Websites have become the face of many businesses, be it online or offline business. Whenever people hear about your business or your service, the first thing they do is check you up online.
And what they find online makes all the difference. If you have a professional website, it will radiate authenticity to them. If they don’t find you online, you are going to look outdated.
So the question is. how do you create a website without any technical knowledge? After all, not everybody can throw money to developers and get it professionally done. You can use an online website builder. It will allow you to build your website to your liking.
And when you search website builders, Wix and Weebly are sure to pop up and confuse you. Which one to choose? Let’s find that out in this article. We are going to do an in-depth comparison of Wix vs Weebly. And you can do your conclusion.
Wix vs Weebly
Ease of Use
When you are going to build a website without any technical knowledge, even a bit of complication will put you off. So it is important to choose a website builder that is easy to use.
Wix has an unstructured editor, which means you can drag and drop elements like buttons, text boxes, images, etc. Anywhere on the web page.
Weebly has a structured editor. That is you can only drag and drop elements in columns and rows.
Wix does have a more flexible editor than Weebly. But that is not always a positive things. To much freedom means things can get chaotic. And the lack of structure means, you have to depend on your precision to build the web page.
If you change an element’s position on Wix it won’t be reflected on its mobile version. You have to carry out the exact same change in the mobile version on your own.
And this means you have to do work twice. And we have to remember that we are not always precise. So the website and its mobile version may end up unsynchronized. And that will be a huge mess.
However, due to the structure editor in Weebly, any small changes will be reflected on the mobile change automatically. Also Weebly has automated functions that makes it less cluttered and very straightforward to use.
For example, if you are editing a text and you want to change the background all of the sudden, all you have to do is click the background.
The text editor will automatically slide out and the background editor will slide in at the bottom. Giving attention to these small things has given Weebly an upper hand when it comes to ease of use.
Website Design
Weebly and Wix have a lot in common. But their website editor is not one of them. It is one of their key differences.
Weebly has a structured grid-like layout with minimum customization. You can easily drag and drop elements but only as rows and columns. Also, Weebly has less customization.
It only allows you to change theme color and font. However, if you are tech-savvy, then Weebly lets you edit the source code as much as you want.
While Wix has an unstructured editor. You can drag and drop elements anywhere you want regardless of alignment. And Wix allows you to completely customize your website.
You can change everything on the website. Add external fonts, change the buttons, etc. You can customize to an extent that you build a completely new website.
Theme
When it comes to themes, Wix has an ocean of more than 550 website themes. Some of them are free and some are paid.
Weebly has more than 70 standard themes that are structured. They too have both paid and free themes.
Even though Weebly has only 70 themes you can easily try them out without having to build your page every time. That is, the elements remain even when the theme changes.
On Wix, this is not possible. If you want to try a new theme, you will be building a new website and that can be such a hazard to utilizing their wide library.
Mobile Preview
Both platforms provide a mobile-friendly website design. After all, more than 50% of the website traffic comes from the mobile browser.
However, if you make any changes to the Wix editor, you have to repeat the change on the mobile version. Since Weebly has a structured editor, you don’t have to change a thing to optimize the mobile version.
Sublevels
Wix only allows only one sublevel for each menu. However, Weebly offers many sublevels on their website. That is you can build a much larger website on Weebly than with Wix. It allows you to add almost 50+ web pages.
Wix ADI
However to beat it’s drawback on the chaotic nature of the unstructured editor, it offers Wix ADI, artificial intelligence design interface.
Wiz will create you a smart website all on its own if you don’t want to tinker with the website editor. All you have to do is enter your website name and the category of the website. If this website is not so perfect, then you can even edit it.
Marketing tools
The role of a website builder is not only to help you build your website but also to help you market and promote it.
Any good website builder will make sure you don’t have to find extensions and apps elsewhere to market your website.
Email Marketing
Wix has a feature called Wix shoutout. It will help you send customized emails and newsletters to your audience. In addition, it will also let you create discounts and coupon codes which you can share on your website and social media.
