A website builder is an excellent tool for those who want to have their own corner on the internet but have little to no experience or skills. They provide you with templates, editors, and various other tools for building your personal site. However, there is a problem – good website builders tend to be very expensive.
But that does not mean you can’t build your own website for free – you definitely can. There are plenty of excellent free website builders that include all the basic (and even some extra) tools and features for a beautiful site. Such a website builder will be more than enough for a small online shop, a portfolio, a blog, or a landing page.
To help you find a provider for building your website, we tested and reviewed numerous free plans of website builders according to what features and how many templates they offer, what are their limitations, and how easy they are to use. Below is our list of the 10 best free website builders in 2024 – continue reading and find the one for you.
Top 10 best free website builders in 2023
- Wix – the best free website builder overall
- Hostinger Website Builder – easy-to-use free website builder for learning
- SITE123 – excellent free option for business sites
- Shopify – free website builder for online stores
- Squarespace – free website builder for professional-looking sites
- Weebly – small business and eCommerce free website builder
- WordPress.com – excellent free solution for bloggers
- Ucraft – free website builder for portfolios
- WebsiteBuilder.com – beginner-friendly free option
- IM Creator – website builder, free for non-profits, artists, and students
📢 Limited offer: Holiday deal! Get Wix with 50% OFF!
Best free website builders – detailed list:
There are so many website builders to choose from, and many offer free plans, however, some may be more limited than others. To help you find the best option, we tested and reviewed dozens of free website builder providers based on what features and tools their free plan offers, whether you can get a custom domain, how easy it is to use the editor, and what template options are available. To find out more about each provider, continue reading below.
1. Wix – an overall winner
| Features: | Two website editors, excellent customizability |
| Free templates: | 900+ |
| Best for: | Design and editing freedom |
| Current deal: | Holiday deal! Get Wix with 50% OFF! |
If you want to learn website building for free – Wix is the overall best option. Over 900+ unique templates and two website editors with unique in-depth site editing tools make a winning combination. Best of all, you can even publish your finished website.
Editor. You can also choose between editors – use the Wix 100% drag-and-drop editor for the full building experience or opt for an AI-powered Wix ADI section-based editor. If you're looking for a free website builder to teach yourself website design, the Classic Editor is there for you. It is highly editable and allows full HTML/CSS customization and functionality building.
Features. The free plan is perfect for a smaller personal site – you get 500MB of monthly bandwidth and 500MB of cloud storage space. You also get to send 200 emails per month, all Wix sites include SSL, and your website is hosted on a global CDN. There are over 900 unique and beautiful templates, too.
What we liked. The best part of Wix is that your creativity is not limited – all templates and editing tools are readily available for everyone, free or premium plan. It is ideal for small personal projects, school projects, and overall website design learning. All the excellent site editing tools are available for everyone, as well as tutorials and guides.
Areas of improvement. The free version is still limited: you cannot connect a custom domain, so your free website will forever be under the wixsite.com subdomain. Besides, all templates come with a watermark, which is not the most professional look. Additionally, such features as e-commerce tools and more apps for design customization require a premium account.
If you want more customization options, are planning to build a bigger website or an e-shop, and don’t fancy yourself subdomains or watermarks, upgrading to a premium Wix plan is the best choice. The starting price for paid Wix subscription starts from $16.00/month.
2. Hostinger Website Builder – easy-to-use free option
| Features: | Drag-and-drop editor |
| Free templates: | 130+ |
| Best for: | Learning purposes |
| Current deal: | Get Hostinger Website Builder, now 81% OFF + 3 months FREE! |
Hostinger Website Builder is another good option for learning how to build a website free of charge. While there is no available free plan, Hostinger Website Builder's demo version offers a great opportunity to try out one of the best website builders on the market without spending a single penny.
Editor. The builder offers a traditional approach, where you pick a template and edit it in the way you like. If you want a pre-made design, you can choose from over 130 free templates, which then can be further edited with the provider’s drag-and-drop editor. There are over 12 pre-designed elements you can test and add to your site. The builder’s easy-to-follow grid will also help you align said elements on the site.
