Reviews & comparisons – ColibriWP Blog https://colibriwp.com/blog WordPress know-how to boost your design skills Wed, 08 Feb 2023 08:28:42 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=5.7.14 https://colibriwp.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/favicon-01.png Reviews & comparisons – ColibriWP Blog https://colibriwp.com/blog 32 32 WordPress vs Weebly: a Detailed Comparison https://colibriwp.com/blog/wordpress-vs-weebly/ Thu, 18 Aug 2022 11:43:49 +0000 https://colibriwp.com/blog/?p=11135 If you’re in confusion about WordPress vs Weebly, you’ve landed in the right place. Our detailed comparison will provide everything you need to know before deciding which platforms you should go with.  In this article, we’ll cover:  What is WordPress? What is Weebly? Pros and cons of WordPress vs Weebly  WordPress vs Weebly: Detailed Comparison …
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If you’re in confusion about WordPress vs Weebly, you’ve landed in the right place. Our detailed comparison will provide everything you need to know before deciding which platforms you should go with. 

In this article, we’ll cover: 

  • What is WordPress?
  • What is Weebly?
  • Pros and cons of WordPress vs Weebly 
  • WordPress vs Weebly: Detailed Comparison 
  • WordPress or Weebly – Which is better for you?

Let’s get started with the mano-a-mano between WordPress and Weebly!

 

A Closer Look at WordPress vs Weebly 

What is WordPress?WordPress interface

WordPress is the most popular content management system (CMS). It’s an open source platform for any content creators planning to build professional blogs and websites.  WordPress is used by 64.3% of all the websites whose content management system we know. This is 43.0% of all websites. 

Initially, WordPress was mostly used to create blogs. Nonetheless, now you can use this platform to build any type of website you want such as personal or professional blogs, portfolios, company websites, eCommerce stores (using WooCommerce), and membership sites.

 

What is Weebly?

WeeblyWeebly is a popular website builder that allows you to create a website in a drag and drop interface.  

It is a tool that can be use to create any type of site, from blogs to online stores.

 

Both Weebly and WordPress are among the best platforms for blogging and website creation. If you already have a website of your own and are considering moving to Weebly or WordPress, LitExtension will help you perform that painlessly.  

 

WordPress vs Weebly: Pros & Cons

 

WordPress Pros: 

  • Access to 9,000 WordPress themes that you can use to create a website. These themes have free features, but you might need to upgrade if you want more advanced design options. Most of these themes come packed with templates for a variety of niches.
  • The WordPress community has created tons of plugins that provide extra functionalities to WordPress themes, from design capabilities to SEO, marketing, security, image optimization, and so many more. Some powerful WordPress plugins are drag and drop page builders (like Kubio and Colibri). Page builders are design tools that allow you to create a website by drag and drop starting from a base theme.
  • You don’t need any coding experience in order to create a site using WordPress.
  • There are tons of resources out there that can help you kick-off with website design: documentation, tutorials, blog articles, etc.
  • Most of the themes and plugins developers out there are offering product support.
  • Competitive pricing plans for the WordPress themes.
  • When you choose to use a page builder such as Kubio or Colibri, the free plan will allow for a lot of design freedom. If you don’t want to build a complex website, the free plan will do just great!

 

WordPress Cons:

  • Depending on the theme or plugin you use, sometimes support might be offered only to paying customers.
  • The learning curve can be a bit long.
  • You will need to buy hosting separately.

 

Weebly Pros: 

  • Free plan and competitively-priced premium plans: Weebly provides a free plan with enough tools to start building your website from the ground up. Its paid options run from $5/month to $38/month (billed annually).
  • Easy to use: It’s a piece of cake to learn to use Weebly. No programming skills are required because everything you need to nail it is to choose the suitable themes and drag-and-drop any features, images, or buttons into the right places. 
  • You can extend the functionalities of your site by using apps (for SEO, marketing, etc).
  • The Weebly plans include hosting as well.

 

Weebly Cons: 

  • Weebly branding visible for free plans.
  • Weebly ads get removed when a professional is acquired. 
  • Weebly has a small number of apps that can boost the functionalities of the website you design. Most of them are paid.

