As you build your business from the ground up, developing a website for it is one of the next steps you’re likely to take. You may want to make your own site if you want full creative control, or you may decide to hire a web developer and designer to do the job for you.
At this stage, you need to decide whether you use a website builder or hand coding when creating the website for your business. That sounds like a simple choice, but there's actually a lot to consider. This guide will take a deep dive into the pros and cons of using hand coding and website builders. Let's break them down so you can decide which is better for your website.
Coding a Website
When building a website using coded HTML and CSS, the coding language is essentially written in the way the website looks. This gives you full creative control over the final product. This is especially useful if you have a creative vision for a website that is different from the rest of the market. If you want to be able to adjust the website yourself as needed or want to understand exactly how it works, you’ll probably want to use hand coding.
Basics of How a Coded Website Works
When you do website development using a coding language, it builds the website by using HTML and CSS. If you’re not familiar with HTML and CSS, here's a brief overview for you. Coding a website yourself lets you have complete control over the website. You can choose the colors, fonts, and other design aspects of the website. This gives you more flexibility during this process. When you use a website builder, you’re limited to the shortlist of designs available.
However, coding can take longer because you have to write the code for your website. When writing code, it’s easy to make mistakes. Mistakes are easy to correct during the coding process, but if you hire a web developer to code your website, mistakes can be costly.
Advantages of Hand Coding
Coding your business website has several advantages over using a website builder. Here are some of them:
1. Full Creative Control
When you use hand coding to build your website, you’re able to control the final product on your own. This means that you’re really able to create a site that matches your brand and personality—and that’s exactly what you want to be able to do!
2. Affordability
Hand coding isn’t expensive. Compared to hiring someone to do the work for you, it’s not expensive at all. In fact, you sometimes can’t even find affordable web designers and developers who can take care of the job for you.
3. Immense Learning
One of the great things about coding is that you can learn a lot about how to build a website. This can be useful for you to understand how to make minor edits to the website or even how to build a website from scratch.
Learning hand coding isn’t easy, but it’s one of the most rewarding things you can do. If you have aspirations to learn programming, coding a website is an excellent place to start.
4. Little to No Code Required
If you use a website builder, you’re really limited to the functionalities of the website builder. If you use hand coding, you aren’t limited in this way. You can create a website with as many features as you want—and you can create them exactly the way you want them to look.
5. Control Over the Website Response
Website builders give you limited control over the website response. When you use hand coding, you can choose to let your website load dynamically or to load it in a more streamlined fashion.
6. Edit the Website as and When Needed
When you use a website builder, you're limited to the designs that are available. With hand coding, you can edit the website as needed so that it fits your business goals.
7. Add Features and Update the Website
When you use a website builder, you can only add features with help from the website builder. You can't add new features without assistance. With hand coding, you have complete control over what features your website has. You can also update the website content at any time.
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Disadvantages of Hand Coding
Now that you know about the advantages, let's talk about some of the disadvantages of coding your website.
1. Time-Consuming
Coding your own website can be time-consuming. It takes time to learn coding, and it takes time to build a website. If you decide to only hire a developer to code your website, they might not be able to complete the project on time. Learning the language alone could take you years, and a mere crash course may not be enough to give you the level of proficiency you want to build a functional and соmрlеtе website.
2. Difficult to Come Up with a Good Design
After you hire a designer to create a design for your site, you still have to use hand coding to implement it. No matter how good your website designer is, соnstructing the code can be difficult, especially if you have a complicated design.
3. Required Expertise
Creating a successful website requires expertise, and you have to have a good understanding of coding. If you don’t have this expertise, your website might not be that great.
4. Difficult to Learn the Language
Learning hand coding is difficult. This is especially true if you don’t have any general coding experience. If you don't know anything about coding, you're going to have a hard time learning it on your own. It can be frustrating to try and learn a coding language without any guidance.
Using a Website Builder
Looking at the other side of website development, you can use the best website builder to create your website. A website builder is an application that enables you to create a website without any coding knowledge.
Website builders are great for people who don’t have a lot of experience with coding. They’re also good for people who are working with a limited budget.
Advantages of Using a Website Builder
There are several advantages of using a website builder to build your website. Here are a few of them:
1. Get a Website Up and Running Quickly
Website builders are fast and easy to use. When you create a website with a website creator, you can get the website up and running quickly. The website builder will take care of the coding for you. It will also give you a step-by-step walkthrough of how to make all of the edits you want.
2. Great for Beginners
Website builders are great for beginners. If you don’t have a lot of experience with coding, or you haven’t tried coding before, a website builder will be very helpful to you. This is the preferred option for people who want to DIY the creation of their website.
3. Creativity Tools
Website builders aren’t just about creating a website. They have creative tools that allow you to add animation, images, and other elements to the website. These tools allow you to do things уоu wоuldn’t be able to do with just hand coding.
4. Easily Add New Features
When you want to add a new feature to the website, you can use a website builder to do so. This can be an easier option than hiring someone to do the work for you, which is much more expensive. You should know how much does it cost to hire a designer to build a website for you.
5. Equipped With Great Support
Website builders often have excellent customer support. This can be a great option if you need help with a problem or if you have questions about how to use the website builder.
6. Flexible Design Options
When you use a website builder, you have limited design options. The website builder will give you the option to choose a design or customize the design to fit your brand.
7. Doesn’t Require Any Coding Knowledge
If you don’t have any coding knowledge, you can use a website builder to create a website. This makes it a good option for companies who want to be successful in business but don’t have the skills to build their own website. Check out this article how can i build my own website? if you want to build a website without having skills.
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Disadvantages of Using a Website Builder
Just like coding, using a website builder has its own disadvantages. Obviously, not all website builders are created equal, which makes it crucial for you to find a builder that suits your needs. Here are some of the disadvantages of using a website builder:
1. Limited to What the Website Builder Offers
Website builders are limited in what they can do. If you want to add a new feature to the website, you have to figure out if the website builder has the capability to do it for you. You can’t add it yourself.
2. Payment to Get the Edits Done
While website builders are affordable, they aren’t completely free. You might have to pay a monthly fee to use the website builder. You might have to pay a certain amount just to get the website started and then pay more each month to get it to a point where it looks good.
3. Hire Someone to Make Better Edits
If you’re trying to build a popular website, you might need to hire someone to make better edits. The website builder might not be able to meet your needs. Sometimes, even your designer or developer will have to resort to making adjustments using code just to make all the modules and website templates work according to your preference.
Website Builders Vs. Coding
Looking at all the pros and cons of both options, you might wonder if you should use a website builder or if you should hand code your website. The choice depends on your needs, business goals, and budget.
When you need to build a website quickly and cheaply, a website builder may be the ideal choice. However, if you have a lot of money to spend and you want to make sure you get something that’s high-quality, hiring a developer to hand code your website may be the best choice.
Bottom Line
For those who have little or no coding knowledge, a website builder is a good option for building a website. However, for those who have a lot of money and want higher-quality results, hand coding is likely the optimal choice. You may want to try both to see which one is best for your business goals.
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