The choice
What you are choosing between
Squarespace is a platform you rent: the site lives inside their system, and it works for as long as you keep paying. A custom-built site is a set of files that belong to you. Whoever hosts it, you can move it, hand it to another developer, or take it with you. That ownership difference matters more than any single feature.
Cost
Cost over three years
Roughly, for a small brochure site:
- Squarespace. Around £16 to £30 a month depending on the plan, so £576 to £1,080 over three years, plus the hours you spend building and maintaining it. Hosting, security certificate and backups are included.
- Custom-built, paid once. £500 to £1,500 once, plus roughly £50 a year for a domain and hosting. Call it £650 to £1,650 over three years, most of it up front, and you look after the site yourself.
- Custom-built, paid monthly. A small setup fee, often nothing to a few hundred pounds, then around £30 to £100 a month for hosting, changes and upkeep. Roughly £1,100 to £3,900 over three years, and someone else looks after the site for you.
The totals are closer than people expect. What differs is what you get for the money, who does the work, and what you own at the end. If you want the full picture on the figures, I have written up what a small business website costs.
Squarespace
What Squarespace does well
- You can have something presentable online in a day or two.
- You can edit text and swap images yourself without calling anyone.
- Hosting, SSL, backups and updates are handled for you.
- The templates are competent, so a simple site looks tidy out of the box.
- It is a reasonable way to run a small shop you will manage yourself.
Custom
Where a custom site pulls ahead
- Speed. Template platforms load a lot of code to stay flexible. A site built for your content is lighter, and page speed is something Google measures.
- Fit. You get the layout and features your business needs, not the nearest template match.
- A choice of how to pay. Pay once and look after it yourself, or pay monthly and have it looked after. Either way, the site is yours.
- Ownership. The site is yours to move or change. You are not locked to one company's roadmap or pricing.
- Accessibility. It can be built properly for screen readers and keyboard use, which templates often only half-manage.
Pick Squarespace
When Squarespace is the right call
You will maintain the site yourself and want to. Money is tight and you would rather trade your own time for a lower bill. You need it live in days, not weeks. The design does not need to stand out, and you are not relying on the site to be found in search.
Pick custom
When to go custom
The website is how customers find you and decide to call. You want to own it rather than rent it. You want it fast and built to rank, or you need something the templates cannot do. If you are still deciding whether you need a site at all, that is a separate question worth answering first.
Questions
Common questions
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Is Squarespace bad for SEO?
Not inherently. You can rank fine on Squarespace for a local business. It tends to be slower than a lean custom build, and you have less control over the technical details, but content and a complete Google Business Profile matter more than the platform for most local searches.
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Can I move my site off Squarespace later?
You can export your text and images, and take your domain. You cannot take the design or the setup, so a move means rebuilding. That is the cost of renting the platform, and it is worth knowing before you invest years of content into it.
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Is Wix the same choice as Squarespace here?
Broadly yes. Wix, Squarespace, GoDaddy and similar are all rented platforms with the same core trade: quick and self-service, but you do not own the site, and it stops working the day you stop paying. The decision in this post applies to all of them.