                                               

WordPress vs Weebly: Detailed Comparison 

Ease of Use

WordPress Ease of Use 

WordPress has an admin area where you can manage themes, plugins, media, general website settings, users, updates, and more. Things are pretty intuitive around here.The WordPress dashboard

The moment you enter any page or post, you will be using blocks with specific functionalities: text, images, slider, etc. You can drag and drop them to the canvas, then style them however you see fit.

You can easily save and publish pages and posts. You can preview a page on desktop, tablet and mobile as well. Most themes and builders allow you to create responsive websites.

At first, things can feel overwhelming in WordPress, there’s clearly a learning curve involved. But once you dig in a bit, things will be clear.

 

Weebly Ease of Use 

Weebly page Editor has a user-friendly drag and drop interface which doesn’t require much effort to get used to. 

The users, main site settings, and apps are managed inside the same interface, inside a different menu.

Weebly settings

 

Pricing 

WordPress Pricing 

Like I said before, most of the WordPress themes and builders out there are free to use. At the end of the day, WordPress is an open-source project.

If you use a page builder on top a theme (which is definitely recommended if you want to enjoy more design freedom), you can definitely find a free one that comes packed with tons of features and customization options (eg: Kubio).

Now, if you want to create a really unique site, with some advanced styling options, the theme prices can start as low as ~$40 per year. There are lifetime plans as well.

If you add extra functionalities to a site, via plugins, you can use free versions, or upgrades that can vary in price.

Hosting is also a cost that will add up.

Here’s the sine qua non of a WordPress site when using WordPress:  

  • Domain name: $12/year. 
  • Hosting: from $3.95/month. 
  • Plugins: $0 – $1,000 (ongoing or one-off charge). 
  • WordPress theme/builder: $0 – $90/year.

Aside from that, if you want to sell online, you’ll need an eCommerce-specific WordPress plugin, for instance, WooCommerce, Easy Digital Downloads, Ecwid, as well as several free and premium efficiency-enhancing features.

 

Weebly Pricing 

Weebly is one of the most favorable website builders in the market thanks to its affordability. In addition to four paid plans with monthly prices ranging from $5 to $38/month paid yearly, Weebly offers a free plan for websites. 

When it comes to a free plan, there will undoubtedly be restrictions on the features you can use. Your site will include advertisements, a Weebly’s default domain (example.weeblysite.com), files no larger than 10MB, and 500MB of storage space

Want to learn more about Weebly pricing? Check out Weebly Pricing: Detailed Explanation & Comparison [2022] now! 

 

Blogging

WordPress Blogging 

Compared to other platforms, WordPress may offer the most robust blogging options. It was initially designed as a blogging platform before progressively developing into a complete website builder. Up to this point, this platform has been the backbone of close to 43% of all websites worldwide

WordPress provides all the advanced tools you’ll ever need for blogging, including tags, categories, and a built-in commenting system

Besides, thousands of easy-to-install add-ons help to promote your website. You can collect leads, create contact forms, create subscriptions, automatically backup your site, and a whole lot more. What’s more, social media plugins are available for you to share and boost your content. No matter what you want to do, there’s a plugin for that. 

 

Weebly Blogging 

Weebly is a good option for blogging as well. Blog templates can be fully customized and adjusted to fit your goals. 

You can start outstanding blog sites thanks to full control over layout and post format. The essential navigation and interaction components that contemporary blog readers demand are provided with category, tag, and sidebar customization.

 

SEO 

WordPress SEO 

There are several built-in features that make optimizing your content for search significantly easier if you use WordPress as your content management system (CMS).

  • Permalink Structure: WordPress allows you to customize your URL permalinks for each of your posts and pages. You can also add a clear description of your page’s content as well as any relevant keywords, making your URL structure search-engine friendly.
  • Meta Description: Creating a unique search engine friendly meta description will not only help you enhance your ranking on Google but also increase the click-through rate. 
  • Categories and Tags: Both categories and tags assist you develop a better structure and allow Google to detect it while indexing your WordPress blog posts.
  • Lots of WordPress SEO plugins available, the most popular being Yoast, AIOSEO, and RankMath. Being known as a powerful plugin in WordPress, Yoast SEO has 5+ million active installations and gets 4.9/5 stars overall. Yoast SEO free version is available for everyone; however, you can upgrade to the premium one to get extra special features.  Yoast SEO makes sure your website complies with the most demanding technical SEO requirements. Furthermore, it provides you with the necessary tools to improve the readability and SEO of your content. 

