If you want the tools and will run them yourself, Wix or WordPress. If you want the work done for you, Bernard: £200 a year for one site, enterprise packages for a team.
The sums are below if you want them.
If you have searched “Wix vs WordPress”, you will have found plenty of advice on which one is nicer to build with. Very little of it asks who will look after the site once it is built, or what you own if you leave. Skipping those questions is why so many people pick on day one and regret it eighteen months later.
This page does not pick a winner. It sets out what each costs in pounds today, what happens after launch, what a second site costs, and a few questions to help you choose.
Bernard is an AI-assisted website and marketing platform for small businesses. He builds a new site or moves an existing one, keeps it fast and readable to search and AI tools, and looks after it. Once measuring is on, he reads your numbers each week and suggests what to do next, with a button that does it. On the Medium and Large plans he also plans your marketing every six weeks and drafts your posts, emails and pages. Everything lands on a draft you approve. One flat price per site.
Why the Wix vs WordPress rankings disagree
Some lists put WordPress first because it can do almost anything. Others put Wix first because anyone can use it. Both are true. Many of those lists also earn money each time a reader signs up, so be careful when one sounds very sure of itself.
The two are built for different people. Wix gives you the hosting, the editor and the upkeep in one package. WordPress is free software you put on hosting you choose, and you look after it yourself.
Which WordPress?
- WordPress.org is free software. You rent hosting, install it and run it. You choose the theme, the plugins and the host, and you can move it whenever you like. When comparisons say “WordPress”, they usually mean this one.
- WordPress.com is a paid service from Automattic. It hosts WordPress for you and does the running of it, so day to day it works more like Wix.
When this page says WordPress on its own, it means the self-hosted kind.
So is Wix or WordPress better for you?
Wix suits someone who wants the website built and then left alone. You deal with one company, pay one bill, and drag things onto the page where you want them.
WordPress suits a business that wants control. You choose the host, there is a very large library of plugins, and no other company can switch off a feature you rely on. In return, you do the upkeep or pay someone to do it.
A quick test: if the words “the plugin needs updating” make you want to close the laptop, Wix is probably the better fit.
What Wix and WordPress cost today
Every figure below was read on 21 October 2026 from the company’s own pricing page. Prices are before VAT. WordPress.com shows US dollars only, converted here at 75p to the dollar.
| Wix | WordPress (self-hosted, SiteGround example) | WordPress.com | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Entry plan with your own address | Light: £9 a month paid yearly (£108 a year) | StartUp: £1.99 a month, prepaid for 12 months | Personal: US$4 a month paid yearly (about £3) |
| What it renews at | Wix does not show a separate renewal price | £13.99 a month | not shown (the renewal figure did not load) |
| Paying month by month | not shown on Wix’s plans page | not shown; the price is prepaid for 12 months | US$9 a month (about £6.75) |
| First plan that takes payments | Core: £16 a month paid yearly | any, with a shop plugin | Premium: US$8 a month paid yearly, payment buttons |
| Plugins or apps | Wix’s app market | any of the free software’s plugins | allowed from Personal, “over 60,000” |
| Updates and security | Wix’s job | yours | WordPress.com’s job |
| Leaving for another host | not possible, says Wix’s own help | copy the whole site to any host | not checked today |
WordPress hosts charge very different amounts. We use SiteGround because its own page shows the first-year and renewal prices clearly. We did not re-read other hosts, so we do not quote them. There is more detail on each in WordPress pricing 2026: what it really costs in the UK and Wix 2026 pricing, explained - what a Wix site really costs.
The costs the price lists leave out
SiteGround’s StartUp plan is £1.99 a month for the first year and “Renews at £13.99 /mo”. Most hosting works this way: the advert shows the first-year price, and you pay the higher one every year after. The reason is explained in Why does your website bill keep going up?.
Wix and SiteGround both show prices before VAT. If you are not VAT-registered, add 20%.
On WordPress you may also pay for a theme or for plugins with yearly licences. Prices vary widely, and none of them is on the hosting bill. The section on life after launch, below, shows which jobs those plugins do.
On Wix the extras are moving up a plan to sell, apps from the app market, and email beyond what the plan’s “marketing suite” covers. Wix’s plans page does not say how many emails each suite sends.
