Published · Phulax LLC
Wix vs WordPress vs Squarespace vs GoDaddy: which small-business websites score best?
Among 490 small-business websites we could identify the platform for, WordPress sites had the highest median score on our search and AI check (85/100) and custom-built or unidentified sites the lowest (74.5). Wix sites had the fewest serious accessibility problems (46%), while 100% of GoDaddy Website Builder sites had at least one.
The biggest gap was the same everywhere: on every platform, most sites answer no customer questions on the home page.
How each platform’s sites compare
Share of sites on each platform with each problem. Lower is better, except the median score.
| Platform | Sites | Median score | No Q&A on home page | No business details for AI | Serious accessibility problem | No sitemap | Very little text | No email shown |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| WordPress | 204 | 85 | 88% | 32% | 83% | 7% | 19% | 38% |
| Custom / unknown | 140 | 74.5 | 84% | 61% | 71% | 26% | 34% | 64% |
| Wix | 52 | 80 | 96% | 46% | 46% | 4% | 40% | 15% |
| Squarespace | 40 | 77.5 | 88% | 28% | 95% | 0% | 42% | 22% |
| GoDaddy Website Builder | 24 | 78 | 88% | 58% | 100% | 0% | 50% | 29% |
| Duda(small group) | 16 | 85.5 | 88% | 44% | 81% | 0% | 6% | 44% |
| Shopify(small group) | 14 | 84 | 93% | 29% | 71% | 0% | 21% | 29% |
Data: Phulax LLC's automated checks of 512 Wisconsin small-business home pages in October 2026, from chamber of commerce and trade-association member directories. No business is named. Platforms with fewer than 10 sites are left out; groups under 20 are too small to lean on.
What stands out for each platform?
- WordPress (204 sites) was the most common and scored well (median 85), but 83% had a serious accessibility problem.
- Custom-built or unidentified sites (140) were the weakest group: 61% give AI no business details, 64% show no email address and 26% have no sitemap. Site builders create some of these basics, such as sitemaps, automatically; hand-built sites only have them if someone set them up.
- Squarespace sites usually had the business details AI reads, but 95% had a serious accessibility problem and 38% had no description for Google.
- GoDaddy Website Builder sites almost always had a main heading (96%), but 100% had a serious accessibility problem and 50% had very little text on the home page.
Whatever your site is built on, the free SEO & AI search check shows which of these problems it has and how to fix each one on your platform.
Questions
- Which website builder is best for a small business?
- In our data no builder guarantees a good site. WordPress sites had the highest median score (85/100) among the larger groups and custom-built or unidentified sites the lowest (74.5). Every platform had sites near the top and the bottom, so how the site was set up mattered more than where it was built.
- Is Wix bad for SEO?
- Not in our data. Wix sites scored a median of 80/100, close to the overall median of 80, and had the fewest serious accessibility problems of any large group (46%). Their weak spots were thin home pages (40% have very little text) and missing answers to customer questions (96%).
- Why do so many sites on every platform skip customer questions?
- No builder adds a questions-and-answers section for you; someone has to write it. It's also the part AI assistants quote most, which is why it's the biggest gap we found on every platform.
- How did you tell which platform a site uses?
- From the page's own code: the generator tag most builders add, and files only that builder serves (for example wp-content for WordPress or wixstatic for Wix). Sites we couldn't identify are grouped as custom or unknown.
How does your website compare?
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