Squarespace is an all-in-one website creation platform best known for its stunning website designs. The popular website builder makes it relatively easy to establish your online presence, manage your site and even set up an online shop. Between its affordable pricing and intuitive interface, Squarespace offers a great package for new business owners.
Pros
- Create a gorgeous, professional-calibre website even with limited design and technical skills
- Unlimited storage and bandwidth
- Fully integrated eCommerce on most plans
Cons
- No phone support
- Upgrading from Squarespace version 7.0 to 7.1 requires a site rebuild
- No free plan available
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Squarespace at a glance
Squarespace launched in 2003 and now has a team that’s over 1,100 strong. The company boasts that millions of websites have been created on its platform.
Squarespace is a fully hosted website builder, which means you don’t have to purchase hosting services separately as you would with some other services. The intuitive drag-and-drop Squarespace website editor simplifies the process of creating a website, making Squarespace a popular option for those lacking the design and coding skills to build a professional-looking website from scratch.
Squarespace pros and cons
Pros
One of Squarespace’s most noteworthy attributes is its drag-and-drop editor. It makes it easy to customise its award-winning templates, even with no coding skills. The platform also provides everything needed to create a complete website, including hosting, a custom domain name (if you don’t already have one) and email.
Squarespace’s e-commerce features are fully integrated into most plans, which is rare for website builders. And, if you need additional features, such as abandoned cart recovery or subscriptions, they can be easily added with its highest-tiered plan.
Cons
While there are many pros to using Squarespace, there are several downsides. Although Squarespace offers 24/7 customer support, it does not have phone support, which can be frustrating if you need immediate assistance.
Squarespace’s Personal plan doesn’t allow you to use CSS or JavaScript, which limits the extent to which you can customise your site. It doesn’t have a free plan, which is rare for website builders. However, it does offer a 14-day free trial so you can try before you buy.
All Squarespace plans have video storage limitations. If you plan on using videos on your website, you’ll need to consider an upgrade. Also, Squarespace’s Trustpilot rating is 1.5 out of 5 stars with 693 reviews, which is lower than many of its competitors.
Squarespace limits you to one sub-navigation menu. While this isn’t an issue for smaller websites, it could be problematic for large sites with deep levels of content.
Squarespace uses a drag-and-drop editor that simplifies the website build process. The editing tool is not quite as intuitive as Squarespace purports it is – especially for true beginners. The good news is that the Squarespace help centre offers detailed instruction on using the editor, and customer support is just a quick chat or email away.
Squarespace core features
Website builder and templates
The Squarespace website builder is one of the main reasons people use the platform. The intuitive drag-and-drop interface makes it easy to customise Squarespace’s award-winning templates without needing to know HTML, JavaScript or CSS.
There are more than 100 of these templates, with new ones added regularly. Whether you need one with a blog, a portfolio, an e-commerce site or all three, Squarespace has a template for you.
However, some users complain that it’s easy to tell when a site uses Squarespace because so many of the templates look the same. The best way around this is to ensure your site has a cohesive colour palette and branding that makes it stand out.
Blogging
Before we get into Squarespace’s blogging features, it’s important to understand that if you have a blog with the intention of making money blogging, you don’t want to use Squarespace to host your site. Instead, use WordPress, which is widely accepted as one of the best platforms for professional bloggers.
Now, with that out of the way, let’s take a look at Squarespace’s blogging capabilities. Its best use is for businesses whose primary function is commerce (whether e-commerce or brick-and-mortar), and that use a blog as a way to educate their audience.
The platform makes it easy to integrate a blog into your website. You can choose from a variety of templates, all of which are designed to showcase your content in an engaging way. Squarespace also offers several features that are designed to help you promote your content, such as social media integration and email capture forms. Plus, its search engine optimisation (SEO) features are top-notch, which is important for getting your content seen by your target audience.
E-Commerce
If you plan on selling products or services online, Squarespace is a great option. Most of its plans come with e-commerce features that are fully integrated into the platform. This means you don’t need to install a separate e-commerce plugin, as you would with WordPress. It also offers a wide range of beautiful templates that are designed for online stores.
Squarespace makes it easy to add products to your website and accept payments. Plus, its built-in shipping calculator makes it easy to calculate and display shipping rates to your customers. And, if you need additional features, such as abandoned cart recovery or APIs, they can be easily added with its highest-tiered plan.
One downside of using Squarespace for e-commerce is that it charges transaction fees on all sales (unless you’re on a Commerce plan). So, if you’re selling products or services online, you’ll need to factor that into your pricing.
Squarespace costs
Squarespace domains
You’ll receive a free domain for your first year with any plan if you pay annually instead of monthly. Otherwise, Squarespace domain costs range from £16 to £56 per year. All domains include an SSL certificate and WHOIS privacy. Unlike other domain providers, Squarespace does not gouge you on domain renewals; you just renew at the same rate as the initial purchase.
