5 Easiest Website Builders for Beginners in Winter 2024

If you're a newbie to web building, but still want a high-performing site, Wix is the best easy website builder for beginners because of its intuitive interface, impressive feature set, and quality free plan. Wix isn't the only top-rated website builder for beginners though, so scroll down to see how our top picks compare on usability, functionality, price, and more.

Beyond these three top choices for easy-to-use website builders, we've researched a wide range of alternatives that could be a good fit for your business or side hustle, depending on your needs.

Short on time and need to find an easy, beginner-friendly website builder now? Get matched with your ideal website builder in just one minute by using our quick and easy web builder quiz created by our in-house team of industry experts and product testers.

In this article:

• What Is an Easy Website Builder?
• Which Is the Easiest Website Builder for Beginners?
• Buying Guide: How to Choose a Website Builder
• How We Rated the Best Website Builders for Beginners
• Building a Website For the First Time: What Beginners Need to Know
• Verdict: Easiest Website Builder for Beginners
• Frequently Asked Questions

As the cost of living increases, outsourcing web design to a third-party professional isn't an option for every business. Website building services can cost your business thousands of dollars on a monthly basis. Considering a recession has been looming for a while now, these kinds of prices just aren't feasible for small businesses.

Thankfully, What-You-See-Is-What-You-Get (WYSIWYG) website builders allow anyone to create a polished site for a reasonable price — and with a high level of control over your site's layout, design, and core functions. Keep scrolling to learn more about these easy-to-use website builders.

What Is an Easy Website Builder?

An easy website builder offers an intuitive interface that even beginners can feel comfortable with. On top of that, it offers specific features and functionality, like SEO tools, drag-and-drop editors, and plenty of templates to make the setup process as simple as possible.

If you've never built a website before, then you'll want a tool that makes the whole process effortless. Based on our extensive testing, we believe that the best website builder for beginners is Wix, which is closely followed by Squarespace. Both of these tools can help you create a brilliant, professional-looking website in minutes – and this isn't an exaggeration. Thanks to simple question-and-answer automatic development tools, you can set yourself up with a sophisticated website template in less than the time it takes to drink a cup of coffee.

You're then free to customize the template with your own images, words, and creative preference. Many first-time builders are blown away by just how easy the process is, and how professional your self-built site can look.

What Makes an Easy Website Builder?

Our research measured the ease of use of website builders to ensure you'd be able to make the right decision for your business. Here are the metrics we used to evaluate easy website builders:

• No coding required – If you have to be technically proficient enough to code your website from scratch, then that's not an easy website builder.
• Drag-and-drop editor – There's nothing easier than being able to simply drag and drop website elements where you want them.
• SEO tools – The best way to get your site discovered online is Search Engine Optimization (SEO), and an easy website builder will have tools to help you get it right.
• Templates – With enough templates, you'll be able to find a design that works for you, and you won't even have to worry about editing the esthetics of your site.

Which Is the Easiest Website Builder for Beginners?

Here's the full list of our top-rated website builders for beginners:

1. Wix — Best website builder for beginners
2. Squarespace — Best design templates
3. GoDaddy — Best for a quick initial setup
4. Hostinger — Lowest cost option
5. Shopify — Best for ecommerce

1. Wix – Best Overall Website Builder

• Wix Ease of Use score: 4.4/5 
• Price from: $16 per month

Wix is our favorite website builder and receives high scores across the board in our testing. It’s super quick to get started with Wix, and brilliantly simple to create a website using one of its top-class templates. Wix pricing starts at only $16 per month.

Due to Wix's affordable price point, seemingly limitless feature offering and shallow learning curve, we think it'll be the best option for most businessnes – even freelancers that can do make do without advanced web building tools. 

Creating a website from scratch is incredibly daunting, especially for beginners. Fortunately, Wix has more than 800 templates on offer – tons more than our runner-up Squarespace's 110 limit –  which will give you the perfect guidance to create your site rather than starting from beginning. Once you've picked your favorite template, you're free to customize as you see fit with almost total control of all the elements and colors on your pages.

Should this sound like too much work, Wix also has its artificial design intelligence (ADI) system. The ADI system will ask you some broad questions about the type of website you want to create, from its name to the industry you're going to operate in. By answering these questions, Wix will then create a website shell that is specifically tailored to your needs.

