What Is the Best Self Designing Website Builder

Best Portfolio websites builders

Almost 50 site builders for all kinds of creatives

Here a review of some nice tools for illustrators, graphic designers, UX & product designers, researchers, makeup artists, photographers, motion designers and filmmakers, 3D artists, writers, bloggers, artists, etc.

Behance

I have some projects even from 2005, when it was released. In the beginning I remember it was a trendy site. Then it was acquired by Adobe Systems for $150 million in December 2012. Now They have about 10 million members. Every junior creative usually has one as it is free.

They have several sections as featured portfolios (hall of fame), livestreams, a job portal. I have seen many recruiters looking for freelancers at Behance. They also have an App, so it is quite easy, even if you are in UX, you can easily make a case study or change anything later quite fast. You can even make moodboards.

Adobe Portfolio

At Adobe Portfolio everything is about squares. Here a typical issue with portfolios or some UI frameworks, every site looks the same. As you see in their home page, I like it for photographers and graduates. It has nice integrations (Behance, Adobe Stock, Adobe Lightroom), so if you have works there and want to make a portfolio fast, this is your place.

It is not free, you need an Adobe license. Maybe if you already have one it is a good chance.

Krop: Connecting creatives with great companies

Here is one of the interesting points about portfolio builders, they are increasingly related to the job market, and Krop is a good example. As they head "Ready to hire: Search portfolios and resumes of world class creatives at all levels".

They have a 14 day trial for creatives, and then it´s about $8.25 monthly. You can sync it with Dropbox, Instagram and GA. Take a look at their template gallery, there are some I like.

Portfoliobox

Looks like a great alternative for photographers, I like their galleries. They are also focused on designers, artists, architects, makeup artists, models and musicians. Also they have ecommerce solution. Looks easy and quite cheap. Take a look at the examples.

They have free pro accounts for students with partner schools.

Morpholio

Not exactly a portfolio builder, although you could use it for that. Actually Morpholio is about four different Apps you can download freely

Trace: Sketch. Design. Create. A drawing app for building & sharing ideas
Board: Discover. Design. Present. A mood board app for interior design & decor
Journal: Write. Sketch. Collect. A sketchbook app to organize, collect & build ideas
Morpholio: Present. Collaborate. Critique. A portfolio app for design, art & photography

ImCreator

They have almost 18 million sites created, as they say "Built by Creators, for Creators". You can choose either free or paid account. There´s a nice option here, you could be a reseller, I think this works same as you do with some Wordpress builders such as DIVI, they call it Whitelabel.

They have templates for weddings, blogs, fashion, restaurant and business, built with XPRS technology is quite easy and fast.

AllYou

Launched on 2011: " Thanks to a simple drag-and-drop editor, graphic designers, photographers, stylists, artists and other creatives can create their own website in just a few clicks. All design templates can be customized to make each website unique".

AllYou has two different price plans and looks easy for building and customization.

Squarespace

This is a big platform, not only for creatives, but one of the things you can do with it is building a portfolio. You can also make an online store and many other things. They have almost a million users. I would say there are two things I like specially from them:

They have different layouts comparing with other builders
A great technical support (guide, support centre, webinars)

There are four different prices plans: personal, business, basic commerce and advanced commerce.

UXFolio

UXFolio is focused for Product Designers, UX Designers or UX Researchers. Their call to action is "Build a stunning portfolio with meaningful UX case studies!". So you can show your design process and your design decisions fast. They have emphasis on Case Studies and you can even embed your prototypes (Axure, Marvel, Invision, Figma. You can take a look at their showcase
There two pricing options: free and premium.

Wix

I really like Wix, I have seen really nice portfolios for designers, photographers, UX writers or researchers.

They have the Wix ADI (Artificial Design Intelligence) to help you customize your site from beginning to end. You can use free editor or ADI. I have tried ADI and like it, it recommends you which features to add to your site, so it is not only about designing a portfolio, but also about what are you doing with it. The process is really awesome and fantastic. It is a step by step builder and in the end you are given three different designs and then you can add different pages.

They have also Velo an Open Dev Platform, a logo maker App and e-commerce options, and a marketplace among others.

