Wix Review: Worthy Winner of Best Website Builder?

illustrated man holding up Wix logo surrounded by question marks

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We recommend website building tool Wix for small business owners in almost any sector, but particularly for services-based industries such as hospitality, health and fitness, and online coaching. We put Wix through its paces in our rigorous review process, scoring it 4.9/5 overall.

We’ve tested dozens of website builders over the past decade, and it takes a lot to impress us. Yet its versatile website features, handy business tools, and marketing automations make Wix a great all-rounder.

We carried out tests in all the areas you care about: functionality, ease of use, support options, pricing, and the all-important design process. For a quick summary, check our research category scores (each out of five):

Website featuresDesign FunctionsValue for MoneyHelp and SupportCustomer ScoreEase of UseOverall Score
4.84.33.64.84.84.44.9

Or read on for our in-depth take on Wix’s features, pricing, weaknesses, use cases, and first-hand user experiences.

Wix is our highest rated website builder in our research. We recommend it for creating a high-performing small business website.

How much does Wix cost?

Wix has recently cut down its number of price packages from seven to four (plus an enterprise tier for large businesses). Three of its price plans will build a website with an online shop.

You can check out our detailed guide to Wix pricing or take a quick look at the table below for an easy overview:

Swipe right to see more
0 out of 0

Light

Core

Business

Business Elite

Price (billed annually)
Price (billed annually)
Price (billed annually)
Price (billed annually)
Best For

Basic small business website

Best For

A small online store

Best For

Expanding online sellers

Best For

Fast-moving online stores

Key Features
  • No online store
  • 2GB storage
  • No Wix ads
  • Free domain (1 year)
  • Customer data forms
Key Features
  • 50GB storage
  • Free domain (1 year)
  • Sell products, video, music
  • 1 auto backup/month
  • Basic gift cards
Key Features
  • 100GB storage
  • Free domain (1 year)
  • Sales tax automation
  • Print shipping labels
  • Sell in 6 currencies
Key Features
  • Unlimited storage
  • Free domain (1 year)
  • Loyalty rewards
  • Priority customer support
  • Custom reports
Take payments?
Take payments?
Take payments?
Take payments?

In our testing, Wix only scored 3.6/5 for ‘Value for Money’, given its prices have gone up a little since this time last year. Wix is more expensive than GoDaddy or Weebly, but its creative editor is far higher quality. So if you're serious about scaling up your business with a functional and attractive website, Wix is the way to go.

Here’s a bonus: you can score a sweet 10% discount on Wix plans with our code: TAKE10

Of course, prices alone won’t mean much until you’ve got a solid idea of what you’re getting for your money. Let’s get a quick overview of Wix’s strengths and weaknesses.

The pros and cons of Wix

✅ Tonnes of templates: better navigation

Wix has added more templates this year, so you can now choose from close to 900 templates for your website. For a comparison, we counted some 150 templates on Squarespace. The new Wix templates have clearer navigation options than its older designs, allowing for a better user experience (UX) for your visitors.

We like the fact you can choose between templates with placeholder content or blank canvas styles, depending on which you find easier. Here are some examples of each template type:

three Wix templates with images and text above three blank templates
Choose between blank templates or those with placeholder content.

✅ Easy to customise your website

Our test users were pleasantly surprised by the easy-to-use website editing tools. That’s reflected in the solid 4.4/5 Wix scored in our ‘Ease of Use’ research category. It did so well, in fact, that it's one of our top AI website builders.

We liked the toolbar feature in the main dashboard that would take you back to the last section you were editing. That helped ensure a smooth, continual set-up process that didn’t waste time.

Screenshot of the Wix dashboard editor with red box highlighting the option to go back to table reservations management
When using Wix, we liked that in dashboard mode, there's often a banner at the top that takes you back to the last thing you were editing.

The design editing space (known as the ‘Editor’) was detailed, yet clearly laid out. We definitely recommend following along with the pop-up help guides otherwise you’ll get lost pretty quickly.

“So many elements are available to add,” said one focus group participant. “Everything is there – premade – and you only have to customise it for your site.” Some users found the Editor became a bit cluttered while using it, though. If you start to struggle, make sure you use the zoom in and out options for a clearer view.

✅ Improved search engine visibility

Did you know it’s possible to tweak your website so it’s more likely to appear for certain web search results? So if you’re selling fluffy slippers, you want your website to pop up when people type in “buy fluffy slippers” on Google.

The official name for these tweaks is “search engine optimisation” (SEO). According to our research, Wix is the best ecommerce platform for SEO. That means it offers the best tips and technical set-up for anyone looking to boost their website’s search engine visibility.

Wix has provided its users with strong SEO advice for several years already. But its recent integration with leading SEO tool Semrush builds on this. Now you can create keyword tracking lists that you can monitor and update over time.

