GoDaddy Website Builder Review 2024

Why Trust Techopedia
Our Verdict

GoDaddy is easy-to-use and full of helpful tools to support everyone from beginners to established e-commerce businesses

The GoDaddy website builder offers an intuitive and user-friendly platform, making it accessible to beginners and well-established businesses alike.

Its standout features include its wide selection of customizable templates, intuitive drag-and-drop editing tools, and seamless integration with GoDaddy’s domain registration and hosting services.

Additionally, GoDaddy provides a full set of ecommerce features, allowing users to easily set up an online store and manage product listings, making it a comprehensive solution for those looking to build and grow their business. Learn more in our GoDaddy website builder review below.

Pros

  • Super responsive customer support for assistance when needed
  • User-friendly interface for quick website creation
  • Wide selection of customizable templates
  • Robust e-commerce functionality for online store setup
  • Seamless integration with GoDaddy domain and hosting services

Cons

  • Advanced users may find the feature set somewhat basic
  • Limited design customization compared to some other website builders
  • Pricing plans slightly higher compared to competitors

In our GoDaddy website builder review, we’ll show you why it’s renowned as an easy-to-use tool for creating professional websites without needing any technical skills. Perfect for beginners, it features drag-and-drop functionality, a variety of customizable templates, and integrated marketing features like email campaigns and social media management.

The GoDaddy website builder is a great platform for entrepreneurs, startups, and even small businesses, and you can get started for free. Keep reading our GoDaddy website builder review, where we evaluate its extensive range of offerings, pricing structure, and insightful customer feedback.

What Is the GoDaddy Website Builder?

GoDaddy is a well-established company that has proven its reliability in hosting, site building, and domain registration. The GoDaddy website platform has a user-friendly design, as well as extensive editing, marketing, and e-commerce tools to help users establish, promote, and maintain a professional online presence without needing any prior technical knowledge.

Whether you’re crafting a portfolio site or launching an online store for products or services, we’re confident that GoDaddy has the features to get you going. The platform offers industry-specific website templates and incorporates built-in digital and social media marketing features that enhance SEO.

These features, combined with GoDaddy’s advanced e-commerce capabilities and readily available customer support, create the ideal environment for website owners to bring their ideas to life through a compelling and visually appealing site. 

GoDaddy Website Builder Review – Pricing & Plans

The GoDaddy website builder has a free plan and three straightforward paid plans, each offering more features and capabilities. Here’s what each plan offers:

Plans Free Basic Premium Commerce
Starting Price $0/month $10.99/month $14.99/month $20.99/month
Free Domain
(GoDaddy subdomain)
Storage & Bandwidth ● Unlimited ● Unlimited ● Unlimited ● Unlimited
E-commerce Capabilities
Free – $0/month

GoDaddy’s free site builder is great for testing its features without any financial commitment. It’s a lifetime plan, so you’ll never be charged for any of its features. However, the plan does not allow users to connect to a custom domain. Instead, it provides a temporary domain that will look like “www.yoursite.godaddysites.com”.

The free plan offers an intuitive click-and-drag editor, complimentary hosting, and a basic suite of email and social media marketing tools. It also includes content creation capabilities through GoDaddy Studio, albeit with branding, and supports one-time appointment bookings.

Additionally, this plan comes with a free SSL certificate, which encrypts sensitive data transmitted from your site. For e-commerce stores or service-based businesses, the free SSL certificate will protect customers’ credit card and bank numbers.

With the free plan, you can set up a simple online store and accept payments with GoDaddy Payments. This level of e-commerce functionality is rare among free website builders, making GoDaddy’s offering particularly noteworthy.

Basic – $9.99/month

The Basic plan is best for startups looking to establish a functional online presence without breaking the bank. You get everything offered in the free plan at a reasonable price, plus the ability to connect a custom domain to your website.

