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Your options compared

Wix vs Squarespace vs WordPress vs GoDaddy: an honest comparison

All four are good at what they do, and for some businesses one of them is the right answer. But the monthly price is only part of the story. Before you drag and drop your way to a website, it’s worth knowing what you’re signing up to keep paying, what you can take with you, and what you’ll still have to do yourself.

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By Paul Morris · Updated

YOUR 995 WEBSITE · NOTHING HIDDEN

  • WIXFROM £9/MO
  • SQUARESPACEFROM £12/MO
  • GODADDYFROM £7.49/MO
  • WORDPRESSFREE + HOSTING
  • BUILDER PLANSEVERY MONTH

AT 995£995

PAID ONCE · NO VAT · YOURS TO KEEP

01 — The short answer

Four builders, side by side.

Prices are UK prices for the plans a small business would usually pick, billed yearly, checked in November 2026. Paying month to month costs more on every one.

How Wix, Squarespace, WordPress, GoDaddy and 995 Digital compare on cost, who does the work, leaving, and what happens when you stop paying.
RouteWhat it costsWho builds itCan you take it with you?If you stop paying
Wix£9–£25 a monthYouNo, Wix sites only run on WixBack to a Wix address, with Wix ads
Squarespace£12–£17 a monthYouPartly; some pages exportA “Website Expired” message
WordPressFree software, plus hosting and pluginsYou, or someone you payYes, it’s open sourceOffline or private when the plan lapses
GoDaddyFrom £7.49 a monthYou, with AIYou can download the codeOffline until you pay again
995 Digital£995 once, no VATWe do, with youYes, all of itThere’s no plan to stop

02 — Each one, fairly

What each is genuinely good at. And where it falls short.

Between them, these four have helped millions of businesses get online, and each one does it well. They’re built around different ideas of who does the work and how much control you keep, so here’s who each one suits, what it does best, and what to know before you sign up.

Wix

£9–£25 a month, billed yearly

Best for people who enjoy tinkering and want to do it all themselves.

Good at

  • The most flexible drag-and-drop editor
  • Hundreds of templates
  • An app for almost everything

Watch for

  • A Wix site can’t move off Wix
  • Apps can add monthly costs
  • The plan never ends

Wix’s plans run from Light at about £9 a month to Business at about £25, or £11.50–£29 paying monthly. Wix says its sites have to be hosted on its own servers, so moving later means starting again. If you cancel, the site goes back to a free Wix address with Wix adverts on it.

Squarespace

£12–£17 a month, billed yearly

Best for photographers, salons and anyone whose work sells on looks.

Good at

  • Widely seen as the best-looking templates
  • The tidiest, simplest editor
  • Polished results quickly

Watch for

  • Fiddly once you step outside the template
  • Exports are only partial
  • A lapsed plan shows “Website Expired”

Basic and Core cost about £12 and £17 a month billed yearly, or £16 and £24 month to month. Exports cover some pages and one blog, but not most page types, styles or custom code. When a subscription lapses, visitors see a “Website Expired” message.

WordPress

Free software, paid upkeep

Best for businesses with someone technical on hand, or the budget to pay for one.

Good at

  • Open source, so you can move it anywhere
  • Tens of thousands of themes and plugins
  • Runs a huge share of the web

Watch for

  • Several editors and plugins to learn
  • Constant updates, or security risk
  • Plugins built for every business, so not quite yours

WordPress now has a block editor, a site editor and, on most sites, a page builder plugin on top, each updated on its own schedule. Someone has to keep the lot updated and compatible, because skipped updates are how many WordPress sites get hacked. WordPress.com handles the hosting for you, but if the plan lapses the site is made private and plugins stop working.

GoDaddy

From £7.49 a month, billed yearly

Best for getting your hours and phone number online today, with the least effort.

Good at

  • The quickest route from nothing to live
  • Domain and email in the same account
  • Paid plans let you download the code

Watch for

  • You ask the AI, rather than drag things
  • AI credits expire each billing cycle
  • Its words need your edits to sound like you

GoDaddy’s builder is now its Airo AI builder: describe your business and it writes and lays out a site for you. The plan’s AI credits expire each billing cycle. If you drop back to the free plan, the site goes offline until you upgrade again.