Take a look also at Wix templates and hall of fame. They have four different pricing options.

Weebly

They call themselves the powerful free website builder. It has also a step-by-step process, e-commerce integration, analytics and so on (see App-Center). Actually it is fully integrated with Square product suite, focused in online stores. They work same way as Shopify (themes, Apps, learning center, etc.) Weebly has around 20 million sites.

Take a look at Weebly themes and inspiration center. Weebly has four different pricing models.

Wordpress

Yes, you can make your portfolio with Wordpress. There many digital agencies and freelancers working just with this framework for site building.

Maybe it is very exaggerated to say that a third of the web is made in wordpress, what is certain is that they have 30 million sites. Anyway, I would consider one of these options:

Use a premade template (there are thousands)
Use a Wordpress builder. Good ones are:
Elementor, Beaver Builder, Divi Builder, Thrive Architect, Themify Builder, Visual Composer or SeedProd. I have used Divi, they are easy to learn, take into account that you should pay a license.

Format

Looks like they are mainly focused on photographers, but also for artists, designers, illustrators, models, architects, music, video and students. Not sure if they have POD integration. Templates look really nice and also their magazine.

They have a 14 days trial period and three pricing options.

Jimdo

They have online stores and logo makers. Looks simple, fast and nice. Five different price options and nice template gallery.

Fabrik

"Join the world's leading filmmakers, artists, Photographers and designers. Build yours now. Presenting your work is the final step in your production workflow. We've worked closely with thousands of creatives to make sure Fabrik shows off your work at its best. See how we do it: What type of creative are you?".

Has three different pricing options and nice themes (you can even see the layout scheme when you choose a theme).

Viewbook

"Create a clean photography website". Viewbook was created for photographers and image makers in 2009, they come from the Netherlands.

They offer several layouts photography focused: "One format doesn't work for every project or style. We offer an ever increasing variety of galleries to choose from". You have a customizer, a store and a portfolio builder just for 16$ a month.

They have also an articles section covering different publications around Photography.

SmugMug

"Save, show off, and sell your photos, all in one place. SmugMug gives photographers of all kinds a feature rich home for their photos."

As they say, Smugmug is for Memory Makers, enthusiasts and professionals. Has photo editing integration, sales tools for photographers, photo printing lab, unlimited storage… quite a lot. Has four different pricing plans.

I wonder if they have the idea of a POD online store as Printful does.

Artschema

Created for artist and art community, to provide visibility to the art community creating websites with content related to art and people working in that field. This community of people is based on solidarity and cooperation, they also work with referrals.

They have two pricing options and here the features.

Pixpa

Portfolio Websites for Photographers and Creators. You can create portfolio website, client galleries, online store & blog. They have nice templates and examples with three different price options.

If you are a student you can get a 50% off. Has a lot of features and is integrated with a huge number of Apps.

SimpleSite

This guys tell you to create your website in three simple steps and free. Looks like a platform for bloggers or to have online presence on the web, but you could also set up a business.

It has some features and simple templates.

Carbonmade

This is how the story was made (from treehouse): "Three bright guys co-founded a small web design and development consultancy. Among their pet projects, Dave created a small personal content management app to manage and display his often-changing and growing portfolio. Within a few months he scaled and distributed the app among friends in the design community who shared the same need.

By the end of 2007, Dave, Jason, and Spencer put aside their consulting work to focus on Carbonmade full-time, self-funded, they launched a $12 per month plan. Viola! Instant ramen revenue! They never marketed it outside of friends and family, and yet, its user base grew at a steady rate".

They have a hall of fame, nice features, and examples. They really look fresh. Actually they focus on creativity profiles such as illustrators & graphic designers, UX & product designers, makeup artists & photographers, motion designers & filmmakers, and 3D artists.

Three pricing options.

Crevado

They have three different price offers. One is free, the others are basic and pro, I would say it is quite cheap in comparison with other site builders. Simple templates, not too complicated.

Cargo

Cargo is a site building platform for designers and artists. As I see the templates and sites in-use, looks more for artist and off-line designers.

