Top 7 Cheapest Website Builders in 2023: From $1/month

IONOS isn’t the easiest website builder to use, demonstrated by its low score of 2.8 out of 5 in our ease of use testing. Its editor is arranged in sections and, even though this ensures your website design stays nice and tidy, it can be frustrating when trying to move things around. Overall, this makes the editing experience feel restrictive.

In general, our testers had the impression that IONOS’s ease of use was more for efficiency than for sparking any love of website building in the user.

One tester said:

“It definitely feels like a website builder run by a company that doesn’t really care about website building, more just pumping out a functional product.”

On the other hand, it is very easy to add additional pages and expand your website. Plus, each new page is a blank canvas, meaning you can structure it however you like. This is great if you like to have a bit more control over your design, but it could pose problems if you just want to get your website up and running as quickly as possible.

IONOS offers two different types of pricing plans: one for website builders, and one for ecommerce stores. Both have plans that begin at $1 per month and, if you opt for the website builder plan, you can still add an additional store feature if you want to.

There are three website builder plans to choose from:

• Starter: $5 per month
• Plus: $1 per month
• Pro: $15 per month
• Pro (with an online store): $25 per month

It’s worth noting that these are introductory prices, meaning that when you renew your plan for the second year, the price will increase. This increases the yearly cost of the Starter plan to $9, the Plus plan to $15, and the Pro plan to $25 per month. If you choose the online store version, the renewal prices are $19 for the Starter plan, $25 for the Plus plan, and $50 for the Pro plan.

As we mentioned, having the cheapest prices doesn’t automatically make it the best value for money option. Unfortunately, its $1 per month pricing and feature set don’t match up well against its competitors.

Unfortunately, IONOS isn’t known for its impressive design features. Users reported that the templates on offer feel outdated, although there is a theme for almost every industry you can think of. However, after our recent testing, we can say IONOS has made a slight improvement to its template designs, rising from a 3 to a 4 out of 5, raising IONOS’s overall design functionality score by 4%, from a 2.5 to a 2.6 out of 5.

While its templates may have improved slightly from last year, getting creative control with this website builder is still tricky. Customization is limited, and you’re often restricted by the template you’ve chosen, unlike Squarespace.

Despite its disappointing designs, 1&1 IONOS does come equipped with a small but good set of tools to help small businesses get online. It comes with a free domain for the first year, a personal email account, and robust SEO tools to help your business grow. In our research, IONOS’s feature score actually increased by 11.2% from last year, from 2 to 2.2 out of 5.

The MyWebsite Now builder is specifically designed to help beginners get online quickly. It’s ideal if you aren’t bothered about creating a website with all the bells and whistles attached, but instead, want something functional to promote your business.

You can sell online with IONOS through four plans, and the online store-only Expert plan starts at $35 per month.

With the beginning Starter plan, you get to sell 500 products; a free domain for one year; integrated payment and shipping methods; cross-platform selling with social media sites, like Facebook and Instagram; and marketing Radar software to track the activity of your competitors.

Thanks to its grid-based drag-and-drop editor, Hostinger is one of the easiest builders to use, scoring 3.9 out of 5 in our ease-of-use testing. It allows a good amount of creative freedom, without everything becoming too overwhelming. As one of our in-house testers said:

“Drag and drop when adding elements made it highly customizable while also keeping things tidy.”

This is perfect if you’re looking for a straightforward, no-frills website to accompany your business.

However, the reason for its simplicity is that it isn’t as feature-rich as some of the other builders out there. It provides the basics, but if you want anything advanced, you’ll need to have a bit of coding knowledge to get there –  not exactly what we’d call beginner-friendly!

Hostinger performs well in terms of value for money, scoring 4 out of 5 in this category (though this is a fall of -4.8% from last year’s score of 4.2 out of 5).  It also offers a 30-day money-back guarantee, so you can start building your website risk-free.

There is only one plan to choose from:

• Website: $2.99 per month

Keep an eye on Hostinger’s prices because it often runs sales, reducing the total cost by up to 75%.