 

Weebly SEO 

To help your blog posts perform better in search results and drive more visitors to your pages, URLs, title tags, meta descriptions, and alt text for pictures are available to be customized inside Weebly. For even better SEO-friendly articles, you can add personalized header and footer code to blog pages. 

Weebly also provides an essential function called 301 Redirects. This is a good improvement because broken links are an issue that search engines dislike. 

Besides, to minimize the negative effect of loading speed on your site’s SEO, Weebly has taken a further course of action. It compresses any large-sized images uploaded to boost ranking and smoothen the customer experience on your site. 

 

Flexibility 

WordPress Flexibility

With WordPress, you can fully utilize your creativity and professional coding skills to create a one-of-a-kind website. A distinct interface that reflects your unique style will undoubtedly be what people remember about you, distinguishing you from the rest of the crowd.

Furthermore, WordPress allows you to install extra plugins for your blog site for powerful functionality. This adaptability is also one of the reasons why so many people choose WordPress.

 

Weebly Flexibility 

Regarding flexibility, Weebly blogging may not come up to high-demanding customers’ expectations. 

Although the drag-and-drop interface simplifies things, it does not allow for much customization. 

I particularly don’t like the user experience behind editing each website element (image, text, etc).

 

Customer Support 

WordPress Customer Support 

WordPress has a large user community so you can learn from others. However, there is a ton of untested information coming from many sources. Therefore, you must sort the good from the bad. 

If you are good at self-education, WordPress’s online instructions will walk you through burning issues. The whole instructions are grouped into categories ranging from “Getting Started” to “Security,” making it easier to select the correct paper.

Also, each theme and plugin developer has its own documentation and support options.

 

Weebly Customer Support 

In general, Weebly offers adequate customer service. By clicking on “Support” at the top of your home page, you can visit the Weebly Support Center, which contains virtually everything you need to know to set up and maintain your website. 

For convenience, the guide articles are divided into areas such as eCommerce, Building Your Website, Your Account, and so on. Each area has several articles that will meet the demands of the majority of users. 

Additionally, emails and live chat are available for all plans. If you still need assistance, the Weebly community may be able to answer your queries. The community is very active, with moderators responding to many topics and providing extensive information. Most of the time, they’ll even ask for your store’s URL to double-check. 

 

WordPress vs Weebly: Which is better for you? 

WordPress is far superior as an open-source platform for any kind of website in the long run. Whereas, Weebly helps customers to easily create websites. Actually, it all depends on what you need the site for and how tech-savvy you are when it comes to website-building. 

You should choose Weebly if you have no experience making a portfolio or a blog before. It’s considerably easier to use right out of the box, and you can have your site up and running in minutes. Weebly will help you through the entire process from beginning to end. 

WordPress is ideal for anyone who wants to be in charge and learn how a website operates. It provides you with complete control over your website. You can add or delete any plugins you like, and even change the underlying code by hand in any way you desire. 

 

Lastly, we hope this article can help you to make a comparison between WordPress vs Weebly and decide which is better for you.

You should think long and hard about what your website needs and apply that to make up your mind. There is no universally right or wrong decision.

 

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Hosting Reviews: HostArmada https://colibriwp.com/blog/hosting-reviews-hostarmada/ Mon, 15 Nov 2021 08:39:11 +0000 https://colibriwp.com/blog/?p=8987 WordPress is a leading CMS for people around the globe due to its flexibility, ease of access, and vast community. Because of this fact, many providers out there have invested resources in creating specialized servers, environments, and tools to accommodate the ever-growing need of the average and advanced WordPress user. Picking the right host for…
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WordPress is a leading CMS for people around the globe due to its flexibility, ease of access, and vast community. Because of this fact, many providers out there have invested resources in creating specialized servers, environments, and tools to accommodate the ever-growing need of the average and advanced WordPress user.

