If you’re looking for a Weebly VS WordPress comparison, you’re likely conflicted on which of the two tools are going to be best for creating a high-end website for the long term. Such contemplations make sense - after all, when speaking about Weebly or WordPress, one of the first things that you will find out is the fact that both platforms are rather different from one another.
To be more specific, while Weebly is a traditional website builder, WordPress is actually a content management system. We’ll get into the details in due time, but for now, suffice to say that both platforms offer a very different website creation experience!
Before we get to the good stuff, though, we need to establish some rules - how should you go about comparing WordPress VS Weebly if there are no set criteria that would allow you to do so, right?
Also, remember to check out a shorter and more-straightforward version of this article - you can find it here.
Table of Contents
Weebly VS WordPress: Comparison Criteria
Now, I know what you might be thinking - I have my own criteria for comparing Weebly VS WordPress, so why should I follow this guide?!
Well, probably the biggest reason would be the fact that we won’t be discussing both site creation tools from the perspective of MY criteria - instead, we’ll be looking at aspects that are universally seen as the most important things that need to be looked at when searching for a high-end site builder for yourself.
Table: Some general information about Weebly and WordPress
These aspects are uptime & site speed, feature variety, eCommerce functionality, ease of use, templates, and pricing. Let’s take a closer look at each one of these.
- Uptime & Site Speed. Uptime is, undeniably, the most important aspect of a reliable site creation platform, followed closely by site loading speed. By popular belief (my own one included), these are the two things that should be the first ones that you look into, no matter if it’s a Weebly VS WordPress comparison, or some other one. After all, uptime will directly determine the period of time that your website can be found and accessed online, while site speed will dictate the amount of time the potential visitor will have to wait in order for everything to load. Obviously, two crucial factors to consider!
- Feature Variety. Feature variety can refer to two big things - either the number of different, topic-specific features that a builder has, or the flexibility of this tool when it comes to creating a multi-layered website (say, an eCommerce store with blogging and gallery sections). It’s an aspect that will determine the potential of the website creation platform, in the long run - something that is crucial to look into, both in this Weebly VS WordPress comparison, and in any other source that you might be using in order to determine the best site building tool for yourself.
- eCommerce Functionality. By now, I probably don’t need to tell you this, but eCommerce is one of the main reasons why people around the world are looking for simple and straightforward ways of how to create the best possible website for themselves. It might even be the main reason why you yourself are trying to decide - WordPress or Weebly? Weebly or WordPress? Whatever the case might actually be, it’s safe to say that any high-end website builder should always possess the capabilities of allowing its users to create eCommerce sites, whether dedicated, integrated ones, or else.
- Ease of Use. Are you looking for a website builder that would be easy to use? Well, you’re not alone - being the main selling point of this specific site creation tool category, simplicity is something that is usually appreciated more than anything else, in regards to the best website builders on the current market. It makes perfect sense, though - this factor alone determines the number of people that are going to be able to create the websites of their dreams, without any prior experience in the fields of web development and programming. Do keep this in mind!
- Templates. When you’re just starting out, website templates might seem like something that’s somewhat trivial - sure, they are a huge help in deciding on the initial outlook of your website, and will cut the time that it would take you in arranging the proper layout of the site, but that’s about it, right? Well, wrong - multiple user Weebly VS WordPress comparisons will tell you that templates serve a much broader and essential purpose than that! If you’re serious about creating a website, and are looking into topics such as SEO, then templates are something that you absolutely need to look into!
- Pricing. Lastly, what would a WordPress VS Weebly comparison be without the pricing factor, huh? Well, jokes aside, pricing is definitely one of the core features that you’ll want to look into and consider when picking out the right site creation tool for yourself. After all, if you like a builder, you’re bound to be using it for a long time to come - for the vast majority of people, finding a great deal will help mitigate a lot of potential costs, and that money can then instead be redirected towards the improvements of your website. Whatever the case might be, if you’re “in it” for the long run, do keep this in mind!
