use it. Thus, Wix takes the win in this category.
Want to Try Wix?
With its drag-and-drop editor and its ADI functionality, Wix is an excellent choice for beginners.
Templates (Design Flexibility): Which Is Better for Expressing Your Creative Side?
Wix Templates and Design
Wix offers more than 800 pre-made website templates made by designers. The templates are some of the highest-quality templates available on the market and are suitable for many different businesses. All of its designs are pre-made and ready to use and are written in HTML5. However, users cannot switch to a new template once their website is live. They can only move elements around and pick different fonts and colors.
Thus, with Wix, users should choose their theme carefully and make sure it is suitable for their business from the start. All of Wix’s pre-made templates are available in its free plan.
Thus, advanced users may find Wix limiting in this area since they won’t be able to switch templates or add their own code if they want to. However, beginners may find the ability to use pre-made templates helpful since they will have beautiful, high-quality templates at their disposal and all they would have to do is pick one that they like best.
WordPress Templates and Design
With WordPress, on the other hand, you will get virtually endless customization opportunities. With it, you will start off on a blank canvas. You can add and customize your website as much as you want on the blank canvas, but doing that will be a lot more complicated than using Wix’s pre-made templates. However, suppose you want to have customization and design freedom. In that case, WordPress offers limitless opportunities for you. With it, you will get to choose from more than 200 WordPress-made themes, over 5,000 third-party-made themes approved by WordPress; you can work with a developer to create an entirely custom theme that only you will have and add more than 55,000 plugins.
Also, WordPress offers many free themes which you can use if you want to save money. You can also choose themes based on subject and pick a theme that is tailor-made for blogs, eCommerce, education, entertainment, food & drink, news, and more. What’s more, you can choose themes based on the layout you want, including grid layout, one column, two columns, three columns, four columns, left sidebar, right-sidebar, and wide blocks.
Winner
The winner in this category is WordPress. It has many more themes and design layouts you can choose from compared to Wix and allows you to customize and add as many plugins as you need to your website. Also, you can always change your website’s template with WordPress, which is not the case with Wix.
Want to Try WordPress?
With WordPress.com, you can customize your website’s design and layout as much as you want and change your templates whenever you want.
When it comes to unique features and tools, Wix has plenty to offer. To start off, we have Wix’s Editor, with which you can start from scratch or choose from over 800 designer-made templates for your website. Its innovative drag-and-drop editor is one of the easiest editors for website building out there. Also, its editor makes your website mobile-optimized automatically and allows you to add scroll effects, media galleries, animations, over 100 fonts, and more.
Another excellent feature we want to mention here is the Wix ADI. It allows you to have a fully-functioning website by only answering a few questions. Wix is also a fast way to get online without having to write a single line of code.
Velo by Wix is another unique feature you can get with Wix. It is an open development platform for building advanced web applications which is suitable for more advanced users.
Wix also has an App Market that has over 300 apps for marketing, selling online, services & events, media & content, design elements, and communication.
WordPress Features and Tools
As we mentioned, WordPress offers more than 55,000 plugins in its plugin directory. Thus, the chances of finding what your website needs are significantly in your favor with WordPress. However, each plugin has its own learning curve, and some might be harder to use than others.
Also, since there are thousands of plugins available, some might prove to be of a lower quality than others. But, there are numerous plugin reviews that you can read to find which app is best for you. Also, you can filter the plugins based on which are the most featured and most popular and find what you need there.
So, as we mentioned, you can do anything you want with WordPress. You can find both free and premium apps in its plugin directory for almost anything you need and add them to your website. You can also add premium plugins from other marketplaces to your website since WordPress allows you to integrate your website with many other tools and apps.
Winner
WordPress takes the win once again over Wix. It is the clear winner of this category just by the sheer amount of plugins users get with WordPress. Even though Wix offers quite an extensive selection of plugins and some powerful unique features, and its app library is still growing, it is still limited compared to WordPress.
Want to Try WordPress.com?
WordPress offers over 55,000 plugins to its users, which can serve all kinds of purposes and add significant functionality to their websites.
We have tested our Wix website using a speed testing tool. Both our Wix and WordPress websites were tested from the same location so that we get the most accurate results for our comparison. When testing our Wix website, we received the following results:
Performance grade B 85;
Page size 1MB;
Load time 778ms;
Our load time was 778 milliseconds, which is less than one second and is an excellent load time for a website. We also need to consider the page size, which is only 1MB, so the 778 millisecond load time is great for such a small page. Our website also ranked pretty well with other metrics, which you will see in the photo below.
WordPress Performance
As we mentioned, we tested both our Wix and WordPress sites from the same location so that we can accurately compare them. When we tested our WordPress site, we received the following results:
Performance grade B 90;
Page size 3.5MB;
Load time 3.04ms;
As you can see, our WordPress website had a slower loading time compared to our Wix website. However, a load time of 3 seconds is still excellent for any website, and our WordPress website is three times larger than our Wix website. So, overall, it fared well in the speed test. Also, our WordPress website scored pretty well in other metrics, which you can see in the photo below.
Winner
It is safe to say that both websites fared well and provided excellent performance for their users. Even though our Wix site had a better loading time, it is significantly smaller than our WordPress website, and it has fewer requests. Also, our WordPress site has a higher performance grade even though it is larger and has more requests than our Wix site. Thus, the winner of this category is WordPress.
