Wix vs Hiring a Web Designer

By James Folk, principal software engineer and founder of NJLIGames Ltd (building software on Long Island since 2015). Wix prices below were read directly from wix.com/plans on August 15, 2026 and are re-checked quarterly. Our own prices are published in full on our pricing page.

What Wix actually costs in 2026

Wix replaced its older tiers with four plans. These are the prices Wix advertises on its own plans page. Note that the advertised figure is the annual-billing rate, so choosing month to month costs more than what is shown here.

Those numbers buy you the platform. They do not buy you a website. You still choose the template, write every word, source every photo, build every page, and maintain it from then on.

What hiring a designer costs

There is no single answer, because Long Island has three different markets pretending to be one.

The three-year math

Comparing a monthly platform fee to a one-time build is where most comparisons go wrong. Here is the same three years, both ways.

So Wix is roughly $3,300 to $5,300 cheaper in cash over three years. That is the honest headline, and we are not going to bury it. The question is what those hours are worth to you.

If building the site takes you 40 hours and another 2 hours a month keeping it current, that is 112 hours over three years. Whether that is a bargain or a disaster depends entirely on what an hour of your attention earns inside your business.

Who should use Wix, honestly

We would rather tell you this up front than take a deposit and disappoint you.

• Your site is a brochure. Hours, location, phone number, a few photos.
• You genuinely enjoy building it, or you want the control.
• Your budget is better spent on inventory, equipment, or ads right now.
• You need something live this weekend.
• You are testing whether the business works at all.

If more than two of those describe you, use Wix. That is not a sales trick. A cheap site you actually launch beats an expensive one you keep putting off.

When hiring someone is the right call

• The site has a job. Booking, logins, member portals, quoting tools, anything with logic behind it.
• You have already tried. There is a half-finished builder site in your account and it has been three months.
• Speed matters commercially. Builder sites carry the platform's overhead whether your page needs it or not.
• You want it to be yours. Wix sites cannot be exported. Leaving means rebuilding.
• Your hours are the scarce thing. This is the common one. Most owners we work with did not lack the ability. They lacked the evenings.

The part nobody puts in a pricing table

With a builder, you are the designer, the copywriter, the person who figures out why the mobile menu broke, and the person who remembers to update the holiday hours. Those roles do not disappear because the software is inexpensive. They move onto your calendar.

When you hire us, you work directly with the engineer who writes the code. There is no sales team, no account manager, and no handoff to someone who was not in the first conversation. That is a consequence of being small, and it is the main thing we would ask you to weigh against the price difference above.

Common questions

Is Wix cheaper than hiring a web designer?

In cash, yes, by roughly $3,300 to $5,300 over three years. The gap narrows once you count your own hours, because with Wix you are the designer, the copywriter, and the person who fixes it at 11pm.

Should I use Wix instead of hiring someone?

Use Wix if you enjoy the work, your site is mainly a brochure, and you would rather spend money elsewhere in the business. Hire someone when the website has to do a job, or when the hours you would spend building it are worth more inside your business.

Do I own my website if I build it on Wix?

You own your domain, your text, and your images. You cannot export the site itself, so leaving means rebuilding somewhere else. A custom-coded site is standard HTML, CSS, and JavaScript and can move to any host. Ask any designer you talk to whether you get the source code. We hand it over.

What does $175 per month actually include?

Custom design, custom-coded development of up to five pages, hosting, unlimited content edits, direct support from the engineer who built it, and lifetime updates. Nothing down, and after the 12 month minimum it runs month to month. Extra pages are a one-time $100 each. If you would rather own it outright, the same site is $3,800 once plus $25 per month for hosting.

What happens if I stop paying?

The same thing on both. A Wix site reverts to limited free hosting with Wix branding and your custom domain disconnected. A subscription site from us comes offline too, because the monthly fee covers the hosting. The difference is the exit: we hand over the source code and help you move it. If you want no exit question at all, buy the site outright.

Related reading: what a website actually costs on Long Island and our affordable web design plans.