Thanks to Wix's partnership with the keyword database Semrush, users can access SEO keyword data directly through the web builder's dashboard. This, in tandem with Wix’s new SEO settings that give users greater control over important technical SEO setup, cements Wix's place as the best website builder for SEO.

Once you’ve created the basis of your website, you’ll have access to a plethora of apps and features that will give you the ability to create loads of different types of websites — whether you need to build a slick online shop or even create a blog. Adding these apps and features is easy as well — it's just like downloading an app for your phone, but doing it for a website instead. Wix keeps improving as well: our testing ranks its features higher than ever, scoring a 4.8/5 in our research, thanks to better blogging tools and internationalization.

Remember, if you want to give Wix a try, you can get a 10% off deal by using the code GET10! at checkout on all available plans.

Is Wix easy to use?

Wix earns a 4.4/ 5 for “ease of use” in our testing — tied with Squarespace with the highest score in this category. The difference between Wix and Squarespace is slight but noticeable. Wix has more features, but Squarespace has more design functionality, scoring a 4.5/5 compared with Wix's 4.1/5 in our research.

With Wix, you won’t need any experience with website builders, or even web development in general. Its simple but detailed editing system means you’ll be able to create a completely original website without any stress — perfect for people who want their business to have a distinct, highly branded presence online.

It really is simple to add words, images, and videos thanks to the easy menus and user-first principles that make everything feel straightforward. Changing them or moving them around the page is a piece of cake with Wix's drag-and-drop editor. However, one word of caution: once you've picked your Wix template, you'll be unable to swap it out for a different template once your site has been published.

While Wix is easy to use as a whole, after testing the product ourselves, we found some aspects of the builder had a steeper learning curve. For example, if you're not an expert in search engine optimization, you may find its SEO Hub a tad overwhelming as the platform doesn't automatically format subheadings or remind you to add alt text.

You can get started with Wix for free today — make sure to use code “GET10!” when you end your free trial to get 10% off a monthly or yearly billed plan.

Want to know more about Wix? Check out our full Wix review.

2. Squarespace – Best Design Templates

• Squarespace Ease of Use score: 4.4/5 
• Price from: $16 per month

If you're not artistically inclined, building a great-looking site can seem like a tall task. However, Squarespace has the capability to make your website look fantastic, no matter your level of creativity. It might only have 110 templates to choose from, but since they’re developed in-house by Squarespace themselves, all of them are beautifully designed.

Due to Squarespaces dedicated design features, it's best suited for artists, designers, and creative business building porfolios or showcasing projects.

As such, you'll find yourself wanting to leave them alone for the most part — only adding your own images and changing the text. Thanks to Squarespace's Fluid Engine drag-and-drop builder, which relies on a malleable grid system, users are able to customize their site heavily to fit their needs.

Is Squarespace easy to use?

Our research found that Squarespace is tied with Wix for the easiest to use website builder, scoring a 4.4/5. Squarespace is a great platform for running a blog, thanks to its aesthetically pleasing template designs and intuitive text editor. In addition, Squarespace's product updates have helped push it higher than ever in our ease-of-use testing, improving its ranking significantly in our latest round of research. Most notably, Squarespace has add onboarding questions that can guide business accounts to the correct template for their business, streamlining one of the most difficult decisions in website building: choosing the right template.

Using Squarespace to create an online store is just as easy as creating a blog. It has templates designed specifically to work as online stores, and a really straightforward product management system that will let you manage prices and track stock. PayPal, debit/credit card, and Apple Pay payment options are also built in.

Thanks to Squarespace's integrations, users are able to unlock more capabilities than meet the eye – from offering merch alongside orders to customizing the layout of the checkout page. When testing them out, we were impressed with the usability and versatility.

Changing the overall layout of your pages isn't as easy with Squarespace as it is with Wix. However, given its overall design excellence, you'll be slightly more reluctant to change them. Our main issue with Squarespace is its slightly confusing system of sub-menus used to navigate pages — it's pretty easy to get lost in the maze of menus, particularly when you start using it.

With that said, you will get used to Squarespace pretty quickly, so don't let an initially confusing navigation system deter you from a very strong website builder.

