Overview
What is Squarespace?
Squarespace is a CMS platform that allows users to create a DIY blog, eCommerce store, and/or portfolio (visual art or music). Some Squarespace website and shop templates are industry or use case-specific, such as menu builders for restaurant sites.
Squarespace Quickly Gets You Up And Running!
Easy to Manage and Learn
Squarespace is Great for Big Teams but Less Great for Precision
Squarespace: The fast and easy website builder
TrustRadius Insights
Squarespace is the easiest way to start a website
Great tool for getting a website up quickly and efficiently
Excellent Website Builder
Squarespace delivers on its value prop, but customization can be time consuming
Try Squarespace for Improved Security, SEO and Online Sales
A happy Squarespace user
Squarespace Review
Minimal and aesthetically pleasing, simple to use CMS
Squarespace as a starter platform for ecommerce performance
Squarespace is great for Artists/ Authors & Illustrators!
Awards
Products that are considered exceptional by their customers based on a variety of criteria win TrustRadius awards. Learn more about the types of TrustRadius awards to make the best purchase decision. More about TrustRadius Awards
Popular Features
- Admin section (89)7.272%
- Mobile optimization / responsive design (86)7.070%
- Page templates (90)7.070%
- Library of website themes (87)7.070%
Reviewer Pros & Cons
Pricing
Entry-level set up fee?
- No setup fee
Offerings
- Free Trial
- Free/Freemium Version
- Premium Consulting/Integration Services
Starting price (does not include set up fee)
- $12 per month
Features
Security
This component helps a company minimize the security risks by controlling access to the software and its data, and encouraging best practices among users.
- 8.5Role-based user permissions(59) Ratings
Permissions to perform actions or access or modify data are assigned to roles, which are then assigned to users, reducing complexity of administration.
Platform & Infrastructure
Features related to platform-wide settings and structure, such as permissions, languages, integrations, customizations, etc.
- 6.7API(45) Ratings
An API (application programming interface) provides a standard programming interface for connecting third-party systems to the software for data creation, access, updating and/or deletion.
- 6.7Internationalization / multi-language(34) Ratings
The software supports multiple languages, countries, currencies, etc.
Web Content Creation
Features that support the creation of website content.
- 8.5WYSIWYG editor(78) Ratings
What-You-See-Is-What-You-Get editing tool allows users to build pages without writing code.
- 8Code quality / cleanliness(71) Ratings
Code generated by WYSIWYG editor is clean and validates according to W3C standards.
- 7.2Admin section(89) Ratings
The admin page is easy to navigate and use.
- 7Page templates(90) Ratings
The CMS has standard webpage templates or types of web pages (e.g. homepage, article page, interior page, blog page, etc.); users can also build custom templates.
- 7Library of website themes(87) Ratings
A library of website frameworks or themes is available as a starting point for building a website.
- 7Mobile optimization / responsive design(86) Ratings
The CMS helps users build webpages that work well on mobile devices – whether m-dot pages or responsively designed pages.
- 7.6Publishing workflow(78) Ratings
The software allows users to set up a custom workflow for updating the website, including approval processes.
- 7.3Form generator(71) Ratings
Users can build website forms for visitors to fill out.
Web Content Management
Features for managing website content
- 7.3Content taxonomy(68) Ratings
Users can create multiple levels and types of content categories including tags.
- 7.7SEO support(73) Ratings
The CMS helps users create the right website infrastructure (pagination, page headers, titles, meta tags, url structure, etc.) to increase the site’s visibility in search engine results.
- 8Bulk management(45) Ratings
Users can change an attribute on a group of documents or sites all at once through features such as global search and replace, making bulk changes easier.
- 6.3Availability / breadth of extensions(60) Ratings
There is a broad library of extensions, plug-ins, modules or add-ons that allow users to easily customize their websites without building custom code.
- 7.3Community / comment management(60) Ratings
Users can put post/page comments through an approval process, auto-approve commenters based on their email addresses, block commenters by IP address, delete comments, etc.
Product Details
- About
- Tech Details
- FAQs
What is Squarespace?
Squarespace allows eCommerce users to customize not only elements like themes and fonts, but also structural elements like online store layout. Templates are optimized for mobile shopping. SEO, product galleries, and order management features are built in. Squarespace integrates with Stripe for credit card payments, and ShipStation for shipping.
