Wix or Squarespace vs a Custom Website: Which Is Right for a Mumbai Business?

A typical first conversation: a physiotherapist is opening her own clinic in Kharghar. She has a logo, a Google Business Profile and a few weeks before opening. A friend built his site on Wix in a weekend and says she should do the same. Her question to me is simple: is that good enough, or will she regret it in a year?

It is a fair question, and my answer has changed over the years. The old arguments against builders (slow pages, poor SEO controls) are much weaker than they were. The argument that remains is about ownership: on a hosted builder you are renting a place to put your website, and moving out is harder than most people realise. In this piece I compare the two on speed, search, ownership, running effort and features, using 2026 data and the platforms’ own documentation, and then give the rule of thumb I use.

1. What you are actually choosing between

A hosted website builder such as Wix or Squarespace is a software service. You pay a subscription, design the site in their editor, and they host and run it. A custom website is code written for you, which can be hosted anywhere you choose. WordPress sits between the two: free software you can host anywhere, with ready-made themes or a custom-coded design.

All three are widely used. W3Techs tracks which content systems power the web.

Source: W3Techs, Usage statistics of content management systems, 29 October 2026. Global figures; W3Techs does not publish an India-only split.

The “no content system” figure is worth noticing. About a third of websites run without a CMS that W3Techs can detect, which includes most hand-coded and custom-built sites. Custom is not an exotic choice either.

See also: if you are weighing WordPress as the middle option, read WordPress vs a custom website.

2. Speed: builders have caught up

Five years ago I would have told the physiotherapist that builder sites were slow. The data no longer supports that as a general rule. The HTTP Archive’s 2025 Web Almanac CMS chapter compares how many sites on each platform meet Google’s Core Web Vitals thresholds on mobile (main content within 2.5 seconds, taps answered within 200 milliseconds, minimal layout shift).

Source: HTTP Archive Web Almanac 2025, CMS chapter. Global Chrome real-user data. The chapter’s text and chart differ slightly on the size of Wix’s gain; the 2025 figure is consistent.

Why have builders improved? The platform controls the hosting, the image handling and the code for every site, so one engineering fix speeds up millions of sites at once. A custom or WordPress site is only as fast as the person who built it and the choices made afterwards.

My reading: a well-built custom site can still beat any builder, because nothing loads that you did not choose. But a carelessly built custom site will lose to a plain Wix site. Speed is now a reason to judge the builder of your site, not the type.

See also: whatever platform you choose, the fixes in how to speed up your website still apply.

3. SEO: the controls exist, the ceiling is structure

The other old complaint about builders was weak SEO controls. That has also changed. Wix’s own help pages describe SEO settings for editing page titles, meta descriptions, URL slugs and whether a page should be indexed, and a URL Redirect Manager for 301 redirects, including from an old non-Wix site’s URLs. One catch from the same article: 301 redirects only work on a custom domain.

It also helps to remember what Google actually ranks. Its page experience guidance says Google “always seeks to show the most relevant content, even if the page experience is sub-par.” No platform makes a thin page rank. A Wix site with a clear page for each service, real local detail and good reviews will usually outrank a custom site with none of that.

Where I see builders limit search performance is in structure at scale, and this is my opinion from projects rather than a published statistic. Generating hundreds of location or product pages from a database, custom structured data for unusual business types, fine control over how filters and search pages are indexed, or tying the site into a booking or inventory system are all easier when you control the code. A ten-page clinic site needs none of that.

4. Ownership: what happens when you want to leave

This is the deciding issue for me, and the one most owners only discover when they try to move. Wix is direct about it. Its help article on exporting or embedding a Wix site says a Wix site “needs to be hosted and operated on Wix’s servers” and that its architecture “does not support external hosting”. The same page says the content you build on Wix belongs to you, but it does not describe a way to export the site.

Squarespace allows a partial export to an XML file that WordPress can import. Its export guide lists what comes across and what does not.

Source: Squarespace Help, Exporting your site, accessed 30 October 2026. Squarespace notes that many features rely on its platform code, so some content does not export, and trial sites cannot be exported.