Picking the right host for your WordPress website is vital. A good provider could make or break your site’s performance in search engine ranking and speed. 

Today, we will introduce you to a great new competitor in the web hosting field – HostArmada. They started in 2019 with the sole purpose of delivering a great hosting experience at a very reasonable price. Their team has over eight years of experience in the field. They are highly knowledgeable (especially in WordPress), which makes them a very good choice if you are new to this, or the technical aspects of WordPress seem overwhelming to you.

 

HostArmada Overview

HostArmada provides a professional, reliable, secure, and fully managed hosting service. Because WordPress is the most popular CMS out there, HostArmada lays heavy emphasis on WordPress hosting and has specialized their support agents to provide comprehensive assistance. Additionally, they have optimized servers for WordPress and implemented must-have tools, such as staging, cloning, and a One-click installer. They offer a 99.9% uptime guarantee and speed-enhancing features such as LiteSpeed and NGINX and a robust security system represented by Imunify360 – an outstanding security service.

HostArmada Performance

Performance is the metric people care about the most. Everyone loves a fast website, starting with Google and the rest of the search engines out there. Having a fast website means that your content will have higher ranking chances. Even the slightest edge is highly beneficial. 

Here is a result from a speed test we performed on the HostArmada plan, costing $5.39/mo.

hostarmada-speed-test

HostArmada was kind enough to provide us with a testing domain, and we used a completely fresh WordPress installation. As you can see from the result, the server responded in a mere 26 milliseconds and the fully loaded time was 286 milliseconds. That’s a fantastic result.

If you like the result, you should definitely check their fast wordpress hosting plans.

 

HostArmada Security

Security is the second most sought metric after speed. Some people may argue that it is even more significant as a secured website is far less susceptible to malware and will sustain a higher uptime/speed. To maintain a healthy and wholesome experience for their customers, HostArmada implemented a robust security system which includes the following:

  • Latest stable security and software updates
  • IP-based firewall which monitors all IP addresses connecting to the server
  • mod_security2 with custom rules that are updated daily based on the most recent exploits
  • Free Malware scan & removal
  • Free SSL certificates on all domains and sub-domains hosted on the server
  • Account Isolation ensuring all users are completely split from one another 
  • Advanced WAF with machine-learning rulest, which self-updates constantly to keep up with the latest application exploits
  • One-of-a-kind, IPS/IDS technology, collecting negation policies and proactively blocking known attacks
  • Two-factor Authentication for both cPanel and their Client Area

Of course, other benefits complement the ones above, but as they are too much to go over, we have included the ones we believe are most important.

HostArmada Technical Support

HostArmada’s technical team has a combined 35+ years of experience in web hosting. Despite being new on the market, they have hosting gurus that have worked in other web hosting companies before and have great insight on the market, where it’s going, and what the user needs and wants. 

As we mentioned above, all of HostArmada’s support agents are highly experienced and undergo intense WordPress training to provide the best possible support for the customers who experience technical issues with their website. They always go the extra mile even if the problem is beyond their scope of expertise. If you are having issues with your site’s speed and performance, be sure to contact them and request a review. Their professional WordPress support team will take the matter into their own hands and recommend or implement a solution to improve your website’s speed. 

They are available 24/7/365 over three support channels: Phone, Chat, and Ticket. All support offered by HostArmada is free of charge and included in the price of the hosting. Suppose you like to do things on your own. In that case, you can use their rich knowledge base or tutorial sections to get information about various web-hosting-related issues, open-source applications, WordPress, domains, and pretty much everything a web enthusiast may want to know.

Last Words

If you want to try something new, fresh, exciting, and with great potential, HostArmada is the place you can go to. They have great options for all types of websites, no matter their size. Their pricing is very competitive compared to the other web hosting providers on the already established market.

