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Until recently the website decision was binary: build it yourself with a template, or pay someone. There are now three credible routes, and the differences that matter are not the ones vendors emphasise. What separates them is control, how fast you get live, and what your position looks like in three years when you want to change something significant.
What matters here
- Speed to live — AI generation is fastest, WordPress slowest, builders in between.
- Ownership and portability — WordPress moves between hosts; builder sites are rebuilt.
- Who maintains it — WordPress needs updates; builders handle that for you.
- Where each hits its ceiling — and whether your business will reach it.
The main options
The AI website builder generates a structured first draft from a description, which you then edit — the fastest route out of the blank page, provided you rewrite the generic copy. The drag-and-drop builder gives you template-based control with hosting included and nothing to maintain, and the template library is where that route starts. Managed WordPress hosting is the ownership route: portable between hosts, extendable through an enormous plugin ecosystem, and serviceable by any developer — at the cost of monthly maintenance. If the site will sell, that decision interacts with the store choice between the built-in ecommerce product and WooCommerce.
How to choose
Choose by what year three looks like. If the site will stay a five-page presence, a builder is genuinely the right answer and the maintenance you avoid is worth more than the flexibility you forgo. If you expect to publish regularly, add functionality or hand the site to a developer eventually, start on WordPress — migrating later is a rebuild, and rebuilds are where budgets and enthusiasm die. And whichever route you take, register the domain in your own name first, because that is the one decision all three share.