Hostinger comes with a collection of stylish and mobile-optimized templates that are perfect for promoting small businesses. It also gives you the option to build one from scratch, which is ideal if you want to put your brand identity center stage.

Hostinger used to stumble when it came to customization possibilities. To keep things simple, you couldn’t do too much to your templates to make them stand out from the crowd. It was the trade-off for the easy-to-use editor. But in our research, Hostinger shot up by a dramatic 16% in design functionality, going from a 3.1 to a 3.6 out of 5 since we last tested it.

Its templates jumped from 3 all the way to a perfect 5 out of 5’s, and its aesthetic capabilities rose 200% from 1 to a 3 out of 5. You can use visual guides and dynamic columns to snap elements exactly where you want them, which is helpful for beginners who are new to web building.

Because it’s such a new website builder, Hostingers’s stock of features is slightly limited, and it doesn’t come with an app market, relying solely on Zapier for all third-party integrations. This is why it only scored 2.8 out of 5 for this category in our research, though this is once again a 16% rise from when we last tested it.

However, its cheapest Website plan does include a free email address for three months, a free domain for one year, basic SEO tools to help with growth, Google Analytics integration, and unlimited storage space and bandwidth. Not bad for just $2.99 per month!

All Hostinger’s plans come with a set of unique AI tools that make it feel like a contemporary builder. These include an AI writer for acing keyword-rich copy as well as a logo builder that’s super useful if you need to keep costs down and don’t want to hire a designer.

Like IONOS, you can list up to 500 products on Hostingers online store option. However, unlike other providers, there’s no option to upgrade to get more space.

You also get a free domain and free unlimited SSL certificates.

GoDaddy is super beginner-friendly because it does most of the hard work for you. It uses Artificial Design Intelligence (ADI), which asks you a few questions, then uses your answers to create a personalized website for you. That’s why it scored an impressive 4.1 out of 5 in our ease of use testing, with one user commenting:

“It was easy to use. I could find everything I needed to find. If I needed to make a simple website for a business, this is the one I would choose.”

The ADI builder means that your template comes with relevant features already built-in, and you can jump straight into making it your own, filling out your own content before publishing.

GoDaddy comes with a free plan in addition to its four premium pricing plans, all of which have a one-month free trial. This allows you to test it out risk-free. The cheapest premium plan costs $9.99 per month when you pay annually:

• Basic: $9.99 per month
• Premium: $14.99 per month
• Commerce: $16.99 per month
• Commerce Plus: $29.99 per month

While the Basic plan gives you a decent set of tools, it’s designed for very basic websites. Due to its lack of SEO tools, limited social media integrations, and restrictive appointment features, most small businesses are likely to feel its limitations.

With GoDaddy, you don’t start off by choosing your own template, because your site is created for you through the ADI editor. However, that doesn’t mean you’re limited to what it chooses for you, because you can switch up your layout and design pretty easily. Customization is limited, so complex branding will be a struggle, but it’s enough to put your own stamp on your site.

GoDaddy’s overall design functionality score took a small dip in our research based on last year’s scores, falling -5.8% overall from 4.3 to a 4.1 out of 5. This was due to a lack of template updates and mobile optimization, two factors of high importance for our users.

GoDaddy is designed to support entrepreneurs and small businesses, which is clear in its suite of marketing tools. GoDaddy Insight is particularly useful as it ranks your site by comparing it to similar businesses, and provides a custom action plan to help you improve.

However, unless you’re a brand new small business, you may find the features on the cheapest plan limiting. A big let down is a lack of recurring online appointment bookings, as well as having no free domain!

However, while GoDaddy’s overall feature score has fallen -6.7% from 3.3 to a  3.1 out of 5, it has made some improvements by adding a logo maker and the ability to add customer testimonials to your site.

Since a 2022 revamp of its ecommerce options, GoDaddy actually has quite a wide range of sales features available on its online store builder. These won’t be to the same level of depth as Shopify or Wix, but users will be surprised at the sheer breadth of options GoDaddy allows you to do.