You don’t have to purchase your domain through Squarespace. If you already license a domain through another service, you can easily connect it to your Squarespace site. If you have trouble doing this, you can reach out to Squarespace’s support team for help.
Squarespace plans
There are four Squarespace plans, with monthly licencing fees ranging from £12 to £43 depending on what tier of service you use and whether you want to pay monthly or annually. Squarespace does not offer a free plan, though it offers a free 14-day trial. For comparison, Wix’s paid plans range from $9 to $119* per month, and the GoDaddy Website Builder plans range from £6.99 to about £21.99 per month.
The primary differences between the plans are the number of features offered. E-commerce functionality is available on all Squarespace plans except the Personal plan.
*Wix’s website lists its pricing in US dollars. Use our currency calculator to convert pound sterling.
Personal
For £16 per month (or £12 a month when paid annually), the Squarespace Personal plan comes with unlimited bandwidth and storage, SEO features, full access to the Squarespace template collection and 24/7 customer support via chat and email. The Personal plan also includes basic website metrics and up to two contributors.
Business
For £24 per month (or £17 a month when paid annually), the Squarespace Business plan includes all the features of the Personal plan plus a professional email from Google, advanced website analytics, promotional pop-ups and banners and complete customisation with CSS and JavaScript. The Business plan also includes fully integrated e-commerce with a 3% transaction fee.
Basic commerce
For £28 per month (or £23 a month when paid annually), the Squarespace Basic Commerce plan includes all Business plan features plus point-of-sale functionality, customer accounts and merchandising. The plan also lets you sync your products with Instagram so you can sell there, too. Transaction fees are eliminated on this plan.
Advanced commerce
For £43 per month (or £35 a month when paid annually), the Squarespace Advanced Commerce plan includes all Basic Commerce plan features plus abandoned cart recovery, advanced shipping options, advanced discount and promotion features and the ability to sell subscriptions.
Squarespace benefits
The Squarespace website builder comes with a variety of tools that help with business promotion and performance. The sheer number of tools offered makes Squarespace one of the best website solutions available today.
- Social media integration: You can easily integrate with popular social channels on your Squarespace website.
- Social story designs: The Squarespace Unfold app offers templates that help you create visually compelling stories for relevant social platforms
- Squarespace website analytics: Monitor website traffic, learn where your site visitors are coming from and spot engagement trends using Squarespace analytics tools.
- Commerce analytics: Squarespace lets you track orders, sales and buying trends, which helps you optimise conversions.
- Search Engine Optimisation (SEO): Squarespace offers a suite of integrated features and guides to help you with SEO. Squarespace resources for SEO can get complicated, so spend ample time with these.
- Expert design services: If you need help designing or customising your site, Squarespace Experts will match you with a third-party designer.
- Squarespace extensions: Squarespace lets you extend the power of your site by connecting with shipping, fulfilment, finance, inventory and sales and marketing extensions, including AfterShip, Freshbooks, Outfly, and TaxJar.
- Free logo maker: Squarespace offers a free logo creation tool that helps you create a simple logo for your website.
Additional tools and functionality
Email marketing
Grow and communicate with your audience using Squarespace Email Campaigns, which features attractive email layouts that complement your website design. You’ll pay £4 to £53 per month for this premium service, depending on the plan you choose and whether you want to pay monthly or annually.
Members-only content
Monetise your content by creating a members-only area on your site. The cost for this Squarespace feature is £7 to £73 per month when paid annually.
Appointment booking
Add an appointment scheduling feature to your website so clients can book and manage appointments online. Calendar management plans range from £11 to £37 per month when billed annually.
Reservations
Use the Squarespace Tock all-in-one reservation system to manage reservations and take online orders. This service is custom-priced, so you’ll need to request information on the Squarespace site to learn more about this service. Squarespace charges a 3% commission on takeout and delivery orders.
Fine print
Squarespace is an excellent web builder that generally earns strong reviews from users. Still, there are a few things you want to know about before you launch your website on this platform.
Expect a learning curve
Squarespace uses a drag-and-drop editor that simplifies the website build process. The editing tool is not quite as intuitive as Squarespace purports it is—especially for true beginners. The good news is that the Squarespace Help Centre offers detailed instruction on using the editor, and customer support is just a quick chat or email away.
Version 7.1 vs 7.0
In 2020, Squarespace introduced version 7.1, and along with it came several significant changes. With version 7.0, every template was customisable, and you could switch templates anytime you wanted. However, changing 7.0 templates often required multiple steps as not all templates included the full breadth of Squarespace features.
With version 7.1, switching templates is no longer an option. That’s because Squarespace includes access to every design feature in every version, so you don’t have to start over. However, if you’re on version 7.0 and want to upgrade to 7.1, you will need to rebuild your site. Squarespace offers detailed guides for walking you through this process.
Navigation
Squarespace limits you to one sub-navigation menu. While this isn’t an issue for smaller websites, it could be problematic for large sites with deep levels of content.
