4 Best Website Builders for SEO

Creating a beautiful, functional website is just the first step. Making sure people can actually find it is another challenge entirely.

That's where search engine optimization (SEO) comes into play.

Depending on your business, SEO could be a key factor when choosing the right website builder. If you're looking to discover the best website builders for SEO, this article is for you. We'll share our top recommendations and help you decide which options might work best for your needs.

Let’s go!

Read: How to Compare Software

What Makes the Best Website Builder for SEO?

This list is the result of thorough research and testing of more than 40 top website builders. You can learn more about our process and what goes into our research here. If you need a refresher on SEO basics, check out our post on Understanding SEO and How It Works.

For this list, we focused on the key factors that matter most for SEO. Here's the criteria we used:

Speed/Performance

Speed is a key factor in Google's "Page Experience" ranking signals. Think about it: if a website takes too long to load, you're likely to leave, no matter how great the content is. While improving your website's speed won't instantly boost you to the top of the rankings, it can give you a competitive edge.

The website builder you choose is closely linked to its hosting technology, which directly affects your page speed. Some builders come with built-in hosting, while others allow you to select your own hosting provider. (Check out our top picks for Best Web Hosting for SEO.)

Resource utilization is another big deal. A good website builder doesn't hog resources; it keeps your site running smoothly and quickly.

Last but not least, we have image optimization, which helps you shrink images without sacrificing quality. This also helps with load speed and is something the best website builders for SEO offer.

Read: Why Is My WordPress Site So Slow?

SEO Features

Some website builders come with built-in SEO features. That's a big plus, especially for people who don’t have the budget for dedicated SEO software.

One such feature is customizable URLs, which are the web addresses for your pages. You can improve your SEO metrics by simply being able to change your URLs. One best practice is to include keywords that search engines like in your URLs and set up the best subdirectories for navigation.

Another useful feature is the option to create a mobile-friendly version of your site. Roughly 60% of traffic comes from mobile devices. That's more than ever before. As a result, Google now decides how and whether to index sites based on their site’s mobile performance. What this means is your site must work well on mobile.

XML sitemaps are another crucial feature. These are like maps of your website that you give to search engines. They help search engines find and list all your pages. Some website builders can make these for you automatically.

Finally, AI site enhancers provide optimization suggestions, which can help you ensure your pages are set up to perform their best.

Customizability

You want your website to look great and stand out. But code customizability also matters for SEO. Some website builders let you add your own code to your site to help with advanced features or design. You can modify HTML/CSS, embed scripts, and optimize your site for SEO by adding custom schema markup.

If you want to add your own features to your website and further customize your SEO with the help of developers, code customizability means having more flexibility to do so.

Integrations

No website builder can do everything, and that's OK. What matters is that it can work with other tools that specialize in SEO. SEO plugins like Rank Math and Yoast optimize on-page content, while analytics tools like Google Analytics track performance.

With robust integrations, you can augment your site builder's native strengths.

The Best Website Builders for SEO

In this section, we’ll explore the top four website builders for SEO, along with their standout features and their pros and cons.

Let’s dive into our top picks.

1. WordPress-Based Website Builders – Best Overall

WordPress is one of the most popular content management systems (CMS). With a 43.2% market share, it powers millions of websites - and for good reason.

WordPress is like a blank canvas. Its flexibility is what makes it the best website builder for SEO. You can add a page builder by downloading it as a plugin. To improve your SEO, you can also use special SEO plugins that help you optimize your site easily.

Overall, WordPress offers more options to enhance SEO than any other platform. While you may trade some ease of use for greater power and customization, the potential is limitless if you're willing to invest time in learning.

Let's look at some of the most popular WordPress website builders.

Gutenberg

Gutenberg is the standard editor that comes with WordPress. From an SEO view, Gutenberg is the best because it doesn't use as many extra resources as other page builders. It's the default builder, not a plugin. But it can be clunky to use and has some creative limits. That's why many people choose a different website builder that's easier to use.

Elementor

Elementor is the leading WordPress page builder. It’s used on more than 5 million websites. Its intuitive drag-and-drop interface makes it one of the best website builders for beginners, but it’s great for SEO too. Elementor works well with Rank Math and has a built-in tool to make images load faster.