Squarespace Technical Details
Operating Systems | Unspecified |
---|---|
Mobile Application | No |
Frequently Asked Questions
Comparisons
Compare with
Reviews and Ratings
(301)Community Insights
- Business Problems Solved
- Pros
- Cons
- Recommendations
Squarespace has become a go-to platform for small businesses, creative professionals, and marketers looking to build and manage visually appealing websites. With its well-designed templates and extensive availability of designer fonts, Squarespace allows users to create a professional-looking website with ease. Users appreciate the platform's intuitive interface and drag-and-drop functionality, making it accessible for both beginners and design professionals. Squarespace also offers useful tools like Analytics to track website traffic and sales data, as well as an Abandoned Cart feature to follow up with potential customers. Furthermore, Squarespace's integration with payment systems like Stripe and PayPal simplifies the process of setting up e-commerce capabilities on a website. Whether it's showcasing products, maintaining portfolios, or running corporate websites, Squarespace provides a time-saving and cost-effective solution for individuals and businesses alike.
Intuitive Interface: Users have consistently praised Squarespace's intuitive interface, with many stating that it has made website creation and management effortless. Numerous reviewers have mentioned that they can easily navigate through different sections of their websites and perform tasks such as managing portfolios, blog posts, and responding to comments seamlessly. This user-friendly interface has greatly enhanced users' efficiency in managing their websites and engaging with their audience.
Wide Selection of Templates: The extensive collection of beautifully designed templates in Squarespace has received high praise from users. Many reviewers appreciate the wide variety of options available, as well as the frequent addition of new templates. These templates are seen as time-saving features for users with limited design background and coding knowledge. Thanks to the intuitive nature of these templates, users find them extremely easy to work with and customize according to their preferences.
Great Customer Support: Squarespace's customer support has been highly regarded by users for its helpfulness and responsiveness. Reviewers mention that the support team is not only friendly but also goes above and beyond to assist them whenever issues arise. Users appreciate having responsive email replies and live chat options available for support. The excellent customer service provided by Squarespace ensures that users feel supported throughout their website building journey
Cons:
- Limited customization options: Users have expressed frustration with the limited customization options in Squarespace, particularly in terms of design and layout. Several users have mentioned that the templates provided by Squarespace can look somewhat generic and lack flexibility for creating more complex websites.
- Difficulties in navigation and finding features: Some users find it difficult to navigate Squarespace's user interface and locate certain features. There is a learning curve associated with the software, making it challenging for users to find their way around and access specific functionalities.
- Lack of customer support options: Customer service being available only through email has been seen as a drawback by some users. They feel that having additional support channels, such as live chat or phone support, would be beneficial for resolving issues or seeking assistance more efficiently.
Based on user reviews, users recommend using Squarespace for any level of web experience and most businesses. They find Squarespace easy to use and navigate, and highly recommend it for beginners. Users suggest exploring different templates and reaching out to support if needed. Squarespace is also recommended for small businesses, ecommerce, organizations, and artists. Users advise learning basic HTML and CSS coding for advanced features and understanding SEO for better website performance. They highly recommend Squarespace as the best website provider and recommend purchasing a domain through Squarespace for convenience. Users advise planning the site on paper before executing it in the system and recommend watching tutorials and experimenting with the program beforehand. Overall, users highly recommend using Squarespace for creating professional-looking websites with minimal effort.
Attribute Ratings
Reviews
(1-25 of 90)Squarespace is a simple tool for rapid website setup
- Simple to use for a newby
- Relatively cheap for the functions you receive
- Integrates with domain hosting for a one-stop management solution
- Backend database integration is non-existent
- Translation is difficult and limited
Squarespace Quickly Gets You Up And Running!
- Design and layout.
- SEO Integration.
- Analytical Overviews.
- Easy-to-use Menus.
- Drag and Drop Features.
- Needs more diverse integration with 3rd party apps.
- Limited on custom coding.
- Issues with Domain Connections.