Features. With the demo version, you get to try out everything that Hostinger Website Builder has to offer. You can use all the AI-powered tools, including a writer and editor. If you decide to move on from the demo version, you will also get free SSL certificates, a custom domain, email, as well as a web-hosting service.
What we liked. Hostinger Website Builder also includes a blog and guides option if you run into any difficulties. It’s a simple, non-intrusive website builder that lets you have a smooth experience no matter what your needs are.
Areas for improvement. Hosting Website Builder’s free demo is a great way to test the editor. However, no changes can be saved for later use. This only means that there is no option to publish the site either, and you will need a premium plan.
If you decide to publish your site (and get a custom domain), Hostinger Website Builder is one of the cheapest options on the market, with prices starting at just $2.24/month
3. SITE123 – easy business website building
| Features: | Simple block builder |
| Free templates: | 180+ |
| Best for: | Small business sites |
| Current deal: | Holiday deal! SITE123 coupon 40% OFF! |
If you just want to build a website as quickly as possible, and both your time and patience are running thin, SITE123 is the perfect solution to build a website without spending any money.
Editor. SITE123 is by far the easiest builder to operate on this list, taking all the intricate design work right out of your hands. It has over 160 pre-made website sections with different layouts. Just put the ones you like together: and you'll be done in no time. There are still some edits you can do: namely with the fonts, backgrounds, color schemes, and so on.
Features. With the free SITE123 plan, you will get 250MB of storage and 250MB of bandwidth per month. This is enough for a small website with no more than 300 visitors per month. The better part about the free version is that you also get basic eCommerce features, which not many providers offer with their free plans. There is also free SSL.
What we liked. SITE123 leans more towards speed & ease-of-use than depth-of-designs & features. It lets you both create a website for free and free your mind from all the difficult decisions.
Areas for improvement. Although the free SITE123 version is perfect for small websites or online shops, it does have limitations. You only get a subdomain with a complicated-looking link, and a watermark is visible on your site at all times. The free eCommerce features are also lacking – there is no option to take online payments.
Use SITE123 if you have a small online business, or just want to build a serious website quickly. But if you want to use your own domain and get additional business and eCommerce features, consider getting a premium plan. The prices for paid SITE123 subscriptions start at $12.80/month.
4. Shopify – website builder for online stores
| Features: | Block-based editor, eCommerce functionalities |
| Free templates: | 9 |
| Best for: | Building a unique online store |
| Current deal: | Try 3 months of Shopify for $1/month |
Shopify is a great choice for those looking to test their abilities in creating an online store. If there’s one website builder we could call all-inclusive and professional, it’s certainly Shopify. It has a free trial that is applicable to any subscription plan.
Editor. Shopify’s editor is very straightforward and all its sections are well organized, allowing you to customize virtually any spot of your website. Whether you’re looking to create a small shop, sell your services, or open up a full-blown e-store, you found the right platform. You can also make use of Shopify’s SEO and blogging tools, as well as email marketing.
Features. With Shopify’s free trial, you get access to all the free features of the editor and can set up Shopify’s payments. You will also be able to preview your website and share the site preview with your friends. Out of +70 templates, Shopify’s Themes shop includes 9 free designs. It’s not a lot compared to other builders, but it is enough to get you started.
What we liked. With Shopify, it’s not hard to crack the code as even the most complex stuff is made simple. While it can be limiting in some aspects, you can create a purely original website. Sure, it may take some time, yet the simplistic block-based editor won’t let you fail.
Areas for improvement. Although Shopify is going in the right direction, nothing’s flawless. You won’t be able to publish your site during the free trial, but if you’re only looking to practice your design skills, it’s a great opportunity to do so without spending a single penny.
If it just so happens that you decide to release your site into the wild, there are 3 plans to choose from, with prices starting from $29.00/month.
5. Squarespace – for professional-looking sites
| Features: | Simple section-based editor, good SEO tools |
| Free templates: | 110+ |
| Best for: | Building visually captivating sites |
| Current deal: | Get up to 30% OFF Squarespace! |
If you’re looking for a beginner-focused website builder, Squarespace is the way to go. A streamlined experience, professionally crafted template designs, and a simple editor – you can try all of that for free. There’s no free subscription but they do offer a free 14-day trial.