 

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Getspace Review – Hosting Services https://colibriwp.com/blog/getspace-review/ Mon, 28 Dec 2020 17:04:00 +0000 https://colibriwp.com/blog/?p=6415 When you build a site, hosting is a mandatory piece of the puzzle. There are a lot of hosting companies to choose from that vary in price and features. This time we‘re doing a review of a company called Getspace. They have big claims on their site: 21x times faster cloud servers. 100% uptime guaranteed.…
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When you build a site, hosting is a mandatory piece of the puzzle.

There are a lot of hosting companies to choose from that vary in price and features.

This time we‘re doing a review of a company called Getspace.

They have big claims on their site:

  • 21x times faster cloud servers.
  • 100% uptime guaranteed.
  • Powerful protection from DDOS attacks.

Let’s check them out.

 

Cutting edge technology

If you run an online business, you must know the importance of speed. Nobody wants to wait these days, if your page takes too much time to load, you’re going to lose customers.

In the old days, HDD was the most used data storage device. Probably there‘s no need to say this technology is quite out of date now. There are some hosts that still use it, though. Now new companies, like Getspace, are using SSD NVMe drives.

Next-generation SSD NVMe drives – this is what makes Getspace stand out from the crowd. SSD NVMe comes with much greater speed and less unpleasant crashes, it will take your high traffic projects or systems to a totally new performance level.

SSD tremendously reduces access time, which means users get the data faster. Of course, faster loading time means increased performance, higher conversion rate, and extra revenue. Also, because you’ll easily handle large files, you’ll receive some SEO juice, and increased chances to rank higher in Google search results.

Pros of using Getspace hosting services

  • CloudLinux

The hosted sites work with CloudLinux. This operating system can help you avoid problems that other users might face. With CloudLinux you‘re independent. It will improve your page stability and security by isolating you from other tenants.

  • Multiple plans to choose from. There are 3 main hosting categories: SSD hosting plans, VPS plans, and WordPress hosting plans. Depending on the type of project you need, each category has several plans, that start from 2.5€/month (+VAT) till 128€/month (+VAT), for virtual private servers.
  • the use of SSD NVMe drives to ensure a way better performance for your website
  • free SSL certificate
  • when you order SSD hosting, WordPress hosting, or VPS you get 100 GB cloud as a gift.

Cons for Getspace hosting

The Getspace support team answers relatively fast, yet there’s a “but”. Since Getspace is a company based in Europe, residents of the US and Canada might have to wait longer to get the answer they‘re looking for and you may have trouble getting full support during the most active hours.

Our take

As you can see, with Getspace there are many different options to pick from. They use cutting edge technology and CloudLinux to provide the highest levels of security, outstanding loading and transfer speed. We recommend you take them for a ride. If you’re not satisfied, you can benefit from their 14 days  money back guarantee.

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Cloudways Review – Managed WordPress Hosting https://colibriwp.com/blog/cloudways-review/ Fri, 16 Oct 2020 10:59:22 +0000 https://colibriwp.com/blog/?p=5876 It’s essential for every WordPress user to choose the right WordPress theme and necessary plugins for their business website. Similarly, selecting the right hosting for your WordPress site is equally essential because it helps your business website grow and prosper.  In this article, I’ll take you through a detailed overview of Cloudways with a closer…
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It’s essential for every WordPress user to choose the right WordPress theme and necessary plugins for their business website. Similarly, selecting the right hosting for your WordPress site is equally essential because it helps your business website grow and prosper. 

In this article, I’ll take you through a detailed overview of Cloudways with a closer look at key features that makes Cloudways a fast, unique, compelling, and above all, a proper hosting solution for your business.

Table of Content

 

Choosing the right hosting solution for your websites could be overwhelming mainly because of the many hosting providers out there. 

To make things easier for you, I will discuss Cloudways, a managed cloud hosting provider that comes with robust features, high performance, and faster speed, all at an affordable price. 

So let’s get started!

Cloudways Highlights:

  • 5 cloud providers (Google, Amazon, DigitalOcean, etc.)
  • A managed cloud hosting platform
  • Super-fast and secure managed servers
  • Free SSL certificates
  • Easy-to-use platform interface
  • Pay-as-you-go billing plans
  • Free WordPress migrator plugin
  • Site and server cloning
  • Affordable prices
  • Unlimited applications on a server
  • Powerful packages like Redis, Memcached, and Varnish
  • 24/7/365 customer support


Cons of Cloudways:

  • Doesn’t include email hosting

 

Cloudways Overview

Cloudways is a fully managed WordPress hosting provider that delivers all the essential tools a business needs for deploying and managing WordPress websites. It offers a simple and intuitive platform that is specially designed to maintain maximum performance, speed, and security.