Evidently, there are multiple additional factors to consider when reading through Weebly VS WordPress comparisons. However, if you’re serious about choosing one of the two platforms, or are interested in website builders and their essential features, as a whole, then the six aspects mentioned above should always be considered and contemplated, no matter the circumstances!
Weebly VS WordPress: The Comparison
To start things off, we’ll take a look at the uptime and site speed factors, and then continue our WordPress VS Weebly comparison from there.
Uptime & Site Speed
As established at the beginning of the article, uptime is something that determines the amount of time your website is reachable by anyone on the internet, and not down for maintenance or due to some freaky outage. Site speed, though, can refer to two things - either the Time Till First Byte, or the time that it takes for your website to load up completely. In this comparison, we’ll be focusing on the latter stat.
As is probably rather self-explanatory, without a proper number associated with the uptime of a website builder, there is basically no redeeming feature that can exist. So what if a builder has the best eCommerce functionality, or the most beautiful templates, if the website that you’ve created with it fails to load for the vast majority of the day? It’s as good as not existing, in general!
That said, site speed is kind of in the same boat, too. If your website takes ages to load, no matter how flashy and cool-looking it might be, no one’s going to visit it, in the first place!
With that being said, let’s move on to the two builders in this Weebly VS WordPress comparison, and see what they have to offer in this regard.
Weebly has great stats, both in regards to uptime, and also site loading speed, too. Websites created with the builder are expected to load up 99,98% of the time - if you were to count nothing else but uptime, that’s one of the best numbers you’d come across!
On top of that, the site speed stats are nothing to scoff at, either. If you choose the builder as your site creation tool of choice, you can expect your site to load completely - from start to finish - in around 1,7 seconds, assuming that you keep it average in terms of encumbrance. That’s pretty good!
Now, whilst Googling “Weebly versus WordPress”, you will also quickly see that the latter tool is, well…. Different.
Table: The speed stats of Weebly and WordPress
As we have already established, WordPress isn’t a builder - it’s a content management system. Evidently, the tool is unique in that it has no uptime or site loading speed, on its own - that’s because, while you can create a website with WP, you can’t host it.
In other words, with WordPress, you will have to find a dedicated hosting provider. This can be really beneficial for some people, however, if you’re looking for a simple way to build a site, it’s really not going to be optimal. Whatever the case might be, in a WordPress-related situation, the uptime and site speed stats are going to depend on your hosting provider of choice!
Feature Variety
No matter the reason why you might be looking for and reading through Weebly VS WordPress comparisons, you would probably want the builder of your choice to allow you to create a multi-functional website, either way, right?
Well, this does kind of depend on the variety of features that the tool might offer.
You see, there are two large groups of website builders out there - general-purpose ones, and others that are topic-specific. The variety of features that a builder might offer to its users is going to depend on its type - simple enough!
Naturally, though, it’s worth acknowledging that someone who’s looking for a topic-specific builder might not need as broad of a variety of features as a person who’s interested in a general-purpose tool. Still, the point remains the same!
Now, with that said, how do the two site creation tools in question compare with one another in this regard?
Well, starting off with Weebly, the website builder does have a pretty decent variety of different features and apps to offer to the user! The builder isn’t topic-specific, which means that it’ll have a rather wide selection of different tools that you’ll be able to utilize.
Table: The variety of features available with Weebly and WordPress
Weebly offers all of the editing tools that you might need to run a blog or a similar website - it’s full of text editing and formatting tools. Next, the platform also has the functionality to help you create eCommerce sections on your website, too!
On top of that, Weebly has over 350 different applications that you will be able to utilize on your website - these include everything from the above-mentioned eCommerce, all the way to social buttons and various networking tools, too.
Having said all of that, though, Weebly ain’t got nothing on WordPress.
WP is probably the most feature-heavy website creation tool that is out there. Thanks to its community-made plugins, WordPress offers its users a seemingly-infinite number of different features that they could utilize - on your website, you will be able to place literally anything that you can imagine!