Weebly has a counter feature called Weebly promote. Weebly has advanced and clear statistics that will help you find the right content, right time, even the right coupons and discounts to your target audience. Weebly’s email marketing tools are more optimized than that of Wix.
Social Media
Next to email marketing, social media marketing is the next big thing. In fact, it’s more effective than email marketing these days.
Both the website allows you to integrate social media buttons to your website with a simple drag and drop. This allows both you and the visitors to share your content on social media platforms.
In addition, Weebly allows you to integrate your Facebook Messenger into your website. This will give a feel of live chat but on social media.
The downside is that you can’t sell your goods on social media platforms directly with Weebly or Wix.
SEO
The better you rank in the browser, the more traffic will come to your website. So Search Engine Optimization is mandatory for a website to reach more audience.
Both Weebly and Wix have good SEO tools that let you change titles, meta descriptions, add focus keywords, keyword density, etc. They even have tools to calculate if your title is strong enough or not.
On the downside, Weebly has some restrictions on the use of headline tags. Wix easily allows you to go from H1 to H6. And Wix has an unconventional way of changing the image names to something cryptic. This will interfere with the image SEO.
When it comes to SEO, both the platforms had their upsides and their downsides. So one is not better than the other.
Blogging
Be it a personal website or a commercial website, blogs are the leading source to drive traffic to your website. A blog will allow you to share relevant content with your audience.
This will assure them of your expertise in your given field and will result in an increased conversion rate.
Both platforms allow you to build a smooth and sleek blog into your website. They offer all the basic features like text, image, video insertions.
However, Weebly has an inbuilt editor while Wix’s editor is not integrated into the platform. Thus it will open in a new tab and will only allow you to add basic information and nothing more.
Since Weebly has an inbuilt editor, you can drag and drop elements like forms, email address, subscribe button, etc. Thus Weebly is a little more sophisticated than Wix when it comes to blogging.
App Store
Not all the website uses are the same. Some websites will need some additional features and others won’t need the feature. For this purpose, both platforms have an app store.
Wix has more than 250 plus in house features. There are extension apps for almost every task like forms, video editing, events, etc. Wix has both free and paid apps.
Even the paid apps are inexpensive and cost only a few extra dollars. Wix is always rolling out new applications.
The Wix allows reviews and star ratings to help you choose the best quality apps. And the cherry on top is you can add these apps with just a drag and a drop on your website.
The Weebly has a whopping 340 in built applications. They call it their App Center. Weebly also has paid and free applications.
They have a decent collection of free applications. And their paid applications are also very inexpensive. For example, the application to all multi-languages to your website will only cost $3 monthly.
This price is negligible compared to the global reach it provides. And Weebly can suggest new applications that will enhance your website.
When it comes to applications, Weebly has the upper hand over Wix.
Ecommerce
If you can sell your products online, to a wider audience why won’t you? That’s why almost all businesses are setting up their online store. And both Wix and Weebly allow you to set up your online store without a hassle.
Wix offers a solid tool to set up your online store like order notification, email marketing, discounts and coupon codes, tax and shipping cost calculations, etc. However, Wix doesn’t offer a personal touch with your customers.
On the other hand, Weebly has an efficient system when it comes to ecommerce. It has great features like:
- Create an account for customers.
- To send an email reminder for Abandoned shopping cart recovery.
- To send personalized gift cards.
- An in-store pickup option for those who want to skip the shipping charges.
- Allow you to sell downloadable digital files in.
Weebly has the most straightforward editor that is available in any website builder. It allows you to add the client’s name in their receipt adding a personal touch. The only drawback is the limitation of the design templates available on Weebly.
This when it comes to Ecommerce, Weebly is more equipped than Wix.
Backup and Restoration
If you want a robust website, you must always have a backup. A website may crash or you may accidentally delete some pages. This will lead to complications if you have to build them from scratch again.
Wix offers you an efficient site history function. This will track changes and store all the versions differently. You can even rename these versions for your convenience.
For example, you can use two themes and build them. You can always rename these two themes and work with them whenever you want.
