Nowadays we talk a lot about website builders. Well, that’s because they represent a new player in web-development and we strive to keep an eye on the ball. It's been a while since my last post about the visual website builders. While discussing Joomla with one of my colleagues, I've got this idea to see how good and comfortable Joomla looks comparing to WiX website builder.
Folks, I’ve got to confess to you… My first love before WordPress was Joomla. I used it a lot, and for a year or two, I was one of those guys walking around and yelling that Joomla is waaaaay more convenient and well-crafted than WP. And that’s how my wardrobe looked like back then:
Just kidding, I’m not that crazy... Well... Alright, I still have one of these t-shirts in my closet. Happy?
Despite the fact that now I am truly in love with WordPress, I’ve decided to go back to the good old days and see what’s up with the latest Joomla release and compare it to WiX - the biggest visual website builder out there. Why? Because I still believe that lots of developers still have faith in Joomla and love it with all their heart, so how can we not pay attention to it?
The format of this article will be quite simple: I will build a website using Joomla engine, and then will try to create the same looking site using WIX. Right after that, we’ll be able to discuss the pricing, convenience, development speed, etc.
I was looking for a multi-purpose template for this project to be able to play with the website look and customize it for my needs, so I decided to go with our Jumerix - Multipurpose Joomla Template.
The coolest thing about Jumerix is that it's ready to be used on any website: blog, portfolio, business and corporate projects, it doesn't matter! Doing an E-Commerce project? It will work for you too, my friend!
In my case, this template will be a great choice to start with, so I'm gonna go and download it, and in the meantime, I will explain you the idea of my future Joomla website.
Quick project description
My imaginable project idea is a sports store that sells the training shoes for the CrossFit Athletes. I decided to call the store ‘Crossfit Gods’ and created a simple logo in a few minutes.
Yeah, I know, it’s simple as hell, but we are not having a logo contest here, right?
I made a quick sketch of my future website structure. I think it should be easy to create it both ways: with Joomla and with WiX as well. I will have a fixed top menu along with the logo, a big block featuring main products, right after that I'll give a brief description of the main product features in a separate block below. Then my customers will be able to add the products to cart (Yes, Jumerix comes along with the Virtuemart integration) and look through the gallery of the famous CrossFit athletes wearing these shoes. Oh, and almost forgot a very basic footer with some contact info.
What are the results?
So I’m gonna be honest with you, to build the whole home page of my Joomla website I wasted around 1,5 - 2 hours. But mainly because I looked for graphic materials and other additional stuff on the internet.
Here is what I’ve got:
Was it simpler than WordPress? Not. But it was not hard in general, so for me, Joomla stays on the second place right after the WP. But that’s just me, how can I forget my first CMS love?
On the other hand, we have WiX. For a lot of people, it’s impossible to resist and walk away from the Drag&Drop development. And I’m gonna be honest with you… Right before I started doing an alternative project on WiX, I knew for sure that it would be much faster. But we shouldn’t be too superficial, let’s go deeper and review everything in details.
First of all, let me introduce to you my alternative website made with the help of the Visual Builder. I tried to copy my Joomla project in details, so here it comes. Here is what I’ve designed in 1 hour:
Well, well, well. What do we have here? As you can see, it’s not a problem to copy a beautiful template using the visual builder like WiX. Oh god, just look at those two. They look like twins, and it's like they've got separated at birth, and each of them has it's own parents now.
‘Shut up and take my money’?
Let’s talk the numbers. I’ve calculated the expenses for both cases, so we could see what option will be the most profitable to go with.
| Option | Subscription or Hosting | License / Template price | Domain | Initial Investment | Annual Investment |
| Joomla | $3,92/m | $75 | 20/Y | $98,92 | $67,04 |
| WiX | $12,5/m | - | 20/Y | $32,5 | $170 |
The total price for a year of owning a Joomla website will be $67. I believe that it’s a fair and small price for a good-looking website. Come on; it’s only $67 a year, you can collect this sum of money by not buying a daily can of soda!
On the other hand, if you double the price for the Joomla website, you will see the annual price for the Wix website. 170 dollars is quite a lot of money for most people. So while giving excellent functionalities to build a website using the visual builder, they take a lot of money for maintaining your website on their platform. And that’s not the most expensive plan, that’s just the most commonly used. For example, if you want to create a store, you will have to pay $218 a year. For me, the difference is just too obvious.
You might say that it’s a fair price for such a convenient way to develop the same website much faster, but hold the horses, there is one more thing you need to consider - the clean code.
Who’s got a cleaner code?
Nowadays if you purchase any Joomla template from a famous design studio or distributor, you will get a carefully-tailored theme with clean code.
For example, here is what you’ll see if you open the source code of my Joomla project:
Now let’s see what WiX can offer the fans of clean code:
Summing up the pros and cons
The primary goal of my article is to determine whether using Joomla is better than using a WiX visual builder, so here comes the resolution.
I’ve summed up some thoughts and highlight pros and cons of both options. To do that I’ll make a table.
Oh damn, I like tables so much!
| Jumerix | WiX | |
| Price | $75 🙁 | $12,5 🙂 |
| Annual Investment | $67 🙂 | $170 🙁 |
| Time to build a website | 2 hours 🙁 | 1 hour 🙂 |
| Can I run my store? | Yes, at no charge 🙂 | Additional $48 to your annual investment 🙁 |
| Documentation | Yes 🙂 | Yes 🙂 |
| Customer Service | 24/7 via phone, chat, e-mail 🙂 | Mon - Thu from 6 AM to 5 PM 🙁 |
As always, I will not tell you what to do; it’s 100% your choice. But if someone asks my opinion, I'm 100% with Joomla.
Why? I just love building websites and especially good-looking websites with cool functionalities. I don’t feel comfortable with visual builders and once I finished my WiX project I was like: 'Oh, finally playtime is over, and I can do something interesting.'
Maybe I’m just too old for visual builders, who knows!
But here is one last thing you need to understand before making your own decision: I spent 2 hours on building my Joomla website, but in the end, I've got a fully functional website with Virtuamart integration, SEO-friendliness and lots of other built-in modules I can implement in future. On the other hand, while building my WiX website - I just designed a simple page with lots of work to do more to make it work and get all the needed functionalities I've got with Jumerix right out of the box.
If you are a Joomla fan, feel free to check our Joomla templates, and you’ll find something eye-catching!
