For a simple website it’s overkill.
For a serious website there’s not much else that has the extensibility. Woocommerce is nearly unrivaled. There isn’t another ecosystem like it. I would think this community would lean towards the open source leaning products to the shopifys.
If you just want a website for cheap: Bearblog, carrd.co, etc.
if you want all the bells and whistles on a platter: Squarespace, Wix, etc.
if you want to supply all the HTML/CSS yourself: Github Pages or Cloudflare Pages.
(Later, if you want to host the above (except the "bells and whistles" tier) yourself: Hetzner, Digital Ocean, etc.)
If you’re building a static site - meaning, a site which does not have any forms which require backend functions - you should use a static site generator. If you’re not building a static site, I recommend starting with a static site. It’s just a lot less to keep in your head as a beginner.
My recommendation is Astro. I like it because it makes it easy and straightforward to create a static site. And, you will also learn JavaScript along the way, without building out a node backend or even anything on the front end.
But, if you really want to learn, I recommend noting. Yes, nothing. Just HTML files in a folder, a css stylesheet, maybe some JS files, and a web server. For deployment, you don’t need a web server config or a VPS. Just use cloud flare pages, link it up with GitHub, and boom, you have a static site.
Don’t be intimidated. If you do just HTML, you can learn a lot and you get the nitty gritty. You understand how the site actually functions from start to end.
What’s the best way to get the template?
I recommend looking at jamstack.org as they have a long list of options.
Personally, I enjoy Hugo, a Go based static site generator. Though if you're unsure then try a couple out and see which you like best.
Personally, I would prefer a static site generator, simply because it requires zero maintenance to safely keep a static site online.
It might also be a good introduction to git and various deployment methods.
I run a website for a living, and moving to a static site generator is the best decision I've made.
If you’re not interested in hand-maintaining the code of the website(s), and you just want a nice GUI for publishing pages/posts/etc., then I’d say use some hosted platform like Squarespace.
For actually learning how to build websites, start with something more low-level and barebones like a static site generator (Jekyll, Hugo, Gatsby, etc.), or even plain GitHub Pages without a static site generator for the most “manual” experience.
In neither of those cases would I consider WordPress.
It sounds like you're fairly new to programming, so I would suggest a static site generator that is easy to install and use.
Zola[1] is less well-known, but it's easy to install and fast. I tend to use Hugo[2] the most these days, which is fast and has solid documentation, but its template syntax is really annoying compared to Zola.
[1]: https://www.getzola.org/documentation/getting-started/overvi...
Astro with a good understanding of how to build using a coding agent (my go to is the BMAD method)
ceejayoz•5h ago
anitroves•5h ago
ceejayoz•5h ago
not_your_vase•5h ago
anitroves•4h ago
wasting_time•4h ago
kimyuhan•4h ago
kaikai•4h ago
anitroves•2h ago
al_borland•4h ago
From the Bearblog GitHub:
> Bear Blog has been built as a platform and not as an individual blog generator. It is more like Substack than Hugo. Due to this it isn't possible to individually self-host a Bear Blog.
Jekyll would an alternative for Hugo.
wasting_time•4h ago