Squarespace Review 2023: Is Squarespace worth it?

Last Updated on   May 23 2023,
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Summary

Squarespace is a website building and hosting platform that allows users to create professional-looking websites using a range of customizable templates, with no coding required. It offers features such as e-commerce, blogging, and analytics, among others, and is designed to be user-friendly for beginners.

Overall
93%
93%
  • Ease of Use - 95%
    95%
  • Features & Flexibility - 95%
    95%
  • SEO & Mobility - 90%
    90%
  • Help & Support - 95%
    95%
  • Pricing - 90%
    90%

Pros

  • Stunning designs and templates: most aesthetically pleasing among builders
  • Impressive eCommerce features
  • Great support
  • Mobile apps available on Android and iOS

Cons

  • Not the best website editor in the market
  • No automatic backups
  • Page speeds are not the fastest

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Introduction to our Squarespace Review: Is Squarespace worth it? That is the question.

Welcome to this Squarespace Review.

Squarespace is one of the big names in website builders. It has been an industry leader since 2004. Therefore, it's not a shot in the dark to say that those keen on building their websites should consider this platform. However, one should ask – given the Squarespace pricing, is Squarespace worth it?

This is the big question I'll answer in this Squarespace review. We'll run through some of its main features, pros and cons, and Squarespace website cost.


Overview: What is Squarespace?

Squarespace is a website building and hosting platform that allows users to create and manage professional websites without the need for coding or design skills. It provides a wide range of templates and design options, as well as features such as e-commerce, analytics, and 24/7 customer support.

Visit squarespace.com


Ease of use:

Squarespace offers its users a minimalist, clean interface. Users, even with no coding experience, will pretty much be able to navigate the site and start creating their projects. So, is Squarespace worth it to a tech newbie? It definitely is.

get the free Squarespace trial


Features and Flexibility:

What features does Squarespace offer?

Squarespace Out-of-the-box:

The excellent news for Squarespace users is that it comes packed with exciting features integrated into the Squarespace website cost. Some of our favourite Squarespace website builder features that make Squarespace pricing a bang for your buck are:

  1. Free Domain: If you have already purchased a domain, you can quickly point this to your Squarespace website. However, if you are still in need of one, you can opt to buy a domain from Squarespace, at annual or bi-annual subscriptions, inclusive of a domain name for a year. After this, and depending on the domain name, the Squarespace pricing ranges from $20 to $70 annually.
  2. Email: Domain based email address can be opted through Google Workspace.
  3. No Ads: One of the best things about using Squarespace is that there are no ads! Regardless of the Squarespace pricing plan, you don't have to worry about dealing with random ads popping in and out of your screen while building your website.
  4. Monetization/ eCommerce/ Google Ads: If you want to run ads on your site, however, or even sell physical or digital goods, you can do so on your Squarespace website. Google Adsense easily integrates into a site, helping you earn through your website.
  5. eCommerce: Another added value in each Squarespace pricing plan is the built-in eCommerce functionality to sell online. For users looking to put their work out in public and for sales, this eCommerce feature is a great tool to take advantage of. This feature is available in all plans and comes with a free SSL certificate, one of the must-haves of a commercial website.
  6. Unlimited Bandwidth and Storage: All plans regardless of Squarespace pricing, come with unlimited bandwidth and storage, allowing websites full functionality any time of the day.

Squarespace Review of Themes and Templates:

When it comes to design, Squarespace takes the lead in the industry. Is Squarespace worth it in terms of aesthetics? Definitely! It offers the most beautiful themes and templates to choose from considering the Squarespace website cost. The themes can be categorised for an online store, portfolio, memberships, blog posts, and launch page.

These themes are all wonderfully created for professional-looking websites. It doesn't matter what style or industry you are in; there is a site theme to go with it. Furthermore, these templates can be customised with some necessary tweaking and can be further modified with coding.

