Webflow or Bubble, which website builder should you pick in 2023?
Read this in-depth Webflow vs Bubble comparison to make a smart choice.
With passing days, the pool of website builders is getting wider and wider, making it difficult to distinguish the best from the bad ones. Website builders often provide both free and paid packages.
But the fact that website builders play a vital role in your website success, its SEO, performance, speed, growth, and much more – the best is to go with a paid version. Because this way you will unlock a complete suite of its features that opens up the road to website success.
So how do we know that the website builder is best for us? For that, you need to deeply examine the website builder across multiple essential categories before reaching a conclusion.
That is why today we brought you a comparison between Webflow and Bubble, taking a deep dive into their features, ease of use and customizability, pricing, customer support, theme libraries, and much more. So stick around to make the right decision for your website.
In a hurry? Check out the summary of Webflow vs Bubble comparison below.
Breakdown Of Comparison
Webflow is a feature-rich website builder and a CMS that aims to empower creative professionals, freelancers, agencies, and web designers with its strong designing features. It makes it possible to design, build, and launch a fully functionally responsive website thanks to its robust features, high-end editors, and customizability options that requires no coding.
Bubble is a visual programmer that provides both front and back-end functionality. This enables you to create, design, and host complex websites and apps with high-end features and customization without the need for coding. However, Bubble is packed with features that make it difficult for newbies.
1. Features
Winner: Bubble. These website builders offer high-tech features but overall Bubble has an upper edge over Webflow due to its greater functionality.
2. Ease Of Use and Customizability
Winner: Webflow. Each of them provides tons of customizability options but Bubble provides relatively greater creative freedom however it is much more complex and difficult to use than Webflow.
3. Templates Library
Winner: Webflow. Webflow wins the race due to its high-end template library with greater flexibility and mobile responsiveness.
4. Pricing
Winner: Webflow. Webflow provides diverse pricing plans to choose from but that makes it complex for users, however, Bubble’s pricing plans are relatively expensive.
5. Integrations
Winner: Webflow. Webflow has an upper leg here due to its large Integrations and resources library which unlocks all kinds of functionality for your website.
6. Customer Support
Winner: Webflow. Both Website builders come up with poor direct support options but Webflow has more and better self-help resources.
Webflow Vs Bubble: Short Verdict
Webflow is the absolute winner of Webflow vs Bubble comparison as it takes the lead over its competitor in most of the categories. Webflow provides a better and more responsive template library, flexible pricing plans, and extensive self-help resources.
Whereas Bubble has more reliable features and provides complete creative freedom. However, it lags behind Webflow in many other categories including pricing and ease of use.�?
1) Webflow vs Bubble: Features
The feature set is the brain of the website builder, if it’s not good, your website won’t be able to take the road to success for much longer. That’s why let’s extensively compare the features of Webflow and Bubble.
Webflow has made its name in the market by presenting itself as a feature-rich CMS and a website builder. The feature set it has to offer promises a fabulous website without the need for coding. All the sites at Webflow are hosted via Tier1 CDN, Fastly, and Amazon Cloudfront for fast performance.
It also automatically backs up your site which can then be restored anytime with just a click. Moreover, it does instant updates, gets you a custom domain, and also allows you a staging site on webflow.io.
Like Bubble, Webflow also lets you add collaborators to your project and set their access parameters. Furthermore, it permits you to paginate the collection lists, create an RSS 2.0 feed and CMS items via Zapier apps, define and fully customize the content and its structure, add custom HTML into the header and footer, filter dynamic content, use CMS API, and export CMS content as a CSV.
Furthermore, Webflow offers Lightbox to create eye-catching galleries, mobile responsive and customizable navigation bar, HTML/CSS sliders and carousels, and a drop-down menu. You also get HTML embed components, infinitely customizable forms, and a simple social sharing feature to connect with people. Adding auto-playing background videos is also easy.
Furthermore, At Webflow billing can be done directly. It also lets you set password protection, organize multiple folders, white-label, define page OG settings, customize page meta titles and descriptions, and create custom favicons and webclip.
Webflow is proud of its design features that let you build in a visual canvas with a grid, enabling you to add CSS filters, use CSS3’s flexible boxes and reusable symbols to edit across the site simultaneously. Additionally, you get access to 2000+ web font families and Global swatches.
Let’s take a look at Bubble’s feature set.
Bubble grants both front and back-end functionality to scale your website. To start with the features, you should know that it uses Cloudflare CDN for fast service, provides automatic backups, real-time logging to track users’ behaviour on your platform, and allows adding more server resources to scale up with ease. Moreover, data storage capacity, traffic volume, and the number of users are not much limited.