You can have up to 5,000 products to sell, plus the GoDaddy Insights helps you keep track of all your purchases. The Marketplace feature lets you sell across Amazon, Etsy, and more – and GoDaddy also has no transaction payments!

The lack of any real scalability is a downside, as are the general lack of features GoDaddy suffers from. In our research, we gave GoDaddy an overall ecommerce score of 3 out of 5.

Despite being a very powerful, feature-heavy platform, Shopify is pretty user-friendly. For some, it might take a little longer to understand, but you can build a detailed website with Shopify. As one of our testers said:

“It’s good for people who are willing to invest a lot of time and money to build something that is professional and scalable.”

In our research, we gave it a 4 out of 5 for ease of use, putting Shopify just behind GoDaddy in this category.

A large part of Shopify’s modus operandi is its app market. Most functions and features that aren’t immediately found in the in-editor navigation bar can be downloaded from the app store.

Shopify is a pretty advanced ecommerce platform, and it shows in its pricing. While there’s no free plan, it does provide a three-day free trial on all plans, and $1 per month for three months on the Basic plan. Its cheapest plan costs $29 per month:

• Shopify Basic: $29 per month
• Shopify: $79 per month
• Advanced Shopify: $299 per month

The prices increase quickly between plans, so it’s best to think ahead before committing.

If you want to start selling immediately and don’t need a fancy store, then the Starter plan might be for you. You can only sell on social media, but with monetized links and all the robust sales features of a Shopify store, it’s definitely worth it for some. Despite this, Shopify’s plans are still pretty expensive which is why it scores 3 out of 5 in our value for money research.

All of Shopify’s designs are created specifically for online stores.

There are nine free themes, but most of them need to be purchased – the cheapest of these costs around $100, with the most expensive costing $180. If you don’t like any of Shopify’s free themes, this is a big upfront cost that you’ll need to budget for.

In terms of design, Shopify’s themes look great, scoring 4 out of 5 in our design functionality research.

They’re all mobile responsive, cover a range of industries, and some come with multiple styles to choose from. Themes are tailored to specific industries, with relevant features automatically included.

While it is primarily an online store-building platform, you can still build a non-ecommerce website on Shopify (though we wouldn’t advise it). Shopify had a near 10% rise in its score for website features from last year. This was due to an update of its internal features offered such as onsite testimonials, audio uploads, and product comparison functionality.

Shopify’s greatest asset is its huge app store – it’s pretty reliant on third-party integrations, so chances are you’ll need to install at least a few apps to get the most out of your store. We recommend browsing Shopify’s app store and adding up which apps you might need to get an idea of the extra costs to budget. In our research, we gave its app store a perfect 5 out of 5!

Shopify is a powerful online store builder that comes packed with features. It’s also our top-rated provider for ecommerce in our research. On the cheapest plan, you can expect:

• Two staff accounts
• Multichannel selling across marketplaces and social media
• Inventory syncing with up to four locations
• Abandoned cart recovery
• Discount codes
• Gift cards
• Shipping discounts
• Print shipping labels
• Fraud analysis
• Shopify POS Lite – accept in-person payments
• Sell in 133 currencies and up to 20 languages

There are even more exciting features on the advanced plans, including real-time shipping rates, manual foreign exchange rates, and professional reports. We gave it a 4.7out of 5 for sales features in our research, a rise of 4.2% from 4.5 since last year.

Wix is a beginner-friendly website builder with an intuitive drag-and-drop editor. With a comprehensive set of features for nearly anything you could imagine, Wix makes it easy to create the website you want. As one of our testers said:

“So many elements are available to add. Everything is there premade and you only have to customize it for your site”

We should mention that while Wix is easy to use, it can be daunting for beginners because it gives you so many features and options! However, it also offers helpful hints and tips as you build, too, so you can just follow Wix’s lead. In our research, it got joint first for ease of use with a score of 4.4 out of 5.