Easy to Manage and Learn
- website design
- customer service
- user friendly
- information collection
- web design specifications
Squarespace is Great for Big Teams but Less Great for Precision
- ease of use
- hyperlinking pages
- built in youtube compatibility
- layout freedom
- easier to create drop down menus
- allow for more buttons on the main menu
Squarespace: The fast and easy website builder
- Easy to build templates
- Easy to adjust settings on the templates
- Easy to link documents for the public to view on your site
- Easy to build test backend pages or make those pages live with drag and drop feature
- Templates are meant not to be broken too much but that limits the variability. Some design feature restrictions could be lowered
- Sometimes its unclear whether a background page is live or not.
- Hard to run backend dns items
Squarespace is the easiest way to start a website
- They have auto updates so you don't have to worry about security issues
- The editor and templates are super easy to use
- Setup is quick and easy
- Minimal development experience needed to maintain.
- Solid templates that look professional with minimal work.
- Easy to manage multiple sites.
- WYSIWYG can be difficult to work with - feels like designing in Microsoft Word sometimes.
- Templates can be limiting and are generally less flexible than competitors like WordPress.
- Plugins and advanced features are mostly not an option.
Excellent Website Builder
- Easy to use
- No need to worry about hosting
- Great integration with various tools
- Mobile Responsiveness
- Not as customizable as Wordpress
- Squarespace version updates can get frustrating
- Looks incredible
- Great integration of marketing and SEO for websites
- Great integration for marketing emails
- Sites are mobile responsive without having to design a separate site
- Customizing the sites can be highly UN intuitive
- Navigation for editing the sites can be difficult and frustrating
- Squarespace has different versions and it's hard to know which version you're on. You can't switch after you start making a site with one version.
- Security
- Customer support
- Maintenance
- Squarespace would be improved by offering options for variants for downloadable products.
A happy Squarespace user
- Streamlined appearance.
- Multiple options.
- Space for creativity and ingenuity.
- Trying to configure site options.
- Adapting a template to a site.
- Being able to move around the interface.
Squarespace Review
- Image Stacking
- Website Building
- Customization
- Drag and Drop
- Domain accessibility
- Pleasant themes
- Usability
- Customization lacking (CSS)
- Easy to navigate
- Simple to update products
- Ease of use for check out pages
- Simple platform for site management
- Low SEO value
- Hard to expand for larger scale online catalogs
- Limited check out integrations
- Templates and Designs worked well for the sort of website I was creating
- Blogging Feature was great to keep customers up to date on current events
- Great price for what your getting in the website deign
- Excellent support whenever you run into a snag. Live chat I have found was a great tool and you get responded to right away.
- I find the usability of the editor to be a little frustrating at times. I would have preferred to have an autosave feature instead of having to save every change.
- Page speed is low, which makes for a poor smartphone experience.
Create & showcase your creativity!
- Easy to set up initially
- Learning curve isn't steep to access the dashboard features
- Decent Analytics to keep track of basic traffic data that helps in making decisions.
- Needs more integrations from other web friendly platform tools.
- Not innovating fast enough - I feel their updates aren't creative enough
- Better Video & multimedia integration.
- Out-of-the-box templates make it easy for non-technical people to get started
- Easy to manage, add users, and customize administrative features
- Ability to integrate a number of other services and applications
- For those who are a bit more savvy than a typical non-customized website but not proficient coders, the tools can seem a bit limiting in ability to really adapt and tweak visuals and special content
- Doesn't always play friendly with mobile versions and different browsers and can be difficult to know, at times, how the content will look across the internet and smart phones
- Limited customization of payment/donation features requires us to use a separate platform for online payments
- Stupid simple to use. I know very creative people who cannot code and this is probably the easiest ever platform for them!
- Pretty website templates and great functionality with showing off portfolios.
- They've already figured out what are the problems that non-coding people have when creating websites and they've figured out a simple solution for all of it.
- SEO doesn't seem to crawl as well on different search engines.
- I wanted to hook up my API code to my squarespace site to see how it tracks visitors and I didn't have a way to do that.
- Website loading time felt kind of average (3-5 seconds). I like to be around 1 second or less.
Squarespace for retail sales was great!
- Fast setup
- Easy-to-understand backend
- Great customer service
- Back end does require some technical knowledge
- There is no scraping opportunity from our our website, which would have improved content speed
- Customer service was email only
Squarespace is a good tool to have
- Provides great looking templates
- Provides good online sessions to develop skills
- Provides website analytics
- The forum needs to have more users
- Help center can have more videos
- Need more templates for more industries
Easy Peasy Get Up to Speed within Minutes!