The biggest cost is time, and almost all of it falls on the WordPress side. Someone has to update WordPress itself, the theme and every plugin, check nothing broke, and fix it when something did. What happens when that work is skipped is covered in WordPress plugin updates - why they break your site, and how to stop minding them and WordPress site hacked again? Move out, and leave the malware behind.
Sums you can check
Every figure here is what a UK business that is not VAT-registered pays. Wix, SiteGround and Mailchimp all show their prices before VAT, so 20% is added to theirs. Bernard is not VAT-registered, so his price is the whole price. All prices were read on 21 October 2026.
These are comparisons of broadly similar business needs, not identical products. Some of these services include things Bernard does not do. Bernard includes planning, reading your numbers and doing the work, which these combinations do not give you without more tools or more of your own time.
Take a yoga teacher with a six-page site (a timetable, prices, an About page and a contact form) and a mailing list. She sells nothing online. Her list is 500 people. She sends two newsletters a month (the timetable, a workshop) and a welcome email to each new sign-up, about 1,000 to 1,100 emails a month. Every column below does the same job, so this is a like-for-like sum.
| Website plus a 500-person list | Wix Light + Mailchimp | WordPress on SiteGround + Mailchimp | Bernard (Nautilus Small) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Year one | £347.33 | £246.39 | £200 |
| Every year after | £347.33 | £419.19 | £200 |
| Two years | £694.66 | £665.58 | £400 |
Mailchimp Standard, the plan with automated emails, is £15.12 a month for up to 500 contacts: £181.44 a year, or £217.73 with VAT. It stands in for whichever email tool she picks. Wix Light includes a “Light marketing suite”, but Wix’s pages do not say how many emails that sends or what more costs, so it is not priced here. On Bernard, email campaigns and automatic emails to her list are part of Small, with no charge per contact. Every site also starts with six ready-made email templates (a short newsletter, an event or workshop, a time-limited offer and others) drawn in the site’s own colours.
With the list counted, Bernard is about £150 a year less than Wix with Mailchimp, and about £220 a year less than WordPress once its first year is over. Over two years that is about £295 and £265 less.
There are free email tools. Kit (once called ConvertKit) is free for up to 10,000 subscribers, but only for plain newsletters. A welcome email to each sign-up needs its Creator plan, US$390 a year for up to 1,000 subscribers on 21 October, about £351 with VAT at 75p to the dollar. With Kit Creator, Wix Light comes to about £481 a year, and WordPress on SiteGround about £552 a year after its first. If a plain newsletter with no welcome email is all she needs, Kit’s free plan will do, and the bare-website sums below apply.
Here is the same site with no mailing list at all.
| A bare website | Wix Light | WordPress on SiteGround StartUp | Bernard (Nautilus Small) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Year one | £129.60 | £28.66 (an introductory price) | £200 paid yearly, £240 paid monthly |
| Every year after | £129.60 | £201.46 | £200 paid yearly, £240 paid monthly |
| Web address in year one | included, if bought new from Wix | included | not included: you pay for your own |
| Theme and plugins | not needed | your choice, not priced here | not needed |
| Updates and security | Wix | you, with SiteGround’s automatic updates | Bernard |
If she needs a website and nothing else, Wix Light costs less than Bernard every year. SiteGround costs far less in year one, and after that its hosting and Bernard are level.
SiteGround’s StartUp plan lists backups, a security certificate, “enhanced security” and managed automatic updates, so nothing is added for those. It does not check that each plugin update left the site working. If updates and checks take an hour a month, that is 24 hours over two years, and the teacher can put her own price on those.
WordPress.com is left out because we could not read its renewal price today. Its first-year Personal plan is US$48 for the year, about £36 before VAT.
Left out of every column: the web address after any free first year, which you pay for wherever the site lives, and any paid theme or plugin.
After launch: Wix vs WordPress upkeep
Once the site is live, someone has to keep it findable, quick and safe.
On WordPress, most of that comes from plugins: one for search (titles, descriptions, a sitemap), one for caching, others for security and backups. Each has its own updates, and some sell a paid version. Yoast Premium, a well-known search plugin, is £118.80 a year before VAT, or £142.56 with it. SiteGround’s StartUp plan includes caching, speed and security plugins, backups and automatic updates, so on that host you need fewer extras. A security problem is still yours to fix, and an out-of-date plugin is the usual way in.