Wix has four premium plans for building a website, with the first starting at $16 per month. This is on the rather expensive side on this list, and Wix only gets a value for money score of 3 out of 5, down -11.8% from last year’s 3.4. The four plans are:

• Light: $16 per month
• Core: $27 per month
• Business: $32 per month
• Business Elite: $159 per month

There’s also an additional Enterprise plan tailored for large-scale businesses that need custom plans.

While these plans are a little pricey, our independent research shows that Wix does indeed offer the best website building service. Its low value for money score comes down to a lack of features offered when prices rose due to economic factors. However, if you want a good deal, Wix is offering our readers an exclusive 10% off when using GET10! at checkout.

Additionally, Wix also has a free plan that you can use indefinitely! Naturally, there are some caveats, like having to use a Wix domain name and have Wix adverts displayed on your site. You also can’t sell online and you won’t have access to Google Analytics.

Wix has around 500 templates to choose from and they cover a wide range of industries and niches, from fashion to portfolios and sports – even CBD!

You also get free reign over your template’s customization – you can change fonts, colors, and the layout as much as you like. This can be great for creating a unique brand, but can also be overwhelming, and result in a cluttered design if you’re not used to best practices. That being said, Wix actually improved their design score from last year by 4.5%, rising from 4.5 to 4.6 out of 5, thanks to improved template offerings and UX.

Wix has an absurdly good range of features for all occasions, from booking appointments, pop-ups, displaying videos, and more. The ADI function can even build the website for you by just asking a few questions. Wix has the highest score of website features of any builder we’ve tested with a 4.8 out of 5.

With the Light plan for $16 per month (or $14.40 is use code GET1O!), you get 2GB of storage and 30 video minutes to put on your website. Recent improvements made to the provider include Semrush integration, allowing you to keyword search directly from the platform. This is a massive ease of convenience for users who can now use built-in SEO tools to optimize their site.

Of Wix’s four plans, three allow online selling. The cheapest costs $27 per month when you choose to pay annually, or you can select a different plan:

• Core: $27 per month
• Business: $32 per month
• Business Elite: $159 per month

Wix’s cheapest Core plan is designed for new or small online stores, providing basic ecommerce tools to get you started. These include:

• Up to 50,000 products
• 20GB storage space
• 5 hours allowance of video on site
• Sell on social channels

You also have access to advanced tools that will help you grow your store, including abandoned cart recovery, customer accounts, and $300 worth of ad vouchers.

In the past, Squarespace received a bad rap for its ease of use, however, in recent months it’s worked hard to simplify its editor. One tester compared it to Wix and said:

“My page ended up looking so much sleeker and neater than when I used Wix.”

As a result, it’s now ranked as one of our easiest website builders to use, scoring 4.4 out of 5 in our user testing. That’s a massive 11% increase from its previous rating!

Its editor uses rows to organize its designs, giving you the ability to reorganize elements within a section. This might be too restrictive if you like free reign to drag-and-drop wherever you please, but it’s great for those with little design experience, and who want to keep their website tidy and attractive.

As we mentioned, Squarespace is our best-rated builder for value for money in our research with 4.6 out of 5. Unfortunately, Squarespace doesn’t offer a free plan, but it does give users a 14-day free trial. This is great if you want to give it a go and see if it’s right for you, but you’ll first need to upgrade to one of its four paid plans to publish your website and set it live.

Its annual plans range from $16 to $49 per month if you choose to pay the full cost upfront:

• Personal: $16 per month
• Business: $23 per month
• Basic Commerce: $27 per month
• Advanced Commerce: $49 per month

If $16 per month sounds a little pricey to you, we’ve got some good news: you can get 10% off the full price when you use our exclusive WBE discount code. Simply enter the code ‘WBE’ at checkout, and you’ll reduce your monthly payments to $14.40.

This is where Squarespace earns its crown. It’s the reigning monarch of stunning visual design and all of its templates are designed to support high-resolution media. Unsurprisingly, it has the highest score of design overall in our rankings with 4.7 out of 5, with its UX design earning a perfect 5 out of 5. Its templates will look beautiful regardless of the device they’re being viewed on and, unlike other builders, such as Shopify, they’re all free.