Thus, everything else aside, it would seem that WordPress is the leader in this regard. That said, Weebly still offers a decent variety of features and apps, too!
eCommerce Functionality
eCommerce functionality is something that is often differentiated from aspects such as feature variety. As pointed out in the introductory part of the Weebly VS WordPress comparison, this is mostly due to the fact that eCommerce, as a whole, is a huge topic to consider, and is worth discussing separately.
This might not seem self-evident straight from the get-go, though - many individuals, to this day, associate the term “eCommerce” with large-scale businesses and advanced-level online-based shops. That does not have to be the case!
A great example of small-scale eCommerce might be this - you run a blog, and at some point, write a book and publish it. Now, what’s the best place to sell your book on? That’s right - the platform where your target audience is the most concentrated! With the right site creation tool, all you’d need to do in a situation like this is create a separate page dedicated to the sales of your book - that’s it!
Now, does WordPress or Weebly have this functionality, and are any of these two platforms decent in regards to their eCommerce feature variety?
Well, yes - truth be told, both of them support eCommerce-related features, as you might have already figured out!
Here, Weebly is a bit limited. Meaning, the builder does possess all of the features that you might need in order to create an entry-level online store - but that’s about it. In fact, Weebly might be the perfect example for the situation that I’ve described above - a great solution for anyone who thinks that they might need eCommerce functionality later on, but isn’t too sure, still.
From the sentiments expressed earlier on in the WordPress VS Weebly comparison, you might have already understood that WordPress is a giant when it comes to features and addons - eCommerce is no different in this regard, either.
Table : The pros and cons of Weebly and WordPress
Thanks to the same earlier-mentioned user-made plugins, you can create a fully-fledged, super-advanced eCommerce site, or a very simplistic one-pager shop, too - WordPress allows you to do all of that, assuming that you have the know-how and patience to follow through with it. Amazing!
The core tool that you will want to look into here is WooCommerce - a WordPress plugin that’s *the* tool for all of your eCommerce-related wants and needs. If you do decide that WP is the way to go, don’t forget to check it out in the plugin hub!
Ease of Use
Truth be told, this is the aspect that will probably reveal the biggest differences between the two website builder tools in this Weebly versus WordPress comparison.
That’s the case simply due to the fact that, as much as Weebly is simple to use and beginner-friendly, WordPress is difficult and complex. Let’s break it down from the top, though.
Being a rather traditional website builder, Weebly knows how important simplicity is for the user. Thus, the company behind the platform has truly optimized the tool to be simple and straightforward to use. Everything from the registration process all the way to adding pages and features to your website is optimized to be as beginner-friendly as possible - it really goes to show, too!
WordPress, on the other hand… Well, let’s just say that it’s literally the opposite of Weebly, when it comes to simplicity.
As established earlier on in the Weebly VS WordPress comparison, WP is a content management system. These platforms are usually much more complex than website builders, since they require web development and programming language knowledge in order to be used effectively.
Furthermore, the fact that WordPress is the world’s most popular website creation platform doesn’t change the fact that its interface is a bit dated, and that it will require a lot of getting used to, for any and all potential site creators out there.
Sure, there are things such as plugins to help you out (such as the aforementioned WooCommerce for all of your eCommerce wants and needs, or Elementor, which makes the WP customization interface drag-and-drop-based), but it’s not exactly optimized to be “simple to use”.
So, in short, if simplicity and ease of use are what you’re after, then it’s really a no-brainer - Weebly is the way to go. The builder is very simple and welcoming, and does not require any prior experience in the field, whatsoever.
However, if you’re already proficient with website making, or would like a challenge (with the reward being some seemingly-unlimited functionality), then WordPress could prove to be a decent alternative, too! It all depends on your perspective!
Templates
At the start of this Weebly VS WordPress comparison, when talking about templates, I’ve mentioned the fact that they are going to be super-important for the general health of your website, and not only in regards to the visual appeal that they might provide.