Squarespace Review of templates
squarespace-templates

check the latest Squarespace Themes and templates now

Squarespace Review of Customisation Tools:

A standard with website builders, Squarespace can be heavily customised by a developer or someone with HTML/CSS skills (to begin with). Also, widgets such as Social Media add ons, galleries, and business tools can help in further designing your site, specific to your needs.

Squarespace Review of 3rd Party Integrations:

Squarespace has its “app store” Extension directory, but it isn't well-stocked. Fortunately, most sites can be integrated with various 3rd party apps and work seamlessly with a wide range of plug-ins, depending on your needs. Payment, for example, is possible through PayPal, Stripe, and ApplePay, while integrations with shipping companies like FedEx, UPS, and the US Postal Service ensure proper shipping and delivery of products to customers.

Squarespace Review of-extensions
squarespace-extensions

Squarespace Review of Hosting:

All websites created in Squarespace, regardless of the plan, come with hosting for the site, along with unlimited bandwidth and storage.

Squarespace Review of Backups:

One of the drawbacks of Squarespace is the lack of CMS backup and restoration supported within the system. In its Support section, a “backup” of the site is recommended simply as downloading a copy of your site's content into a local or cloud storage.

Squarespace Review of Migration:

If you already have an existing site and looking to transition to Squarespace, its website migration feature is the perfect tool.

However, Squarespace does not currently offer the ability to export a website in the traditional sense, where all the files and data are downloaded to your computer. But you can export your website's content, such as pages, blog posts, and products, in a format that can be imported into another website or content management system.

Squarespace Review of Mobile Application:

But what really sets Squarespace store apart from the competition is the Squarespace Commerce app for Android and iOS devices. The app enables you to manage your Squarespace online store on the go, allowing you to scan shipping labels, contact customers, manage inventory, and even fulfil orders on the fly.

squarespace-app
squarespace-app

Squarespace Review of eCommerce Tools:

Is Squarespace worth it for eCommerce? Unlike before, Squarespace now comes with a powerful eCommerce tool, much to its users' delight.

How does Squarespace's eCommerce feature work?

Squarespace's e-commerce feature allows users to easily set up an online store on their website.

Some of its basic commerce features include easy-to-customise templates for any business and industry, add items to cart, simple checkout, shipping, abandoned cart recovery, unlimited product listings, product descriptions and videos, related products, product catalogues, built-in inventory, and more.

The platform also provides a variety of design options for the online store, as well as built-in analytics to track sales and customer behavior. Additionally, Squarespace offers integrations with popular payment gateways such as Stripe and PayPal.

For a more exhaustive Squarespace review of this platform's eCommerce features, best to follow this link for our full Squarespace eCommerce review.

see more Squarespace features


SEO and Mobility:

Is Squarespace good for SEO?

Through the years, one of the major boosts in features that justifies Squarespace website cost is its SEO functionality. Squarespace provides its users with the following SEO capabilities right into their sites:

  • Direct edit of the SEO page title and descriptions
  • Hide a Page from a Search Engine
  • Control the image appearing together with your content
  • Sitemap Generator

Mobile First:

Squarespace sites are mobile-optimized and fast-loading which is an important ranking factor for SEO.

Squarespace Review of Pagespeed:

Our tests through Pingdom and GTmetrix discovered the following;

pingdom-speed-test
squarespace-pingdom-speed-test

 

gtmetrix-speed-test
squarespace-gtmetrix-speed-test

It's not the fastest website builder out there. Squarespace's page speed performance varies depending on the specific template and elements used on a website.

Overall, it is known to have a relatively good performance with fast load times. However, some users have reported that the platform can struggle with loading large amounts of content or heavy media files.

Additionally, some website templates may not be optimized for page speed, resulting in slower loading times. To improve page speed performance, it is recommended to optimise images, reduce the use of third-party embeds, and enable Gzip compression. Squarespace offers the SSL option and HSTS.

see more Squarespace SEO features


Support and Resources:

Does Squarespace offer customer support?

