4.5

Simplicity
Designs
Features
Pricing

Squarespace review conclusion

Squarespace is a complete tool for building and maintaining a successful website. Its template and design editors help you build amazing and professional looking websites.

Squarespace is definitely the strongest website builder in terms of design. Another big plus for Squarespace is its professional and active customer support. On the other hand, Squarespace’s template editor might not be the most simple and flexible solution out there, since it’s a bit confusing at the start and elements could be moved to predefined sections only.

If you choose designs over simplicity, Squarespace is definitely the way to go. After all, the editor is not that hard either. Squarespace has everything you need, starting from the website builder and ending with SEO tools.

Website builder
Total score

4.5

Pros

Amazing templates and designs Perfect template scalability to mobile devices Good value for money ratio Active and professional customer support

Cons

The editor is a bit confusing in the beginning You don’t have complete freedom over element placement No free plan
Squarespace Home Page

I’m sure you’ll agree with me when I say:

Choosing the right website builder is hard. Furthermore, choosing the wrong one and finding out too late is frustrating.

Is it really this hard?

Well… it does not have to be this way: if you read a couple of reviews and try each out for 5 minutes, you will most likely choose the right one for you.

There are many different website builders out in the market today. The largest ones today are Wix and Weebly.

In this article I am going to give you an honest Squarespace review. All you have to do is reserve a couple of minutes of your time and scroll down…

Make sure to read the Wix review and Weebly review as well before making the final decision.

What is Squarespace?

Squarespace (since 2006) is an American cloud-based website building and hosting software.

Squarespace is a classic drag-and-drop website builder. The website building is done by modifying pre-built website templates.

Squarespace is currently powering a little over 2 million websites from different locations worldwide.

The advantage over its competitors, like Wix and Weebly, is definitely design. Squarespace offers over 100 pre-built templates, that look professional and perfect in every aspect.

It does not stop there, all the templates also adapt to mobile devices with perfection, so the users don’t have to build two versions of their sites.

Squarespace’s main features include:

  • Drag-and-drop website builder
  • Pre-built, professional and amazing looking templates
  • Marketing tools: SEO, email campaigns, social media and many more

Obviously the list is long here. Squarespace has everything for building, hosting and maintaining a successful website.

If you want to dig deeper, I recommend continuing with this Squarespace review…

Who is Squarespace for?

Quick answer

Because of its stylish templates, Squarespace can be used in various industries to stand out from your competitors. Squarespace is great for blogs, personal and business websites, photographers and even for eCommerce sites.

Are you in an industry where you really need to stand out with your design? If yes, then Squarespace is definitely the way to go for you.

Like most website builders, Squarespace is ideal for small businesses, since the cost for a professional-looking website is extremely low.

I find Squarespace a perfect fit for:

  • Bloggers
  • Personal websites
  • Business websites
  • Photographers
  • Even for eCommerce sites

Squarespace has all the tools for eCommerce sites, but in my honest opinion, I find eCommerce specialized sites like Shopify and BigCommerce better for the occasion.

Squarespace’s drag-and-drop editor is quite simple, but it’s certainly not the easiest one in the market. If you find Squarespace’s editor too complicated I suggest using Wix or Weebly.

Continue reading this Squarespace review to find out more about the editor and how to use it.

Usability

Quick answer

Squarespace is easy to use – not easiest in the market though. There are some limitations about moving elements around, it’s section based. Also, it takes a bit more getting used to than its competitors.

Getting started is simple with Squarespace: you just have to click get started from the top navigation.

Next, Squarespace asks you to choose a pre-built template for your site. Take your time exploring the templates, you will most likely find the one that fits your needs.

After choosing the template you are started: that was really easy, huh?

Now, if you have used other drag-and-drop website builders, you might find Squarespace a bit difficult at first.

The first problem is that you cannot drag elements everywhere on the screen, rather you are provided with some pre-arranged locations. So, Squarespace does not give you complete freedom.

For my personal belief and opinion, usability is a bit affected by the lack of the left side menu. To edit an element you have to click edit on it and a modal opens on the screen with lots of choices.

This kind of solution is not the easiest one to get used to, but it’s fine when you play around with it a bit. For easier editors, you should check Wix or Weebly.

Continue reading this Squarespace review to find out how to use it!

Tip

To get started, choose a random template and play around with it for 10 minutes or so. If you understand everything by then, you are good to go and Squarespace is a possible choice for you.

How to use Squarespace?