For security purposes, you get a free SSL certificate and multi-factor authentication on higher plans. You also get to view the analytics through its built-in analytics in the dashboard. In addition to that, you can set privacy rules, export data using CSV files, manage databases with fully customizable drag-and-drop Workflow tools, and extend the functionality by connecting javascript plugins and no-code API connectors.
Bubble grants an opportunity to publish your own API in a single click, set your own page slugs, set SEO parameters, and send customizable emails. Some users need to collaborate with their colleagues to share the workload, that’s why Bubble allows you to add up to 40 collaborators. You can empower them to make edits, track the changes live, and provide feedback.
Unlike at Webflow, you don’t need to build a user management system here, instead, it comes with a pre-made sign-up/login workflow for users. Translating the website is also not a problem as Bubble supports over 80 international languages.
Not to forget, its impressive drag-and-drop editor gives you great creative freedom without coding. You can also white-label your website or app, and set app-wide styles for a coherent design.
In brief, it is clear that both of these website builders provide tons of robust features but overall Bubble has a better feature-set with greater database functionality and much more.
Winner: Bubble
2) Webflow vs Bubble: Ease of Use and Customizability
Website builders are there to make the website building process easier while granting you access to tons of customizability options. So let’s see if Webflow and Bubble are really easy to use and provide enough creative freedom.
Webflow is loaded with tons of features and customizability options, that’s the reason it does not have an intuitive dashboard. There is too much to learn which might get newbies perplexed. But if you give it some time, it will give you exceptional results. Webflow comes with a designer, an editor, and a dashboard.
The designer panel is an amazing drag-and-drop editor that follows a box model. It allows you to add elements and create reusable symbols, access CMS collections and dynamic content, and manage pages. The elements and the content can be customized right on the page whereby also enabling you to form responsive designs and customize them accordingly. Moreover, to make it easier, it gets you direct access to video tutorials, help, and keyboard shortcuts.
The highlight of its customizability is its extreme granular control over the elements. It gives you the opportunity to manipulate CSS values visually, without typing in the code, such as for 3D transforms, hence giving you control over HTML5, CSS3, and Javascript in a completely visual canvas. Moreover, you can design directly with CMS data to build a site with real content. Such a design approach leads to empowering web developers and designers.
On the other hand, the editor lets you edit any content right on the page, like text and changing images, instead of working backend. Furthermore, it allows you to add collaborators, control custom branding, and configure settings like straightforward SEO controls. So collaborators can also edit the content, access any collection, track the changes, and create new items like a blog.
To get further control over CSS3 and HTML5, you are also permitted to add custom code to the page and make tweaks to the code as well.
This gives rise to a question, Is Bubble better than Webflow in this aspect?
Bubble has multiple editing tools like a drag-and-drop editor and a visual workflow editor. With its drag and drop editor, you can set any elements like images, icons, maps, videos, on the canvas with full freedom and pixel-perfect placement.
It also enables you to fully customize the elements’ appearance and behaviour via loads of designing options in its Property Editor. The Property Editor has three sections, Appearance for customization, Conditionals for changing properties based on states, and Transitions to animate the style of an element. Each property editor is different for different elements unlocking unique functionality. It also allows you to add dynamic data and expressions to the elements that can even come from an external API.
Once you sign up you will get to its interface that has multiple sections like Design, Workflow, Style, and Data built for different functions. Starting with Bubble.io may be harder for users with no experience of using no-code platforms.
It provides tons of features for customizations and designing both the front and the back ends, but with a sea of functionality options, there comes a greater learning curve. That is the reason, initially, you will need assistance through video tutorials to understand the interface and the way to use them. It would not wring to say, that it is much more complex to use that Webflow.
In addition to that, when you hover over an element on the interface, it will display a reference button that will take you to an appropriate reference section to guide you. The Styles Tab in its interface manages collections of visual properties shared across elements. This means that you can set a style and easily apply it to all elements simultaneously.
To cut it short, Webflow takes the lead due to being comparatively much easier to use and less complex given that Bubble provides greater creative freedom and customizability options.
Winner: Webflow
3) Webflow vs Bubble: Templates
Templates are pre-made themes that lay down the foundation of your site to make the web designing process smooth and easy. Let’s see who come up with a better template library and its editing options.
Webflow encompasses a rich library of more than 500 HTML5 responsive website templates. But the sad part is that most of them are paid, with only 40 templates at no cost. The templates are perfectly divided into several categories including Blog, Business, design, Photography, and many more. Furthermore, it allows us to set a different template for an individual web page as well like homepage, review, contact, etc.
