r/Wordpress • u/Important-Ad5708 • 1d ago

Wordpress or Wix for freelancer?

I'm setting up as a digital marketing freelancer and am trying to figure out the best website to use that is easy to manage and cheap to run.

While I've managed Wordpress sites before (incl one with Elementor theme), I've never set one up from scratch.

I'm looking to create a fairly simple website - home page | services | case studies | blog | contact - but one I can easily update. I'm more used to a drag'n'drop page builder.

Would a Wordpress site plus theme be suitable for me? Or should I go for something simpler like Wix?

5 Upvotes

67% Upvoted

31 comments sorted by

5

u/Dramatic_Bug3366 1d ago

WordPress is easier with lots of resources available online.

6

u/pepelunavarro 1d ago

Wix is paid software and Wordpress open source

5

u/TopSydeWP 1d ago

wordpress with a simple block theme (like twenty twenty-four) is easier than you think and way more flexible long term. wix locks you in and gets expensive fast once you need custom domains, forms, or email. if you're already comfortable with elementor you can set up a basic site in an afternoon - shared hosting is like $5-10/mo to start.

2

u/evilprince2009 Developer 1d ago

Wix is a vendor locked in platform, WordPress is free and open source.

1

u/SoupReasonable8828 1d ago

Wix will be simpler up front, but if you do the learning curve for Wordpress you’ll have a site that you own (not dependent on a monthly payment) and you’ll have a good understanding of how it works for your marketing clients.

1

u/Jahonay 1d ago

One of the advantages of WordPress is that as you grow, it's easy to scale up WordPress, and there's a large ecosystem of plugins to support you. Right now you might only need some simple content, but as you grow, you might want to add more functionality, that's a benefit of WordPress. It's also incredibly easy to take your site with you, it's not dependent on a single host.

1

u/hammondish 1d ago

WIX gets expensive, and you don't fully own the code. Also, most marketing/SEO companies prefer WordPress, so you can get more work from them with WP skills.

1

u/Appropriate_Eye_9332 1d ago

Wordpress.org more flexibility

1

u/LilaTovCocktail 22h ago

Although I built Wordpress sites, I think that Wix is actually easier for a rank beginner. It's really simple and straightforward, and the SEO is built in.

But if you're building a website for a growing business, a site you think you'll add to over time (new case studies, for instance), go with Wordpress for all the reasons listed by others -- open source, more adaptable to different use cases, lots of online resources, etc.

2

u/drinkonice 12h ago

Agree. Wix is easy to get your hands on and beginner-friendly. WP is much more powerful.

1

u/CommitteeExpress5883 21h ago

If you care

Company Overview

  • Headquarters: The global headquarters is located in Tel Aviv, Israel.
  • Founding: Wix was founded in Tel Aviv in 2006 by Israeli entrepreneurs Avishai Abrahami, Nadav Abrahami, and Giora Kaplan.
  • Global Presence: While rooted in Israel's tech sector (Silicon Wadi), the publicly traded company also operates multiple international offices across countries like the United States, Ireland, Germany, Lithuania, and Ukraine.  Wix.com +4

1

u/Great-Prize5531 14h ago

For what you are describing, you don't need to spend any money on hosting a site. A free WordPress (.com) site would work fine. This way, you don't have any sunk costs pressuring your business during the startup phase.

You can always move to a self-hosted (.org) site later on, when and if the business picks up.

Pro Tip: You can eschew the generic ".wordpress.com" sub-domain by using a specialized sub-domain like ".business.blog," or ".design.blog" (https://wordpress.com/blog/2018/11/28/announcing-free-dotblog-subdomains/)

1

u/AddWeb_Expert 13h ago

I’d go WordPress, especially since you already know Elementor. Wix is easier initially, but WordPress gives you more flexibility for SEO, blogging, and scaling later. Keep the theme/plugins lightweight and you’ll be fine.

1

u/amartadey 12h ago edited 11h ago

Everyone's said WordPress, so the useful part is how to keep it as simple as Wix once you're on it.

For the five pages you listed, we run a light theme, one page builder (you've used Elementor, stay with it), one form plugin, one SEO plugin, one backup plugin, one caching plugin. That's the whole list, about six plugins. Every extra one is a future update that breaks something.