It is worth noting that you won’t be able to edit your website’s base code if you’re on the Personal plan. This kind of advanced customization is only available from the Business plan up. If you’re a beginner, this limitation will give you a safety net, so you won’t ever accidentally edit the code by mistake and affect your website’s stylish look!

All of Squarespace’s plans come with a healthy dose of premium features, all of which are usually designed in-house, so they’re purpose-made to integrate with your website. Of course, the more expensive your plan is, the more features you’ll have access to.

 

The Personal plan benefits from a fantastic set of blogging tools, high-quality SEO features, and space for up to two website contributors. Its basic analytics also give you a good overview of your performance.

If you need any additional functionality, be sure to take a look at Squarespace’s extensions library. This is the equivalent of an app store and gives you access to plugins such as Delighted, Quickbooks, Mailchimp, and Smart SEO. Major improvements were made to it since last year, and it raised Squarespace’s overall feature score by 4% from a 4.4 to a 4.6 out of 5.

The cheapest way to sell online with Squarespace is with the Business plan for $23 per month. With it, you’ll get access to an array of ecommerce features, albeit these are a little basic. You get unlimited products and can accept online payments, but do be warned there’s a 3% transaction fee on all sales. It’s still a great site for those wanting to start a small business, and users can always upgrade to the Basic Commerce plan for $27 per month if they want a full, ecommerce platform.

In our research, we gave Squarespace a 4.4 out of 5 for ecommerce overall, a slight drop of -2.3% from last year’s score, due to a lack of additional features when compared with Wix and Shopify.

Square Online is easy to use, making it a great choice for beginners or for sellers eager to start making money quickly. The setup process is quick and simple and helps you along by asking questions about your business so it can tailor your site to your needs.

However, things do get trickier once you enter the editor. This is because Square uses its own terminology for well-known ecommerce features, and sometimes it’s difficult to find the element you’re looking for among the many tabs in the toolbar.

Once you’re familiar with it, it couldn’t be easier to get your store up and running. One of our testers said:

“It gave you just the right amount of options, it never felt like it was overloading you. This always makes the process easier when you’re not getting overwhelmed with choice.”

Square Online has a free plan, and it’s immediately better than others based on the fact that you can sell an unlimited number of products.

To remove adverts from your storefront, you’ll need to choose one of Square Online’s two premium plans, which start at $29 per month when you pay annually:

• Plus: $29 per month
• Premium: $79 per month

We should also mention that each of the plans comes with different transaction fees, too. On the free and Plus plans you can expect to pay 2.9% + $0.30 on each payment, whereas the Premium plan has a fee of 2.6% + $0.30.

The cheapest Plus plan removes adverts and provides a free domain for one year, or you can connect to your own custom domain if you have one. Other features on this plan include Instagram integration, Square POS syncing, curbside pickup, order status text alerts for customers, gift cards, and more.

Square Online did not score well for design in our research, only getting a 2.6 out of 5. It doesn’t start you off by choosing a template – instead, it creates a tailored store for you based on the information you provide during setup. This means you end up with a store that follows the best ecommerce practices for your industry, but very little creative freedom.

While predominantly an ecommerce platform, Square does still have a range of features that are important for any type of website. In our research, Square actually rose by 6.7% from last year for website features, from 3.7 to 3.9 out of 5. This is due to great improvements made to its app and widget store, which rose by 50% from a 2 to a 3 out of 5.

However, Square was the only ecommerce builder to see a reduction in Sitespeed performance, decreasing by 10% since last year.

Square Online provides the usual ecommerce necessities, such as inventory management, shipping tools, and gift card creation. However, it reserves the advanced features for the more expensive plans, such as abandoned cart recovery and shipping discounts.

It also throws in some great bonus features, which shows that Square Online is paying attention to sellers’ needs and moving with the times. Examples include order text alerts, curbside pickup, and in-store customization, which lets customers edit their orders and set their pickup hours. All of these features are available on the cheapest plan.