Wix vs Squarespace for artists in 2026

Building a portfolio in Wix

Wix gives you a free place to start, but the free plan comes with Wix ads and a wixsite.com address. You can't connect a custom domain, and storage and bandwidth are both limited to 500 MB.

For a painter or illustrator putting work online, that's a place to try the builder before paying. For a photographer, the storage limit deserves a look before uploading a collection.

The Wix Editor has 800+ templates, according to Wix's help center, but you can't switch to a different template after creating your site, so spend some time with your choice before building out the pages. That's a commitment.

Check which editor a tutorial covers, too. Wix Harmony launched in January 2026, while Wix ADI sites have been unsupported since November 10, 2024.

Wix also gives you editable page titles, meta descriptions and URL slugs. Its SEO tools include an automatic sitemap, custom structured data and a redirect manager with CSV import of up to 500 redirects.

Selling your work with Wix

Planning to take payments on the site? Core is the first Wix plan that supports that. On yearly US billing as of November 2026, Light is $17 a month, Core is $29 a month, Business is $39 a month and Business Elite is $159 a month.

Storage changes with the plan: Light has 2 GB, Core has 50 GB, Business has 100 GB and Business Elite has unlimited storage. Don't choose Light expecting to add online payments later without changing plans.

The Wix Art Store can't be added to sites anymore; that stopped in October 2022. And if an older artist's tutorial tells you to install it, that route is closed.

New Wix Premium plans have a 14-day money-back guarantee on monthly and yearly billing, but domains aren't refundable. Most yearly Premium plans include a voucher for a new domain bought through Wix, free for 1 year.

There's also an exit limit worth knowing before you build: Wix doesn't offer code export, and you can't export a Wix site to host it elsewhere.

Selling your work with Squarespace

Squarespace lets you sell on Basic rather than requiring a move to Core. Basic costs $19 a month billed yearly or $25 month to month, with a 2% store transaction fee.

That isn't the only fee. US card processing on Basic and Core is 2.9% + $0.30, and digital products have their own fee schedule: 7% on Basic, 5% on Core, 1% on Plus and 0% on Advanced.

Selling physical paintings or prints? Look at the store transaction fee and card processing. Selling digital work? Look at the digital-product fees as well.

Core, Plus and Advanced have a 0% store transaction fee. Card processing is 2.7% on Plus and 2.5% on Advanced. Keep those charges separate when comparing plans; a 0% store fee doesn't remove card processing.

You can try Squarespace for 14 days without a credit card, though there's no free plan. Yearly plans include a free custom domain for the first year. Students can get 50% off their first yearly plan through Student Beans (it can't be combined with other codes).

For a portfolio, pay attention to export rather than assuming everything can move later. Squarespace exports a WordPress-format XML file, but portfolio pages, product pages and store pages aren't included. Neither are album and index pages, custom CSS or style settings, and you can't import that export into another Squarespace site.

Using Heya for a portfolio

Here at Heya, our builder is another option if you want a portfolio that links out to a separate checkout or store. It doesn't have a built-in store, checkout or form builder.

Heya Free costs $0, with no credit card and no time limit. You get 3 sites with up to 5 pages each, all 68 templates, a yourname.heya.bio address with HTTPS and a small Made with Heya badge. You sign in with Google to publish.

Heya Pro Lite is $3 a month and removes the badge, allows up to 20 pages per site and removes nofollow from links. Heya Pro Standard is $6 a month, with 5 sites and 1 custom domain per account with HTTPS. You bring the domain from a registrar; Heya doesn't sell domains.

Heya Pro Plus is $15 a month and includes a downloadable ZIP of your site's HTML files, along with 25 sites and up to 10 custom domains.

Images can be up to 20 MB. For inquiries, link to a Google Form or Tally form; for bookings, use the Calendly embed.

Related guides: Artists, Wix vs Squarespace, Top 10 portfolio websites and Art portfolio website.

More from Heya: All guides, Templates and Pricing.