Let’s talk about website building platforms. You’ve almost definitely heard of Wordpress, which dominates a lot of the website space. You may or may not have heard of the professional’s alternative: Webflow.
Webflow marries CMS and designer tools in a way that empowers the non-technical. And while there are a lot of reasons to love Wordpress — it still powers 30% of the web, so we can’t dispute its popularity — in this blog post, we’d like to share with you why Orogamis prefers Webflow.
Although we may colloquially refer to platforms like Wordpress and Webflow as “website builders,” they really are content management systems (CMS). Content management systems are applications used to create, edit, and publish website content (which, in addition to website pages, may include landing pages and blog pages).
Wordpress has a lot of bells and whistles. You can integrate pretty much everything imaginable with it. The downside is that when you’re using a lot of plugins, you may end up generating bloated code (i.e., it loads slower).
Whereas the Wordpress dashboard has a lot of elements, the Webflow dashboard is simpler. A lot of users don’t touch most of what’s on the Wordpress dashboard. For some, these options may be nice to have, but most of us will only ever touch the “Posts,” “Pages,” and “Appearance” tabs.
There are two things we really appreciate about the Webflow dashboard:
That second point is important. When we work with clients on this platform, this allows us to pare away all the distractions.
This depends on what you’re looking for. Webflow is generally faster and easier to use, but the wonderful world of Wordpress plugins is something that really sets it apart.
The ability to edit the dashboard is one of a few reasons why Webflow is easy for collaboration. Together, we can build a style guide, stage the website, and mock up high-fidelity designs -- all in a single hub.
This also makes it extremely easy to manage the workflow (we imagine this is part of what inspired Webflow’s name). After the designs are approved, Webflow can host or we export the code to be passed off to developers. Webflow also has built-in tools for editorial collaboration.
While we can technically build a website on Webflow without the help of developers, there are instances where Javascript will need to be adjusted (i.e., where there’s custom functionality). However, Webflow usually relies less on devs than Wordpress – if you want a fully custom design.
If you have an on-staff developer and want a fully custom site, Wordpress is a good option for you. At a minimum, you need some basic HTML knowledge to get Wordpress to work. Webflow, on the other hand, is perfect for people who aren’t technically savvy and still want fully custom design. For one thing, you can edit pages directly!
And finally, there are no plugins when it comes to Webflow. For some people, this is a definite drawback. Wordpress has the most robust, third-party marketplace for developers in the world. In fact, the lack of plugins is probably the biggest con of using Webflow. Forms, analytics, email...there’s a lot to love about Wordpress plugins.
Most of these have a free version that you can use forever. That’s a ton of value. (That being said, plugins come with their own set of drawbacks — site speed and compatibility with your site not being the least among them).
When it comes to ease of use, Webflow is unparalleled.
Mastering your SEO on Wordpress requires plugins. Not the case with Webflow. Webflow hosts all SEO settings natively. This allows you to edit directly on the page, so you can easily:
To edit something like a meta description on Wordpress, you need a plugin like Yoast or Autoptimize.
This point is a tossup: Both Wordpress and Webflow get the job done, and will give you that mobile-friendly design that improves ranking.
Webflow comes with great hosting: The tier-one Amazon Cloudfront (AWS). The content delivery network (CDN) which means your content is hosted on servers all around the world and will pull in from a location nearest to the person who’s accessing your website. Webflow websites are fast, secure, scalable, and come SSL-certified.
As far as security is concerned, Wordpress is known for being…susceptible.
You can get great hosting for Wordpress, as well, but it requires another third-party service.
And on that point, let’s clear up a common misconception: Many initially feel that Webflow is more expensive, but after you’ve paid for all the add-ons you’ll need for Wordpress, the price is the same.
This one goes to Webflow. The hosting is second to none and Wordpress is known for their security vulnerabilities when a user doesn’t maintain the site appropriately.
Wordpress and Webflow are both great tools. Webflow’s biggest con is that it doesn’t have plugins. This is Wordpress’ most notable advantage, although as we mentioned, plugins themselves can be a drawback. We personally prefer Webflow for its speed and ease of use. We’ve found not only that Webflow sites tend to be faster, but the process of designing and developing them is much more streamlined.
If you need help, book a Discovery Call here. We have both Wordpress and Webflow experts ready to help you.