What does that mean, exactly? Well, the templates that a builder provides are going to be important both in regards to site visitor experience, and the way that Google and other search engines see your website, too.
From the visitor side of things, it’s rather simple - if, without reading this Weebly versus WordPress comparison, you yourself go and visit some sort of an outdated-looking website, would you feel comfortable purchasing something, or leaving some sort of your personal information on it?
It might be perfectly safe, sure - however, outdated and old-school websites surely do not inspire confidence within the visitor. Something that DOES inspire confidence, though, is a modern layout, beautiful images, and smooth transitions - all of these things are completely dependent on the templates of the site.
In regards to Google and other search engines, a proper template is going to ensure that your website looks and feels legit, and that everything is like it should be when it comes to SEO. This, in turn, will help rank your website higher up in people’s search results - while it’s definitely not the core factor, it’s still very significant!
Now, then, in regards to Weebly, the builder offers individuals some modern and beautiful-looking templates! In total, there are around 70 different options for you to pick from, all designed and tailored around different types of websites that you might want to create.
Weebly does a pretty good job in regards to keeping things modern and in-line with the current industry trends, too - the themes available with the builder are pretty and fully-functional, and should suit most people’s wants and needs, too.
When it comes to WordPress, the situation is... Interesting, to say the least.
Table: The design elements of Weebly and WordPress
This website creation tool offers a vast array of some very different templates - most are made by the community behind WP, and are fully customization-friendly. That being said, while finding a beautiful template shouldn’t be a struggle, if you’d want to integrate some smooth transitions and make that template interactive, this will more than likely require some advanced CSS knowledge - not something that every aspiring website designer might possess.
All things considered, once again - if you’d like to keep things simple, and utilize a beginner-friendly option, Weebly is the way to go. WordPress does possess a lot of different perks in regards to templates, too, but is aimed at a bit of a more experienced audience of website creators.
Pricing
To finish our Weebly VS WordPress comparison off with a bang, let’s take a look at the pricing options available with the two site creation tools in question.
Weebly has two types of pricing plans - for websites, and for online-based stores. The website plans are priced like so:
For stores:
The fact that the builder has a free plan available for its potential users to try out and “get a feel” for the tool in question is actually really cool! As far as the rest of the price tags go, most users of the builder seem to agree that, in a general sense, Weebly is a really well-designed site creation tool, and the prices do fit the quality of service that you can expect to receive.
WordPress, on the other hand, is completely, 100% free to use. That’s right - you can download and install the software required to run it, and start creating your website in no time.
Table: The pricing options of Weebly and WordPress
Where’s the catch? Well, you CAN create a website, completely free of charge. However, if you want that website to be reachable by anyone out there on the web, you are going to have to find a reliable website hosting provider, and host it this way. The actual prices are going to depend on the hosting service of choice!
Conclusions
So, then - which website creation tool out of the two discussed in this Weebly VS WordPress comparison should you choose?
Well, given that both platforms are quite different from each other, I think the answer is rather simple.
If you’re someone who has never created a website before, and are looking to start off slow, or perhaps you simply want to keep things simple and create a functional website super-quick, then Weebly is the obvious choice here. The builder is considered to be top-tier, and will provide you with all of the essential features that you might need for any type of a website, whether it be a personal blog or an online shop.
Table: General information about the companies behind Weebly and WordPress
WordPress, on the other hand, is aimed at individuals who are already somewhat proficient in regards to website creation, or are not afraid to take on a challenge. The CMS provides users with unrivaled customizability, but does require a lot of time, patience, and persistence to be utilized to its fullest extent.
Now, if neither Weebly or WordPress seem to suit your wants and needs even after you've checked out our data-based comparison, do make sure to also check out our list of the best website builders on the market, in general - perhaps you will find a better alternative here?
With that said, though, thanks so much for reading, and good luck with all of your website creation ventures to come!