This plan enhances your site’s online visibility with built-in SEO tools and facilitates direct communication with site visitors through a unified inbox and website chat feature. Moreover, this plan allows for 100 email marketing sends per month and basic access to content creation and design tools.

Premium – $14.99/month

The Premium plan includes everything offered in the Basic plan with extended flexibility to take appointments and boost marketing efforts. With this plan, your clients can book recurring appointments and make secure online deposits.

You’ll also have access to a wider range of marketing resources, including the ability to create and launch ads on social media platforms like Facebook. Finally, the plan includes 25,000 monthly email marketing sends and unrestricted access to content creation and design tools.

Commerce – $20.99/month

Similarly, the Commerce plan includes all the features offered in the previous plan. What sets this plan apart from the others is its focus on scalability and automation. With its point of sale (POS) system, you can take your online store to popular online marketplaces like Amazon, Etsy, and eBay.

This plan allows users to sell online with unlimited products and automates the inventory sync across all sales channels. You also get flexible shipping options, an automated sales tax calculator and 100,000 monthly email marketing sends.

All GoDaddy websites include unlimited storage and bandwidth, a free SSL certificate (Secure Sockets Layer), mobile optimization, hundreds of dazzling templates, a marketing dashboard for site performance tracking, secure payment processing, a free professional email that matches your domain, and 24/7 expert customer support.

You can try the premium features in the paid plans with a 7-day free trial without entering any credit card details. The paid plans listed above reflect GoDaddy’s current promotion, which offers discounts of up to 34% on their regular price.

GoDaddy Website Builder Review – Key Features

Whatever you need for your site’s optimal performance, from SEO and ecommerce to analytics and AI-powered tools, GoDaddy offers it all. Let’s take a deeper look at these features.

AI website builderMobile-Friendly TemplatesGoDaddy InsightEcommerce FeaturesMarketing ToolsGoDaddy AiroAI Domain SearchGoDaddy HostingGoDaddy Logo MakerGoDaddy Website Design ServicesGoDaddy StudioGoDaddy Guides

With just a few questions, GoDaddy’s AI website builder will create a customizable website for you in minutes. After your site is set up, all you need to do is personalize it with the click-and-drag editor, market it, and manage the site from one GoDaddy dashboard.

This is especially convenient for beginners with bright ideas but no technical skills.

If you’re not interested in building with artificial intelligence, GoDaddy has hundreds of modern, professional website templates available to customize with your own content.

These designer-made templates are beautifully crafted to cater to every industry and idea. Plus, you can apply theme filters to edit layouts, fonts, and colors. More importantly, GoDaddy’s templates are designed to be mobile responsive to ensure your site looks great across all devices.

GoDaddy Insight is an AI-driven tool for website analytics and improvement. It tracks your site and marketing performance, measures it against other businesses, and provides industry-standard advice with actionable plans to boost your business.

GoDaddy offers essential ecommerce features on all plans, with more robust capabilities offered on paid plans. With GoDaddy Payments, you can accept payments from credit and debit cards, as well as other payment processors like PayPal, Apple Pay, Google Pay, or Venmo.

GoDaddy also allows users to sell on multiple marketplaces, social media, and in person with POS. You can also manage tax and shipping rates, offer discounts, and remind customers of their abandoned carts.

GoDaddy offers a range of built-in marketing tools on every plan. These include a professional email with which you can run email marketing campaigns, SEO tools, and social media integrations.

GoDaddy SEO Wizard makes it easy for anyone, especially those with no website-building experience, to ensure that their site gets seen by search engines. It gives step-by-step guidance on improving your site content, keyword usage, and other SEO best practices so you can build the best business website possible.

These tools enable you to grow your online presence and engage your target audience, making it one of the best website builders for SEO today.

GoDaddy Airo (Artificial Intelligence Recommendations and Optimization) is a relatively new offering that is included with new domain purchases through the brand. It is an AI-powered tool that provides a comprehensive website building and management approach.

