WordPress Alternatives For Small Businesses: Astro Vs WordPress

The main WordPress alternatives for a small business are website builders like Wix and Squarespace, Webflow, Shopify for online shops, and fast static websites built with a framework such as Astro. Which one is right depends less on features and more on who will look after the website once it’s live.

WordPress runs a huge share of the web, and for good reason: it’s free, flexible and there’s a plugin for almost everything. But for a small business that just wants a website that loads fast, looks good and brings in enquiries, that flexibility often turns into a job nobody asked for.

Why Small Businesses Look For WordPress Alternatives

Updates That Never Stop

A typical WordPress website has three layers to keep up to date: WordPress itself, the theme, and every plugin. Each one is updated on its own schedule, by different people. Skip the updates and the site gradually becomes a security risk. Apply them and, now and again, one update clashes with another and something breaks.

If you have a developer on a care plan, that’s their problem. If you don’t, it’s yours.

Security

Because WordPress is so popular, it’s a common target. Most attacks are automated: bots look for the login page, for out-of-date plugins with known weaknesses, and for weak passwords. A well-maintained WordPress site can be perfectly secure, but it needs that maintenance.

Speed

WordPress builds each page when someone asks for it, by running code and querying a database. Caching helps, but every theme and plugin can add its own code to the page, and on a phone with a weak signal, that adds up. Speed matters because visitors leave slow pages, and Google takes page experience into account.

The Cost Of Plugins

Plenty of plugins are free, but the useful ones often have paid versions, and many premium themes and plugins are sold as yearly licences. Add a forms plugin, a backup plugin, a security plugin and an SEO plugin, and a “free” website can come with a list of renewals.

The Main WordPress Alternatives

Website Builders: Wix And Squarespace

Best for: people who want to build and edit the website themselves.

You pick a template, drag things around and publish. Hosting, security and updates are handled for you. The trade-offs are that you pay a monthly subscription for as long as the website exists, you’re limited to what the builder allows, and moving the site somewhere else later usually means starting again.

Webflow

Best for: design-led teams who want a visual editor with more control than a website builder.

Webflow gives designers fine control over layout without writing code, and it’s hosted for you. It has a learning curve, and like the builders, it’s a subscription platform.

Shopify

Best for: businesses whose website is mainly an online shop.

If selling products online is the main job of your website, Shopify is built for it: payments, stock, shipping and orders in one place. It’s not designed for a services business that wants enquiries.

A Static Website Built With Astro

Best for: businesses that want a fast, secure website built for them, with nothing to update.

Astro is a modern web framework. Instead of building pages when someone visits, it builds every page ahead of time into plain, finished web pages, and only adds JavaScript where a page actually needs it. The result is served straight from a global network, so it’s quick to load wherever your customers are. This is what we build our websites with.

Astro Vs WordPress At A Glance

Speed: Astro Vs WordPress

Because an Astro site is made of finished pages, there’s very little for the browser to wait for. Pages don’t need a database, and they don’t carry code from plugins you aren’t using. A WordPress site can be made fast too, with good hosting, caching and careful plugin choices, but it takes effort to get there and effort to keep it there.

Maintenance And Security

With nothing running a database or a login page on the live site, there’s far less to attack and almost nothing to patch. That doesn’t make any website unhackable, and we’d be wary of anyone who says it does. It does remove the most common ways small business websites get into trouble: out-of-date plugins and weak admin passwords.

When WordPress Is Still The Right Choice

We’re not going to pretend WordPress is wrong for everyone. It’s a good fit if:

• you want to change every part of the website yourself, whenever you like
• you rely on a particular plugin, such as a booking or membership system that only exists for WordPress
• you have a team publishing lots of content every day and want a familiar dashboard
• you already have a developer you trust who keeps it updated

The honest downside of an Astro site is that bigger changes to the layout are a job for a developer. That’s why we include small changes for the first year, and why you can always pick up the phone or send us a WhatsApp.

How We Build Without WordPress

Every website we build is designed from scratch, built with Astro, and set up for Google from launch day. Hosting, security, backups and small changes are included for the first 12 months, and then the website is yours to keep. You can see how it works on our website design process page, compare the options on our pricing page, or read more about small business website design.

We’re based in Whitefield, Greater Manchester, and work with businesses across the North West and beyond, all by video call.