Why is Wix and Squarespace so expensive? (What you can do)

A Hungarian friend of mine recently told me that she pays US$500 every year for her Wix subscription.

Her website is very simple. It does not collect payments, does not have an email sign up and she doesn’t use any appointment features.

Another friend of mine seems to also pay $400 a year for his Squarespace website.

These prices seem steep to me because my clients don’t pay hundreds to host a simple, brochure website.

How does Squarespace cost so much?

Site Builder Report outlined some reasons why people will buy the higher tiers for Squarespace. They said that the e-commerce, third-party integrations, advanced metrics and marketing tools are some reasons why people will fork out $33/month ($416 a year; but $276 if paid 12 months at once) for their business package.

Looking at some of the things they offer, it does seem quite expensive, at least to someone like me.

For example, a business plan allows the user to have promo pop ups, announcement bars, conversion tracking (how many users filled out this form, joined mailing list, etc.) and allows third-party integration like Gmail and Acuity Scheduling (which is a great tool, and I reviewed it)

Site Builder Report says that if you want to get an email, you must use Google Workspace (i.e. paid Gmail), so that you can get a [address]@[yourdomain.com] email address.

Google Workspace adds another $72 per year, at least.

Wix costs $200+ per year

You really only want to start with the Unlimited plan which costs $22/month, paid annually.

If you pay any less, your bandwidth is limited to 2GB or less. Meaning that you’re not expecting much traffic, and do note that Wix websites are data-heavy.

How do you reduce your website’s running costs?

I have managed to host websites for $0. The only cost being the domain.

I built one of my client’s website based on this zero-dollar methodology. Therefore, they only pay the domain cost.

There’s no secret about how I do it. Here’s a complete guide.

Would hiring a web developer cost you less than a Squarespace or Wix?

Possibly.

Let’s take the previous example where you choose my zero-dollar framework.

You pay for the domain. $12.

You use a free email service.

The running costs of having a brochure website is therefore one dollar a month ($12 divided by 12 months).

In order to do it this way, your biggest cost is your start-up cost.

You need to find a developer who will be able to do the method above. Say, you find someone entry-level and pay $2,000.

That’s a lot of money from the start, but you won’t need to design and develop the website yourself. Wix and Squarespace makes it easy for you to develop your website yourself, so that’s their strength.

A solid website with little change can last for many, many years.

Therefore, you’ll have to do the sums — cost of hiring a developer divided over the number of years you expect to use the website.

Then consider whether you just want to hand the web design and development away to somebody else, so you don’t have to fret about it.

With a good designer and developer, you can get a better designed website that performs better with much more elasticity.

One stonewall that most Wix and Squarespace developers find over time is how the platform is quite rigid. One DIY web developer said that he had to move from Squarespace to WordPress because Squarespace didn’t have a blogging feature.

Ultimately, whether you can save money by hiring a professional to do it really comes down to the price you’re paying for the service and how long you’re going to use the website.

The calculator below will show you how these variables affect the sums.

Website builder versus hiring a professional

This calculator will help you determine the difference in annual cost of doing it yourself with Wix or Squarespace.

Here are the reference prices for Squarespace and Wix.

Squarespace Plan	Paid monthly USD	Paid annually USD per month
Personal	$23	$16
Business	$33	$23
Ecommerce Basic	$36	$27
Ecommerce Advanced	$65	$49

Wix Plans	Paid monthly USD	Paid annually USD per month
Unlimited	$29	$22
Pro	$34	$27
VIP	$49	$45
Business Basic	$34	$27
Business Unlimited	$38	$32
Business VIP	$64	$59
Enterprise	Custom pricing	Custom pricing

Hiring a pro can save you time and money

The sums might have shown you that it’s worth getting a pro to do your website since you will save the hassle and get better results.

Before you go out hunting for a pro, know the difference between a web developer and web designer.