- What is the best church website builder?
- There is no single best one. The right fit depends on your size, your budget, whether you want church-specific features built in, and who will keep the site current. Church-specific builders like The Church Co, Nucleus, Tithe.ly Sites, ChurchSpring, and Sharefaith ship giving and sermons out of the box. General builders like Wix and Squarespace are easier and cheaper but leave the church features to you. The bigger question for most churches is not which builder, but whether to build it yourself or have it built for you.
- What is the cheapest way to build a church website?
- The cheapest church-specific option is Tithe.ly Sites at about $19 a month plus a one-time setup fee, bundled with their giving platform. General builders like Squarespace and Wix start around $16 to $17 a month. WordPress is free as software, but you pay for hosting and, more importantly, the volunteer hours to run it. Cheap on the sticker price often means expensive in staff time.
- Are Wix and Squarespace good for churches?
- They work for a simple church website, especially if a capable volunteer owns it. They are easy to edit and look good. The tradeoff is that they have no church features, so online giving, recurring gifts, and sermon libraries get bolted on with third-party tools. For a small church with a willing volunteer, that is fine. For a church that wants giving and sermons handled cleanly, a church-specific builder usually fits better.
- Should we build the website ourselves or hire someone?
- Build it yourself with a church builder when you have a volunteer who will keep it current and you are comfortable with templates. Have it built for you when nobody on staff wants to own it, when you want a custom design instead of a template, or when the last DIY attempt has been half-finished for a year. The honest test is whether the site will still be current six months after launch.
- Do we own our church website?
- With most builders, no. You rent the site, and if you stop paying, the design and pages go away with the platform. Custom-built sites can be different. We build church sites your team can run, and your church owns the site after the term. Ask any provider the same question before you sign: if we leave, what do we keep?