Do you want to create beautiful websites, but you don’t want to spend time learning all of the technical jargon?
One of the best recommendations I could make is to use Squarespace. It is an easy-to-use website builder that allows anyone to create beautiful websites in a short amount of time and with minimal effort.
Squarespace is an excellent platform for developing creative and professional websites. It possesses the highest quality designs and features available on the market, making it ideal for resumes, photography, and blogging. In addition to that, Squarespace provides you with remarkable sales tools for your online business.
Here at the Squarespace hosting review, we put their claims to the test. We will put their product through our extensive tests and analysis in the following categories:
Reliability: Will your website be available at all times, with no downtime, and in a reliable manner?
Speed: I was wondering how quickly pages loaded and how well Squarespace dealt with unexpectedly high volumes of visitors.
Features: Do they offer all of the functions and tools that you will require to complete your task?
Customer Support: Is it simple to get assistance whenever you require it?
Pricing: How much would it cost, and are there any discounts or deals offered by Squarespace that could save you money?
This is going to be an in-depth review of Squarespace, including a comprehensive analysis of the hosting offered by Squarespace.
If you do not wish to read the comprehensive review of the hosting service, the summary scorecard is provided below, along with our conclusion.
Performance Grade A+
Average Load Time 759ms
Average response time 235ms
Free domain Yes
Support Live chat/Knowledge base
About Squarespace
Squarespace, Inc. is a website creation and hosting company that was founded in the United States and has its headquarters in New York City. It offers users the ability to create and modify webpages through the use of pre-built website templates and drag-and-drop elements, and it delivers its software as a service for the purpose of building and hosting websites.
An undergraduate student at the University of Maryland established the sophisticated website back in 2004, and it has seen tremendous growth since that time. Today, Squarespace is one of the most widely used website builders in the world. Millions of people have used it to create their online identities using the platform.
Pros and cons of Squarespace
It is important to consider both the benefits and the drawbacks of the services provided by each hosting company before you sign up for an account with one of those companies. Some of these drawbacks might be deal-breakers for your company, while others might be ones that can be tolerated in the interim while alternative solutions are being sought.
The selection of Squarespace managed WordPress hosting for your website comes with a number of benefits as well as drawbacks, which are outlined in the following paragraphs.
Pros of Squarespace
- Unlimited storage space: Every Squarespace plan comes with an unlimited amount of storage space. This is fantastic news for creative websites that will invariably amass a substantial media library over the course of time. You won’t have to worry about reaching a storage or bandwidth limit if you use Squarespace to manage your website.
- Live chat support: Stuck? No need to worry. The live chat feature of this platform ensures that there is always a representative available to assist you with any issue relating to the construction of your website.
- Help guides and webinar: When it comes to the backend of your website, Squarespace, like most other website builders, does have a bit of a learning curve to get used to. However, in order to make up for this shortcoming, it has created a sizable library of in-depth help guides as well as webinars that will quickly bring you up to the level of a Squarespace expert.
- Tools specifically for ecommerce websites: When it comes to the types of customers that they serve, Squarespace does not hesitate. As soon as you learn about them, it becomes immediately apparent that they place a high priority on visuals. In addition, they place a high priority on providing you with the best ecommerce tools available so that you can create a dynamic online store. If you are specifically interested in developing an outstanding ecommerce website, this helps narrow down the web builder options available to you.
- Built-in email marketing: The built-in email marketing tool that Squarespace provides is one of the platform’s features that I enjoy using the most. To put it more succinctly, it is an add-on that gives you the ability to construct eye-catching emails with beautiful templates without the need to go through a third party. In addition to that, you will receive a wealth of integrated analytics.
Cons
- Limited SEO features: The SEO capabilities of Squarespace have been called into question by a great number of digital experts. Optimizing your posts and pages on Squarespace isn’t as intuitive as it is with other website builders like WordPress or Drupal, despite the fact that there are plenty of success stories of sites ranking on Google. This is an important consideration to make if search engine optimization (SEO) is the primary method by which you intend to drive traffic to your website.
