The content management system (CMS) market in Nigeria has seen rapid growth in recent years.
Two of the most popular CMS platforms used by Nigerian businesses and bloggers are WordPress and Wix.
WordPress is the world’s most popular open-source CMS.
It started off as just a blogging platform but has evolved to be used for all kinds of websites including ecommerce stores, portfolios, magazines and more.
WordPress is loved for its open and flexible nature that allows for easy customization.
There is also a massive ecosystem of themes and plugins available for WordPress that helps users enhance their sites.
On the other hand, Wix is a proprietary website builder known for its drag and drop functionality.
Wix makes it very easy for non-tech savvy users to build professional looking websites without coding.
It offers hundreds of designer-made templates along with easy to use editing tools.
Wix sites are hosted on Wix’s servers.
Both platforms have their own pros and cons and are popular choices for Nigerian website owners.
This article will compare WordPress and Wix head-to-head to help you determine which CMS is better for your needs in Nigeria.
Key Takeaways
- For absolute beginners and non-tech users, Wix is easier to use than WordPress given its straightforward drag and drop editor.
- WordPress offers far more design flexibility in the long run. Wix templates can feel limited down the road.
- WordPress has the edge for advanced features and functionality thanks to its wide ecosystem of plugins and integrations.
- WordPress gives more under-the-hood control for SEO. But Wix handles security well by default.
- Those wanting maximum customization and scalability should opt for WordPress. But Wix can be a great starting point for many.
WordPress or Wix: Ease of Use
When it comes to ease of use, there are some major differences between WordPress and Wix:
Learning Curve
Wix is much easier for complete beginners to learn than WordPress. Its drag and drop editor requires no coding knowledge.
You can easily build a site just using the available templates, images, fonts and tools.
WordPress has a steeper learning curve. While the admin interface is pretty user-friendly, you will have to work your way around concepts like installing themes and plugins, updating permalinks etc.
Without some technical know-how, WordPress can be confusing initially.
Editor
Wix has an extremely intuitive drag and drop editor.
You can easily drag elements like text, images, shapes onto the canvas and edit them.
Their template blocks make it very simple to put together a professional looking site.
The WordPress block editor has improved but isn’t as seamless as Wix.
You have more flexibility in WordPress but may need to rely on documentation initially.
Page Building
Building pages on Wix is as easy as choosing a template, customizing it with their editing tools and adding your own content.
You can have a polished website up in no time.
In WordPress, you start with a blank canvas.
You need to choose and install a theme first.
Then you can start building pages either using the block editor or theme customizer options.
It involves more steps than Wix.
Learning Resources
Wix offers a Wix Academy with ample tutorials and courses for users at all levels.
Everything is well documented.
WordPress relies heavily on community created resources.
Their official docs cover basics but for advanced topics, you have to rely on blogs and forums.
Quality can be hit or miss.
Ease of Use Winner: Wix
With its straightforward drag and drop editor, abundance of templates and built-in support resources, Wix is just easier to use for most people especially beginners.
WordPress offers more flexibility but requires some technical comfort.
WordPress or Wix: Design and Customization
When it comes to design and customization features, WordPress and
Wix have the following key differences:
Design Templates
Wix provides hundreds of professionally designed templates for all types of websites.
You can easily use them as is or customize them.
WordPress has thousands of themes available including both free and paid options.
There is lots of variety but quality can be inconsistent.
Customization Options
Wix lets you customize templates extensively through its editor.
You can tweak colors, fonts, layouts, add animations and more without coding.
In WordPress, you can customize themes using the native editing tools or custom CSS.
But it requires some learning and technical skill.
Colors and Fonts
The Wix editor makes it easy to change colors and fonts site-wide or page-specific basis.
You have 100s of font and color options.
With WordPress, you are limited to the font and color options provided by the theme.
You can add custom fonts through plugins.
Layouts and Spacing
Wix provides absolute control over layout including columns, spacing, alignments, containers etc through its intuitive editor.
WordPress page layout depends largely on the theme.
You can tweak it with CSS or install page builder plugins for more control.
Animations
Wix has built-in options to add cool animations or effects like parallax, scrolling animations to sites without any coding.
In WordPress, you need to rely on your theme’s built-in effects or install animation plugins like Animate.css.
Requires technical skill.
Shapes and Lines
Wix lets you add decorative shapes, lines and dividers on your site with a few clicks.
In WordPress, you would need to either find a theme that supports shapes or add them manually using CSS.
Design Flexibility Winner: Wix
With its drag and drop editor, abundance of templates and easy customization options, Wix provides much more design flexibility than WordPress out-of-the-box.
WordPress or Wix: Features and Functionality
When it comes to features and functionality, here’s how WordPress and Wix compare:
Forms
Wix has an intuitive form builder that lets you create contact forms, RSVP forms, order forms etc easily without any coding.