03 — Three years on

The monthly price, multiplied.

A builder looks cheapest in month one. This is what each costs by the end of year three at today’s prices, before domain renewals, apps or price rises.

Approximate three-year cost of each route for a small business site, at November 2026 prices, billed yearly.
RouteThree yearsWhat’s not included
Wix (Light to Core)£324–£576Design, words, build, your time
Squarespace (Basic to Core)£432–£612Design, words, build, your time
GoDaddy (Starter)About £270, if the price holdsRewriting the AI’s words, your time
WordPressFrom about £150 on a cheap plan, rising with hosting and pluginsUpdates, security, your time
995 Digital£995 plus a one-off £195 handover, then your domainNothing. Or £35 a month if we look after it

On price alone, the builders win, and we won’t pretend otherwise. But price isn’t what wins you work. A customer doesn’t see your plan; they see the website. Whether they ring you or the next name on the list comes down to how it looks, what it says, and how quickly it answers the question they searched for. A builder gives you the tools to make that. Here’s what each actually buys you.

A builder plan buys you

£270–£612 over three years

  • An editor and a choice of templates
  • Hosting, for as long as you keep paying
  • Apps and plugins, often at extra cost

Still yours to do: deciding what goes on each page, writing every word, choosing and ordering photos, setting it up to be found on Google, and fixing whatever breaks. In your evenings, for as long as the site is live.

£995 buys you

Paid once

  • A Design System for your business: colours, type, spacing and logo rules
  • Pages designed around your customers, not a template
  • Every word written or edited with you
  • Built to load fast, read well and be found on Google and AI search
  • Launched on your domain, and yours to keep

Afterwards, your only bills are your domain, typically £10–£20 a year, and hosting, which for a site this size is often free. If the site brings in one extra job, for most local businesses that pays back the difference.

Website builders hire you the cement mixer. We lay the patio, and you keep it.

04 — What the price tag leaves out

The bits nobody mentions at sign-up.

None of these shows up on a pricing page, and most only become obvious a year or two in.

You’re renting, not owning

On Wix, Squarespace and GoDaddy, the site only exists on their platform. Your words and photos are yours, but the site isn’t something you can pick up and move.

The subscription never ends

The plan is the price of the site staying online, for as long as you have it. Prices can rise at renewal, and the free domain is usually free for the first year only.

The “Website Expired” page

Someone has searched for what you do, found you, clicked through, and landed on “Website Expired”, an advert-covered page or nothing at all. That was your first chance to make an impression, and it’s gone. Most people won’t try again; they’ll ring the next business on the list. All it takes is a card that expires or a renewal that fails while you’re busy with work.

Apps built for everyone

Need a booking form, a menu or reviews? You add someone else’s app or plugin, built to suit every type of business and so not quite right for yours. Some bill monthly on top of the plan.

Flexibility stops at the template

Builders are quick while you stay inside what the template expects. The moment your business needs something it doesn’t, you work around it or go without.

Your evenings

A builder gives you the tools, not the decisions: what to say, in what order, and how to turn a visitor into a phone call. That part is the website.

05 — To be fair

When a builder is the right call.

We’d rather you picked the right option than ours. A builder is often the better answer if one of these is you.

  1. 01

    You’re testing an idea

    If you don’t yet know whether the business will last, a builder’s cheapest plan is a low-risk way to find out.

  2. 02

    You enjoy doing it yourself

    If you’ve got the time and like the work, Wix or Squarespace will get you a decent site, and you’ll know every corner of it.

  3. 03

    You need it live this week

    GoDaddy’s AI builder can have your hours and phone number online today. Plan the proper site for later.

  4. 04

    You want to run a big shop yourself

    Selling hundreds of products is a bigger job than a small business site. If you want to set it up and run it yourself, a dedicated shop platform is the quickest start. If you’d rather it was designed and built properly around your products, we do that too, as a custom project quoted up front.

06 — Why we’d still recommend 995 Digital

The most flexible option. And the best outcome.

For a local business that needs to be found, trusted and contacted, this is what £995 gets you that a builder plan doesn’t.