Simply give the AI a few details about your business, and it will customize a ready-to-launch website for you, stacked with logo options, social posts, ads, payment capabilities, and email marketing campaign templates.

For U.S. residents, GoDaddy Airo registers a free Limited Liability Company for your business. However, some local filing fees may be incurred.

GoDaddy offers one of the largest domain registries in the world. With the AI-powered Domain Name Search tool, you can quickly and efficiently find the domain that aligns with your brand identity, purchase it, and register it. This tool also suggests creative and available domain names based on certain user-inputted keywords.

Besides its website-building features, GoDaddy also offers reliable hosting service to keep your site lightning fast, secure, and running. It promises enterprise-grade security, guarantees 99.9% uptime, and operates with an intuitive cPanel.

With GoDaddy’s logo maker, you can design a brand logo from scratch using easy-to-use design tools. It also provides designer logo templates tailored to a vast industry scope. The best part is that you don’t need design skills to work with this tool.

Simply customize a template, download your high-resolution logo, and use it wherever. Remember to copyright your logo to claim ownership.

Where customers prefer a more specialized solution, GoDaddy has a team of expert website designers ready to transform your vision into reality. Schedule a free consultation to express your business goals, design ideas, and brand information.

The professionals at GoDaddy will handle the rest, ensuring you’re involved every step of the way. Additionally, if you need updates or changes down the line, GoDaddy provides ongoing maintenance plans to keep your site current and functional.

GoDaddy Studio allows users to create professional and captivating branded content using a wide array of customizable templates, fonts, and media. It’s a great feature for those who want their sites to stand out and draw attention.

GoDaddy is a very customer-centered company, offering multiple channels for customer support, including email, live chat, phone support, a well-furnished help center, and helpful FAQs. Its most effective channel is undoubtedly phone support, which provides one-on-one guidance with a human expert called a guide. User feedback verifies that these guides are passionate about helping you resolve any issues and are available 24/7.

GoDaddy Vs. Other Website Builders

Comparing GoDaddy with other website builders is crucial in determining whether it’s the right choice for your specific needs. By analyzing key features, you might find other platforms that better align with your site-building requirements.

To aid in this decision-making process, here is a side-by-side comparison of GoDaddy with some of the best site builders on the market.

Website Providers Starting Price (annually) Top 3 Features Free Domain Storage & Bandwidth
GoDaddy $0/month AI-powered GoDaddy Insight for website analytics, Built-in e-commerce and marketing features on all plans, Domain tools and services supported by AI domain search ● Unlimited storage
● Unlimited bandwidth
Wix $0/month Built-in SEO features, Advanced design features such as Wix ADI (Artificial Design Intelligence), Wix Website Editor with intuitive drag-and-drop functionality ● Up to unlimited storage
● Unlimited bandwidth in business plans only
Squarespace $16/month Wide range of designer templates, Squarespace Blueprint AI, Integrated e-commerce and digital marketing features ● Unlimited storage
● Unlimited bandwidth
Weebly $0/month Integrated ecommerce features, Built-in SEO and marketing features, Easy-to-use drag-and-drop editor ● Unlimited storage in more expensive plans
● Unlimited bandwidth
Shopify $29/month Advanced e-commerce and marketing functionalities, Shopify App Store for useful integrations, AI-powered tools supporting e-commerce ● Unlimited storage
● Unlimited bandwidth
Webflow $0/month Creative control for customizing interactive design, Automatic code generation, Content Management System (CMS) ● Unlimited storage
● Up to 400 GB of bandwidth

GoDaddy Customer Reviews

To understand GoDaddy’s pros and cons in the real world and make a balanced and informed GoDaddy website builder review, we analyzed customer feedback from the most trusted sites. GoDaddy has a high rating of 4.7 out of 5 from 102,546 users on Trustpilot. Keep in mind that these reviews are not only for the GoDaddy website builder, but will also be reflective of its hosting and other services.