Editors. Squarespace’s section-based editor is very easy to get a hang of. You’ll get a large variety of pre-made elements that you can easily add to your site and further customize. Although the editor is quite restrictive, it’s virtually impossible to mess up the design. Squarespace offers over 110 free, beautiful, and responsive templates.
Features. Squarespace is filled with tools and features for your blog, online store, portfolio, event, or video showcasing sites. The free trial will get you access to most editor’s features, and possibilities to add contributors and build an unlimited number of websites. Squarespace also includes unlimited storage and bandwidth, a free domain, and an SSL.
What we liked. Squarespace’s themes are all professionally made and aesthetically pleasing. Because of the professional templates, you can finish a website in a matter of seconds. And if you wish to customize it, the simplicity of the editor lets you achieve the end result in no time.
Areas for improvement. Squarespace doesn’t have a free plan, and while the free trial is perfect for seeing the builder’s full potential, it is still limited. You won’t be able to publish until you upgrade. Your Getty images will remain unlicensed, and the possibility to create subscription products is not available either.
While it won’t be possible to publicly boast about your end results, you still have complete freedom to build a fully-functional website. And if you realize that your website is worth releasing, you might want to consider the entry plan for $16.00/month.
6. Weebly – affordable way to sell online
| Features: | Simple eCommerce tools |
| Free templates: | 60+ |
| Best for: | Small businesses looking to sell |
| Current deal: | Get up to 33% OFF Weebly! |
Weebly is a website builder known for its easy-to-use drag-and-drop editor and excellent business features. And while the business features are paid, the site editing options are all free. You get a lot of freedom to build exactly the site you want with virtually no site-building experience required.
Editors. Once you're done choosing the right builder and going through selecting a theme, you'll end up on the drag-and-drop interface. From there, you can put everything together the way you want it to look. Alternatively, if HTML/CSS code is more than random symbols to you, you just go straight to the code editor and do some major changes that way. Or you can also do several global changes to your site's style through the extensive design options.
Features. The free Weebly version gets you 500MB of storage, unlimited bandwidth, and free SSL protection. You also get access to extensive design options, with no restrictions and paywalls.
What we liked. Weebly is a very simple website builder with no bells, whistles, or designer-winning pre-made adapting sections. It's a fairly custom DIY experience, letting you shift, change, and build things the way you want them to be.
Areas for improvement. As with every free builder, Weebly also has some limitations. You can't sell online and your site will be hosted on Weebly's own subdomain. Plus, the Weebly branding on your website is going to be quite visible at all times.
If you want Weebly features, but the domain issue is a dealbreaker, there is a solution. For$6.00 a month, you can gain access to Weebly's Connect plan, which is essentially the same Free plan but allows you to connect your own domain.
7. WordPress.com – blogger's dream tool
| Features: | Excellent page editor |
| Free templates: | 20+ |
| Best for: | Blogging sites |
| Current deal: | Get up to 43% OFF Wordpress! |
WordPress.com is a perfect free website builder for bloggers. With several blog-focused themes, a great content management system, and an excellent editor, this is a great place for my fellow writers to shine.
Editors. The editor is simple and easy to understand. It lets you seamlessly write the content right in it, and also includes various text and media elements. However, the customization options are somewhat limited: you can only use a block editor to add and replace various elements on your site. For more advanced customization, you'll need to check out the WordPress themes. A lot of them are free, but the best options will be paid. The better part about WordPress though is that it doesn’t put watermarks anywhere on your site – there’s only a small, unintrusive banner.
Features. The free WordPress plan includes a wordpress.com subdomain – like with many free builders, you have to pay if you want a custom domain. There’s also 3GB of disk space and a free SSL certificate. However, if you want to host your site on a CDN, you will need to install some third-party WordPress plugins.
What we liked. Setting up WordPress only takes a few minutes. After gliding through the registration process, you'll be taken into the WordPress editor. Letting you focus on your content, it's a simple and effective website-building solution.