Yes, Squarespace offers 24/7 customer support through its website, email, and live chat. They also have a large knowledge base, video tutorials and webinars to help users learn how to use the platform. The Help Center available allows for easy browsing of queries. There is also an option to hire a Squarespace expert to help you with everything you need for your site.

However, it limits its support to online support only; they have taken great pains to explain why they do not offer phone support.

help-center
squarespace-help-center

see more Squarespace Support features


Squarespace Cost:

What is the cost of using Squarespace?

Squarespace offers a variety of pricing plans to fit the needs of different users and websites. The cost can range from $12 to $40 per month, depending on the chosen plan. There are four main Squarespace plans to choose from, depending on your needs.

Additionally, Squarespace charges a transaction fee for e-commerce transactions and a fee for using external payment gateways. For selling, it's important to note that the Commerce plans offer zero transaction fees, in contrast with Business.

Users can also purchase custom domains and email campaigns through Squarespace.

All Squarespace website cost plans come with free hosting and 24/7 customer support. You can also save up to 30% by paying annually.

Squarespace Pricing Plans:

  • Personal: The most basic of all the plans and comes with the standard package of the free domain (for one year), free SSL, unlimited bandwidth and storage, SEO features, and various templates to choose from.
  • Business: This plan is ideal for small to medium businesses and provides an eCommerce system for your market. As mentioned, there is a transaction fee to take note of.
  • Commerce (Basic and Advance): The best plan for businesses looking to sell on their site entirely, the Commerce Plan takes zero transaction fees and come with more functionalities such as customer accounts, inventory tracking, and so much more.

 

squarespace-pricing

Squarespace Free trial/refund policy/money-back guarantee:

From their Terms of Service page, Squarespace trial comes in 14 days of free testing of the Business Plan. Once the Squarespace trial expires and your account reverts to the “Personal” plan, any business plan progress will not be saved.

>> Click for the latest Squarespace Pricing plans today <<


Users Squarespace Reviews:

According to user Squarespace reviews, Squarespace is generally considered to be a user-friendly website builder that is easy to navigate and customize. Many users appreciate its sleek and modern design templates, as well as its robust e-commerce features.

However, some users have reported that the platform can be a bit limiting in terms of design flexibility and may not be the best option for more advanced users. Additionally, some users have complained about customer support and the cost of certain features.

trustpilot Squarespace Review
trustpilot-squarespace

Overall, despite a poor score on Trust Pilot; Squarespace is generally considered to be a great option for small businesses, personal websites, and online stores.


Conclusion and Recommendation to our Squarespace Review:

To wrap up this Squarespace review – is Squarespace worth it?

My Personal Experience

I have used Squarespace in the past for several of my own personal projects and for clients.

The user interface is intuitive and easy to navigate, even for those without much technical experience. The templates are modern and visually appealing, and the built-in e-commerce functionality is a great option for those looking to sell products or services directly from their website. The customer support is also top-notch, with helpful resources and responsive customer service.

One downside is that Squarespace is not as customizable as some other website builders, but for those who want a sleek and professional-looking website with minimal effort, Squarespace is a great option.

Overall, my experience using Squarespace has been positive and I would recommend it to others looking for a simple and efficient website building solution.

What is it best for?

Squarespace is an excellent tool for businesses and individuals looking to build a professional website for sales or personal use. For a competitive Squarespace website cost, it comes with beautiful designs to choose from and can be customised, along with powerful tools perfect for SEO and eCommerce.

What is it not best for?

Squarespace is not recommended for users looking to create a website for free. The platform is relatively more expensive than its competitors. Also, if you're a complete newbie who doesn't want any to undergo any learning curve, this isn't for you.