WordPress requires you to install form builder plugins like Contact Form 7, Gravity Forms or Ninja Forms to add forms.
But they provide more advanced features than Wix.
Galleries
Adding image galleries in Wix is very straightforward.
You can create galleries and add effects like slideshows without plugins.
In WordPress, you need to rely on your theme’s gallery features or install a gallery plugin.
The most popular is NextGEN Gallery.
Blogs
Wix has basic blogging functionality built-in.
You can start writing blog posts out of the box.
WordPress is purpose built for blogging.
It offers features like categories, tags, archives etc to easily manage blogs.
Ecommerce
Wix offers robust ecommerce features through its “Wix Stores” plans.
You can add shopping carts, manage inventory etc.
WordPress requires you to install WooCommerce, a free ecommerce plugin.
It is very powerful but has a learning curve.
SEO
Wix has decent on-page SEO options to add meta titles, descriptions etc.
But URLs are not customizable.
WordPress gives you full control over SEO through various plugins like Yoast SEO.
URL structures are customizable.
Performance
Wix sites are hosted on Wix servers so performance depends on their infrastructure.
Limited control for users.
WordPress offers choice of hosting so users have flexibility in optimizing sites for speed and scale.
Functionality Winner: WordPress
While Wix covers basics well, WordPress offers much more flexibility and advanced functionality through its wide ecosystem of plugins and integrations.
WordPress or Wix: SEO and Marketing
In terms of SEO and marketing capabilities, WordPress and Wix have the following strengths and weaknesses:
SEO Features
Wix provides basic on-page SEO settings but you don’t have full control over title tags, URLs etc.
WordPress gives you granular control over all important SEO factors like headlines, meta descriptions, alt text etc through plugins.
URL Structure
Wix uses subdomains (yourname.wixsite.com/website) by default.
You can only change to a custom domain on premium plans.
WordPress offers clean URL structures like website.com/page-name out of the box.
This is better for SEO.
Performance
Sites hosted on Wix servers. Limited control over page loading speeds, caching etc.
WordPress offers choice in hosting.
Lets you independently optimize site speed, server response times etc.
Backlinks Analysis
Wix provides a basic backlinks reporting tool showing top linking domains and anchor text.
WordPress has expansive backlink data through SEMRush integration in plugins like Yoast SEO.
Marketing Tools
Wix provides basic native tools like blog, contact forms, social integrations.
Email marketing requires third-party.
WordPress offers all major marketing tools either natively or through plugins – email marketing, social media, analytics etc.
Ecommerce
“Wix Stores” plans provide shopping carts, payment processing and inventory management.
WordPress + WooCommerce offer far more advanced ecommerce features and marketing functionality.
SEO/Marketing Winner: WordPress
WordPress offers much more under-the-hood SEO control.
When combined with top plugins, it trumps Wix for serious marketing capabilities.
WordPress or Wix: Security and Performance
Here is how WordPress and Wix compare in terms of security and performance:
Uptime
Wix guarantees 99.9% uptime on business plans since it manages hosting and servers
WordPress uptime depends on hosting provider.
But offers flexibility to choose hosts with best reliability.
Backups
Wix backups your site regularly and keeps copies for recovery.
Limited flexibility for users.
WordPress itself does not handle backups.
But users can download plugins to backup whichever way they prefer.
Security
Wix sites are hosted on Wix servers so security depends on their policies.
Limited user control.
In WordPress user has full control over security measures like firewalls, SSL, permissions etc based on hosting.
Spam Protection
Wix provides built-in spam protection and bot detection for forms, comments and memberships.
WordPress relies on plugins like Akismet to handle comment spam.
Captchas can be added to forms.
Brute Force Protection
Wix claims to block malicious login attempts automatically.
Details not publicly disclosed.
WordPress sites can face brute force attacks.
Users need to take preventive measures.
Vulnerability Scanning
Wix constantly scans sites for malware and vulnerabilities as per their policies.
WordPress itself does not provide scanning.
Users need to rely on plugins or external tools.
DDoS Protection
Wix states they are equipped to absorb DDoS attacks and mitigate impact for user sites.
WordPress does not provide native DDoS protection.
Users need to implement through hosting or CDN.
Site Access
Wix allows user to easily put site in maintenance mode but no staging environment.
WordPress has plugins to enable maintenance mode.
Also has staging sites capability.
Performance
Wix sites hosted on their servers so speed depends on their infrastructure. Caching is limited.
WordPress offers flexibility in hosting, caching, CDNs etc to optimize performance.
Security Winner: Tie
Wix takes care of security measures by default but gives users less control.
WordPress offers more flexibility but user needs to implement security.
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