Areas for improvement. WordPress’ free plan comes with the fact, that a lot of great things about WordPress are simply not available there, such as themes and plugins.
While given WordPress' reputation as a blogging platform a wordpress.com subdomain is actually not a bad look for bloggers. However, if you’re after more themes, plugins, and a custom subdomain – WordPress premium personal plans start at $4.00/month.
8. Ucraft – portfolios and custom domains
| Features: | Beautiful designs, modern editor |
| Free templates: | 28 |
| Best for: | Portfolios |
Are you looking for a free website builder to showcase your work on a portfolio site? Need something that looks good, feels good, and is very easy to use? Ucraft is the website builder for you – it offers great opportunities for a beautiful portfolio site with your own, custom domain.
Editor. It's a very powerful, intuitive interface letting you add elements – text, images, buttons, or blocks – pre-made sections of the website, suited specifically to your theme. Compared to other free website builders on this list, Ucraft is certainly at the top when it comes to beautiful, responsive designs.
Features. Even on a free plan, you can connect your domain to the site. You can also make up to 15 pages, and get unlimited storage, and unlimited bandwidth. There’s also a total of 28 theme options, a lot of them focused heavily on small businesses and portfolios.
What we liked. With Ucraft, you can make a website that has a modern, consistent design language, and most importantly – your custom domain right on it.
Areas for improvement. The free Ucraft plan offers limited templates, blocks, elements, and features. Certain elements and blocks are entirely out of bounds. Out of nearly 100 in total, free plan users only get access to 28 templates, and all the best themes are under a paywall. There is also a visible watermark at the bottom of the site.
Ucraft's free plan still gives you a fair amount of stuff to do. Still – if you wish to sell online, remove the watermarks, create unlimited pages, or make the best out of the exciting design option, you'll need a premium plan which starts from $10.00/month.
9. WebsiteBuilder.com – simplicity through and through
| Can connect a custom domain | No |
| Features: | Simple website setup process |
| Free templates: | N/A |
| Best for: | School projects, beginner users |
| Current deal: | Get up to 60% OFF WebsiteBuilder! |
With its super intuitive and quick website editor and powerful free plan, WebsiteBuilder.com is an excellent budget option for complete beginners.
Editors. On the editor, all the sections and the information can be changed: using the pre-made page layouts, you can pick from several different options. It's a good way to minimize the required amount of effort and design skills. Simply finding something that you like is better than making it yourself.
Features. The free WebsiteBuilder.com plan includes all the editing features and page layouts, as well as an online store with 3 products (and a 3% transaction fee). You can also do 2 monthly email campaigns with 100 unique email addresses.
What we liked. WebsiteBuilder.com is simple – that's the defining trait which it acts, lives, and dies for. The free plan is ideal for simple school projects, and other similar use cases. If you're more interested in the final result and not the customization or the web design lessons learned along the way, you’ll find WebsiteBuilder.com to be a good choice.
Areas for improvement. If you’re all about the editing process, the truth is that there isn't much in-depth editing you can do. Also, with the free version, the chunky WebsiteBuilder.com banner will be visible on your site at all times. Additionally, you can’t use a custom domain.
You should consider the premium plan if you’re not fond of the branding on your page and would like a custom domain with a more expansive online store and more extensive email campaign options WebsiteBuilder.com subscriptions start at $7.58/month.
10. IM Creator – free website builder...for some!
| Features: | Simple website setup process |
| Free templates: | 60+ |
| Best for: | School projects, beginner users |
IMCreator is a website builder that offers a unique opportunity to build your website for free, and includes all the necessary tools, a huge template collection and more.
Editors. The site editing itself is focused on sections: pre-made parts of your website, combining text and media into one. It's not a drag-and-drop website builder, it's more of a "click-and-choose" option. You'll get slightly less creative freedom than on some other builders. All you can do is just move, add, or subtract the ready-made sections and make them match your template’s style, not edit them individually.
Features. With the free version, you’ll be fully equipped with simple and minimalistic templates which you can further customize according to your taste., and IMCreator also includes eCommerce, and your website will comply with all the latest SEO standards.