The company behind Elementor continually works to improve it and add new features. They offer a free version and a paid version, including hosting. They've also added some cool AI features. These can help you quickly create text, images, sections, and even custom code.

Divi

Divi is the silver medalist to Elementor's gold. Some people find this page builder made by Elegant Themes a bit easier to use. It has a number of built-in SEO settings that can be adjusted. It also works well with SEO plugins like Rank Math. It uses a front-end visual builder that's perfect for designing beautiful websites.

There's no free version of Divi, but if you buy the paid version, you can pay once and use it forever.

10Web

10Web may not be as well-known as other platforms, but it's quickly gaining popularity, thanks in part to its AI features that help optimize your site and improve speed. It assists in creating SEO-optimized content, generating keywords, and even automating some technical SEO tasks.

While WordPress can be challenging for beginners, 10Web offers a relatively user-friendly experience.

2. Webflow – Best for Web Designers

Webflow is our choice for web designers and developers who need advanced customization.

It comes with all the essential SEO tools you need. Plus, you can set up custom rules for things like the structure of your title tags.

You can still play with code if you want to, but Webflow makes it easier than just working with plain code. For example, you can use placeholders if you want to add schema markup (code that helps search engines understand your content better). These are connected to specific data designed to help Google understand the page better and, in some cases, to display certain features when you come up in search results. (Check out some of the most commonly used schema types to get a better sense of what they do.) Once you set this up, it works for all pages in the same category where you use the schemas.

You can edit almost every part of your website with Webflow. There's even an option to create sitemaps, which help search engines find all the pages on your site.

3. Wix – Best for Easy SEO Handling

If you care about ease of use, Wix is one of the most beginner-friendly website builders. It uses an intuitive drag-and-drop editor and has more than 900 designer-made templates you can customize.

While Wix doesn't offer as much design flexibility as WordPress or Webflow, it provides plenty of built-in SEO functionality, namely its SEO Wiz feature. This tool guides you through creating SEO-friendly content and helps with keyword research. It's a complete set of SEO tools that enables you to optimize your site's meta tags, title, and description.

With Wix, you can create your own SEO rules and apply them to multiple pages of the same type. Wix also works well with Google Analytics, Google Search Console, and Google Business Profile.

Compared to WordPress and Webflow, Wix is much easier to use, as users have everything they need right from the start. Wix even includes a Personalized SEO Setup Checklist, tailored to your business, location, and keyword research. This research is powered by Semrush SEO software.

4. Hostinger – Best for Affordability

Hostinger is the most affordable option on our list, but its affordability doesn't mean it's not as feature-packed as the other website builders.

Think of Hostinger as a cheaper version of Wix. It's also easy to use and comes packed with all the SEO basics you need. Hostinger has more than 150 templates that are SEO-friendly and customizable. It can also automatically create XML sitemaps for your website. Remember, these help search engines find all your pages.

Keep in mind that Hostinger is not the best option for you if you need more flexibility for your SEO through custom code or structured data markup. If you plan to run a membership site, online store, or website in multiple languages, then Wix might be a better choice.

For all other websites, such as simple blogs and company websites, Hostinger is a great choice. The business plan even has built-in AI SEO features you can use to create SEO-optimized text and images.

Hostinger also tops our list of best website builders for beginners. It's a really versatile pick!

Choosing the Right Web Builder for Your SEO Needs

The best website builder for you depends on your goals, budget, and technical abilities. But any of these four options check the boxes for an SEO-friendly platform.

If you want the most control and flexibility for your website, you might want to go with self-hosted WordPress. It's the best DIY web builder for SEO. Keep in mind that while WordPress offers the most freedom, it's also harder to learn than other website builders.

If you're on a tight budget, which is often the case for startups and small businesses, then Wix and Hostinger are great options.

If your site's appearance and customizability are a top priority, consider Webflow.

Compare Your Options

At the end of the day, the builder you choose merely paves the way for good SEO. The actual optimization involves creating high-quality content, conducting keyword research, building backlinks, and providing an excellent user experience.

Starting with one of the best website builders for SEO is a smart move. If you want to dive deeper, check out our top picks for the best website builders. You can also compare website builders side by side using our Comparison Tool to find the best fit for your needs.