The best website builders for small businesses in 2023

In 2023, 71% of businesses have a website, according to Forbes. The best website builders for small businesses, often also the best website builders available, offer business-specific features and tools for building a website for your company. These platforms enable any business to simply, quickly, and cheaply build a website that's professional and meets company requirements.

Our picks for the best small business website builders also offer functionality and tools for enhancing a business's online presence, such as ecommerce, bookings, subscriptions, and marketing. For those on a budget, many platforms rank among the best cheap website builders too, offering cheaper, professional site creation that enables you to save for other projects.

There's no one builder that works for all business use cases, and you might be overwhelmed by the choice available. We're here to help: we review all builders by creating custom sites, testing uptime and response times; examining specific small business tools; comparing builders to competitors; discussing and exploring pricing in detail; and trialing customer support and service responsiveness.

Read on to see who we considered the best small business website builders.

The top 3 website builders for small businesses right now

Wix: best all-around builder for small businesses
Wix has hundreds of templates, a suite of tools, and a flexible, beginner-friendly drag-and-drop interface. Its fairly-priced plans come with a 14-day money-back guarantee: ideal for small businesses starting out. You get the full builder with its free plan, while paid plans provide an ad-free, feature-packed site builder.

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Squarespace: top for native tools and templates
With over 500 professionally-designed templates available, native tools designed for businesses, and plenty of options for customization, Squarespace provides visually-appealing designs for small business sites, including online stores.

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GoDaddy: ease-of-use and high security
GoDaddy's website builder is packaged with its web hosting services, and as well as being simple and easy to use, it offers compatibility and improved security as part of the package. Other features include excellent support and powerful analytics, and its drag-and-drop interface allows for personalization.

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The best website builders for small businesses of 2023 in full

Wix is a regular feature at the top of lists of the best website builder, and it's top of the best small business website builders for good reason, too. Take advantage of the Wix ADI (artificial design intelligence) tool to get online fast, or use the more powerful Wix Editor to harness the full power of the platform. 

One thing that stands out is the template library, which contains more than 500 attractive designs that you can base your site on. There’s also a great selection of add-ons available via the Wix App Market, and the free-forever plan is up there with the best we’ve seen. 

Wix is a little confusing to start with, though, so expect to spend some time familiarizing yourself with the platform. It’s also at the expensive end of the spectrum, so it’s not a great choice on a tight budget. There are four business-specific plans, with Business Basic - at $27 a month, with 50GB storage - more than enough for most small or medium businesses.

Read our full Wix review and view our Wix promo codes.

If you’ve heard of website builders, the chances are that you’ve heard of Squarespace. It’s one of the most popular site creation platforms in the world, and it’s easy to see why. 

For one, it offers a neat selection of modern templates that you can use to start your small business site. All plans come with unmetered bandwidth and storage, and there’s a range of great ecommerce tools. The cheapest business-focused plan is the Business package, starting at $23 a month, with Basic and Advanced Commerce plans for those with online sales at $27 and $49 a month respectively.

The editor is relatively powerful, but it doesn’t offer the pixel-perfect design flexibility that some of the other options on this list do. It’s also a little confusing, so you should expect to spend some time familiarizing yourself with it when you’re getting started. 

Read our full Squarespace review and view our Squarespace promo codes.

If your main priority is getting a basic site online as fast and efficiently as possible, the GoDaddy website builder could be your best option. Although it’s quite basic, the editor is simple and intuitive. 

In addition, GoDaddy boasts a selection of basic ecommerce tools, a full analytics portal, and excellent support resources. There’s also a great free plan that you can use to test the platform, and three premium plans ranging from $9.99 to $29.99 a month, increasing after renewal. The Basic, Premium, and Ecommerce plans are ideal for businesses starting out, growing, or selling online.

On the downside, design flexibility is very limited. You won’t have access to any advanced tools whatsoever, which can make it hard to personalize your site. The templates are also quite basic, which can make it hard to build a business site with any sort of size or complexity. 

Read our full GoDaddy website builder review and our GoDaddy hosting review.

With its powerful yet intuitive editor and selection of beginner-friendly site creation tools, Strikingly is another great option for website building newbies. It’s designed specifically for landing pages and one-page sites, and it comes with a suite of unique features. 

The standouts among these are the simple store and blog modules, which you can use to add ecommerce and blogging functionality to your one-page site. The template library is a little limited, and the Limited account (from $6 a month) comes with a five-page restriction, but overall, there’s a lot to like here. 

When it comes to paid plans, the Pro and VIP packages are best for businesses, starting at $11.20 a month and $34.40 a month respectively if you pay for five years up front. These allow you to sell hundreds and products and have unlimited bandwidth.

Read our full Strikingly review.

* Based on a five-year plan.

Weebly is a great choice for small businesses that want to add an online store to their website. It features an excellent range of ecommerce features, and its online store tools are controlled by Square, one of the world’s most popular payment gateways. 

On top of this, Weebly boasts a selection of templates for sites of all shapes and sizes. Its free forever plan is a neat option for those who want to try the platform before purchasing a subscription, and the premium plans have seen a price slash in 2013.

For small businesses, the Professional and Performance packages (at $12 and $26 a month, respectively) offer the best levels of website services as your business grows.  The biggest addition of the Performance plan is the addition of PayPal payments.

Note, though, that the builder is a little limited. You will be restricted to predefined element positions, and it can be hard to achieve the design that you want. 

Read our full Weebly review.

