Last Updated on July 19, 2026
Wix spends a fortune telling UK businesses it is the obvious choice.
So we checked. In July 2026 we examined the websites of 24 real UK businesses: roofers in Leeds, electricians in Manchester, plumbers in Bristol, pest controllers in Sheffield, skip hire firms in Nottingham, drainage companies in Surrey and accountants in Norwich. Real firms winning real work, found the same way a customer would find them: near the top of a search.
This is what they run on:
| Platform | Sites | Share |
|---|---|---|
| WordPress | 15 | 63% |
| Custom-built or other | 7 | 29% |
| Squarespace | 2 | 8% |
| Wix | 0 | 0% |
There was not a single Wix site among them, and nothing built with an AI builder either.
The mistake
Most guides answer the wrong question. They compare drag-and-drop editors, template counts and free trials, as if you were choosing a phone case.
The businesses actually ranking, and actually taking calls, made a different decision. They chose the platform that lets them own the asset.
The question underneath the question
Ease of use is a fair question for your first month. The question that decides the next ten years is who owns your website when you stop paying.
With WordPress, you own it. The files, the content, the design. Fall out with your host and you move the whole thing elsewhere in an afternoon.
With Wix, you own nothing you can take. Wix’s own help pages confirm you cannot export your site to another host. You can download your images and your customer data. The site itself stays behind.
Squarespace is only slightly better. Its export tool produces a file that carries your blog posts and basic page text. Your design, galleries, product pages and navigation do not come with you.
That is the fact the adverts leave out. A builder site is a rented shop with a decent fit-out. A WordPress site is a shop you hold the deeds to.
What each route really costs (checked July 2026)
Wix. The Core plan, the realistic minimum for a business, is around £17 a month on annual billing. Roughly £200 a year, every year, forever, for a site you cannot take with you.
Squarespace. Basic at £12 a month and Core at £17 a month on annual billing, VAT included. Same deal: pay forever, leave with a text file.
WordPress. The intro offers look absurdly cheap. Hosting from £2.99 a month is real, but read the terms: that price usually needs a 48-month upfront commitment, and renewal jumps to around £10.99 a month. Budget £130 to £160 a year after year one, plus £10 to £15 for the domain. Still comparable money to a builder, but you own the result.
So the price difference is smaller than either side pretends. The ownership difference is total.
Where each one belongs (by stage)
Start. If you have no site, no budget and need to be live this week, a builder will not kill you. What matters at Start is clarity: what you do, where you do it, what it costs, how to call you. A £12 Squarespace site that says those four things clearly beats a £3,000 anything that does not. One rule: register the domain yourself, at a registrar, in your own account. Own the front door even if you rent the house.
Build. Once the business depends on the website for work, move to WordPress. This is the stage where you need proper local pages, reviews, speed control and the freedom to change host or developer without starting again. It is no accident that 15 of the 24 established firms we checked sit here.
Scale. At this point the conversation is not about platforms at all. It is about conversion, tracking and what each enquiry costs you. If you are still debating Wix vs WordPress at Scale, something upstream is broken.
The takeaway
Choosing a platform is really choosing who owns your website.
Builders sell convenience and keep the asset. WordPress asks more of you up front and leaves you owning the result. Among the 24 UK businesses we checked, that trade-off produced a lopsided vote.
If you are not sure what stage your website is at, or whether it is quietly costing you work, run it through our Whito Pro before you spend another pound on it.
Method: 24 UK business websites across seven sectors and seven areas, found via search in July 2026 and examined in a real Chrome browser. Platforms identified from each site’s own code. Pricing checked July 2026 against published UK plans; always confirm current prices and VAT treatment before buying. Full dataset held by Whito.
