Compare website platforms by the controls and workflows your site needs. Test real pages and migration requirements before choosing a CMS for SEO.
There is no automatic SEO winner
A platform is useful when your team can publish helpful pages, maintain internal links and preserve working URLs. A feature checklist does not prove that a finished website will rank. Evaluate a representative service page, article and product, rather than only the homepage demo.
WordPress: inspect the complete setup
In this comparison, WordPress means self-hosted WordPress.org software with a few free plugins installed, not hosted WordPress.com plans.
The WordPress SEO documentation covers crawlable content, permalinks and site structure. Assess the actual theme, hosting and plugins together. Ask who maintains updates, redirects and metadata, and demonstrate those tasks on the proposed installation. WordPress.org software and hosted WordPress.com plans are not interchangeable product specifications.
Squarespace: test the editorial workflow
The Squarespace checklist documents page titles, descriptions and search preparation. Have the future editor publish a page and update its search presentation. Check URL mapping and the content types you need before migrating an existing site.
Wix: verify controls on representative pages
Wix documents an SEO setup checklist and configurable SEO tools. Test the controls on your actual page types, including any multilingual or dynamic content. A setup checklist is a starting point, not a guarantee that every business requirement is covered.
Weebly: distinguish existing-site support from a new build
Weebly's published SEO guide describes titles, descriptions, URL controls and redirects. That guide is historical; verify the editor and product available to your account before making a new-platform decision. Do not assume a Square Online feature and a Weebly feature are the same.
HubSpot: confirm the plan and operating needs
HubSpot documents SEO recommendations and their subscription requirements. Check whether the proposed plan includes the controls your team needs and how the website fits its CRM workflow. The old COS label is not a current feature specification.
Run the same acceptance checklist on each candidate
- Edit a unique page title and description, then inspect what the published page serves.
- Publish readable headings and descriptive links; check the page without depending on an editor preview.
- Preserve existing URLs where possible and map necessary redirects to relevant destinations.
- Confirm canonical URLs, language versions and sitemap behaviour for the actual templates.
- Test content export, ownership and routine editing with the person who will operate the site.
Compare the practical scope of our website design service and review the ecommerce launch checklist if you will sell online.
Planning a project like this? See our SEO service or tell us about your project.
