Blogging has become a great way of communication allowing you to share ideas and information with the global audience. Recently with the growth of e-commerce and online shopping, blogs have been playing a major role in branding and promotion of businesses as well. Blogging is a creative way to reach a vast number of people and showcase your thoughts, products, works, etc.
So if you are planning to start blogging and have a bucket of ideas and plans about it then you are on the right page. Since the first step of Blogging is to choose a Blogging platform, we have created a list of the 5 best blogging platforms of 2023 and have also included the major criteria to look at while choosing the best blogging platform for you.
List of 5 Best Blogging Platforms of 2023
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1. WordPress
WordPress was introduced in 2003 to provide a platform for creating and publishing personal blogs and later on expanded its features and utilities. Today, WordPress is the world’s most widely used blogging website which can be easily reflected by the 43% of all the websites across the web being made on it. This open-source content management system allows you to create highly customized websites and blogs. WordPress has two platforms i.e. WordPress.org and WordPress.com.
The first one comes with a huge amount of customizable options and allows you to pick the host of your choice while the latter one is designed for beginners who want everything in one place and less manual work. It has a large worldwide community and an extensive amount of plugins and themes. It’s a dominant force in the blogging field and a versatile platform offering you tons of features to make your blogging site the way you want.
Features:
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Open-source blogging platform
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user-friendly interface
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Highly customizable
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Mobile app available
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Built-in analytics dashboard
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Integrated blogging features
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Third-party integrations
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SEO-friendly and performance-optimization
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Thousands of themes and plugins
2. Wix
Wix is a great blogging platform. It’s one of the best websites that offers a vast array of customization and user-friendly interfaces without compromising the flexibility for users. There are several themes and plugins with a drag-and-drop feature that allows you to easily put on tools and experience how your blogging website will look with the preview button. Wix has gained huge popularity because it doesn’t require coding work and is suitable for beginners as well to design both static and dynamic websites.
However some may find the vast flexibility of the Wix website a little overwhelming sometimes, but overall it’s a great option to go with if you don’t want to delve into technicals. Furthermore, Wix has its marketplace and offers multiple cloud hosting that prevents your blogging website from facing any downtime.
Features:
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Over 500 designer-made templates
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Built-in SEO tools
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Mobile app available
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Auto optimization for mobile devices
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Wix App Market for Web Apps
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Best in-market drag-and-drop feature
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Wix artificial design intelligence
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Build web apps with Velo by Wix
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Wix Blog, Wix Photography, Wix Music, Wix Booking, etc.
3. Squarespace
This American website-building company offers a great platform for bloggers for whom design is an important factor. Squarespace offers some of the most intuitive templates that can give your blogging site a perfect look. Whether you are building a blog for personal expression and monetization or business promotion and professional branding, Squarespace has all the templates that will suit your purpose.
There are various pre-built layouts to like about, contact, portfolio, etc. that you can add to your website. Moreover, Squarespace features a powerful designing tool with an in-built photo editor, custom colour palettes, etc. One of the unique features of Squarespace is multiple access and contribution where you can delegate different tasks to different people who will have access to certain tools, pages and data on your website.
Features:
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Mobile app available
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Customizable templates
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Pre-built layouts for websites
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Powerful designing tools
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Built-in custom CSS editor
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Multiple contributions and accessibility
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Passwords and page lock facility
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Draft, publish, and schedule your blog posts
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AMP integration for faster loading on mobile devices
4. Weebly
Create blogs with Weebly, a user-friendly blogging website that offers an intuitive drag-and-drop feature, pre-made themes and tons of customization options. If you are into e-commerce and want to enhance your brand’s online presence through blogs, then Weebly can be a good option. Weebly has its app centre where you can integrate third-party web apps with your blogs and website.
It also has powerful SEO tools to help you enhance the visibility of your blogging website in various search engines. You can effortlessly track how well your blogging website is performing with Weebly’s built-in stats dashboard.
Features:
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Weebly app centre
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Website analytical dashboard
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Powerful SEO tools
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Media and third-party integration
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Advanced blog management
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Responsive and mobile-friendly templates
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Several tools for designing an e-commerce website
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Integrated with RSS and social media sharing features
5. Blogger
Blogger is one of the oldest blogging platforms in this list founded in 1999 that enables users to publish their writings and contents. Blogger is a great blogging website for beginners who prefer simplicity and don’t want to equip advanced features into their blogs. There are not so many customization options and templates in Blogger. Still, on the positive side, it is equipped with well Google services as it is Google’s product and you can also monetize your blogs with Google Adsense and buy a custom domain of your choice. Blogger features editing of published blogs, adding images to your blogs, saving drafts or publishing your posts instantly.
Features:
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Highly convenient to use
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Mobile friendly blogs
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Seamless integration with Google services
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Built-in SEO tools
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Comment moderation
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Buy custom domain
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Edit published blogs
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Template designer
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Customizable themes with HTML & CSS
How to Choose the Best Blogging Platform for You
Blogging is creative work but it requires a lot of time and effort to create quality blogs. It can significantly affect your or your brand’s online presence. Before you start to create blogs you need to decide the platform first. Everyone has their own set of ideas, needs, and plans based on which they decide which blogging platform to go with. Below are the main factors that you should consider to decide which blogging platform is good for you:
Purpose
Decide whether you are blogging for your personal expression or for professional purposes like business promotion or branding.
Cost and Budget
Consider the cost of the blogging platform and whether it aligns with your requirements and budget.
Hosting and Domain
Check whether the platform you are going with offers hosting as a part of their package or if you will need a separate hosting service. Also, check whether they allow you to switch to your custom domain or not.
Ease of Use
If you’re a pro and comfortable with coding then you can delve into blogging platforms that require manual work and are highly customisable, but if you are not then you should go with a blogging website that offers user-friendly platforms and easy-to-use tools.
Customization Options
You need to assess the level of customization your blogs and blogging site will need to make it look good. Some platforms will offer you a high amount of customization while some will be inclined more towards pre-made templates and themes.
SEO Tools and Features
This is a crucial aspect that one should consider while choosing a blogging website because good built-in SEO tools can optimise the search visibility of your blogs.
Security and Customer Support
You should check the security features of the platform like SSL support, and regular updates and make sure their customer support is good and responsive.