Cloudways offers the choice of five top cloud infrastructure providers including DigitalOcean, Vultr, Linode, AWS, and Google Cloud. In practical terms, Cloudways takes care of all server configurations and removes hindrances while letting you focus on your business.

 

Cloudways Performance

Website performance is an essential factor in your business’s growth because a slow website generally results in a loss of traffic and conversions. Cloudways provides a simple solution where it enhances the cloud servers by integrating powerful caching technologies such as Redis and Varnish. As a result, you would see a dramatic improvement in your website’s performance.

To test this claim, I performed a site speed test using GTmetrix. For this, I installed three popular plugins (WooCommerce, Yoast, Elementor) and page builder framework on my test website. The website was hosted on a 1GB DigitalOcean server. Incidentally, this server costs around $10. 

And here are the results…

Cloudways performance

As you can judge for yourself, this is the fastest WordPress hosting.

 

Cloudways Security

Maintaining your website’s security might be the biggest challenge you can face as a WordPress website owner. While you are running your WordPress website, you must have noticed that the number of attacks has increased drastically which means you need a highly secure platform to have some peace of mind. 

Cloudways come with different security layers that make your server really difficult to penetrate. It wouldn’t be wrong to say that it provides you with just the right security tools to make your server and application secure at all levels.  

 

Salient Security Features:

  • A firewall that allows access only to specific ports.
  • SSH/SFTP logins to deal with brute force login attacks. 
  • Cloudways offers a free SSL certificate by Let’s Encrypt, along with the support for paid SSL certificates.
  • Two-factor Authentication (TFA) enabled by default.
  • Database security where you can whitelist the IP addresses that can access the database remotely.
  • End-to-end encryption for data transfer.

 

The Cloudways Platform

Deploying a cloud server like AWS can become quite tiresome and managing a WordPress application installed on these servers can often become a challenge even for seasoned developers. Cloudways makes server provisioning and configuration a lot easier.

 

With Cloudways Platform, you can quickly launch a cloud server on one of the 65+ data centers. You can even install unlimited WordPress applications on a single server without any extra charges with server specifications being the only real restriction. 

Cloudways platform

However, if you think you are hitting the specification limit, scaling server resources is a matter of a few clicks.

Cloudways offers a server management panel through which you can easily manage all the server-related configurations. You’ll find different sections on the panel, and each section delivers a separate set of server management functions.

Let’s take a brief look!

  • Master Credentials: You’ll find server access credentials (IP, username, and password) in this section.
  • Monitoring: You can monitor your server’s resources (RAM usage, CPU usage, disk usage, etc.).
  • Manage Services: You can manage core services and settings (Apache, NGINX, Varnish, etc.).
  • Settings and Packages: You can manage server-level settings (execution limit, upload size, etc.) and manage packages (Redis, Database & PHP versions, etc.).
  • Security: Manage security settings (whitelist IPs, SSH/SFTP, etc.).
  • Vertical Scaling: You can increase your server size in a few clicks.
  • Backups: You can manage backups (schedule time, backup frequency, etc.).
  • SMTP: You can configure SMTP services for your server.

Just like the server management panel, Cloudways offers an application management panel that allows you to manage several application-level settings and configurations. This also consists of different sections, and each section serves a different purpose.

 

  • Access Details: You’ll see your application URL, admin panel credentials, and DB access credentials.
  • Monitoring: You can monitor your application (traffic, PHP performance, analyzing logs, and more).
  • Domain Management: You can point to the primary domain and additional domains from here.
  • Cron Job Management: You can add a Cron job for your application.
  • SSL certificate: Install a free SSL certificate or bring your paid certificates without any issues.
  • Backup and Restore: Restore your files and database.
  • Deployment Via Git: Deploy code via Git.
  • Application Settings: Manage application settings for Varnish, SSH access, etc.
  • Migration Tools: Free WordPress migration plugin that helps you bring your application to the Cloudways Platform.
  • CloudwaysCDN: You can configure CloudwaysCDN easily from here.