Terrific customer support has played a key role in GoDaddy’s long-term loyalty to the website builder. Across countless reviews, customers consistently praise the exceptional service they receive from the company. They highlight the support team’s patience, prompt response times, and expert knowledge. If anything is evident from customer reviews, it’s that GoDaddy is highly dedicated to customer satisfaction.

Customers love that they can converse with real-life humans and that their issues are generally resolved in just a single call of 5 to 20 minutes. Whether dealing with hacking and technical quirks or onboarding and refunds, most customers assert that GoDaddy’s specialist customer support provides quick and effective results.

However, some noted that the live chat option was less effective than the phone support, which makes sense. In contrast, others found the call wait time unnecessarily long and the repetitive hold music annoying.

In addition, persistent upselling, even during support calls, has been frustrating for some customers. Customers have reported that representatives often prioritize selling add-ons over resolving issues. Finally, some advanced users find GoDaddy’s website-building tools too restrictive, forcing them to seek alternative solutions.

Read all customer reviews on Trustpilot

How to Use GoDaddy - A Step-by-Step Guide

GoDaddy is renowned for its intuitive interface, allowing users to build a fully functional, personalized website in five simple steps. Here's a quick guide on getting started with GoDaddy:

  1. Create an Account

    To begin, visit Godaddy.com and create an account. You can do this through Facebook, Google, or email, whichever works best for you.

    <strong>Create an Account</strong>
  2. Choose or Generate a Website Design

    Now, you can get started with building your site. You’ll be led back to the GoDaddy landing page. Locate the GoDaddy website builder and select “Start for free” to generate a website design with AI.

    Immediately, you’ll be prompted to answer a series of questions about your project, including your goals, mode of selling, revenue range, website type, and contact details. After answering the questions, the site will lead you to your dashboard, where you will find a complete AI-generated website waiting for you.

    However, if you prefer a more traditional approach, you can browse the various available templates and select one you’re satisfied with.

    <strong>Choose or Generate a Website Design</strong>
  3. Customize Your Website

    Next, select “Edit website” to customize your website using GoDaddy’s user-friendly drag-and-drop editor. Here, you can get creative. Add your brand’s content and include sections, business information, and products where relevant.

    You can also play with various themes to customize the site’s colors, font, and layout.

    <strong>Customize Your Website</strong>
  4. Complete Site Optimization Steps

    While customizing, GoDaddy will provide a checklist of steps to take to optimize your site. These steps are categorized into four sections including:

    • Get Started – This includes updating your contact information, reviewing and editing your site’s content, and adding your brand’s logo (or creating one with GoDaddy’s logo maker).
    • Improve Your Site – This includes connecting a custom domain, enabling bookings, linking social media, and utilizing search engine optimization for site visibility.
    • Grow Your Audience – This includes hiring a marketing expert, adding products to your online store, and setting up a GoDaddy email marketing campaign.
    • Explore New Tools – This includes selecting a premium plan, exploring POS hardware, and downloading apps like the GoDaddy Mobile and Studio apps.

    You need to complete all the tasks in a section to unlock the next one, but you’re free to skip any tasks that aren’t necessary for your needs.

    <strong>Complete Site Optimization Steps</strong>
  5. Preview and Launch Your Website

    After fully customizing and optimizing your website, use the preview function to check how it looks on mobile devices. Double-check everything to ensure it appears as you intend it to.

    It’s time to go live. Publish your website to launch your online presence and reach your target audience.