Squarespace Alternatives:

Here's a list of the best Squarespace alternatives to create a website;

Rank Key Features Price (Basic Paid Plan) My View
1. Squarespace Beautiful Professional design templates, blogging tools, powerful marketing tools, great eCommerce features for small to medium-sized stores Starts at $12/month Check Pricing Perfect for creatives and small businesses needing a visually stunning site Try For Free
2. Webflow Visual CSS design, CMS features, eCommerce capabilities Starts at $12/month Check Pricing Best for designers and developers wanting deep customization Try For Free
3. Weebly Easy-to-use, eCommerce capabilities, range of templates Starts at $6/month Check Pricing Good for small businesses and e-commerce Try For Free
4. Shopify Comprehensive eCommerce tools, large app store, SEO features Starts at $29/month Check Pricing Best for creating an online store Try For Free
5. Wix Drag-and-drop builder, wide range of templates, App Market Starts at $14/month Check Pricing Great all-around website builder with flexibility and features Try For Free
6. Wordpress.com Blogging tools, large theme selection, good for large sites Starts at $4/month Check Pricing Best for blogging and larger sites Try For Free
7. Carrd Simple, one-page sites, ideal for personal profiles and resumes Starts at $19/year Check Pricing Best for simple, one-page sites Try For Free
8. Jimdo AI-powered builder, eCommerce tools, SEO features Starts at $9/month Check Pricing Ideal for beginners with its easy-to-use interface Try For Free
9. 1&1 IONOS Wide range of templates, marketing and eCommerce tools Starts at $5/month Check Pricing Good all-rounder with a focus on business websites Try For Free
10. GoDaddy GoCentral ADI, email marketing, eCommerce tools Starts at $9.99/month Check Pricing Easy-to-use, but limited in terms of design customization Try For Free
  • Squarespace vs Wix: Squarespace offers more advanced e-commerce features, while Wix has a wider range of design templates.
  • Squarespace vs WordPress.com: Squarespace offers a more user-friendly interface, while WordPress.com is more customizable and is open-source.
  • Squarespace vs Weebly: Squarespace offers more design flexibility and e-commerce options, while Weebly is more affordable and beginner-friendly.
  • Squarespace vs Webflow: Squarespace is more focused on website building, while Webflow is a more powerful web design tool.
  • Squarespace vs GoDaddy: Squarespace is known for its sleek, professional designs and robust e-commerce functionality, while GoDaddy Website Builder is more geared towards small businesses and individuals looking for a simple, easy-to-use website builder.
  • Squarespace vs Square: Squarespace is a website building platform, while Square is a payment processing and point-of-sale solution.

Squarespace Review Final Word:

Still wondering “Is Squarespace worth it?” – give your mind a rest and take it on a test drive! Grab the 14 Day Free Squarespace Trial available for the Squarespace Business Plan. You can even extend the trial or request to continue a free trial in an existing project.

Try for free


FAQ:

What are the benefits of using Squarespace?

There are many benefits to using Squarespace to build and host your website. One of the main benefits is its user-friendly interface and drag-and-drop design options. This makes it easy for users to create and manage their website without the need for coding or design skills. Squarespace also offers a variety of templates and design options to choose from, as well as built-in features such as e-commerce, analytics, and 24/7 customer support. Additionally, Squarespace provides reliable hosting, which ensures that your website is always up and running.

Can Squarespace be used for a blog?

Yes, Squarespace can be used to create and manage a blog. It offers a variety of templates and design options that are suitable for blogs, as well as built-in features such as commenting, categories, and tags. Additionally, Squarespace's platform is optimized for search engines, which can help improve the visibility of your blog.

Can I use my own domain with Squarespace?

Can I use Squarespace to create a multilingual website?

Can I create a website with Squarespace for free?

Squarespace does not offer a free plan, but it does offer a 14-day free trial. This allows you to test the platform and its features before committing to a paid plan.


That’s all for now:

Thanks for reading our Squarespace review and don’t forget to keep an eye out for our ever-growing blog of review and comparison articles such as;

1 thought on “Squarespace Review 2023: Is Squarespace worth it?

  1. I’m not sure if it’s worth it to switch to Squarespace, but it’s an interesting platform to check out!

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