Alternative to Squarespace: Dazzly Website Builder

Ease of use and time to publish

• Dazzly

  Editor is intentionally simplified—fewer panels and choices. Typical marketing, portfolio, or small store sites reach launch quickly because layout, typography, spacing, and mobile behaviour are already tuned. The flow centres on essentials (content, navigation, baseline SEO) instead of layers of optional widgets, cutting build time and ongoing upkeep.

• Squarespace

  A design‑focused block editor offering granular visual control and preset styles. It supports branding and layout work, but the number of style options and nested panels can slow decision making.

Design & templates

• Dazzly

  Curated templates adjust quickly without breaking structure. Provides enough styling freedom to align with brand while avoiding complexity that leads to inconsistent or blocked designs.

• Squarespace

  Refined templates with extensive style controls (fonts, spacing, imagery). Offers flexibility, though frequent tinkering can lengthen builds compared with Dazzly’s guided approach.

Apps, integrations, and extensibility

• Dazzly

  Core capabilities—hosting, SSL, forms, store, SEO—are built in, with a small set of proven integrations rather than a large app marketplace. Lean scope means simpler updates, less to maintain, and lower cumulative cost. Optional Extras are available when needed.

• Squarespace

  Built‑in ecommerce, scheduling (Acuity), email campaigns, and a modest Extensions marketplace. Custom code injection allows advanced tweaks; the third‑party plugin ecosystem is smaller than some alternatives.

SEO and performance

• Dazzly

  Dazzly automates foundational SEO alongside performance basics. It prepares sensible titles/meta, prompts for useful alt text, generates XML sitemaps, includes structured data, prerenders pages for quick first paint, and optimises images automatically. Cohesive defaults limit manual tweaking and support reliable visibility and speed from day one.

• Squarespace

  Clean HTML, automatic sitemaps, SSL, and mobile‑responsive layouts offer solid SEO foundations. Heavy imagery, custom code, or background videos can affect Core Web Vitals if not optimised.

Pricing and total cost of ownership (TCO)

• Dazzly

  Unified platform lowers reliance on external apps, often reducing total spend. Built‑ins cut custom development needs, and strong default performance/SEO help avoid later rebuilds—keeping TCO predictable.

• Squarespace

  Plan tiers (Personal, Business, Ecommerce) plus add‑ons (email campaigns, scheduling) increase spend. No permanent free plan—only a trial—and transaction fees apply on Business plan sales until upgrading to Ecommerce tiers.

Support

• Dazzly

  You receive real human support, not just long self‑serve paths.

  Guidance is tuned for small business—plain language, clear next steps, help prioritising tasks.

  Assistance covers initial setup, content refinement, baseline SEO, simple store or booking configuration, and light troubleshooting—reducing DIY hours and maintaining momentum.

• Squarespace

  Help center, community forum, 24/7 email and scheduled live chat. Guidance is broad—hands‑on strategic help is limited compared to Dazzly’s small‑business focus.