The 10 Most Popular Website Builders in 2026, Ranked by Number of Websites

Which are the most popular website builders, really? Not by how loudly they advertise, but by how many live websites actually run on them. Here are the 10 most popular website builders in 2026, ranked by number of websites, plus the runners-up that are catching up fast — and how the list changes for the world’s biggest websites.

The 10 most popular website builders in 2026

Ranked by the number of live websites using each platform, as counted by BuiltWith across the entire internet in October 2026.

How these numbers are measured

The counts come from BuiltWith, which scans the web and detects the technology behind each live website. I kept only tools you build websites with, and left out entries such as hosting control panels (cPanel, Plesk), Google Search Appliance and Atlassian Cloud. As a cross-check, W3Techs puts the same platforms in a very similar order, with WordPress on 39.6% of all websites.

Where’s Shopify? BuiltWith files it under e-commerce rather than website builders, so it isn’t in this list. By W3Techs’ share of websites, it would rank second, at 5.3%. And no tool counts every website perfectly, so treat these numbers as solid estimates rather than exact totals.

What each website builder is best for

1. WordPress

Free, open-source software that you install on your own hosting. It powers everything from small business sites to large publishers, with thousands of themes and plugins. Best for: businesses that want full control, room to grow and strong SEO. It needs updates and maintenance, which I cover in ongoing website costs.

2. Wix

A hosted drag-and-drop builder with hosting included. Quick to start, with lots of templates and apps. Best for: small businesses and individuals building a simple site themselves.

3. Squarespace

A hosted builder known for polished, design-led templates. Best for: portfolios, creatives and small businesses that want a good-looking site with little setup.

4. GoDaddy Website Builder

A simple builder offered alongside GoDaddy’s domains and hosting. Best for: getting a very basic site online quickly.

5. GoDaddy Airo

GoDaddy’s AI-powered builder, which drafts a website from a short description of your business. Its numbers show how quickly AI builders are growing. Best for: getting a first version online fast, on GoDaddy hosting.

6. Duda

A website builder sold mainly through agencies and web service providers, often under their own brand. Best for: agencies building many similar sites for clients.

7. Hostinger Website Builder

A drag-and-drop builder with AI features, bundled with Hostinger’s hosting plans. Best for: budget-friendly small sites.

8. Joomla

An open-source CMS, like WordPress, that has been around for a long time and is still widely used. Best for: existing sites and organisations already invested in it.

9. Webflow

A hosted visual builder aimed at designers, with fine control over layout and animation. Best for: design-heavy marketing sites built by professionals.

10. Tilda

A block-based builder where you assemble pages from ready-made sections. It’s especially popular in Eastern Europe. Best for: landing pages and simple, visual sites.

The runners-up: website builders 11 to 20

Below the top 10, the numbers get smaller, but this is where the newest tools show up — and some of them are climbing quickly.

* BuiltWith lists Framer twice: Framer App (329,175) and Framer Sites (302,238). The table uses the larger number. If the two don’t overlap, Framer’s real total is closer to 631,000 — enough for the top 10. Beaver Builder (233,485) is left out because it runs on WordPress, so its sites are already counted there.

Two names stand out. Lovable, an AI builder that only launched in late 2024, already runs more websites than Jimdo, which has been around since 2007. And Framer, which went from a prototyping tool to a website builder only a few years ago, is on the edge of the top 10. Canva Websites is another one to watch: it turns the designs people already make in Canva into simple sites.

Most used vs. most used by big websites

The ranking changes a lot when you look only at the world’s most-visited websites. Here’s how the same platforms compare among BuiltWith’s top 1 million websites and across all websites:

Webflow runs about three times as many high-traffic websites as Wix or Squarespace, even though Wix runs more than ten times as many websites overall. Drupal, outside the overall top 10, is the second most common choice among big sites. Wix and Squarespace are built to get small sites online easily; larger organisations tend to choose platforms that give them more control. WordPress leads in both lists.

AI website builders are growing fast

AI website builders are no longer a side note. GoDaddy Airo already runs about 6.6 million websites, enough for fifth place overall, and Lovable has reached the runners-up list in roughly two years. Framer, a visual builder with growing AI features, is close behind the top 10.

AI makes building pages faster, but it doesn’t decide what your website should say or who it’s for. I wrote more about this in Is building websites by hand dead?

Which website builder should you choose?

Popularity tells you a platform is safe and well supported, but the right choice depends on what your website needs to do:

I build client websites on WordPress, because it gives businesses full ownership of their site and the most room to grow. The platform matters less than the planning behind it, though — a well-planned site on any of these will beat a rushed one on the “best” platform.

Frequently asked questions

Not sure which platform fits your business?

Tell me what your website needs to do, and I’ll recommend the platform that fits — even if it’s not the one I usually build with.

Sources: BuiltWith, CMS usage on the entire internet and in the top 1 million websites, October 2026; W3Techs, Usage statistics of content management systems, 20 October 2026. The numbers change slightly every day.