In this section of the Squarespace review, I give you an insight of creating a page in Squarespace and customizing it to your needs.

Getting started is really easy, just sign up and create your first site.

Tip

Try out different website builders and their editors. Dedicate 10 minutes to each of those and see if you could use those. That way you can be certain that after choosing the website builder you can handle it.

Creating a site on Squarespace

After you have created an account and logged in to Squarespace go to your account page and click create a site on the top right of your screen.

Squarespace Account Page Header
Squarespace account page layout

All your websites and domains are listed in your account page and you can edit and delete those from there.

For the next step, you have to choose a template for your site. Take your time, there are many amazing designs you could use. You can see all the templates here and there is a preview available for each template.

Squarespace Template Gallery
Squarespace template gallery

After you have chosen your template you will be directed to the page editor. Squarespace asks for your page title and provides a 3-step introduction to the editor and how to use it.

Site initialization
Squarespace site setup and tutorial

Editing the layout elements

To edit the site’s layout, you have to click edit on the top left of the preview box, now the editor opens. To modify the specific elements, just click on the element.

You can change text elements and their style directly and easily. The customization menu appears above the element and text can be edited like in any other editor.

Edit Text Block
Editing a text block on Squarespace

You can also edit different sections on the page by hovering the section and clicking the pencil button from the top right of your screen. The new menu opens with customization options. You could modify section height, content width, and alignment, also background and colors.

Section editor
Editing a section on Squarespace

For bigger blocks like header, there might be more options to choose from. For example, for the header, you could change logo, layout, title, colors and much more.

To achieve this hover the header and click edit. A modal opens on the right of your screen. In this modal, you could control every changeable aspect of the header.

Edit Header
Editing a header on Squarespace

Thus far, everything about editing a layout is covered in this Squarespace review… except for moving elements around on the screen.

This is the part where you don’t have full freedom. Squarespace provides you with some sections where you could move specific elements.

It is a sacrifice you have to make if you want to use Squarespace. If this is totally unacceptable for you, I suggest using Wix instead.

To move an element around on Squarespace: hover it and move the cursor towards the side of the element until your cursor changes into a hand. Left-click and start dragging.

If you hit the section the indicator appears in the background, meaning you could drop the element there. If the position is invalid the element will be returned to the initial position.

Drag Element on Squarespace
Start dragging the element on Squarespace

Warning

Move elements around with caution. There is no undo button, so you might have to manually move the element back to its initial position if necessary.

After you have finished with the layout, you should check if everything looks like expected on the mobile as well. Most of the time it does, but it is always better to be safe than sorry.

To check the mobile version of the layout, click the mobile icon on the top right of the page and site preview will be changed into a mobile layout.

Squarespace Mobile Preview
Squarespace mobile preview

You cannot change the elements in the mobile preview: all the modifications must be done in the desktop view.

Finally, when you are satisfied with the result, click done from the top left of your screen to save the changes.

Next up in this Squarespace review: the design.

Editing the design on Squarespace

Editing design is made easy on Squarespace. It has an easily understandable and intuitive left menu.

Squarespace Editor Main View
The main view of Squarespace editor

To edit design click design from the left menu and menu will transform into a design editor with all the options. You can change mostly everything for every block, like fonts, colors, spacing, etc.

I am not going into detail here, because it’s just not necessary. The design editor is simple and a pleasure to use.

Change Squarespace Font
Changing font on Squarespace

So far, I have covered everything you need to know about building a website that fits your needs with Squarespace.

But there is more, Squarespace is not just a website builder, but rather a complete tool for creating, hosting and maintaining websites. It means that Squarespace has many essential and not so essential tools for websites.

I am not going to explain to you specific tools since there are so many of those, but I will provide you with an overview of using those tools. If you want to know the relevance of Squarespace tools, read the tools section of this Squarespace review as well.

Using Squarespace tools

Using Squarespace tools is made really easy.

If you handled the design manager, you will handle the usage of tools with ease. Squarespace offers many tools for your website and those are all maintained from the left menu of the site editor.

Tools include commerce, marketing, analytics and more. Just choose the tool from the left menu and enjoy it.

Squarespace Google Analytics Tool
Squarespace’s tool for Google Analytics integration

Now, as you know everything you need to know about building a website with Squarespace, it’s time to discuss pricing. What is a Squarespace review without pricing information?

Pricing – how much does Squarespace cost?