  1. 01

    A Design System, first

    Before any page is designed, we create your Design System: your colours, typography and spacing, and how your logo should and shouldn’t be used. The website is designed from it, and it’s yours to use everywhere else too, from social posts to flyers, signs and the van. Everything is built on the same foundations, so your business looks like one business wherever people meet it.

  2. 02

    Designed for your business

    Not a template. The pages, layout and look are worked out for your customers, then built from scratch, so it does exactly what you need and nothing you don’t.

  3. 03

    Written with you

    We write or edit every word, so the site answers what your customers actually ask and sounds like you, not like an AI or a template.

  4. 04

    Built to be found and fast

    No builder code or plugins loading on every page, just what your site needs. That makes it quick on a phone signal, accessible, and easy for Google and AI search to read.

  5. 05

    Yours, with no lock-in

    The design, the code, the content and the domain are yours. Take it on yourself for a one-off £195, or leave it with us for £35 a month with one month’s notice. Either way, there’s no plan that can lapse and take your site with it.

Still weighing up costs? See how much a small business website costs in the UK, or what a “free” website really costs you.

07 — Before you choose

Six questions for any builder.

Whichever way you go, get these answers before you put in the hours.

Ask before you start

  • What will the plan cost when it renews, not just in year one?
  • Is the domain registered in your name, and what does it cost after year one?
  • Which paid apps or plugins will you need on top of the plan?
  • Can you export the site, or would leaving mean rebuilding it?
  • What do visitors see if a payment fails?
  • Who writes the words, and how many evenings will it take?

What you get at 995

£995

one amount · 25% deposit to start · no VAT

We’re a team in the North East, and we build websites for anyone, anywhere. One price for everyone, with nothing added on top. Shops, booking systems and customer logins are quoted separately and agreed before we start.

Once it’s live, take it on yourself for a one-off £195, or leave it with us for £35 a month. No contract either way.

Book a slot

Design and build

  • 01

    Up to 10 pages, agreed up front

    We work out the pages and what goes on each one together, and agree the scope before any design starts — enough to sell what you do properly.

    included
  • 02

    A proper design system first

    Type, colour, spacing and buttons signed off before any code, so every page hangs together. It’s yours to keep, too: the same system works for signage, social posts, menus, vans — anywhere the business shows up.

    included
  • 03

    Modern, mobile-first design

    Thumb-sized tap targets and a fast first load, because most customers meet you one-handed.

    included
  • 04

    Accessible to everyone

    Built to WCAG 2.2 AA accessibility standards: readable contrast, clear text, full keyboard and screen-reader support. Nobody gets shut out — and search engines reward it too.

    included

Words and pictures

  • 05

    The words worked out together

    We draft, you mark it up, we iterate until it sounds like you.

    included
  • 06

    Your photos, properly treated

    Cropped, straightened and colour-matched. Good phone photos are genuinely enough.

    included

Found, and yours

  • 07

    Structured to be found — by Google and AI

    Clean headings, schema, sitemap and fast Core Web Vitals.

    included
  • 08

    Google Business Profile tidied

    Hours, photos, and the map pin in the right place.

    included
  • 09

    Your domain, included

    We move yours across or register a new one. The DNS is our problem.

    included

After that, looking after it is optional — do it yourself, or £35 a month and we keep it running.

Questions

Still wondering?

Anything else? Ring 07455 105278 — no charge to talk.

It depends on who’s doing the work. If you want to build it yourself and you’re happy to keep paying monthly, Wix is the most flexible and Squarespace has the best-looking templates. If you want something live today with as little effort as possible, GoDaddy’s AI builder is the quickest. If you want a site you can move anywhere, WordPress is the only one of the four that’s open source. If you’d rather a site designed for your business, written with you and fully yours, that’s what we do for £995.

Book your slot

Tell us about the business.

We keep a small number of builds running at once, so the queue is real. No payment now — we’ll come back the same day to confirm and take the deposit.

Rather talk first?Message us on WhatsApp (opens WhatsApp)995@twelvepointnine.com
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Your bespoke, accessible, responsive website, designed and built£995

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