- Blogging feature - easy to set up
- A variety of templates and designs for the clients to from
- Mobile apps
- Couldn't see anything wrong. Almost makes me want to stop creating custom sites because of Squarespace!
- The sites created in Squarespace are easy for my clients to maintain.
- Updating a Squarespace site can be completed by the client
- It is easy for me to quickly design and implement a wide range of websites for my clients.
- Maintaining a Squarespace website costs more than a traditional or WordPress site.
- Building larger or more complex sites is difficult.
- Lack of 3rd party plug-ins reduces customization options.
Quick, Easy, Professional and Beautiful.
- Squarespace is very easy to use, this is a super helpful thing as small business owners we have to wear many hats and being a full blown website developer doesn't need to be one of them.
- Squarespace has quick and simple plugins.
- Squarespace allows you to easily expand as you need to.
- As a wine company it would really love it if Squarespace had an easy plugin for wine club subscriptions.
- Squarespace would be awesome if it could automatically take your photos that you upload on the site and optimize them for the web and for the website.
- I do wish we could have more than two contributors for the basic website costs.
- Squarespace makes it simple to set up your website, whether you know a lot or very little about web design. HTML coding can be used but is not necessary, thanks to the hub's large selection of templates for both overall website look and individual pages.
- The backend "Dashboard" for Squarespace sites is very clean and clear — navigation is simple to get started, and if you select a wrong section, you can easily go back to the main menus.
- Commerce is very nice. I've used Shopify and a few custom store backends, and Squarespace stands out as one of the best. Because I'm a longterm user, I have certain benefits that now have a different price point, but I'd recommend their store as a very good option for most groups.
- Analytics are pretty standard, which is nice for groups who want to keep track of basic traffic and sales without needing a secondary tracker, but may not satisfy someone looking for extra robust information.
- It takes practice to get used to the editing flow for setting up pages in Squarespace: you need to both use an on-page "Page Content" tab to edit most aspects but also use a gear icon on the left-hand sidebar to finish setting up the pages with SEO, social image and metadata style descriptions.
- Because so much of your website is created through drag and drop, it can be frustrating at times when items do not move as precisely as you need. I end up having to resize columns after laying out the whole page from time to time.
- I pay for a domain through Squarespace because it keeps it simple, but the pricing is not ideal, especially if you need more than one domain. If you are bringing your own domain names, there is extra work, but it does work.
- Squarespace makes it very easy to get products listing in an eCommerce store. The interface is intuitive (they've improved in this regard quite a bit in their recent update, in my opinion) and quick to navigate.
- Squarespace is designed for fast deployment. While it sacrifices some customization, it is very simple to get your website framed up, the pages filled out with images and content, 3rd party integrations set up, and everything launched.
- The tools for building your content are easy to understand use. They've improved greatly with the functionality for inserting a content block. It used to be pretty buggy or fiddly but you can now just place your cursor in the editor where you want to insert something, see an indicator for where the new content will be inserted, click, and you're on your way.
- Solid uptime performance. I've never had problems with my website going down after two years as a customer.
- Automatic updates keep the site secured and free of malware or other problems that tend to afflict the average WordPress user.
- Design options tend to be limited unless you venture into the world of add-ons where things can get quite technical. If you're looking for a plug-and-play, you'll get it here, but you will likely have to concede some personal design preferences to fit the boundaries of their templates.
- It can be a little bit tricky at first to figure out the Pages tool and how to use it to get your navigation the way you want. I have some pages that I don't want in the primary navigation and
- This platform really needs more turnkey functionality for a membership site, recurring payments, gated content, etc. I hope that's coming at some point. Right now, you're better off using Squarespace for a more conventional eCommerce business.
- If you're a blogger and want to load up your site with ad placements, Squarespace is not for you. The platform is really unfriendly for any kind of ad network integrations, including AdSense.
Squarespace is not a great choice for ad-revenue-reliant bloggers or similar content creators. Its eCommerce tools are great for launching quickly but lack a lot of customization options without custom development. If you have the resources to go that route, however, there are some great Squarespace development shops that can do some pretty cool stuff.