Wix or a custom website
Wix is the surprising result in our study. Of the 707 Wix sites we tested, only 10% scored poor on mobile, the lowest rate of any platform with 100 or more sites, and well below the 27.3% across the whole sample. That deserves a fair hearing before anyone talks you out of it. This page covers where Wix is strong, where it still falls short, what its plans look like, and when to stay.
Wix's 707 sites averaged 66.1 on Lighthouse mobile performance (median 67) against 62 across the full sample. Only 10% scored under 50, compared with 47.2% for Squarespace and 28.7% for WordPress. If your fear is a site that fails outright, Wix is the platform in this study (among those with 100 or more sites) least likely to be one.
The other half of the picture is time to main content. The median Wix site took 6.6s to paint its largest element, a little quicker than the all-site median of 6.9s but still more than two and a half times Google's 2.5 second bar. Wix rarely fails badly. It also rarely feels fast. That is the ceiling a hosted builder gives you, and it is the gap a custom build exists to close.
Source: data/research/lighthouse-2026.json, by_platform and overall_scores.performance. Read the full study.
| Platform | n | Mean | % poor | LCP |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| WordPress | 5,554 | 59.6 | 28.7% | 7.4s |
| Wix | 707 | 66.1 | 10% | 6.6s |
| Squarespace | 528 | 49.4 | 47.2% | 11.1s |
| Shopify | 527 | 51.5 | 45.9% | 11.1s |
| Webflow | 143 | 55.9 | 28.7% | 8.4s |
A few cautions. Each site was run once through throttled mobile lab testing, so single scores are noisy even though averages across 707 sites are stable. Wix sites were identified from page fingerprints at 0.7 confidence or higher, and all 707 cleared that. The sample leans toward small local service businesses. The study also cannot tell you how a given Wix site is built, only how it performed.
Where Wix is the better tool
What a hand-coded site changes
What each side costs
Ours first: custom builds start from $8,000 AUD, fixed price, and the floor does not move. The rows below are Wix's public plans, read directly off its pricing page.
Source: https://www.wix.com/plans, read 5 October 2026. Wix states that prices and currency vary by location and that any USD prices on the page are for reference. The page served to our server was localised to EUR, so the figures above are shown as displayed and are not Australian dollar prices. Check the checkout page for what you would pay. Plans change; confirm on the platform before you decide.
Full price ladder, including the $1,500 Fix Sprint and the $495 Blueprint, is on the pricing page.
Stay on Wix if
- 01Your site is working and you are getting the enquiries you need. A site that earns its keep is not a problem to solve.
- 02You rely on Wix Bookings, Events or Members and they fit how you operate. Rebuilding those costs real money and usually only pays back if your flow is unusual.
- 03You edit the site yourself, often. Wix's editor is one of the friendliest around, and handing routine changes to a developer is a step backwards for many owners.
- 04Search is not how customers find you. If your business runs on referrals, repeat customers and Google Business Profile, the rest matters less.
- 05Your budget is under $8,000 and the site is not yet a revenue channel. Tidy the pages, compress the images and keep the plan.
If you are unsure which side you are on, the $495 Blueprint is the cheaper way to find out. It is a paid diagnostic, and the fee comes off a build if one starts within 60 days.
What moving looks like
Plan on rebuilding a Wix site rather than converting it. We do not rely on any export: we capture the text, images and structure from the live site itself, which is why week one is an inventory of every page, image and form before anything is designed.
Six weeks is the plan we scope against for a typical small business site. Larger sites, shops and booking systems take longer, and we say so at quote stage, not after.
Talk it through, or keep reading
- Squarespace vs a custom websiteThe builder with a 47.2% poor rate and 11.1s median load.
- WordPress vs a custom website44.0% of the sites we tested.
- What Wix really costs over three yearsLine-by-line cost in Australian dollars.
- Squarespace, Wix or customA decision guide by business stage.
- The full 2026 Lighthouse study12,621 sites, every table and the method.
- PricingFix Sprint, Blueprint, builds and the Care Plan, all fixed price.