IONOS Website Builder is a beginner-friendly website builder that’s very competitively priced and backed by a selection of great features. Every plan comes with a free domain, unlimited storage, and unmetered bandwidth. There isn’t any free forever plan, but the introductory prices are very competitive. 

One standout feature of the IONOS Website Builder is its excellent multilingual site tools. There’s a built-in translator, which can be used to translate your content into 62 different languages. Individual sites support up to 25 different languages at a time, which makes this a great option for small businesses targeting different language groups. 

You can get a basic site with the Starter plan at $9 a month, but the Plus and Pro site builder plans cost $15 and $25 a month respectively, bringing in features like customizable designs and unlimited webspace that most businesses would need. But this pricing doesn't include an online store, which comes at an additional $10 a month.

Read our full IONOS Website Builder review.

WordPress is the most popular content management system (CMS) used on the internet in 2013. You can choose to host the free CMS on your own WordPress hosting, or you can use WordPress.com, which is a website builder based on WordPress.

WordPress.com has six pricing plans, but businesses will typically choose between the Business plan ($25 a month) and the Commerce plan ($45 a month). The Commerce plan includes one of the most powerful and customizable online stores you can find, with premium store themes, dynamic product upsells, bulk discounts, and inventory management.

You have full code access and complete control over every aspect of your site, enabling you to build exactly what you want. Note, though, that WordPress can be a little challenging to get started with, and it will take you some time to get your site online. 

Read our comprehensive WordPress review.

Although it’s a relative newcomer to the website-building world, Gator Builder from HostGator stands out as excellent. All plans come with unmetered storage and bandwidth, as well as a free domain for the first year. 

The builder is arguably the most powerful after Wix, and this is largely due to the advanced drag-and-drop interface. Unfortunately, there isn’t a free-forever plan or a free trial, but there is a 45-day money-back guarantee. Even the cheapest of the four plans, Website at $4.95 a month, features a free domain, but it's doesn't have the features most businesses will look for.

Adding marketing tools with the Website + Marketing plan brings Gator Builder to $7.95 a month, and the Online Store plan costs $13.95 a month. A more advanced store option with features like bulk product editing costs $19.95 a month.

Considering all the features included, from marketing tools to secure online payments, Gator Builder is well worth checking out.

Read our full HostGator review.

Zyro is one of the most intuitive website builders in the world, from leading web host Hostinger. The designer is a little on the simple side, but it’s still more than good enough for those looking to get a simple site online with a minimum amount of fuss. 

One standout feature is the company’s excellent customer service, which includes online live chat and email ticketing. There’s also a neat set of AI tools, including an AI writer, logo builder, and blog title generator. Benefit from simple ecommerce tools if you want to add an online store and select a design from the template library base your site on. 

On the downside, prices are quite deceptive, and you can expect to pay significantly more than the advertised price when it comes time to renew your subscription. The Website plan is $11.99 a month, and offers unlimited bandwidth, storage, free emails for three months, and a free domain for a year, with the Business plan at $14.99 a month offering ecommerce functions.

Read our full Zyro review and view our Hostinger coupon codes.

Small business website builder FAQs

What is a website builder?

A website builder helps anyone to build a website, regardless of experience level, by employing simple platforms all the way up to powerful editors utilizing drag-and-drop technology, template libraries, and additional further tools for site creation.

Many of the leading platforms offer small business-specific features and tools, which include ecommerce functionality; marketing and email tie-ins; business and SEO analytics; and much more. The top builders generally offer business-tailored plans and packages, so you won't have to go far to find what you're looking for.

How to choose the best small business website builder for you

When you're trying to choose one of the best small business website builders, it's worth keeping key factors in mind to help make a good choice. First of all, decide why exactly you need a small business website and clearly identify your available budget, as well as the top tools you require.

If you want ecommerce tools, remember that not all builders offer ecommerce. Remember also to check if you require web hosting on top of your builder: this isn't likely, but it's important in particular if choosing WordPress.

Consider how much time you can spend building your site. Choose a beginner-friendly builder like Weebly or GoDaddy if you want a site finished quickly and easily; opt for a more powerful option like Wix if you want to spend more time finalizing your site's look and feel.

What's key to remember, however, is that most builders are available on free trials and some are free-forever website builders. As such, it can quite literally pay off to spend time researching builders before you choose; testing each out for free; and then opting for the paid plan from the provider you've earmarked.

How we review the best small business website builders

We review all website builders in similar ways, whether reviewing those focused on small businesses, ecommerce, or free blogs. First of all, we test the builder and editor by creating custom sites. In doing so, we can then say for sure where the platform resides on the difficulty scale, between beginners and advanced users.

We test our site's uptime and response times once online, as these metrics are integral to website performance. If your business site is offline or slow to respond, you can lose custom, money, and time.

On a more specific, small business-focused site basis, we examine specific small business tools and features, which could be ecommerce-related or could be more targeted elements like AI tools or content creation. We compare builders to competitors and discuss and explore in detail what each pricing plan offers, so you know which one to invest in for your business site.

Other common areas of our reviewing process include examining platform-specific features, as well as trialing customer support and service responsiveness and knowledge. The last thing you want is to have a problem with your business site, and then have a slow-to-respond, less well-informed support service.

 See our testing methodology page for more information.

Next steps with website builders and web hosting

Learn more about drag-and-drop editors, as most small business website builders utilize this technology. If you're wondering about web hosting, discover the differences between web hosting, WordPress, and website builders and learn what web hosting is.

When it comes to the providers featured, check out our step-by-step guides outlining how to make a website with Wix, with Squarespace, and with GoDaddy.