On the other hand, Weebly offers you a complicated backup option. It allows you to download your website as a Zip file. You can upload this Zip file to other hosts but not back to Weebly.
And in other hosts, you can’t use the drag and drop feature to update the look and feel of the website. So this Zip file is pretty much unchangeable. And the website will soon become outdated outside Weebly.
Even though both platforms allow backup options, Wix’s backup is more advanced and optimized.
Customer Support
Customer support is very important if you want to choose a website builder. You can be at peace if you know there is help with the whole process.
Both Weebly and Wix have a great support system. They have phone support, email support, detailed tutorials, and live forums with helpful discussions.
Wix has phone and email support for all its paid plans. It has a comforting help button displaying at every step of the process. And the button will lead you to task-centric guides and tutorials.
To compete with this Weebly has a live chat option, this makes some common doubts cleared quickly. No going through the FAQ or searching on forums is required.
However, if you delete your web page by accident, you have to contact their support team since they don’t have a history feature. Then the support team will restore your page. This is an unnecessarily complicated process.
Thus Wix is more comforting and there for you when it comes to customer support.
Pricing
Pricing is another determining factor when choosing a website builder. It is important to find the best value for your budget. Here we are going to compare exactly that.
Wix has almost 9 plans for its users. Four of these plans are for personal and general websites. And four of it is for e-commerce websites.
For the Website:
- The combo plan comes at $13 per month and is suitable for personal websites.
- The unlimited plan comes at $17 per month and is suitable for entrepreneurs and freelancers.
- The pro plan comes at $22 per month and is suitable for building an online brand.
- The VIP plan comes at $39 per month and is suitable for first priority support.
For the Ecommerce:
- Business basic comes at $23 per month and it allows you to accept payment on your website rather than using a third-party service.
- Business unlimited comes at $27 per month and is suitable for growing your business.
- The business VIP comes at $49 per month and is suitable if you want a fine website service.
- The enterprise plan comes at $500 per month and it is suitable to scale up your business.
In addition they have a free plan, with bare minimum features to build a website.
The Weebly has five plans. Three for general websites and two for e-commerce websites.
- The free plan comes at $0 per month. It doesn’t have hosting. But it is actually a decent plan.
- The connect plan comes at $8 per month. It comes with a free domain.
- The pro plan comes at $12 per month and is suitable for groups and organizations.
- The business plan comes at $28 per month and is suitable for a website and a basic store.
- The performance plan comes at $38 per month and is suitable for power sellers like wholesales.
The Weebly obviously provides more value for the money than Wix. The basic and pro plan also supports stores but you cannot accept payment on the website.
Drawbacks
Both the platforms come with their own set of drawbacks. Let us compare them.
The drawbacks of Wix are:
- Due to their unstructured editor, the website will get chaotic and hard to navigate.
- Their mobile version has to be edited whenever you make a change on the website. This means double the work.
- They don’t have live chat support. They actually want you to find answers in the FAQ.
- They don’t allow you to customize the receipt at checkout as Weebly does. Their e-commerce tools are efficient but still lags when compared to Weebly.
The drawbacks of Weebly are:
- They have a limited set of themes and templates.
- The design flexibility is very rigid and you can barely customize your website other than its font and color.
- They have a complicated backup and storage system.
Conclusion
If you want to choose a website builder, then it’s going to be based on your personal needs and expectations. Both Wix and Weebly are efficient platforms that allow you to build great websites.
Wix allows you complete control over your website design, it has a great back up option, they have a wide range of themes and apps.
Thus it is suitable for people who want a sophisticated site regardless of its clutter and a small learning curve.
Weebly is one of the most straight forward website builders. It is very easy to learn and navigate, they have great eCommerce tools.
Thus if your main concern is to build a website without any fuss or if you want to build your eCommerce store, then you will be very satisfied with Weebly. It is also the cost-efficient one among the two platforms.
This you have to determine them based on your expectations or you can give them both a try with their free plan. And then decide which you want a long time subscription to.