❌ Tricky to access phone support

There’s no publicly advertised phone line for Wix customers (nor is there for WordPress.com or Squarespace, either). But this isn’t universal; Weebly, IONOS, and GoDaddy all offer a phone line for their customers. Instead you can request a callback, but you may have to wait some hours before that comes through.

You can get priority support over the phone only if you upgrade to the Business Elite plan (over £100 per month).

❌ A little slow to load

We found ourselves staring at loading screens a few times during the Wix set-up process. That’s perhaps to be expected, given the entire website creation process is taking place through your web browser, rather than a program downloaded onto your computer.

But even with a fast internet connection, the loading time between stages can be 5-10 seconds long. So we’re not talking hours of wasted time, by any means. But you’ll need some patience.

progress bar almost fully loaded with text above it reading "Adding your pages..."
You may have to get used to this.

Wix key features explained

1. Swiss army functionality

If you need a website that takes payments, schedules appointments, makes videos, and does a backflip, Wix is ready. (Alright, maybe not the last one). Scoring 4.8/5 in our ‘Website Features’ category, Wix is clearly trying hard – and succeeding – at holding onto its reputation as the best website builder on the market.

It does this by offering a bunch of essential business tools you’d usually have to buy separately. While its logo maker, social post creator, and email marketing are standard features you can expect of any website builder, some of its others are uniquely helpful.

For instance, Wix’s Customer Relationship Management (CRM) tools and freelancer marketplace make it easy to automate marketing and hire creative talent on demand.

2. Order management: straightforward but solid

If you choose to upgrade to one of Wix’s business/ecommerce plans, you can take payments for services and appointments, sell subscriptions or ship physical items. Wix’s sales, inventory, and order tracking features are streets ahead of GoDaddy or Squarespace.

You won’t get end-to-end order fulfilment on the ‘Business Basic’ plan (£15/month), though. To get that, plus the ability to print shipping labels, you have to upgrade to ‘Business Unlimited’ at £20/month.

Those prices are still small potatoes compared with Shopify, though, whose prices range from £25/month for its ‘Basic’ plan, through to £344 every month for its ‘Advanced’ one. Though Shopify affords you more sophisticated features than Wix, such as more in-depth reporting. So larger online sales businesses would be better off with Shopify than Wix.

3. Payment processing: loads of options

Wix is a great choice for online sellers because of its very wide range of payment processing options. We know that offering a variety of payment options increases the chance of customers completing the checkout process.

list of fourteen payment providers to connect with your Wix website
Wix websites connect with far more payment providers than GoDaddy.

Wix allows you to connect dozens of payment types (we counted 31 plus Wix’s own payment gateway), including buy-now-pay-later options and payment with cryptocurrencies. With Squarespace, on the other hand, you can only add a very limited range of payment processors to your web shop.

Curious about dropshipping? Wix can help you find suppliers and customers

4. Help and support: decent online guides

When it came to troubleshooting website editing, Wix performed fairly well in our tests. The knowledge centre was a helpful resource when it came to simple technical questions about meta tags and page redirects. Wix scored 4.8/5 in our ‘Help and Support’ testing category, meaning you should be able to resolve most problems you’re likely to face.

But if you want to speak to a real human – even about an issue as vital as billing – Wix makes it somewhat hard to access direct contact. As we’ve mentioned, there’s no available phone line for UK customer support. Instead you can request a callback, which may come in several hours after your request.

screenshot of Wix chatbot conversation, with final text both saying "an expert will call in the next few hours" and this line is underlined in red
Wix admits its customer service phone lines have long waiting times, and we found this in our own experience with the platform.

By the way, we couldn’t find this callback option easily. It was only after asking the bot directly “How can I speak to a human?” that this service even presented itself. At least you can easily find the chatbot through the ‘?’ symbol on several Wix pages.

We were underwhelmed by the Wix community discussion forum, too, which appears to be unmoderated. There’s no option to report spam. As a result, almost all recent comments seem to be bot generated to promote spam links.

It seems limiting access to support staff may be a way to keep operating costs low, as Wix continues to cut its workforce this year.

What kind of business is Wix best for?

With its dual set-up areas of the Dashboard (for functions and features) and Editor (for visual layout), Wix is best suited to a wide range of business folk. Wix is for people who need their website to perform specific actions that help run their business.

In this vein, Wix has a versatile set of tools that equip you to run events, book appointments, set up meetings, sell subscriptions, stream videos, send out marketing emails, track sales, and so on. It’s a truly useful all-rounder for a relatively low price.

That said, it can be a little hard to use as a beginner. Wix is likely to be overkill if you don’t need fancy features such as lead tracking and sales management. If you want a website that’s more of a landing page with contact details or a simple showcase for images, you’re better off with Squarespace or Weebly.

We recommend Wix for the following types of business users:

1. Small or medium online sellers

If you want to bring in more revenue by selling services, physical goods, subscriptions or other digital products, a Wix website is a good idea. As a fairly mature platform (beginning in 2006), Wix has market-leading tools for small to medium sized web retail businesses. In fact, its sales features are such good quality that we've named Wix as the best ecommerce platform for a small business.