Want to Try WordPress?
WordPress provides fast loading speeds and excellent overall performance to its users.
Help and Support: Who Has the Better Support System?
Wix Help and Support
Wix has a help center where you can ask a specific question via its search bar and find answers. You can also browse through many different categories and learn about Wix and how to use it properly. Some of the categories include a “Getting Started” category, “The Wix Editor,” “Domains,” “Billing,” “Managing Your Site,” “The Mobile Editor,” “Managing Your Account,” “Wix ADI,” “Editor X,” and more. The Help Center is available for users in multiple languages, including English, German, French, Italian, Dutch, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Polish, and Turkish.
You can also contact Wix’s in-house support team via phone or email from Monday to Thursday, from 5 am to 5 pm EST. Wix also has a blog where you can read numerous helpful articles and get tips. Also, you can watch video tutorials on different topics that can help you learn even quicker. What’s more, you can request a callback from Wix’s support team at any time.
WordPress Help and Support
WordPress, on the other hand, does not offer customer support. Since it is a free and open-source program, users will not get the option to contact a support team or an expert to help them with what they need.
Thus, you will have to rely on articles and guides written by random WordPress users to find answers to your questions. But it’s not as grim as it seems. Since WordPress is free to use, there are many WordPress websites out there and many WordPress experts who write tutorials or guides online.
WordPress has built a large community over the years. Therefore, you will find thousands of WordPress-related articles on the Internet. Remember that you will most likely have to scroll through thousands of low-quality articles before finding what you need. However, in the end, you will find a relevant article that can help you with what you need. Also, you can find forums with documentation on WordPress.com’s website that may help you solve your issues.
Another solution to WordPress’s support problem is hiring a WordPress expert to help you create and manage your website. However, that can be expensive.
Winner
Wix is the winner in the Help and Support category. Wix provides a lot more help to its users compared to WordPress, including direct support from a team of experts. So, Wix users can call its support team and work through whatever they need directly with them, which is much better than just reading articles online.
Want to Try Wix?
Wix offers an excellent support system with experts available to help users with anything they need. It also offers video tutorials, articles, tips, and how-to guides to its users, which are available on Wix’s website.
Wix is an excellent option to choose, depending on the situation you are in. So, you should choose Wix if:
You are a beginner with no technical experience who wants to create a website and get your business online. Thanks to Wix’s incredibly easy to use builder and editor, anyone can create the website of their dreams and sell their products or services online;
If you need support from experts but cannot pay extra to hire a developer to help you create and manage your website over time;
Wix is ideal if you want to get online extremely fast without having to move a muscle to create your website. Wix’s ADI builder is ideal for those who want to get their website online quickly, without needing to do any of the legwork themselves.
Why Choose WordPress?
WordPress is best for more experienced users, and it is the ideal choice if:
You want power and flexibility – WordPress is the ideal option for those who want powerful features and the freedom to customize their website as much as they want. Due to the thousands of powerful plugins it offers and the freedom to modify the code and every other element on your website, WordPress is ideal for those who need more power and control over their website;
You are looking for highly-customizable templates and design – as we mentioned, WordPress offers its users the opportunity to customize its website as much as they want. It also offers users the option to start on a blank canvas and create their own template if they want.
You want to create a website that offers many different functionalities and features – WordPress’ extensive plugin directory and its ability to integrate with other third-party platforms and tools allow users to create a diverse website with different functionalities and features.
Our Recommendation
Overall, we can conclude that WordPress takes the win and is the better overall platform when compared to Wix. It offers many more features, plugins, and overall functionality. Also, users are free to do whatever they want and are not limited to only the features included in their plan. What’s more, WordPress can fit all kinds of budgets, and you can customize your plan based on your needs.
Even though it’s not as beginner-friendly as Wix, people can still learn how to use it if they have the time. If you really want to stick out from the millions of websites available on the Internet, no other builder can help you achieve that as WordPress can.
Want to try WordPress?
WordPress is an excellent website builder with which you can create the website of your dreams and stand out from the crowd. It offers more than 55,000 powerful plugins and customization tools that you can use to make your website the best one yet!
If you have some coding knowledge and feel confident in your tech skills, WordPress is better for you. However, if you aren’t tech-savvy and are looking for a platform that is beginner-friendly, easy to use, and offers direct expert support, then Wix is the better option for you.
What is the difference between Wix and WordPress?
Wix is a website builder that offers an all-in-one solution to its users, which includes a builder, editor, web hosting, a domain name, and everything you need to create and manage a website online. On the other hand, WordPress is an open-source Content Management System that helps users create a website. However, WordPress does not offer web hosting, a domain name, or security features, so you will have to buy those yourself.
How much does it cost to build a website with Wix?
Technically, you can build an entire website with Wix for free. Wix offers a free plan which you can get to create your website, but the free plan comes with certain limitations, so if you want to create a professional website, it is not the best option. Wix’s premium plans start at $4.50/month and go up to $35/month (paid annually). Also, if you choose to pay monthly, the prices are slightly higher, and you can also get Wix’s Enterprise plan which starts at $500/month.
How much does it cost to build a website with WordPress?
The cost of building a website with WordPress varies based on the price of your hosting plan, a domain name which usually costs about $12 a year, and other factors like paid themes and additional premium plugins, so you will initially need to invest around $200 if you want to build a robust and content-driven website.
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