    <strong>Preview and Launch Your Website</strong>

Methodology

How We Review And Test Website Builders

To provide our readers with accurate and well-informed recommendations, we test the most popular website builders on the market to find the best options for you. Our methodology consists of the following criteria:

  • Template Variety and Quality: We evaluate the range and quality of pre-designed templates offered by each website builder, considering factors like aesthetics and customization options.
  • Mobile Responsiveness: We test the responsiveness of websites created with each builder to ensure they display correctly and function smoothly on various devices, including smartphones, tablets, and desktops.
  • Customization Options: We examine the level of customization available within each website builder: layouts, fonts, colors, custom CSS or HTML code.
  • Ease of Use: We assess the user interface and overall usability of each website builder to determine how intuitive and beginner-friendly the website builder is.
  • Speed and Performance: We measure the load speed and performance of websites built with each website builder, considering factors such as page load times, image optimization, and caching options.
  • SEO Features: We analyze the built-in SEO tools and features offered by each website builder, including meta tags, sitemaps, URL structures, and integration with analytics platforms.
  • E-commerce Functionality: We evaluate the e-commerce capabilities of each website builder, assessing product listings, inventory management, payment gateways, and order processing.
  • Integrations: We look at the integration capabilities of each website builder, including compatibility with third-party tools such as email marketing software, CRM systems, and social media networks.
  • Customer Support: We test the responsiveness and availability of customer support offered by each website builder, such as available support channels, response times, and user satisfaction ratings.
  • Scalability and Flexibility: We evaluate the scalability and flexibility of each website builder, considering factors such as the ability to add new pages, features, and functionality as the website grows and evolves.
  • Security Features: We review the security features of each website builder, including SSL encryption, malware scanning, and regular security updates.
  • Analytics and Reporting: We examine the analytics and reporting capabilities of each website builder, including the availability of built-in analytics tools, integration with external analytics platforms.

How To Choose The Best Website Builder

Keep in mind that the best website builder for one business may not necessarily be the best for yours, as different businesses have unique needs.

In any case, here are some key factors to evaluate:

Evaluate Your Specific NeedsBudget & Value for MoneyEase of UseKey FeaturesDesign Options & CustomizabilityCustomer Support

What do you hope to achieve with your website? Do you need an online store, a simple portfolio, a blog, or a hobby site? Some website builders have a particular purpose as a focus when compared to others.

Understanding your website’s goals will help you select a builder that offers features that comfortably provide a bespoke solution.

Do you have budgetary constraints? Determine your financial limits and select a good builder that doesn’t exceed them. Many free and affordable website builders are feature-rich and will serve you satisfactorily if you don’t have lofty demands.

Website builders with intuitive interfaces can significantly reduce the time and effort required to get started, eliminating the need for a complex onboarding process.

The entire purpose of website builders is to simplify the site creation process for people without technical or design skills. Therefore, those featuring user-friendly drag-and-drop editors are highly recommended.

At this point, you should have fully ascertained your website’s needs. But how can you determine if a website builder can meet these requirements?

Search for website builders that provide essential features that support your goals. For instance, all of GoDaddy’s plans include payment acceptance capabilities, a crucial feature for online stores.

Website templates and AI-generated sites have their limitations when it comes to conveying your unique brand identity. As such, a good website builder should offer a wide array of design and customization options across its plans.

As a fundamental requirement, any website builder you select should support responsive design for optimal mobile viewing and allow you to customize essential design elements.

A website builder with competent and accessible customer support can significantly impact your user experience. In fact, the quality of customer care is often a key reason why many users remain loyal to certain platforms.

Opt for a website builder that offers a variety of support channels, such as email, live chat, and phone support. Access to forums and help centers is also crucial for providing immediate solutions to common issues.

FAQs

Is the website builder on GoDaddy good?

Is the GoDaddy website builder really free?

Is GoDaddy hosting good?

How much does it cost to hire a GoDaddy website builder?

Is GoDaddy a good website builder for a small business?

Ademilade Shodipe-Dosunmu
Technology Expert
Ademilade Shodipe-Dosunmu
Technology Expert

Ademilade has spent the last five years creating optimized content for SaaS, tech, and entertainment publications like MakeUseOf and GameRant. With a solid background in Mechanical Engineering, he strives to devise content that informs and helps people leverage the technology around them. Furthermore, as a Top Writing Voice on LinkedIn, he regularly contributes to the growing body of content knowledge, helping budding writers find their footing.