Webflow also lets you choose from a blank canvas so that you can build your site from scratch rather than having an already-laid foundation beforehand in the form of a template. Impressively, this template can adjust to any screen size so you don’t need to worry about how your website will look on a mobile screen. You can even preview before selecting one to make sure it’s the right one.
Customization of templates with Webflow is made simple as you get a Designer or an Editor to go with. These will help you edit the pre-filled content on the template with ease. If you want your team members to jump on to assist you, then that’s also possible through Zapier integration.
So do you think Bubble will perform better in this category?
Bubble has a promising template library containing dozens of impressive and professionally designed templates. Some come up for free while some are paid; providing fewer features with a free one. These templates can be added to your prototype, MVP, app, or website that you want to develop. You can also get templates for individual pages or a component like a landing page, dashboard, or contact form.
You can filter the templates by choosing the categories from the drop-down list to narrow down your choice. These no-code bubble templates are fully customizable which can be edited through the drag-and-drop editor accompanied by dozens of customization features. Before selecting a template, you can preview all the details of the template.
Moreover, some of the paid templates also grant a 14-day money-back guarantee as well. However, the major downside here is the fact that these have comparatively poor mobile responsiveness.
Conclusively, Webflow turns out to be better than Bubble in that category as it provides a greater template library with better options and flexibility.
Winner: Webflow.
4) Webflow vs Bubble: Pricing
Now that we have seen the features that both website builders provide us, it’s time to know how much we have to pay them in return.
Webflow makes sure that its users are satisfied by the system’s functionality using their forever free plan that offers full design control but like all free plans, it comes up with limited features.
With its free plan, you do not get white-labelling, site password protection, and project transfer features. Moreover, you will be limited to only 2 projects which will be published on webflow.io, along with Webflow promotion.
Webflow’s pricing structure is quite complicated. First, these are divided into two major categories; Site plans and Account plans. Each of these is then further divided into two more categories.
Site plans are best for those who want to create an individual site like a business site, blog, or eCommerce store. It has two categories which are Website plans (starting at $15/month) and eCommerce plans (starting at $42/month).
Details of Website plans are as follows:
| Webflow Website Plans | Regular Price | Best-for | Discounted Price |
| Basic Plan | $15/month | Simple Website Plans | Check Price |
| CMS Plan | $20/month | Blog Websites | Check Price |
| Business | $45/month | High Traffic Sites | Check Price |
| Enterprise Plans | Varies | Large Enterprises | Check Price |
The eCommerce plans are described below:
| Webflow Ecommerce Plans | Regular Price | Best-for | Discounts |
| Standard | $42/month | New Business | Check Price |
| Plus | $84/month | High Volume Business | Check Price |
| Advanced | $235/month | Scalable Growth | Check Price |
Account plans unlock new features like the ability to add your own logo on the client-facing editor, a shared dashboard, and multiple collaboration tools. It is best for agencies who work for their clients or web professionals. It has further two divisions; Individual plans (starting for free) and Team plans (starting at $42/monthly).
The individual plans pricing structure is stated below;
| Webflow Account Plans (Individuals) | Pricing | Best-for | Discounts |
| Starter Plan | Free | Testing Out The Service | Check Price |
| Lite Plan | $24/month | Adding Multiple Projects | Check Price |
| Pro Plan | $42/month | Active Freelancers | Check Price |
The pricing structure of Team plans is mentioned below;
| Webflow Account Plans (Teams) | Pricing | Best-for | Discounts |
| Teams Plans | $42/month | Collaborative Projects | Check Price |
| Enterprise Plans | Varies | Large Companies | Check Price |
Like Bubble, here also, you can either choose to pay monthly or yearly which will get you a 15% discount. Keep in mind, that upon cancellation, you will not get a refund and the plan will be degraded to the free plan instead of deletion.
Now let’s see how Bubble fares against Weblow’s pricing structure.
Bubble, like Webflow, also provides a free plan so that you can explore and learn the platform but yes, its offers limited features. You will not get access to the live version, APIs, scheduled workflows, and data backup. The bubble will advertise itself on your site or app, while you get no custom domain name, 500MB of file storage, and basic server capacity.
Other than that, Bubble provides 3 premium plans starting at $29 a month. With these premium packages, you unlock greater functionality like a custom domain and white-labeling.
Bubble premium packages are as follows;
<Bubble premium package table>
Additionally, you get access to the Agency plan if you build software for your clients. This package will cost you $78 a month per designer. Moreover, if you are a student or an NGO, you will be awarded a discount on all plans. Payment can be done on a monthly basis or all at once for an entire year, in which case you get a discount.
When talking about pricing, Webflow provides a lot of options to choose from that give flexibility but make it complex for users as well. However, the pricing of Bubble is neatly provided but is relatively expensive than that at Webflow.