What we liked. The best part about using IM Creator is that there are no watermarks anywhere on your site. Other than that, it’s just a really good website builder for a beautiful and aesthetic personal portfolio site.
Areas for improvement. The free URL includes branding and your username, which is not entirely professional. The free version also doesn’t offer email addresses, and hosting is limited to 50MB. It's noteworthy that the builder is best for non-profits, artists, and students, as it is available to these groups for free.
Nevertheless, if you like what the free version offers but still want more – including connecting your website to any domain, unlimited bandwidth, email addresses, etc – you might want to consider the paid plan. You can get an IMCreator subscription for a price starting at $8/month.
How we tested the best free website builders?
To compile our list of the best free website builders, we tested and reviewed dozens of providers based on criteria relating to what their free plans offer, overall performance, and ease of use. Here are some of the criteria we used to take our picks:
- Free templates. Even with a free version, you want to have plenty of opportunities for artistic and authentic choices. Templates are also useful if you need to create a website quickly.
- Free features. Many website builder features tend to be behind a paywall. However, we looked for providers that offer features such as custom domain, eCommerce, SEO, email, and various more advanced editor tools free of charge.
- Ease of use. The most preferred option among users is the drag-and-drop editors, as they are easy to navigate and understand. Additionally, we took into account whether the free versions offer AI tools such as writers, editors, logo creators, etc., to facilitate an even faster and easier website creation process with a free AI website builder.
- Free version, trial, or demo. Some of the best website builders don’t have free versions but still are among the best in their field. That’s why we did not limit our list and included website builders that let you try their full potential for free.
Setting up a website for free in 5 easy steps
Happy with the options, and looking to make a website, using a free website builder?
If you're looking to set up your website for free, here's what you should do:
- Plan ahead, create a mockup of how you want your site to look
- Choose the right website builder. We recommend Hostinger website builder, now 81% off.
- Pick a website name and register a domain – free or custom, depending on what your website builder allows.
- Sign up for your chosen website builder.
- Use editing tools to make a beautiful website. If you need some help, Hostinger has an excellent tutorial on how to use it.
Planning ahead is the way to go: gathering what goals you have in mind, and what features you prioritize is crucial. It's pretty awful to find out that you wasted a lot of your time with an unsuitable products. Especially, when a better option was readily available. Make sure to do your research!
Free website builder vs paid website builder
Free website builders give you an opportunity to learn website development and create your blog or portfolio website for free. However, paid website builders offer more advanced features, and more options, and are often geared toward more serious, business-focused websites. But which option is right for you?
Choose a free website builder if:
- You need a small and simple website for your portfolio, small online shop, blog, landing page, etc.
- You don’t need a custom domain
- You aren’t going for big email campaigns or many visitors
Consider a paid website builder if:
- You want a professional-looking website for your business
- You need a custom domain
- You are aiming for more than a couple of hundred visitor traffic per month
- You need advanced eCommerce, SEO, AI-powered editor tools, and other features
- You want more customization options
Keep in mind that more expensive does not necessarily mean better. In fact, there are plenty of cheap website builders that offer excellent services. For instance, builders like Hostinger Website Builder start at $2.24/month, while Gator website builder starts at $3.46/month. Both of these plans let you connect your own domain, and use all of the premium website-building features. Neither of them has a free plan – but sometimes it’s better to spend a little money on a good product than get something that doesn’t suit your needs for free.
Video review
Check out our video review and recommendations for the best free website builders this year:
Which free website builder should you choose?
Building your own website is always a great idea, and it’s even possible to do it for free, with the help of a website builder. While many website builders offer their services for a price, there are also some truly great ones that are completely free – and they include templates, easy-to-use editors, and plenty of excellent features.
According to our findings, Wix is the best free website builder. It's a perfect all-rounder, especially excellent if you wish to learn website development. Another close contender is Hostinger Website Builder – a simple and easy-to-use option for learning the ins and outs of building a website.
So there you have it – these are the top options. Good luck making your websites and saving some money.
