Platform guide
Squarespace: Polished Templates With a Narrow Exit
Squarespace is known for clean templates that look finished with little effort. Its plans include a store on every tier, and its export covers only part of a site.
What Squarespace is
Squarespace is a hosted website builder with a strong focus on design. Templates are tightly composed, typography and spacing are handled for you, and the editor works in sections that keep pages tidy even when the person editing has no design training. Hosting, security updates and the domain can all sit under one account.
The tighter structure is the point. Squarespace gives fewer ways to break a layout than a freeform builder, and fewer ways to do something unusual. That suits an owner who wants a good-looking site without fuss; an owner who wants custom features may feel boxed in.
Plans and prices
Squarespace's pricing page offers four plans and a toggle between annual and monthly payment. Each plan shows two monthly figures; the page says "Pay annually to save up to 36%", so the lower figure is the annual rate.
| Plan | Paid annually | Paid monthly | Store transaction fee | Digital content and memberships fee |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Basic | $19 | $25 | 2% | 7% |
| Core | $29 | $39 | 0% | 5% |
| Plus | $49 | $65 | 0% | 1% |
| Advanced | $99 | $139 | 0% | 0% |
Two fee lines are easy to miss. The store transaction fee applies to physical and service products sold through the online store; the page's line "Upgrade your plan for 0% transaction fees" refers to it. The separate fee on digital content and memberships applies to paid content such as courses or member areas, and it only reaches 0% on Advanced. Payment processor fees are charged on top in both cases.
Selling with Squarespace
Every plan includes an online store, so a small shop can start on Basic. The 2% fee on Basic means the arithmetic changes as sales grow: on $10,000 of store sales a year, the fee is $200, which is more than the yearly price difference between Basic and Core when both are paid annually ($120). Run your own numbers in the first-year cost calculator, and see the ecommerce fees guide for how processor fees stack on top.
Leaving Squarespace
Squarespace can export part of a site as an .xml file in WordPress format. Its help article lists what is included and what is not.
Exports: layout pages, one blog page with its posts (and up to 1,000 comments per post), text blocks, image blocks, text from embed and Instagram blocks with minimal structure, and gallery pages.
Does not export: album, cover, index, info, calendar, portfolio and store pages; content in page-specific headers, footers and sidebars; any blog beyond the one you select; dropdowns, audio, product and video blocks; drafts, style settings and custom CSS.
The article also notes that some content, "like linked .pdf files, exports in the .xml file but can't import to a WordPress site."
So a blog-led Squarespace site can move to WordPress with modest cleanup, while a store or portfolio site needs its products and project pages rebuilt. Squarespace has a separate export for Commerce orders, which helps with records but not with recreating the storefront.
Getting the most from a Squarespace site
Because Squarespace limits structure on purpose, a few habits make a large difference to how well a site works:
- Choose the template for its layout, not its photos. Sample images are easy to replace; a page structure that does not suit your content is not.
- Plan your navigation early. Decide the five or six main pages before adding content, and keep the menu short.
- Keep text in text blocks. Words placed inside images cannot be read by search engines or assistive technology, and they do not export.
- Write your own page titles and descriptions in the page settings, rather than leaving defaults.
- Keep product data in a spreadsheet as well as in the store, since store pages do not export.
Two checks specific to Squarespace
If you plan to sell courses, downloads or memberships, look at the digital content fee row in the plan table before choosing a plan: it is 7% on Basic and only reaches 0% on Advanced. And if your site will lean on store or portfolio pages, accept now that those page types do not export, and keep their content in a spreadsheet or folder of your own.
A worked example: selling digital content
Suppose a coach sells $4,000 of online courses a year through a Squarespace member area. Using the annual prices and digital content fees from the plan table (our arithmetic, before payment processing):
| Plan | Plan cost a year | Digital content fee | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| Basic | $228 | 7%: $280 | $508 |
| Core | $348 | 5%: $200 | $548 |
| Plus | $588 | 1%: $40 | $628 |
| Advanced | $1,188 | 0%: $0 | $1,188 |
At this level Basic is the cheapest, because the fee saved on higher plans is smaller than their extra cost. Rerun the sum as sales grow: at $20,000 a year, Basic's fee would be $1,400 and Plus would cost less in total.
Strengths and limits
Strengths. Templates that look finished; an editor that keeps layouts consistent; a store on every plan; hosting and updates handled by Squarespace.
Limits. Less flexibility than freeform builders or open-source software; a 2% store fee on Basic and fees on digital content below Advanced; an export that leaves out several page types; and third-party extensions are fewer than on WordPress or Shopify.
Who Squarespace tends to fit
On the facts above, Squarespace fits portfolios, restaurants, studios, consultants and small shops that want a professional look and will manage the site themselves. It is a weaker fit for large catalogs, sites with complex custom features and anyone who wants a clean exit. Our Squarespace vs Wix comparison sets it against its closest rival.
Sources for this page
- Squarespace: Squarespace Pricing Plans & Features. Official source, read November 4, 2026.
- Squarespace Help Center: Export your site content. Official source, read November 4, 2026.
- Squarespace Help Center: Export Commerce orders. Official source, read November 4, 2026.
Questions
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