As you can see, the Cloudways Platform enables you to invest time and energy in your business rather than maintaining complex servers.

Cloudways Support

Cloudways offers 24/7/365 free standard support to all users and aims to provide prompt assistance to your queries. You can contact the support team over live chat, create a ticket, use the Cloudways User Facebook group, and even refer to the detailed KB to resolve your query.

 

Final Thoughts!

Now you know how Cloudways helps your business grow and expand in this challenging digital world. We’ve discussed the key features that make Cloudways a better hosting option for SMBs.

No doubt, the Cloudways platform is powerful and robust, but to achieve peak performance, you need to know how to optimize the packages and features that it offers.

Cloudways offers a 3-day free trial. So give it a try and make your website faster.

 

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Webflow vs WordPress: Which One to Use for Your Digital Agency? https://colibriwp.com/blog/webflow-vs-wordpress/ Mon, 17 Aug 2020 06:50:19 +0000 https://colibriwp.com/blog/?p=5260 Webflow vs WordPress: game on!   Website builders have opened web development for the public. Practically anyone can build a beautiful website in a matter of hours with no coding skills.  Most website builders offer enough functionality to cover the needs of individual web designers. Yet, digital agencies require specific functionalities and advanced features to…
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Webflow vs WordPress: game on!

 

Website builders have opened web development for the public. Practically anyone can build a beautiful website in a matter of hours with no coding skills. 

Most website builders offer enough functionality to cover the needs of individual web designers. Yet, digital agencies require specific functionalities and advanced features to create websites for their clients. 

Webflow vs WordPress: Functionalities, Integrations and More

In this Webflow vs. WordPress review, we’re going to compare these two content management systems (CMSs) based on their functionalities, design options, speed, and other crucial aspects. After reading, you’ll have enough information to decide for yourself which platform is best for your digital agency.

 

Webflow: websites from scratch with no code 

webflow

Image Source: https://webflow.com/

Originally launched back in 2013, Webflow is a cloud-based website builder that allows users to design fully functioning websites with no coding knowledge. 

Although the platform is relatively young, it has become popular among web developers because it carries a decent level of customization. 

 

WordPress: powering 42% of the world’s websites 

wordpress

Image Source: https://wordpress.com/

WordPress.com is a powerful and flexible website builder that offers a high level of power and flexibility. Initially introduced in 2003, WordPress is a content management system that currently powers 42% of the internet. 

Now, as you’ve learned the basic information about the two content management systems, let’s compare WordPress and Webflow based on the following criteria: 

  • Functionality 
  • Templates and themes 
  • SEO 
  • Customer support 
  • Pricing 

 

1. Functionality 

Webflow offers many built-in functionalities, including a drag-and-drop page builder, intuitive editor, and responsive design capabilities. 

On the other side, WordPress is built on themes, templates, plugins, and builders (we’ll deal with these later on).

Now, let’s take a look at the main differences between the two:

  • Webflow lets you make edits on-page. In WordPress, you usually need to mix a theme and the built-in WordPress customizer. Some builders out there help you skip the WordPress customizer (see Colibri) and build everything in one place.
  • Webflow can be more expensive (even if you consider that they include free hosting, and in the WordPress case you need to buy it separately, after getting your website domain).
  • WordPress websites need various plugins, which can raise the overall costs.
  • WordPress has a huge community of developers and many free resources available.
  • Lots of integrations are available for WordPress (you might need those for marketing purposes, for example).

Both Webflow and WordPress:

  • Have lots of pre-made templates available
  • Make use of customizable designs 
  • Provide mobile responsiveness features
  • Can help with the design of an e-commerce website
  • Ensure media management
  • Need some extra-coding if you want a fancier website, with more complex functionalities.

 

2. Templates and themes 

Just like many other website builders, Webflow uses templates as a foundation. There are over 100 templates to choose from, including 40 free templates.

