The 5 best free website builders you can use in 2017
Bloggers, photographers, graphic designers, small business owners, entrepreneurs, industry experts — these are just a few professionals who could greatly benefit from having a personal website. Having your own website allows you to solidify a digital footprint which is invaluable for marketing to build awareness, generate traffic, gain leads, and increase sales.
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Building a website now is easier than ever before. You don't need to be a coder or a designer to do it; just head over to one of the many website builders available on the internet and you can set up your own website in a matter of hours, if not minutes. There are, however, so many of these website builders that choosing the right one can be a bit of a headache. That's why we've compiled a list of the five best free ones that you can use to create your own personal website.
Weebly
Weebly is probably the most user-friendly website builder on the internet today. It comes with pre-designed page layouts and templates (which you can modify if you know HTML/CSS) that work well with its intuitive drag-and-drop interface. Its free plan is more than sufficient for small businesses and, should you ever feel the need to upgrade, its paid options are pretty affordable.
Jimdo
Jimdo is one of the most versatile free website builders. It doesn't quite have a drag-and-drop interface but is extremely easy to use nonetheless. It has a diverse set of pre-designed templates and is definitely the best platform to use if you want your website to feature a language other than English. Also, coders with even a basic knowledge of HTML/CSS have complete freedom on Jimdo to carry out any design changes they want.
Wix
Wix has a wonderful collection of professional design templates that cater to virtually any business you can think of. It employs a simple drag-and-drop interface that makes use of an ‘artificial design intelligence’ to make creating designing websites easier and faster than ever before.
Yola
This website builder allows users to create three-page websites even while using the unpaid plan. It comes with built-in statistics, quality customer support, open designing options, and one GB of storage. The most impressive thing about Yola though, is that it keeps your websites completely free of third-party ads.
IM XPRS
If we’re talking only about design, IM XPRS is the best option out there. It has a vast collection of wonderful templates that can help you create a lean website that looks professionally designed in a matter of minutes. It also makes use of something called Polydoms technology, which offers users pre-designed content blocks (contact form, store, gallery, product features and more) that can be easily mixed and matched to create exactly what you want.
Keep in mind that since you're using the unpaid plans, you won't get a custom domain – i.e., www.example.com – with any of them. You also won't have access to a few features like analytics and SEO. But all these website builders offer multiple paid plans that you can easily upgrade to if you ever want to take your website to the next level.
