The world as we know it continues to advance at a super fast pace, connecting people from different walks of life. Prior to the advent of technology and the advancement of the internet, businesses, and brands were only able to reach out to and connect with clients within their locale. The internet, however, has forged the world into a global market with its ability to connect a businessman in Asia to a client in Europe. And for any business or brand to solidify their claim to a niche today, it is undeniable that they need a website. With a plethora of options available to any business looking to build their website, this blog post would be helping businesses and brands decide between two of the best website builders – Weebly vs WordPress.
If you are trying to decide between Weebly vs WordPress as a site builder, let’s start with a surface description.
Also Read: Blogger vs WordPress
What is Weebly and WordPress?
Weebly for most website builders is considered an easy to use alternative to WordPress. Weebly allows you to build your blogs, website and eCommerce stores.
WordPress, on the other hand, is a popular choice among website builders that powers 23% of all the websites on the internet. This is a huge number considering a plethora of website builders available on the internet.
With these descriptions above, we are going to help you decide if your brand or business should opt for Weebly or WordPress by making a Weebly vs WordPress comparison. While this article would not teach you how to use Weebly to create Weebly blogs, this Weebly vs WordPress comparison is put together to show our readers the pros and cons of each, so they can make a calculated decision which one is best for their business or brand.
Before we get into it…
It is important to mention that this Weebly or WordPress comparison is between the Weebly platform and the self-hosted WordPress.org platform. WordPress.org is not to be confused with WordPress.com.
Let’s get right into it!
Here’s a WordPress vs Weebly Comparison across 5 site-building qualities.
Weebly vs WordPress: Hosted Platform vs. Self-Hosted
The Weebly platform is an entirely hosted service. What this means is that your brand’s or business’ website would reside on the Weebly servers, and this by extension also means you have to obey their policies and terms of service. In the event that you decide to take your brand or business to a different platform, you would have to brace for an extremely difficult migration process. However, Weebly’s admin area offers its users a plethora of tools that they can use to design, edit, and manage their Weebly site.
WordPress, on the other hand, is a free software that users can install on their preferred web hosting account, giving businesses and brands 100% ownership and control of all content, data, and information on the platform. Switching from one platform to another is as seamless as making up your mind on what you want.
So when it comes to hosting, WordPress outshines Weebly in the WordPress vs Weebly comparison.
Weebly vs WordPress: Features and Plugins
The Weebly platform has a large selection of built-in tools for their users. These tools give Weebly enthusiasts the ability to have a blog, an online store, contact form, add photos and much more. Perhaps the best part about using Weebly’s built-in features is that Weebly users do not need to install any extension or new applications.
But the best part is also the not so great part because if your brand or business expands to the point where you have to introduce a feature that is unavailable on the Weebly platform, then you have a difficult situation on your hands. Weebly users, at the moment, do not have the luxury of a plethora of Weebly plugins that WordPress users have.
However, with WordPress, there is just about any feature you need: from online stores to contact forms, portfolios, galleries, SEO and so much more. Although most of these features have to be added to your WordPress with plugins because there are so many plugins that WordPress cannot tell what your brand or business might need, the positive part is that you get a plethora of options that Weebly plugins do not offer.
The WordPress plugin directory has more than 37,000 free plugins. Not to mention that there are other countless premium plugins provided by third-party websites. This by extension simply means that if you want any feature whatsoever, then there is a very good chance that there is already an existing plugin that does just that. Plugins such as WordPress SEO by Yoast makes WordPress blogs and websites more SEO friendly than Weebly blogs.
In the simplest terms, think of the features in WordPress vs Weebly as the difference between Smartphones and feature phones(Android and iPhone). With this analogy, WordPress is the smartphone which comes with all the basic apps, but then, it has a play store as well as other third party websites where you can download and install any app of your choice and add new functions to your device.
So what is Weebly then?
Weebly is the feature phone (iPhone) which comes with some really cool built-in apps but doesn’t allow third-party apps. What you get is what it comes with.
So when it comes to features and plugins, WordPress outshines Weebly in the WordPress vs Weebly comparison
Weebly vs WordPress: Design and Layout Choices
There is almost no need to learn how to use Weebly because when it comes to the ease of design and layout choices, Weebly beats WordPress hands down.
Weebly well and truly excels at designs, and if there is one most desired feature that Weebly offers its users, it is the simple drag and drop page builder. At the moment, Weebly offers its users nearly 100 themes that businesses and brands can customize to suit their style and personality by simply using the drag and drop tools. Compared to the complexity of WordPress, Weebly is very easy to use and beginner friendly as well.
WordPress, on the other hand, does not offer its users a Weebly style drag and drop page builder. WordPress, however, has a plethora of available pre-made templates, some of which offer that drag-drop functionality. Most of these templates are available for free in the WordPress themes directory. Thanks to their openness to third parties, business and brands can also purchase themes that reflect their personalities such as StudioPress, ThemeLab, and Themify.
So when it comes to design and layout choice, Weebly outshines WordPress in the Weebly vs WordPress comparison
Weebly vs WordPress: eCommerce and Business
With Weebly, you have the tools necessary to open your own online store but this comes with a price. Weebly features are pretty basic, plus there is not much that you can do when it comes to customizing your store just how you want it.
But that’s not all
Weebly deducts 3% as transaction fee in addition to the fee that you are charged by whatever payment processor you choose to use such as Paypal and Stripe. What this means is that you would be paying twice the normal price in transaction fees. To get out of these fees, Weebly gives you the option to upgrade to the Business plan package which costs $25 every month to take out the extra transaction fee. This is just terrible for small business owners.
With WordPress, however, you get a plethora of robust eCommerce plugins that gives you the freedom to design your own online store. Some plugins like iThemes Exchange, EasyDigitalDownloads, WP eCommerce, WooCommerce, and several others make WordPress a safe haven for businesses.
Add coupons, change the entire layout of your store, whatever you want, WordPress offers and this is all at no additional transaction fee. You simply pay the regular payment processor fees like on any other platform.
So if you want an eCommerce platform or a business website then WordPress outshines Weebly in the WordPress vs Weebly comparison
Weebly vs WordPress: Data Portability
When moving your website from one platform to another, Weebly would let you download your site in a zip file format, but this file would only contain have HTML pages and images of your website. If you are moving your blog, on the other hand, these HTML pages and Images would not be exported. Not to mention that your sliders would not work after you export the site.
Hosting your website on the WordPress platform means you can export your website into several formats. Whether as database export, an XML file, download your content and files. You can simply move your WordPress website to any platform you like.
In this comparison, WordPress wins.
Final Thoughts
While Weebly is an amazing service with a beautiful builder that is more suitable for the smaller websites, it is not the best option to create a blog or even run an online store. WordPress is a better option.
We hope this article helps you pick a platform that suits your next website perfectly!