Wix vs Squarespace vs Webflow for UK Creative Portfolios

Choosing a website builder for a portfolio has less to do with features than with which one you will still be happy updating in eighteen months. Wix, Squarespace and Webflow can each produce a site that makes a photographer, illustrator, designer or ceramicist look serious. They simply ask for different things in return: money, time, or a willingness to learn something new.

Here is how the three compare on the things that matter when you are running a creative practice from the UK — cost, day-to-day editing, search visibility, selling, and the small practical details that only surface once you have paid.

The short version

Squarespace is the one to pick if you want to spend your evenings making work rather than tweaking layout. The templates are restrained, typography looks good by default, and site-wide style settings mean a font change updates everything at once.

Wix gives you the most freedom to place things exactly where you want them without writing code, plus the largest collection of add-ons. That flexibility cuts both ways: it is easy to build something slightly untidy, and easier still to break the mobile version while fixing the desktop one.

Webflow behaves like hand-coded CSS with a visual interface. It is the steepest of the three to learn and the most rewarding if your portfolio has an unusual layout, a large body of work, or if you also want to build sites for clients.

Cost: what you pay now and later

All three offer a way to try before you buy, and all three make a free site unsuitable for a professional portfolio — typically because of advertising or a builder-branded subdomain. Paid plans are billed monthly or annually, with the annual price per month noticeably lower. Watch the renewal rate rather than the introductory offer, because that is the number you will pay in year two.

Beyond the subscription, budget for:

• A domain — a small annual cost, whether you register it through the builder or with a UK registrar.
• Business email, which is usually separate unless you already have hosting or a Google Workspace or Microsoft 365 plan.
• Transaction fees on lower commerce tiers, which apply on top of the payment processor's cut.
• Third-party tools: a mailing list, a booking system, a forms app or a cookie banner.
• Templates. Squarespace and Wix include theirs; Webflow's marketplace templates are usually a one-off purchase.
• Webflow's split between a workspace plan and a hosting plan, which catches people out. Squarespace and Wix bundle hosting into the site subscription.

Prices shown at checkout often exclude VAT, so the final figure may be higher than the headline. Check what the renewal will cost before you commit to a year.

Ease of use

Squarespace

The editor uses a grid you drop blocks into. You can make a page look wrong, but it takes effort. Client galleries, password-protected project pages and blog posts all behave predictably, which matters if you update between commissions.

Wix

Drag almost anything anywhere. That suits someone with a clear picture of the layout they want and the patience to check every breakpoint. The mobile editor is separate, so plan on adjusting phone layouts by hand rather than assuming they follow the desktop version. If you want a shop, a booking calendar or a members' area, Wix has a native answer for most of it.

Webflow

You work with divs, flexbox, grid and reusable classes — the same concepts as a stylesheet. Expect a weekend of tutorials before your first page looks right, then a faster workflow than anything else here. Its CMS collections are the real draw for creatives: add one project entry and it appears in the grid, the archive page and the sitemap.

SEO: what actually moves the needle

All three produce crawlable sites and let you edit page titles, meta descriptions, alt text and redirects. The platform matters far less than what you do with it.

• Write a specific title and description for every project page rather than accepting the defaults.
• Rename image files before uploading, and write alt text that describes the work.
• Compress images and avoid autoplaying large video. A slow portfolio loses visitors before they see anything.
• Keep one URL structure and set 301 redirects when you change it.
• Connect Google Search Console and submit your sitemap.
• Link to your portfolio from directories, galleries, press coverage and your social profiles — links still matter more than settings.

Squarespace and Wix generate some structured data for you; with Webflow you will usually add it yourself or through an app. No builder will rank your work for you.

Selling work and taking payments

If you sell prints, editions, digital downloads or commissions, Wix and Squarespace both include stores that handle a small catalogue comfortably: products, variants, shipping zones for the UK and abroad, and tax settings. Webflow's commerce tools are capable but need more configuration and a separate plan.

For one-off client invoices, a payment link from Stripe or your bank's invoicing tool is often simpler than bolting a shop onto a portfolio. And if you take bookings, Squarespace's scheduling tool and Wix Bookings are worth comparing before you pay for a third-party system.

Once selling becomes regular, talk to an accountant about VAT registration and record-keeping. The tools will take the money; they will not tell you how to report it.

UK-specific practicalities

All three are American companies, so support runs mainly through chat, email and forums, with response times that vary. Wix has offered phone support in some markets; check what is available to you before relying on it. Webflow's community forums are busy and genuinely useful; Squarespace's are quieter.

Register a .co.uk if most of your clients are here, or a .com if you show abroad. You can buy the domain through the builder or point one you already own at the site — just keep the registrar login yourself and understand how to move the domain later.

Cookie banners, a privacy policy and mailing-list consent are your responsibility, not the platform's. For anything involving VAT, data protection or client contracts, take advice from an accountant or solicitor rather than guessing from a help article.

How to decide in a fortnight

Pick two of the three and give them the same job.

1. List what you actually need: how many projects, whether you will sell, whether you will blog, how often you will update.
2. Build the same single project page in both, on desktop and on your phone.
3. Run each page through Google PageSpeed Insights on mobile, after compressing the images.
4. Add up the real annual cost: subscription at renewal, domain, email, any app you cannot live without.
5. Choose whichever one you finished fastest. Speed of finishing is the best predictor of whether you will keep the site current.

Want a site you barely think about? Squarespace. Want to tinker and add tools without code? Wix. Want control, and happy to learn flexbox to get it? Webflow. Whichever you choose, the work, the sequencing of images and the writing about each project will do more for you than the platform underneath it.

Photo: tranmautritam / Pixabay