Top 3 Blogging Sites

There are many good reasons to create a blog.

You may want to practice your writing, create a following, establish your brand or use blogging as a marketing tool to increase site traffic. It’s also a great way to connect with like-minded people.

How do you choose the site to build your blog on?

There’s a wide choice of blogging platforms. The more choices there are, the harder it is to make up your mind.

To help you choose the right blogging platform for yourself, we will first talk about what to look for in a blogging solution. After that, we’ll examine the pros and cons of the 10 best blog sites.

Ready? Let’s get started…

How to Choose The Best Blogging Platform

For making a decision, it helps to know what you are looking for. As they say – if you don’t know where you are going, every way is the right way. Below are some categories to judge the candidates by:

• Costs – An indispensable consideration. It’s not only important that your blogging platform of choice fits within your budget but what you also get for your money. A free offer is worth nothing if it doesn’t do what you need.
• Beginner-friendliness – Beginners need a blogging solution that is easy to set up, manage, and doesn’t need coding skills to run. They also have to be able to find support when they run into trouble.
• Features and extendability – Over time, your needs and requirements for your site will change. You might want to modify or overhaul the design, add features, or make other drastic changes. A good blogging platform needs to be able to accommodate that.
• Maintenance – How much hands-on work does your blogging solution need? Does it take care of most of the activities and features for you, or do you have to do everything by hand? This will have a serious impact on your workflow.
• Monetization options – Many people start a blog or website to eventually earn money. If that is your objective as well, you better choose a platform that enables you to do that in a way that works for you.

The weighing of the factors above will be different depending on your skills, goals, and requirements. Keep them in mind while we compare the best blogging platforms out there.

3 Best Blog Sites for 2020

Below, you’ll find some of the most popular blogging solutions in the world and how they compare to each other.

1. WordPress.org – Best for Self-Hosted Blogs

Among the best blog sites, the self-hosted version of WordPress is, by far the most popular blogging platform in the world. WordPress powers over 90 percent of all the blogs on the Internet. It’s often confused with its close cousin WordPress.com. We will cover the latter as well. You can learn more about the differences between the two platforms in this article.

WordPress.org self-hosted version is perfect for all kinds of blogs, but mostly for those who are serious about blogging:

• Personal blogs
• Business blogs
• Online businesses
• Bloggers who want full control over their site

Pros

• Very flexible – WordPress gives you full control over every aspect of your site
• Highly extendable – you can add almost any functionality through plugins (The WordPress directory has over 55,000).
• Thousands of mobile-friendly themes allow you to switch the design of your blog at the touch of a button
• The platform is search engine friendly and works well with social media
• You will have full ownership of your content
• Its large community means lots of support options

Cons

• You need to have a web hosting and a domain name

Setup and pricing

WordPress is an open-source blogging platform which means it’s free to use. However, to set it up, you’ll need a domain name ($10/year) and web hosting ($4/mo). Also, you may want to spend money on premium plugins and themes that add more flexibility to your blog.

• Setting up a self-hosted WordPress blog is relatively easy, all you need is a web hosting that offers “one-click-installs” for WordPress, such as Bluehost.
• We also wrote a step-by-step guide on how to build a self-hosted WordPress blog.

2. WordPress.com – Best for Free Blogs

WordPress.com is a blog site hosting service by Automattic. You can get a free blog with basic features. For advanced functionality, you need to opt for one of their paid plans. It can be a great starting point for blogging. If you ever decide to have more control over your site, it’s relatively easy to move from WordPress.com to WordPress.org.

Perfect for

• Small hobby blogs
• For people who want to test waters with blogging

It’s a good option for small blogs or hobby blogs that are not actively maintained.

Pros

• Super easy to set up – just create an account and follow the installation wizard
• Hosting is included, so you have less moving parts to deal with
• The interface is even more streamlined than self-hosted WordPress
• No need to worry about site maintenance, everything is done for you
• Built-in stats and community functions
• Professional and dedicated support on paid plans

Cons

• The free account is very limited, e.g., your blog is hosted on a subdomain
• Narrow customization options, third-party themes, and plugins are only available on Business plans
• Limited monetization opportunities, advertising is forbidden for lower plans
• You can lose your site if you violate the terms and services of the platform
• Ads and branding are present on your site unless you pay to remove them

Setup and pricing

Paid WordPress.com plans cost between $4 and $25 per month (billed annually). Each tier increases the amount of storage space, features (including monetization options) and support. With the Business plan, you can install external plugins and themes and connect your site to Google Analytics.

Signing up with WordPress.com and building a limited free blog can be done here – WordPress.com

3. Wix.com – Best for Small Websites

Wix is similar to Squarespace. It allows you to put together your web presence via drag and drop and comes with blogging ability that you can add to your site. You can read about adding Wix in this article.

Perfect for

• Small business owners who need a blog with a website
• Creative artists who mostly share photos

Pros

• Ability to customize your site with templates and third-party apps
• No coding skills required, you can achieve everything with the graphical interface
• Quick and easy setup, includes top-notch hosting
• Lots of design options and everything is built with HTML5
• Has a feature to automatically design your blog using an artificial intelligence
• Comes with free stock images

Cons

• The free account comes with limited capabilities, traffic, storage and has Wix branding and ads
• The number of free apps is limited
• You are unable to change your site template after choosing it
• The e-commerce capabilities of Wix are limited, even on paid plans
• The service charges for many things so costs rack up easily
• You are unable to move your site elsewhere and take your content with you

Pricing

Wix is subscription-based and offers different packages. They start at $13/month for 2GB of bandwidth and 3GB storage plus the ability to connect a custom domain (which you need to pay yourself). Higher plans add more bandwidth and storage, free domains, apps, the ability to create an online store and remove the ads. The most expensive plan ($39/month) also comes with VIP support.

Visit Wix.com to start a free blog

Best Blog Sites – What’s Your Pick?

When looking for the best blogging platform, you have many candidates to consider. Each comes with its pros and cons. There are three varieties: self-hosted blogging platforms, hosted blog sites, and site builders that also have blogging capabilities.

Which is the most suitable for you depends on your needs, goals, and preferences. Here on websitesetup.org, we like the self-hosted WordPress. It’s what this site is built on and we have had solid experience with it. It’s powerful, super flexible, and deserves to be among the best blog sites for a reason.

What do you consider the best blog sites out there? Anything to add to the list? Let us know in the comments section below.