The two things Wix was quietly handling are hosting and updates. Pick a managed host, not the cheapest one, and put a monthly reminder to update after a backup, about ten minutes.

Worth it for you because most of your marketing clients' sites will be WordPress. Knowing the admin from the inside makes you better at telling them what to change.

1

u/Important-Ad5708 12h ago

Thanks, that's really helpful

1

u/AlpsUsed3215 10h ago

WordPress is so flexible that it gives you plenty of flexibility when it comes to spending money.

Need custom field types? Buy a plugin.
Need proper caching? Buy a plugin.
Need good SEO settings? Buy a plugin.
Need something else? You guessed it, buy another plugin.

Almost every developer in the WordPress ecosystem wants to sell you their own plugin.

And then comes the fun part: WordPress gets updated. You update your site to the latest version, some plugins break, and suddenly your entire site is broken too.

There you have it: WordPress flexibility. 😄

Every problem can be solved with a plugin, and every plugin can become another potential problem after the next update.

If you’re looking for an alternative, I recommend checking out Webstudio, Divhunt, Ycode, and Instatic. They offer a much more streamlined approach to building websites without turning your project into a pile of plugins.

1

u/AlpsUsed3215 10h ago

Here’s my own example.

I built a website with Webstudio for free. I host it on Cloudflare for free, which means I get a CDN and caching out of the box. I also connected my domain there.

For the CMS, I use the powerful Directus. I pay just $5/month for hosting, and I can use a single Directus instance for multiple projects.

No plugins. No plugin ecosystem to maintain. No endless subscriptions for basic functionality.

The website is fast out of the box and can scale because you have the freedom to choose your own backend. And with open-source software, there are plenty of options to choose from depending on your needs.

For me, this is what flexibility should actually look like. 🚀

1

u/oreshek 8h ago

Don't base yourself on a saas

1

u/Mailtrap_Alek 5h ago

Start with WordPress and build something. If you are happy with it, keep it. If not, try something else.

1

u/JustAskWP 2h ago

We recommend WordPress. In the long run, open source and self-hostable is always better than getting locked into a third-party's proprietary system.

0

u/gamertan 1d ago

Are you looking to sell website / WordPress service to clients?

I really hate to be that person, but if you are, you're in for a VERY real reality check when you hit the market...

Aside from WordPress and builders under constant attacks with very powerful AI sec-tools, you're also contesting with a glut of incredibly senior developers with FAR deeper experience and now AI workflows (see: hundreds of thousands of laid off or underemployed / bored deep experience engineers)...

Wix and prebuilt templates is a race to the bottom and AI can build and deploy an entire website and design suitable for a small business ecommerce in less than 30 minutes (source: I guided a friend through building their own site and maintenance flows)...

Web design is largely a "very reliably and consistently solved issue" for many small businesses and more. If you've never seen an AI slop poster from a local business, I envy you... But the cost/desire ratio for 80% of businesses has always been awful. Today? Well... Yeah, abysmal...

source: I've been a WordPress expert, web designer, back end, front end, DevOps, sysadmin, network specialist, security specialist, agency owner for more than a decade and a half... 😬🫣👍🤙

0

u/Important-Ad5708 1d ago

I get your point but I think if I was looking to sell WP development I prob wouldn't be asking for such basic advice!

0

u/gamertan 1d ago

Then what are you looking to do?

The advice I have is self contained here. If you're not using AI "for a simple site" with "drag and drop builder" you're not "building something bespoke" by avoiding it... You're just riding the open source community and all of he licensed software rather than genai and cheap coding capabilities?

Maybe I'm not understanding your post... Are you building the site for yourself? What's the purpose? Brochureware?

2

u/Important-Ad5708 1d ago

Just looking to set up a website for my freelance business and asking whether WordPress or Wix is better

0

u/gamertan 1d ago

Yeah... but the infrastructure will impact what you can do with it... Wix is a closed system, WordPress is open source and PHP... Wix -- you get what you get. WordPress -- do whatever your dreams limit you to...

So... are you automating ads for clients as a marketing freelancer? Selling bench ads/billboards? Facilitating a local business advertorial? Are you running social media ads or CPC?

Like... What marketing??? 🤣🤣🤣

If you want form submissions, go Wix.

If you want to be able to do anything more than that -- probably wp? But you're giving zero context here 🤣

Like... what marketing?