Customer support
Squarespace offers customer support via online chat and email. Phone support is not available, which can be problematic when you need to troubleshoot a complex problem quickly.
Top Squarespace alternatives and how they compare
Squarespace vs. Wix
One of the main differences between Wix and Squarespace is that Squarespace doesn’t offer a free plan, and Wix does. So if you’re looking for a free website builder, then Wix is a better option.
Wix also offers considerably more video storage than Squarespace. The least amount of storage it offers is 30 minutes for its cheapest plan, which is what Squarespace offers for each of its plans. However, Wix’s most expensive plan has unlimited storage.
What Squarespace does better is structured design. It has a far better selection of modern, clean-looking templates. What’s more, its editor is more intuitive and easier to use. So if you want an easier platform to use and better-looking templates, Squarespace is a better choice.
Squarespace vs. WordPress
If you’re looking for a simple, easy-to-use website builder, Squarespace is the platform you want to choose. However, if you want ultimate flexibility and customisation, WordPress is the platform of choice. This is because it’s an open-source platform, which means that there are thousands of themes and plugins available for it.
However, this also makes WordPress more complex than Squarespace. If you’re willing to give it a go, WordPress has thousands of third-party tutorials on getting started and managing your site, so provided you have a little time, you can learn how to use it effectively.
Squarespace vs. Shopify
Shopify is built for e-commerce, making it ideal for those wanting to sell online. With it, you can sell via social media, dropship or even create an omnichannel experience for your customers. Squarespace, on the other hand, is better for those wanting to create a simple website or blog. It doesn’t have as many features as Shopify, but it is one of the simplest drag-and-drop website builders to use.
Squarespace vs. GoDaddy
GoDaddy is cheaper than Squarespace, with a free version and paid plans starting at £6.99 per month. It also offers free professional email for your first year, email marketing, list segmentation and advanced marketing analytics. Squarespace charges extra for this.
You also won’t find phone support with Squarespace, but GoDaddy offers this 24/7. The biggest benefit of using Squarespace over GoDaddy, though, is its award-winning, customisable templates.
Is Squarespace right for you or your business?
The Squarespace site builder is a popular choice among solopreneurs like artists, authors, coaches, bloggers, and small businesses, such as restaurants, salons, financial services, and fitness centers. It’s not a great solution for large, complicated eCommerce sites or those with advanced technical website-building skills.
With Squarespace, you can build a simple, mobile-responsive website in a matter of a few hours. Ecommerce functionality allows you to monetise your site while Squarespace’s add-on features, like email, calendar management, and reservations, provide robust functionality that many business owners find helpful.
While there are cheaper platforms on the market, like Wix or GoDaddy Website Builder, the value for the features and design flair Squarespace offers is worth the modest additional expense. If having an attractive, modern website design is important to you, Squarespace delivers.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Is Squarespace better than WordPress?
While WordPress offers more design flexibility and features than Squarespace, those with limited technical and design skills sometimes struggle with WordPress.
Squarespace is a relatively easy-to-use website builder that offers a drag-and-drop editor and stunning design templates, making it a popular choice among those who want a DIY website option.
If you seek great design and a simple builder, and you’re willing to give up custom features and some design flexibility, Squarespace may work best for you.
If you need considerable design flexibility and custom features, WordPress may be the better choice.
What is the best Squarespace template?
The best Squarespace template for you depends on your business needs.
Squarespace offers more than 100 templates for a variety of websites, including online stores, professional services, restaurants, blogs, podcasts, events, and fashion.
Popular Squarespace templates for bloggers are Five and Palmera, while Maca and Holly are favorites for online shops.
Is Squarespace good for blogging?
Squarespace is an excellent blogging platform for beginners. Many bloggers prefer Squarespace because the website builder makes it easy to create a beautiful website quickly.
Squarespace is an all-in-one platform, which means you don’t have to acquire hosting services or mess with plug-ins to accomplish basic blog functions.
The templates are gorgeous, and the drag-and-drop editor is intuitive.
There are a few downsides to using Squarespace for blogging. Squarespace costs more than other blogging platforms, you have access to fewer templates, and design customisation is limited.
Is Squarespace good for SEO?
Squarespace is a good platform for those who are interested in SEO because it offers users the ability to edit website code, title tags and meta descriptions.
Squarespace also generates an XML sitemap automatically, which can help improve your website’s ranking in search engine results pages.
Is Squarespace good for e-commerce?
Squarespace is a great option for businesses that want to add e-commerce functionality to their website.
Users can set up an online store quickly rather than spending months or years developing it from scratch.
Not only does Squarespace give users a robust platform to design their website, but it also offers inventory management, shipping options and discount codes for e-commerce stores.
Are website builders secure?
Because most website builders offer cutting-edge technology, they are usually ahead of the curve when it comes to keeping their sites secure.
They do this by keeping their customers’ websites protected by using top-end technology.
Because of this, most website building companies offer some of the best security options available on the internet.