The actual question
Most "which tool to use" guides skip the most important question: what's the next 12 months of work going to look like? Pick wrong and you'll either waste time fighting a constraint, or pay for power you'll never use.
Hand-coded (Next.js, Astro, plain HTML)
Use it when: performance matters, you want full control, the site has any unusual interaction, or you're working with a real studio.
Pros: fastest possible site, perfect SEO, zero monthly fees beyond hosting (~$0 on Vercel for most cases), no tool limits.
Cons: needs a developer to make changes, takes longer to build initially.
Cost: $180–2,400 upfront, ~$0/month after.
Framer
Use it when: you want a polished, designy site you can edit yourself, you don't have unique technical needs, and you're OK paying $20–60/month for hosting.
Pros: beautiful animations out of the box, fast performance, real designer-friendly editor, modern aesthetic.
Cons: locked into Framer's ecosystem, limited customisation when you hit walls, exit costs are real.
Cost: $0–$600 design + ~$25/month forever.
Webflow
Use it when: you have a marketing team that wants to publish often, the site has 10+ pages, and you want a real CMS without writing code.
Pros: mature CMS, decent performance, used by serious agencies.
Cons: steep learning curve, expensive at scale, you'll write CSS-like classes anyway.
Cost: $600–3,600 design + $25–180/month.
Wix / Squarespace
Use it when: you're a non-technical founder building a personal portfolio, a small business with no growth ambitions, or a side project.
Pros: truly DIY, cheap, lots of templates.
Cons: looks templated (because it is), slow performance, weak SEO foundations, painful to migrate off.
Cost: $0 design + $6–18/month.
WordPress
Use it when: you have a content-heavy blog with many authors, and you have someone managing maintenance.
Cons: see our full take here. Short version: not in 2026.
Notion / Super / Potion
Use it when: you literally just need a knowledge base or docs site, and you already write in Notion.
Cons: looks like Notion. Performance is mid. Not for marketing sites.
The honest decision tree
- Are you a designer who wants to push pixels yourself? → Framer
- Do you need a CMS for 10+ pages and have a team? → Webflow
- Do you want the fastest, leanest possible site, with edge cases? → Hand-coded
- Are you genuinely fine with a templated look? → Wix / Squarespace
- Are you running a real publication? → WordPress (or Ghost)
What we use, and why
At studio10days, we hand-code everything in Next.js + Tailwind + Framer Motion, deployed on Vercel. We do this because:
- It's faster than any builder, by a lot
- It's free to host for 99% of traffic levels
- You walk away with code you can take anywhere, no lock-in
- SEO is built in by default
- We can build literally anything without hitting a tool's wall
If you want a builder, that's fine, pick the one that matches your skill and budget. If you want the fastest site possible without ongoing fees, hand-coded wins, every time.