Quick answer

Unlike its competitors, Squarespace does not offer a free plan. But don’t worry you still have a free 15-day trial, you can set up your website during that time with ease. To maintain your live site, you would have to pay with other builders as well. I find Squarespace to be great value for money, for non-commercial sites you could manage with $12 and for commercial with $26 a month.

First of all, I want to point out that Squarespace has a great value for money ratio. It might be slightly more expensive than some of its competitors, like Weebly, but you get more for that as well, including amazing customer support.

Squarespace offers four price plans: personal, business, basic commerce, and advanced commerce. Prices fall into $12 to $40 a month range if paid annually and $16 to $46 a month if paid monthly.

Squarespace plans
Squarespace plans

It’s common sense that you should choose the cheapest plan that fits your needs.

To put plans and your needs into frames, I can give you an estimate solution:

  • Personal – you need a website without online store capabilities
  • Business – you need online store features, but you sell only a little. The store has transaction fees of 3%.
  • Basic commerce – you need an online store, you sell enough products to make this plan adequate. The store has transaction fees of 0%. You don’t need advanced eCommerce features like gift cards or limited availability labels.
  • Advanced commerce – you need an online store, you sell enough products to make this plan adequate. The store has transaction fees of 0%. You also need advanced eCommerce features like gift cards and limited availability labels.

So the users who do not operate online stores can manage with $12 per month and users with small stores can manage with $18 per month. If you need more you could most likely afford more, since your store has grown quite big.

You can read more about plans and included features here.

Squarespace tools

In addition to its website building tools like drag-and-drop layout editor and design editor, Squarespace offers many more tools for maintaining your live site and making it successful.

With all of its tools combined, Squarespace is definitely a complete toolkit. It handles everything from creating a website to SEO and analytics.

The feature list is really long and if you need to know details about the features you can do it by following this link. I can just say it has almost everything. If you have a doubt, that it’s missing something essential for you, just check it out to be sure.

Squarespace’s best feature is, of course, its design. I can say with confidence that its templates are the best in the market.

Another advantage Squarespace has over its customers is support. I am not brave enough, to say it has the best support in the industry, but it’s definitely at the top.

All those features and tools and of course amazing support make Squarespace a pleasure to use.

Summary

To sum it all up, Squarespace is an amazing tool for people who do not know and do not want to know anything about coding:

  • All the templates are pre-built and look astonishing
  • It gets you started quickly
  • It’s quite easy to understand when you try it out for a short period of time

If you choose Squarespace as your website builder you get stunning designs for both websites and mobile sites, professional and active customer support. You also get a reasonably priced products that you can rely on.

On the downside, you lose a little extra time getting to know Squarespace and also some freedom about placing your elements. If that’s unacceptable for you, check out Wix or Weebly.

Feel like the advantages of weight over shortages? What are you waiting for? Try Squarespace now!

4.5

Simplicity
Designs
Features
Pricing

Squarespace review conclusion

Squarespace is a complete tool for building and maintaining a successful website. Its template and design editors help you build amazing and professional looking websites.

Squarespace is definitely the strongest website builder in terms of design. Another big plus for Squarespace is its professional and active customer support. On the other hand, Squarespace’s template editor might not be the most simple and flexible solution out there, since it’s a bit confusing at the start and elements could be moved to predefined sections only.

If you choose designs over simplicity, Squarespace is definitely the way to go. After all, the editor is not that hard either. Squarespace has everything you need, starting from the website builder and ending with SEO tools.

Website builder
Total score

4.5

Pros

Amazing templates and designs Perfect template scalability to mobile devices Good value for money ratio Active and professional customer support

Cons

The editor is a bit confusing in the beginning You don’t have complete freedom over element placement No free plan

FAQ

Squarespace (since 2006) is an American cloud-based website building and hosting software. It’s a complete tool for creating and maintaining successful websites for yourself or for your business.

Squarespace offers four price plans: personal, business, basic commerce, and advanced commerce. Prices fall into $12 to $40 a month range if paid annually and $16 to $46 a month if paid monthly. You should choose a plan depending on your needs. If you don’t need store functionality you could manage with $12 a month, else with $18 a month.

Using Squarespace is simple. Go to the Squarespace site and click get started. Squarespace takes you to your new website step-by-step. It is actually quite easy!

Yes, all Squarespace templates are responsive. They fit well on every screen and look amazing on mobile devices.

Squarespace has one of the best customer supports in the industry. They are friendly and supportive and help out whatever problem you might have.

Author

Technology enthusiast. Researcher. Author.

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