On Wix it is all inside Wix. Its search tools are “built into every site”, and Wix “creates and maintains your XML sitemap”. You cannot add a tool Wix does not offer.
Bernard checks and fixes, which are different jobs. Each time you publish, he checks for broken links, titles and descriptions, and structured data (the labels search engines read), and runs Google’s speed test. Fixes go on a draft for you to approve. When a site moves in, he adds alt text to every image, repairs structured data, shrinks images and strips unused styling. Each publish tells Google and other search engines, unless you switch that off. Reports shows which AI assistants, such as ChatGPT and Claude, have been reading your pages, and whether it was to answer someone’s question. The accessibility check re-runs itself every week.
The speed gain is small. On 6 August 2026 we measured ten live sites before and after their move. The average mobile score in Google’s Lighthouse test went from 65 to 72. Seven got faster. Two fast ones got slower, from 91 to 78 and from 72 to 67. How the pages are built is in How Bernard builds - lighter pages, greener hosting.
| After launch | Wix | WordPress on SiteGround StartUp | Bernard |
|---|---|---|---|
| Search basics (titles, sitemap) | built in | a plugin you choose and keep updated | built in, checked on every publish |
| Speed | Wix’s hosting | SiteGround’s caching and speed plugin, plus any you add | checked on every publish, fixes on a draft |
| Security and updates | Wix | SiteGround’s automatic updates and security plugin; you check plugins still work | Bernard |
| Backups | not checked today | included; on demand only on bigger plans | the last 100 published versions kept |
| Paid extras | apps from Wix’s app market | paid plugins, such as Yoast Premium | none for these jobs |
None of this puts a site at the top of Google. How clearly a page explains your business to search engines and AI assistants depends mostly on your words.
Growing: a second website on Wix vs WordPress
Wix’s own help says: “Each site you want to upgrade must have its own Premium or Studio site plan.” SiteGround’s StartUp plan says “Host 1 website”, so a second site means a bigger plan. GrowBig allows “Unlimited websites” at £3.99 a month for the first year, renewing at £23.99 a month, before VAT. On Bernard, every plan covers one site, and an extra site is £150 a year on any plan. You add it yourself in the app, and it stays one payment.
| Two bare websites, VAT included | Wix Light, two plans | WordPress on SiteGround GrowBig | Bernard Small plus an extra site |
|---|---|---|---|
| Year one | £259.20 | £57.46 (an introductory price) | £350 |
| Every year after | £259.20 | £345.46 | £350 |
Wix is two Light plans: £129.60 x 2 = £259.20. GrowBig’s first year is £3.99 x 12 = £47.88, plus £9.58 VAT, £57.46. After that it is £23.99 x 12 = £287.88, plus £57.58 VAT, £345.46. Two StartUp plans would cost more after the first year: £201.46 x 2 = £402.92. Bernard is £200 + £150 = £350, flat.
For two bare sites, Wix costs less than Bernard every year, and GrowBig is about level with him after its first year. If both sites have a mailing list, add the email tool to the Wix and WordPress columns.
What Wix and WordPress each do well
Wix does everything in one place. Hosting, the editor, security, updates and support come from one company, so there is little to set up and little to break. That matters if you want a good-looking site live this week. Bookings and services come with the Core plan, which suits anyone selling their time.
WordPress runs on almost any host, so no company can take it away from you. There is a plugin for almost anything, so an unusual need (a particular booking system, a members’ area, a link to another tool) can usually be met. If someone in the business enjoys this kind of work, WordPress gives them plenty to do.
Each has a downside. With Wix, you build inside what Wix offers. With WordPress, every plugin is one more thing to update, and the price goes up after the cheap first year.
Where Bernard sits
Bernard moves an existing site off Wix or WordPress (and most other platforms) onto lighter hosting, then looks after it. Updates, security and backups are part of the job, and the move is included with the yearly plan. If you are on Wix, the details are at /move-from/wix; on WordPress, /move-from/wordpress.
You do not need an old site. You can start from scratch, with a one-page starter draft and a short interview, or copy one of your own sites. Once the site exists in Bernard, you can design pages in Claude Design, page by page. There is a fuller guide to how to make a website for your business.