You can filter templates by industry, or look for premium vs free templates. Also, Webflow allows you to preview designs before making the final decision. 

webflow templates

Image Source: https://webflow.com/templates/new 

 

You will find a brief description of each template that tells you the type of website the template is best suited for. 

All of the templates are customizable and responsive which means that they automatically adapt to fit the size of the user device.  A great range of templates are suitable for dynamic content. 

For WordPress you have both themes and templates. Now, let’s be clear, in WordPress a theme ensures the design of your whole website, while the template deals with the layout of a single page on your site.

It’s helpful to use a VPN service to access plugins and themes that may be blocked in your country. According to PrivacyJournal, it’s helpful to use a VPN service to access plugins and themes that may be blocked in your country.

WordPress themes

 

3. SEO: built-in features vs plugins

Webflow comes with built-in SEO features, and you don’t need to install any additional software to start using them. 

You can add and edit metadata, create image alt text, and target keywords. Besides these core SEO functionalities, there is an automatic sitemap generation feature and customizable 301 redirects.  

WordPress allows you to optimize your website for search engines with specific plugins. Here is a list of the most popular SEO plugins that will help you accomplish your SEO tasks: 

  • All in One SEO Pack 
  • WP Rocket 
  • Yoast SEO 
  • MathRank
  • Autoptimize 
  • W3 Total Cache 

 

4. Third-party integrations

Third-party integrations with WordPress or Webflow websites are needed when you want to sync another platform or account with your website, allowing an open data exchange (eg: push emails to your email marketing software).

They can enhance your websites and unlock all kinds of functionalities. Many of them come in the shape of plugins and widgets.

Let’s look at some categories:

  • SEO (already mentioned above)
  • Email
  • Social media
  • Forms & Surveys
  • Landing pages
  • Security
  • Performance

And many more.

Because of a huge community, there are tons of plugins available out there for WordPress, see here.

In the Webflow case, there are fewer integrations available, if you want a different one than the listed ones, you will need to do some manual developer work (not funny, I’m telling you).

 

5. Customer support 

Webflow offers a quick email and live chat support services for subscribers. There is a free help center called Webflow University, where you can search for topics, tutorials, questions, and other educational materials.  

Also, there is a Webflow community forum where users post their questions and help others solve issues. 

Source: https://university.webflow.com 

WordPress offers customer support options for customers, as well as support forums and community support forums. Because the WordPress community is so big, you will find a lot of useful information in the WordPress community forums. 

 

6. Pricing 

Webflow’s pricing options can be a little confusing. There are two types of plans, Site plans and Account plans. Site plans start from $12 per month and include special eCommerce plans starting from $29 per month.  

If you’re a digital agency, you can check all Webflow’s pricing options here

Also, Webflow offers free individual plans under the Account subscription option. 

The WordPress website builder offers five subscription options.

You can choose a free version, but it’s fairly limited and doesn’t include any advanced features. Note that even though there is a free plan, you will have to purchase a domain, theme, plugins, and other services not included in the default WordPress builder. 

You can find the full WordPress pricing comparison here

wordpress pricing

Image Source: https://wordpress.com/pricing/ 

 

Wrap up: Webflow vs WordPress

Which One to Use for Your Digital Agency?

Now, I don’t want to be biased. Both Webflow and WordPress are amazing tools (more info on the subject in this thorough video).

In certain situations, one tool would fit an audience better than the other one.

For example, the e-commerce settings aren’t yet bulletproof in Webflow, so, I would definitely recommend WordPress for starting your online shop.

If you are a designer or developer, you might feel more at home using Webflow..somehow it might remind you of Photoshop.

In terms of resources, there is a whole more knowledge put there about WordPress, and tons of plugins and integrations.

In the end, it’s your choice, it all depends on your background and the complexity of your project.

Now, more bloggers, small businesses, and Fortune 500 companies use WordPress than all other options combined. That says a lot, doesn’t it?

The Webflow vs WordPress battle ain’t over yet. Each product is evolving, the communities are evolving. We’ll be here to watch, but also evolve. Wanna find out about our past and future projects? Check out this article from HostingAdvice about our projects: Extend Themes and Colibri.

 

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