- Limited control on domain name: If you buy your domain name through Squarespace, you won’t be able to transfer it to another hosting provider in the event that you change your mind in the future and decide to go with a different company. This can be a deciding factor in whether or not you want to make Squarespace the home of your website and buy the domain name for your website from within Squarespace.
Squarespace Hosting Speed Test
Every hosting provider boasts that their servers are the quickest, that they have the best customer service, and that their clients have the best experience possible when using their services.
We came to the conclusion that it would be in our best interest to conduct our own exhaustive testing on the claims that were made by Squarespace in order to determine how well they perform in comparison to the criteria that we use when conducting tests.
Squarespace Hosting Speed Test Results
We used Pingdom speed test tool for Squarespace testing and here are the results.
It took less than a second for our test site to load, which is an excellent result.
Squarespace Hosting Plans and Features
Squarespace is not the most affordable website builder and host that is currently available. If, on the other hand, your primary objective is to quickly and easily create jaw-dropping websites that grab the attention of your target audience, then the price tag for even a personal plan might not be an issue for you.
Personal Plan:
This plan is for 16$ per month if billed annually.
After making the decision to go with the Personal tier, you will have access to essential site features such as a free custom domain, SSL certification, unlimited bandwidth and storage, additional features for search engine optimization, access to Squarespace extensions, and round-the-clock customer support.
Everything included for $16 per month. Even though you can get all of this and sometimes even more with other website builders for a lower price, it is still worthwhile to look through each of Squarespace’s tiers in order to find a plan that is suitable for your requirements.
Business Plan:
This plan is for 23$ per month if billed annually.
If you are looking for an online store that comes with basic tools at an affordable price point, the Business plan offered by Squarespace is an excellent option to consider. You get everything that’s included in the Personal tier when you upgrade to the Business tier, in addition to a suite of fully integrated ecommerce tools that will enable you to sell and track inventory, accept payments, and do a lot more besides.
In addition, you will have the ability to sell an unlimited number of products, to take donations, and to provide your customers with the ability to create and send gift cards. Bottom line? If you are just starting out or are already somewhat experienced in running an online store, you should get started with the Business Squarespace tool.
Basic Commerce Plan:
This plan is for 27$ per month if billed annually.
Consider the Basic Commerce tier of Squarespace to be the more experienced sibling of the Business tier. If you pay the additional $27 per month, you will not only receive all of the capabilities of the business tier, but you will also receive several more powerful perks.
Your online store will be able to quickly list and tag products on Facebook and Instagram, have access to advanced ecommerce analytics, and even create customer accounts if you use Basic Commerce. Although other website builders may be able to provide a comparable range of services, Squarespace organises their offerings in such a way that they are especially suited to e-commerce.
Advanced Commerce Plan:
This plan is for 49$ per month if billed annually.
The absence of transaction fees, which is included in Squarespace’s Advanced Commerce plan for an additional $49 per month, is one of the platform’s most appealing features.
What does this imply for the success of your online retail business? A built-in payment gateway that is prepared to process payments without charging any of the fees that can quickly eat away at your profit margin.
In addition to receiving everything that was included in the preceding tiers, you will also receive more advanced tools to manage shipping, more advanced discounts, and an abandoned cart recovery strategy that has the potential to put more money in your pocket. It is abundantly clear that Squarespace has considered all of the factors necessary to successfully build an ecommerce business, paying particular attention to the frontend and backend aspects of the business. Due to this, I believe they are entitled to a good number of bonus points.
Squarespace Customer Service
Squarespace’s customer service is really appreciable. They provide 24/7 live chat feature, everytime, anytime you need help with something, there you have them.
Bottom Line
Squarespace is a dependable website builder that caters to the needs of creatives, artists, and online retailers who place an emphasis on the visual aspects of their marketing strategy. Squarespace more than makes up for the fact that its site plans are typically more expensive by providing you with the ability to build and host your website all in the same location and by providing you with a long list of site templates that you are free to customise to your heart’s content.
It is now up to you to proceed. How would you describe your overall experience with Squarespace? Please share your thoughts on it in the comments below.
Start building your website right away with Squarespace after you sign up for an account.