In practice, leaving either builder means rebuilding the design and re-entering much of the content elsewhere. That is fine if you go in knowing it. It is painful if your site has grown to 80 pages and a shop.

The domain is a separate trap. If you buy your domain through the builder, moving it later has its own steps. Wix’s domain transfer guide notes that transferring a domain away disconnects the Wix site, and that, under ICANN’s 60-day lock policy, a newly purchased domain or one whose registrant details were just changed cannot be transferred for 60 days. Owning the domain at a registrar you control, and pointing it at whichever platform you use, keeps your options open.

Custom sites have their own ownership question. Under India’s Copyright Act, 1957, an assignment of copyright must be in writing and signed (Section 19). If your developer’s contract does not assign the code and design to you, “custom” does not automatically mean “yours”.

5. Running effort: who does the work every month

Builders bundle hosting, security updates and backups into the subscription. Plans are billed per year, and prices vary by country and change often, so check the current rupee price on the builder’s own plans page rather than trusting any blog, including this one. Note that connecting your own domain requires a paid plan, according to Wix’s help pages.

A custom site moves those jobs to you or your developer: hosting, security patches, backups, and fixing things when a browser or a third-party service changes. That is not a reason to avoid custom, but it is a cost that never appears in the build quote. Ask who does it, how often, and what happens if they leave.

The editing experience matters as much as the bill. A builder’s visual editor is easy for a confident owner, but it also makes it easy to break the layout on mobile while fixing something on desktop. A custom site can give staff a narrow, safe editing screen for the parts they change, with everything else locked.

6. Features: check the Indian specifics before you commit

Builders are excellent at standard features: pages, galleries, a blog, a contact form, simple bookings, a small shop. Where Indian businesses run into trouble is with local specifics. Before committing to any platform, I would confirm each of these in a trial or with the platform’s support, rather than assuming.

• Payments: does it support the Indian payment gateway you want, UPI, and settlement in rupees to an Indian bank account?
• Invoices and tax: can it produce GST-compliant invoices, or will you handle that outside the site?
• WhatsApp: can you add a click-to-chat button, and do any WhatsApp integrations you need work with the Business Platform you use?
• Languages: can you run Marathi or Hindi versions of pages properly, with separate URLs, not just a translation widget?
• Your other systems: will the site need to talk to your billing software, CRM, clinic management or inventory system? This is where custom builds usually earn their cost.

See also: for online selling specifically, compare the options in Shopify vs WooCommerce and how to start an online store in India.

7. How I decide, in one table

Infoways’ opinion, based on project experience. Not based on a published dataset.

Where this advice breaks down

• Platform-level data hides wide variation. The Web Almanac figures describe millions of sites worldwide. Your Wix site can be slow and your custom site can be fast; test the actual pages.
• Builders change quickly. Features, plans and export options can change between the time I write this and the time you read it. Treat the help-page quotes as accurate on 30 October 2026 and check them again.
• “Custom” is a wide term. Some custom proposals are excellent; some are a bought template with a new logo. Ask what is genuinely written for you.
• Lock-in is not always bad. If you never intend to move, a builder that handles hosting, security and backups for you can be the lowest-effort option for years.
• My view is not neutral. I run a company that builds custom and WordPress sites. I have tried to show where builders win, and I recommend them to clients for whom they fit.

If you start on a builder, plan the exit on day one

Starting on a builder and moving later is a perfectly reasonable path. It goes smoothly when you prepare for it from the start.

1. Register your domain yourself and point it at the builder.
2. Keep the original text and full-size photos in your own folder or drive, not only inside the builder.
3. Keep a spreadsheet of every page URL, its title and its description as you add pages.
4. When you move, follow Google’s site-move steps: map old URLs to new ones, use permanent 301 or 308 redirects, keep them for at least a year, and expect some ranking movement for a few weeks.

See also: when the time comes, the website redesign signs piece covers how to tell you have outgrown your current site.

Checklist before you choose

For the physiotherapist in Kharghar, a ten-page clinic site that she edits herself, a builder with her own domain is a sensible start. The regret comes later only for owners who never asked what leaving would involve.