Winner: Webflow.
5) Webflow vs Bubble: Integrations
Now it’s time to see how Webflow and Bubble stack up against each other in terms of integrations and plugins.
Webflow has a huge Library for Integrations and resources where you can find tons of widgets, plugins, apps, and integrations and embed them to your site. These resources are divided into multiple categories for easy navigation.
It lets you view analytics and test different designs through tools like Google Analytics, Optimizely, Hotjar, etc. Other than that, Marketing and content management apps include Proof, Livechat, Mailchimp, ActiveCampaign, and much more. For payment gateways, you have PayPal Stripe and Amazon Payments.
You get plenty of integrations for eCommerce, Faceted Navigation, Job board, Forms, CRM, Anti-spam, maps, migrations tools, Social integrations like Facebook and Instagram, and for many other essential functions. Furthermore, you get access to tons of images, videos, and other assets for the site.
These integrations enable you to buy domains from inside Webflow through Wix, Dreamhost, and other renowned domain registrars. Not to forget important integrations like Zapier, Shopify, Off Script, etc. Creating an impressive image gallery is also made easier through Lightbox Gallery, After effect, and Lottie integrations.
Let’s what Bubble brings to the table in comparison.
Bubble encompasses a bunch of integrations and plugins to connect you with other services to increase the functionality of the system. These integrations are not too much neither they are arranged in categorized. You get Payment and Stripe for payment processing. For social services, you get Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, and others. Furthermore, some major integrations include Box, Yelp, WordPress, Figma, Heap Analytics, Trello, Mailchimp, Zoom, Amazon, Github, Dropbox etc.
Bubble also lets you integrate some Google apps, like Google Drive, Gmail, Google translates, and Google maps. Most importantly, Zapier can also be integrated which in turn provides myriad of integrations like Shopify, ActiveCampaign, etc.
Moreover, It also provides a plugin store where you may find a useful addition to Bubble’s features. However, it is not the perfect store after all. The store has a limited review system, developer communication, no stats on bug reports, and not a vast collection of plugins. But if you do not find a plugin for the feature you want, you can either build one with its Plugin Editor or connect a third-party app having a compatible API.
In the store, you can find Bubble-built Plugins like Airtable. Audio Recorder, Disqus, Dexi, etc, or the ones created by Bubble users. This also comes with a downside as a user might have left behind the plugin after developing so you won’t find support.
Briefly, Webflow wins the Webflow vs Bubble integration comparison due to its large integration and resources library with easy navigation as opposed to only a few high-end plugins and apps at Bubble.
Winner: Webflow
6) Webflow vs Bubble: Customer Support
Website builders need to provide top-notch customer support to help you out of any trouble you face. That’s why let’s see who wins the Webflow vs Bubble customer support round.
Webflow provides loads of tutorials, full-fledged courses, and lessons that deal with a variety of topics helping you climb the learning curve. Without a doubt, you will be surprised by the diversity of the courses so that you easily learn everything you need to know for free.
Other self-help resources include a Webflow support blog, community forum, and Ebooks, all of which help you discover more information about the niche. When it comes to direct technical support you have Email support which is active Monday to Friday from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m PT. Your emails are usually responded to within 24-48 hours. Additionally, you can hire an expert to assist in designing and web development process or send support tickets.
Do you think Bubble provides better support? Let’s take a look.
Bubble has a Help Centre that contains numerous support articles but these articles do not cover a wide range of issues that users may bump into, nor do they provide detailed guides with pictures or video tutorials. Other than this help Centre, it provides access to a blog, a community forum where you can find answers to the FAQs, and Podcast to learn more about web development processes.
But if you need direct technical support where your questions are answered directly by a real live agent, so we are afraid you might be disappointed. That is because Bubble only provides email support where your issues would be resolved via their support team. However, it does not offer live chat or phone support.
In short, Both of the website builders have poor direct support options, however, Webflow has an upper edge over Bubble due to a wide variety of detailed self-help resources like tons of full-fledged courses and lessons.
Winner: Webflow.
Final Thoughts
Both Webflow and Bubble are no-code website development platforms and provide a free plan. But still, many factors set them apart. Webflow has responsive and comparatively easy-to-use editors, better self-help resources, extensive integrations and resources store, a greater high-end and responsive template library along flexible and diverse pricing plans for its users.
Bubble on the other hand is mainly focused on app development rather than on website development. But still, it has an impressive feature-set which is even better than Webflow. It offers greater creative freedom and designing options, more database functionality, and a better plugin store. However, it is relatively expensive and complex to use. In conclusion, Webflow wins over Bubble as it is better in the majority of the categories we evaluated.