Even if you do get stuck, Squarespace has a robust support center featuring video tutorials, community forums, and live chat support. We were so impressed when we tested the help center out that we gave it a perfect 5/5 score, making them the best tools we researched – even beating our frontrunner Wix.

Find out more in our guide to Squarespace pricing or take a look at its templates and start building your site today

3. GoDaddy – Best for Quick Set Up

• GoDaddy Ease of Use score: 4.1/5
• Price from: $11.99 per month 

GoDaddy is a big name in the world of website development, and perhaps best known for its website hosting and 24/7 phone support.

A few years ago, GoDaddy wasn't even near our top pick website builder on the market. However, we've since noticed considerable improvements to the product, and we appreciate how it's noticeably improved its design control and feature set, with better and more customizable templates available.

Time is money for most small businesses. So, if you don't have tons of spare time to create a site, GoDaddy will be a safe bet. The platform offers the quickest setup time of any other solution we've tested, making it ideal for users that don't have tons of time to invest in the process.

Check out our GoDaddy review for more information.

Is GoDaddy easy to use?

GoDaddy had a few drawbacks in previous years, but the brand has come a long way as it now offers an easy-to-use website builder. These days, it has arguably one of the best AI website builders out there. As a user, you simply answer a few questions about what type of website you're looking to build and, in a few simple steps, it creates a slick-looking draft website for you.

Such a tool isn't unique to GoDaddy – most of the brands on this list have an ADI of their own, Wix and Hostinger included. However, GoDaddy's is impressively intuitive and will feel effortless to first-timers. This helped it score an impressive 4.1/5 in our ease-of-use testing, making it the only website builder (along with Wix and Squarespace) to score four or higher in this category.

GoDaddy's page editor lets users add elements to the page by clicking a big plus button. This pulls up a list of options to add that are tailored to the type of site you're trying to build. After giving the software a spin ourselves, we found its side menu particularly convenient because it allows you to easily keep track of each part of the process on one screen.

Design flexibility still isn't as great as with Wix, but it's simple to build a site with GoDaddy. For example, block elements are fairly restricted, so users won't be able to resize or move image blocks beyond certain parameters.

GoDaddy's website builder is completely focused on building websites for businesses and online stores — to the point that it makes no sense to try and build a different type of site. GoDaddy's focus on these types of sites makes it one of the best website builders for small businesses.

4. Hostinger – Best Low-Cost Option

• Hostinger Ease of Use score: 3.9/5
• Price from: $2.99 per month

Hostinger's website builder tool is cheaper than Wix – and every website builder on this list when you take into account the special deal that lets you get started for only $2.69 per month. This helped Hostinger secure a 3.7/5 in our value research, as you really can't beat this price.

However, Hostinger comes with fewer features and abilities as well. In short, this is a just-the-basics website builder for users who need a simple site that's quick to set up and won't break the bank – and there's nothing wrong with that!

Another perk is the Hostinger logo maker, which can help users create their own logo branding for a new storefront. The results are similar to the AI writer tool, but with visual flair. It's worth noting that Wix also has a logo maker, so don't let that feature sway you if the limited features are a deal-breaker.

Finally, there's a heatmap analytics feature that lets Hostinger's users see what pages draw more website visitors, and how interested those visitors are in spending time on the site.

Check out our Hostinger review for more information

Is Hostinger easy to use?

Hostinger's greatest weakness can also be considered its greatest strength: the service has reduced functionality when compared with the big website builders like Wix and Squarespace, but this also makes it easier to use. Users can build a website faster and quicker when their options are more limited, which is the reason it nets a 3.9/5 in our ease of use research.

Check out our Hostinger vs Wix comparison guide for more info.

If that sounds like damning the site with faint praise, we can also confirm that Hostinger's interface is also easy on newbies, with a grid-style layout that our researchers found comprehensive and usable. When we used the software, we found its AI automation features straightforward to get to grips with, which is ideal for users looking to create a site in little time and with minimal effort.

There is one ease-of-use issue that we have to ding Hostinger for, though: there's no onboarding process, which would have gone a long way towards reducing intimidation as a new user settles into understanding the website builder and how it works.

One extra perk for saving money with the already low-priced service: you can save on the monthly price with our exclusive code “TECH,” and get online for just a few dollars per month if you're getting an annual plan. You might also be eligible for an extra four months free hosting, a free SSL certificate, three months of free business email, and a domain all thrown in for free.