Examples of industries well-suited to Wix include: sporting goods retailers, fashion and accessories, homeware, arts and crafts, gift shops, pet supplies, healthcare products, and digital education course providers.

Wix takes a cut

Wix takes a 2.5% sales commission from all ticket sales through your website. There are no additional Wix fees for other sale types though.

2. Hospitality, restaurants, and in-person entertainment venues

Wix has recently added table reservation management to its existing restaurant-specific features (which include food delivery services and menu display). All three features are suggested by the website creation engine if you select your business type as ‘Restaurant’ when you first get started with Wix.

Wix set-up screen with three recommendations for restaurant specific features and a red box around the phrase "Recommended for you"
When you select your business type, Wix suggests website features you're likely to need.

This shows Wix has really put themselves in your shoes as a restaurateur, immediately showing you the priority features you need for your hospitality business. You can also save some time and admin effort by setting up food delivery services directly through the special ‘Food Orders’ feature.

3. Consultants, coaches, legal firms, medical facilities, and health clubs

Wix is an attractive option for services-based businesses thanks to its reliable appointment scheduling features. If you need your website to funnel curious customers into your in-person office or to book video appointments with you, we can safely recommend Wix.

What sets Wix ahead of competitors is its successful Spaces by Wix app, which allows users to buy products from and book appointments with their favourite businesses. Already five million users strong, it’s one of several app-based options for reeling in more customers.

Health and fitness businesses can specifically benefit from the Fit by Wix app (free to download without a premium subscription). It allows you to take bookings for gym classes, offer memberships, set up community groups, host discussions, and sell merchandise.

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How does Wix compare to its competitors?

Wix's closest competitor is Squarespace. And the two performed very strongly in our research overall, scoring 4.9 and 4.8 respectively. But Wix is the clear winner, thanks to its slightly more advanced business features.

They're both beginner-friendly tools: Wix and Squarespace had the joint highest score in our research category for ‘Ease of Use’: 4.4/5. Yet Wix scored higher than Squarespace in both ‘Website Features’ and ‘Design Functions’ categories. Wix is therefore the better choice for most people.

We'd stress that Wix is a great do-it-yourself style website maker. If you're after a more custom scalable site for building an online shop, then you should look into WooCommerce on WordPress. It's one of our top ecommerce platforms for large companies.

Does Wix have good customer reviews?

Yes, Wix is backed by many positive customer reviews across several major review platforms. Our ‘Customer Score’ category analyses the popularity of website builder tools, and Wix scored an impressive 4.8/5 here.

Wix has seen its Trustpilot score improve massively over the past six to eight months. Although there are a fair number of one-star reviews, they’re now heavily outweighed by five-star reviews.

In general, Wix reviews mention appreciation for the range of features you can set up for your website (including extra ones you can find via the Wix App Marketplace). Many feel it’s good value for money, too.

What did our test users have to say?

Our research participants were divided over how easy Wix is to use. Scoring a 4.3/5 in the ‘Design Features’ category means the average person can get to grips with the editing tools. But broadly speaking, it takes some concentration and effort to learn to use Wix properly.

This comment from one focus group attendee sums up the general feeling pretty well: “It’s a funny one because so much of it [using Wix] is really easy, and then some things just feel like they’re a headache for no reason.”

Expert verdict: Wix is the worthy winner of all-round best business website builder

We highly recommend Wix for entrepreneurs who need a website that performs essential business functions. If you want to take bookings, sell online, track orders, schedule classes or form community groups, you’ll find the tools you could need with Wix.

Is it the cheapest? No. Is it dead simple to use? Not really. But Wix’s high quality templates, reliable business tools, and wide range of payment processing options set it head and shoulders above competitor products.

You definitely won’t need a degree in marketing or computer programming knowledge to get started with Wix. But if you do get stuck, there’s several support options including over the phone assistance.

With a free plan available, and 10% off premium plans using our discount code “TAKE10”, you may as well give Wix a go.

Why not take a look at Wix's web design templates?
Written by:
Sabrina Dougall
Sabrina is a business journalist whose career began in news reporting. She has a master's in Investigative Journalism from City University London, and her work has appeared in The Times, The Daily Express, Money Saving Expert, Camden New Journal, Global Trade Review, and Computer Business Review. She specializes in writing about SEO (search engine optimization). Having run her own small business, Sabrina knows first-hand how critical digital marketing is to building a client base and local reputation.
Reviewed by:
Robyn Summers-Emler, Grow Online Editor, Profile Picture
Robyn started working on Expert Market in 2021 as a specialist in business websites and digital marketing. As the Grow Online Editor, she ideates, commissions and optimizes content on Expert Market that helps businesses thrive in online spaces and maximize their ecommerce potential. Covering everything from choosing a website builder to scaling a social media marketing strategy - Robyn uses her expertise to help startups, SMBs, and larger businesses realize digital growth in an increasingly competitive landscape.