Best website platform in 2025 – which should you choose?

The right choice depends on factors like ease of use / editing, design flexibility, SEO features, and integration capabilities. This guide will help you navigate the top website platforms of 2025 and find the one that aligns with your goals and technical expertise.

When choosing a website platform, you should consider these 3 key areas:

1.       Quality of the finished product for SEO, Security & Professional look and feel

2.       Ease of Use for customisation, maintenance & editing

3.       Cost for Development, Hosting & Maintenance

Comparison of the top 5 website platforms:

Webflow

Quality: 

Visual design flexibility, modern aesthetics. Generates clean, responsive HTML, CSS, and JavaScript code which assists in improving SEO.

Ease of use: 

no need to manage plugins or security patches. Editing your own website can be easy if the intuitive CMS is used for managing dynamic content. The built-in editor makes editing simple for customers to maintain content themselves with no prior web design experience, whilst keeping the website looking professional

Cost: 

Hosting costs may be more expensive than other platforms. Whilst you can build your own Webflow website, you’ll get a better end-result if you hire a professional to develop your Webflow website so you so development costs need to be considered. There are no maintenance costs

WordPress

Quality: 

Highly customizable when hiring the right developer, suitable for professional websites. Excellent in-built SEO options. If purchasing a template, the level of customisation will be limited if you’re going to build your own website. Potential security concerns arise from any plugins used, and being widely used makes it a target for hackers

Ease of use: 

Although you can edit your own content but without any design experience, the end result may not look as professional as you’d hoped. Requires regular updates, and potential plugin conflicts may make maintenance time-consuming, expensive and may break your website.

Cost:

As you can organise to have your website hosted anywhere, it may be more cost-effective than other platforms for hosting. Whilst you can build your own Wordpress website, you’ll get a better end-result if you hire a professional as Design changes are limited to the template chosen unless a developer is hired, so development costs need to be considered.

Wix

Quality: 

Finished websites may lack key SEO features and professional feel.

Ease of use: 

Easy to use, quick setup. Limited customization compared to Webflow and WordPress, less scalable for large projects. Design changes are limited to the template chosen.

Cost:

Wix is an all-in-one platform with a subscription-based pricing model that includes hosting, design tools, and customer support. You can save money by building your own website, you may pay extra for the subscription than other platforms like wordpress, especially if you want add-on features like premium apps, SEO tools or extra storage or bandwidth

Squarespace

Quality:  

Finished websites may lack key SEO features and professional feel.

Ease of use:

Stylish design options, all-in-one hosting, and user-friendly interface. Limited customization compared to Webflow and WordPress, less scalable for large projects. Design changes are limited to the template chosen. Limited flexibility for advanced customizations and fewer third-party integrations.

Cost:

Squarespace operates on an all-in-one subscription model, which includes hosting, templates, and basic tools. You’ll pay extra for premium integrations & 3^rd party apps

Shopify

Quality: 

Excellent for online stores, eCommerce websites and entrepreneurs selling products online. Robust eCommerce tools, payment gateway integrations, and mobile-friendly themes. It’s less suited for non-eCommerce sites. SEO features are not as good as Webflow or wordpress.

Ease of use: 

Scalable, and easy to manage. Design changes are limited to the template chosen.

Cost:

Monthly fees can add up, especially if you’re using many paid plugins, but often the benefit outweighs the cost if you have an ecommerce business that turns over many sales per month.

Summary - The Best Website Platform 2025

The right platform depends on your main goal:

• Goal: I want a professionally built website that brings new customers to my business: Webflow or WordPress are best for this goal. But which to choose?

• For Quality, both will produce a professional result if you hire the right developer up-front and both have excellent SEO capabilities so both will assist to bring your business new customers
• For Ease of use, Webflow wins. Many of my clients get in touch after attempting to customise a WordPress template they have purchased, only to find out after investing much time and money into it that it will only satisfy 85% of what they wanted. Webflow designs are fully customisable, even if originally based off a purchased template. Whilst it’s well known that wordpress has the best selection of plugins, many people don’t consider the extra cost of these plugins. It is also possible to use many 3^rd party plugins with webflow – including online bookings, calculators etc. Webflow also wins hands-down for ongoing ease of use the built-in editor mode – check out the video here https://webflow.com/edit-mode and because there’s no need for ongoing security & maintenance updates.
• For price, WordPress may be cheaper upfront for hosting costs when maintenance is not considered in the equation, but as Webflow has no hidden maintenance costs, your annual hosting cost includes maintenance, it may end up cheaper in the long-run.

• Goal: I want to build it myself: Wix or Squarespace are the best options if you want to build it yourself, but many people are surprised how long this takes, and are often disappointed by the end product. Why not consider getting a quote first, to see if it is more cost-effective to have a professional build it for you? A website built in Webflow initially can be handed-over at Go-live so you can perform ongoing content updates & edits yourself.

• Goal: I want an easy to manage Ecommerce website: Whilst Webflow and WordPress both offer an excellent ecommerce platform, Shopify is currently the best option in Australia for online websites, ease-of-use, product management, and most flexible range of payment and shipping options.

The information in this blog article is All Design by Lisa’s professional opinion only. I recommend you also do your own research on this subject. See disclaimer for more details.

Whether you’re ready to go ahead, or you’re still deciding, why not give All Design by Lisa a call? I’m happy to answer any questions you have, even if you decide not to go ahead with hiring my services. Speaking to a local rather than a faceless online developer about your website may help to put your mind at ease.