You will not find an app store as part of Hostinger's service, meaning that there really aren't many integrations that could be bundled with a Hostinger website. Email marketing is also missing, though Instagram marketing is included.

Hostinger's limited functionality isn't the same thing as not having any features at all – Hostinger actually has a small group of unique functions that might attract users and won't be found on any of the other options we list here. So, what are they?

First, there's an AI writer, which will auto-populate written content for your website – you'll definitely want to give it a fact-check after generating it to catch any inconsistencies, but this tool means you'll be able to craft engaging writing much faster than if you had to write it yourself.

5. Shopify – Best for Ecommerce

• Shopify Ease of Use score: 3.7/5
• Price from: $29 per month $1 per month for 3 months

Shopify is one of the best ecommerce website builders on the market today. It offers an unmatched selection of features that are geared towards building your online store and managing your digital inventory. Even better, Shopify had the highest customer score across our research with 4.8/5, which means the average user is considerably happy with the website builder on a regular basis.

Due to Shopify's advanced sales features and slightly steeper price point, it's best suited to large, or high-growth ecommerce businesses. 

The biggest problem for Shopify is that its price is pretty intimidating. The starting price comes in at $29 per month, which is much higher than most others on this list, and it hides a lot of valuable features behind the more expensive plans, which get as high as $299 per month.

However, Shopify's price point isn't always high. It's current deal lets users get started with the software for $1 per month for 3 months – offering a great oppurtunity to retailers looking to trial out the website builder.

Check out our guide to Shopify pricing for more information

Is Shopify easy to use?

We'll be the first to admit that Shopify isn't the easiest website builder to use. With an ease-of-use score of only 3.5/5 – lower than any other provider featured on this list – it's clear that all those ecommerce features do get in the way of an intuitive interface.

The massive app store does contribute to this score a bit because it offers a whole lot of functionality, but you have to integrate these tools as they're not built in.

Still, when we tested Shopify we found lots of features were very user-friendly, like Shopify Magic, the platform's in-house AI-generated product description creator. Again, Shopify has an excellent customer score, so you know it's not too complicated for everyday users.

Buying Guide: How to Choose a Website Builder

If you've made it this far in our easy website builder guide, you're probably in the market for one yourself. However, you might be a bit overwhelmed by all the pricing plans,  features, and options that you'll need to consider before making your decision.

Still, finding a website builder doesn't have to be difficult – you just have to know what to look for. Here are a few things to consider when choosing a website builder for your business:

• Price – Your budget needs to be considered when it comes to purchasing a subscription to a website builder.
• Features – Depending on what you actually want to do with your website, you'll need to know what kind of features are available.
• Ease of use – If you aren't proficient in business software or coding, you need to know how easy it will be to get a website up and running.
• Customer support – Expecting a lot of problems with your site? Make sure your website builder has excellent customer support before you buy.

Tech.co has done a lot of research into website builders, which is why we recommend you take our website builder quiz. You'll get in-depth recommendations for providers, all based on your responses to specific questions that measure your particular needs for a website builder.

How much does it cost for a website?

With a good discount, the cheapest website builders can start at just a few dollars a month, although $5-$12 per month is more common. Website design agencies can create custom websites for a higher price – between $250-$650 for small sites, and $3,250-$13,000 (or more) for large ones with complex elements.

Should I build my own website or pay someone?

You'll likely want to use a website builder to create your own site if you don't have any out-of-the-ordinary needs, since high-quality templates exist within all of the top website builders for ecommerce sites, restaurant websites, and sites for retail or other stores. However, a third-party agency is worth paying for if you need a unique website and have a large enough budget.

How can I make a simple website for free?

Wix is the top services for building a website for free. However, all of its free plan come with some limitations, such as bandwidth caps, hard-to-Google URLs, and ads. We'd recommend opting for a paid plan instead – with the right discount, services like Wix start at just a few dollars per month.

How hard is it to make a website?

Using a website builder to create a website is fairly simple: log in, pick out a basic template to model your website after, use a drag-and-drop editor to tweak elements of it, choose a color scheme, upload a few images, and you're done. It doesn't need to take much more than a day, although knowing a little color theory can go a long way.