How to Choose Between Webflow vs WordPress to Build Your Website
Whether you are building your digital brand presence or redesigning an existing website, you may find yourself wondering which content management system (CMS) to use. There are differences between Webflow vs WordPress that can help you choose the right CMS to build your website. We’ll compare the technical and non-technical aspects of both.
When researching the benefits and advantages of Webflow and WordPress, it’s impactful to consider the ease of use, features, integrations and pricing. Below are the 4 main differences between Webflow vs Webflow that we will compare:
4 Main Differences Between Webflow vs WordPress
- Ease of Use
- Features
- Integrations
- Pricing
Ease of Use
Webflow is a low or no-code tool for building websites. The platform is a visual drag-and-drop builder with a designer toolbar. The biggest benefit with Webflow is that you don’t need to have any coding experience. As with any software, you’ll need to get familiar with the interface.
Webflow’s front-end website builder allows you to see the changes made in real time without publishing the website. If you do have coding experience, you can add custom code to a single page or to the whole site.
Webflow offers both free and affordable website templates and cloneable sections to get started. It’s users can create cloneables, both paid and free, for other users to use in the community which provides helpful solutions, resources and creative ideas.
WordPress is an open-source website platform with a built-in CMS. The software is created for content management, such as blogging, and for plugin integrations to build a custom website.
WordPress requires some knowledge of code including HTML, CSS and PHP if you decide to build a site from scratch. Otherwise, WordPress offers countless themes and plugins to get started with a template and design.
Drag-and-drop builder plugins can be installed to design pages in a no-code format, however most of these are not free.
Building a website in Webflow is faster and easier than building a website using WordPress. Webflow has all the tools you need in one place and coding experience is not required. The built-in drag-and-drop builder out performs the visual builder plugins for WordPress.
Features
Search Engine Optimization
Search engine optimization (SEO) is a requirement for every website. If you don’t have SEO implemented, you will struggle to get traffic from Google.
Webflow has SEO settings built into the platform, allowing users to enter custom page titles and meta descriptions for each website page.
Whereas WordPress requires a plugin to be installed, called Yoast SEO, to implement keywords and meta descriptions.
E-commerce
E-commerce websites require a great platform for managing products and orders. Webflow has e-commerce capabilities built into the platform, and it will integrate with other software such as Shopify.
WordPress requires a plugin called Woocommerce to be installed to have an e-commerce store. The Woocommerce plugin is free but has paid features to enhance the full capabilities of an online store.
Webflow’s built-in SEO and e-commerce tools result in a cleaner and faster loading website. While the Yoast SEO and Woocommerce plugins for WordPress have been around for years and offer extensive features for an additional cost.
Integrations
Webflow’s integrations allows users to connect to other software and services, and implement visual components. Due to the limited integrations, you’ll likely have to rely on embed codes and other tools.
WordPress offers countless plugins with extensive settings and integrations, giving it much more flexibility and software connections. It’s easy to implement integrations with WordPress too.
Pricing
Webflow’s pricing varies based on the features you use, such as CMS items and e-commerce. You can get started for free but you’ll need to purchase the software in order to publish a website and use the full features.
The cost of the site plan is from $12 - $36 a month, the average plan being $16 a month.
E-commerce integration will be an additional $29 a month. An account plan is also required in Webflow which is free unless you plan to build three or more websites under that account. The biggest benefit with Webflow is that it includes hosting and an SSL certificate through AWS.
To summarize, the monthly pricing for a simple custom website built in Webflow is $16/month which includes CMS, hosting and an SSL certificate.
For WordPress, the core software is free to build a website but it does not include hosting or SSL which are required and must be purchased separately. Depending on your expertise, these may cost around $20 - $60 a month.
Remember, these cost estimates do not include your domain name, themes or plugin pricing.
Pros and Cons
As we summarize the differences between Webflow vs WordPress, the benefits ultimately come down to your experience and pricing preferences.
Webflow Pros and Cons
- Easiest CMS to build a website with; everything you need in one place
- Drag-and-drop builder with a front-end editor
- Clean and high quality code
- Users create cloneables for community use
- SEO and E-commerce built-in
- SSL Certificate and hosting included
- There is a cost to use its software
- Limited integrations offered natively
- Less number of theme options
WordPress Pros and Cons
- More complex to build a website with because you need a theme and plugins unless you know how to code
- Countless themes and plugins
- Slow website speed due to the amount of plugins and code integrated
- Hosting and security not included
- Free to use software
WebRenew uses Webflow to build custom websites. Although we can use WordPress, we prefer the efficiency and effectiveness of Webflow. The website speeds are fast and it’s simple to build for mobile responsiveness. The cost to build and maintain a website in Webflow is affordable.