Bernard prepares changes for your approval. Website edits stay on a draft until you choose to publish them, and you can undo a change afterwards. Social posts can be scheduled to go out automatically at the time you approved.
The prices are flat with no VAT added, because Bernard is not VAT-registered: Nautilus Small is £200 a year, Medium £500 and Large £1,000. A shop is £200 a year on top, and Bernard takes 0% of each sale. Courses are £600 a year. Emailing your list is part of every plan, with no charge per contact. Medium adds social posting and scheduling.
When Bernard is not the right choice:
- He is newer and smaller than Wix or WordPress.
- He is not built for tinkering. You can add your own code, but he checks it first and it goes live only when you publish. If you want to write a lot of code or choose from a huge plugin library, self-hosted WordPress will suit you better.
- Dragging is limited. On a computer you can drag sections, gallery photos and product cards into a new order, but there is no free-form page like Wix’s.
- On a bare site he costs more. With no mailing list, Wix Light costs less every year, and budget hosting costs far less in its first year, as the bare-website table shows.
- He does not sell web addresses or email accounts. Those stay in your name.
What you own on Wix vs WordPress
On self-hosted WordPress the files are yours, and the whole site can be copied to any host. Wix’s own help says a Wix site “needs to be hosted and operated on Wix’s servers”, so leaving means rebuilding the pages. On Bernard, your web address and your contacts stay in your name. You will hardly notice any of this in year one, and it can matter a lot by year five.
How to choose between Wix and WordPress
- Decide who will do the upkeep. If nobody will, rule out self-hosted WordPress, or budget for someone to do it. For help with that sum, see Is it worth paying someone to manage your website?.
- Price year two, not year one. Use the renewal price, add VAT, and add any theme or plugin you know you will need.
- Count your hours. Put a number on them. On a site you run yourself, they are usually the largest cost.
- Think about leaving. If you want to be able to pick up the site and go, that points to WordPress.
- Count your sites. If a second one is likely, price it now: a second Wix plan, a bigger hosting plan, or an extra site on Bernard.
- Try both. Wix has a free plan to experiment on, and so does WordPress.com. Build one page on each.
For the wider choice, including Squarespace and Webflow, see The best website builder for a small business depends on who runs it and Squarespace vs WordPress 2026: an honest cost comparison.
See what Bernard would do with your business. Already have a website? Paste its address and he measures it up, free, and shows you the new place before you decide anything. Starting from nothing? Tell him what you are building.
Questions people ask
- Is Wix or WordPress better for a small business?
- It depends who will look after the site. With Wix, one company does the hosting, the updates and the security, so there is less for you to do and less to go wrong. WordPress can be made into almost anything and you can take it to any host, but somebody has to keep it updated and safe. If nobody in the business wants that job, Wix will usually suit you better.
- Is WordPress cheaper than Wix?
- In year one, often. On 21 October 2026 SiteGround’s entry WordPress hosting was £1.99 a month for the first year, renewing at £13.99 a month, both before VAT. Wix Light was £9 a month paid yearly. From year two the hosting alone costs more than Wix Light, before any theme, plugins or time.
- What is the difference between WordPress.com and WordPress.org?
- WordPress.org is the free software you install on hosting you rent and run yourself. WordPress.com is a paid service from Automattic that hosts WordPress for you, so it works more like Wix. On 21 October 2026 WordPress.com showed prices in US dollars only, from US$4 a month paid yearly for its Personal plan, which allows plugins.
- Can I move from Wix to WordPress?
- Not with a button. Wix’s own help says a Wix site has to be hosted on Wix’s servers, so moving means rebuilding the pages on WordPress, by hand or with help. Your web address is yours and can be pointed at the new site. A WordPress site, on the other hand, can be copied whole to any WordPress host.
- Is WordPress harder to use than Wix?
- Editing a page is about as easy on both. Running the site is more work on WordPress, because you choose hosting, a theme and plugins, and you keep all three updated. Wix does that for you. You notice the difference months later, when an update needs doing or a plugin stops working.
- Do Wix and WordPress prices include VAT?
- Usually not. Wix shows prices before tax and adds it by billing address. SiteGround shows its UK hosting prices ‘Ex. VAT’. A customer who is not VAT-registered pays 20% on top, so Wix Light’s £108 a year becomes £129.60.