They have two different price models, basic and with e-commerce solution. They have also free plan for students and nice font integration.

Dunked

Dunked welcomes the creative. They have some examples but I couldn´t find the template gallery. Anyway this is the first home I find with an introductory video.

Pricing has two options: one for agencies, other for professionals.

Motion Array

This one is fully oriented for videographers, motion graphics specialists, video-editors, etc. Easy, beautiful, video portfolio websites.

It is integrated with nice plugins and integrations, has a marketplace with lots of categories and presets, and has a learning centre.

They have three different price options.

FolioVilla

You won´t find much info on their site. It is a free service and made for artists. Here you´ll see the sense of community. Nice templates and examples where you can filter with different categories (all, architecture, sculpture & craft, fashion, graphic design, illustration, jewelry, photography, traditional painting and other).

Moonfruit

The quickest, easiest way to build a beautiful website. Quite new portfolio builder, from 2017. Really cheap pricing plans, there are two, both under 7 pounds.

They have a code-free editor to build easy and fast sites, integrated stock libraries images, slideshows, galleries, animations, SEO and Apps. You can see templates here.

GoDaddy

To be honest, I was looking for Virb and was redirected here. By the way they work as website builder or ecommerce store builder among others as they have lots of services (hosting is the big one). Four different pricing options, clean templates for many categories, and many integrations with different features.

PixieSet

Beautiful Websites for Photographers. Their philosophy is "fun and easy", they have beautiful page templates, one-click layouts, content for photographers and curated design options. See some examples. There are five pricing options, you can begin free and change later.

Fotomaf

They have a manifest against templates: "Fotomat is a visual site builder that does more than just apply a template to your site. A template rarely looks right because it was not made for you. Fotomat is more flexible. Click some buttons. Play with the settings. Find your site."

Some of the nice features is that you can mix images and video. They have also what they call Magnum Flow: "Flow allows the Magnum collective's members to share both contemporary and historical work relating to world-changing events, in near-real-time. Magnum Flow is a visual blog made in co-creation with Fotomat".

Pricing can be monthly or yearly. See featured projects to see examples.

JournoPortfolios

"Beautiful Portfolios for Writers: Join thousands of journalists, copywriters, authors, translators, bloggers and other creatives who have built a writing portfolio with Journo Portfolio".

If you are a writer, you have here your niche, and there no many as this one. They have lots of features and templates, with three different pricing options, one of them free.

Dribbble

Discover the world's top designers & creatives. "Dribbble is the leading destination to find & showcase creative work and home to the world's best design professionals".

So this works like this, you need and invite to enter, and then you upload your portfolio, next steps: explore, find work or hire designers. There are plans for designers and for people hiring designers.

They have workshops, shots, teams, shop, you can even advertise something for creatives, etc. I could make a post just talking about Dribbble. I would say this is one of the outstanding portfolio builder becacuse of UI quality and because of integration with the job market.

WebStarts

Here you can create aWebsite, Online Store, or Blog, and free.

Looks easy and simple, has some features, templates and three pricing options.

Webflow

One of the most famous NoCode editor. This is a big one, not only a portfolio builder but also a tool for CMS, eCommerce, etc. There are great companies using webflow. Has nice templates, showcase and you can even become a webflow expert. They have even a webflow university with tutorials, lessons, courses, etc. Also what they call Webflow enterprise: "Loved by designers. Trusted by enterprises. Bring Webflow in-house at your company with advanced security, custom traffic scaling, guaranteed uptime, and much more."

I don´t recommend to jump into webflow if you do not know nothing about coding, at least I would do first, the Webflow 101 Crash Course.

For pricing there are site plans and account plans, you can have two projects free

Notion

Yes, you can use Notion to build your portfolio site. I don´t consider myself a designer but I see them (designers) amazed with Notion. Actually I found some tutorials to build your site with it:

The Quickest Way to Create Your UI/UX Portfolio Using Notion

The quickest way to create your UX/UX Portfolio using Notion
Build Your Portfolio using this Notion template

Has nice integrations, a great community and for pricing you can see here. I don´t see it as the single source of truth (I would rather use Airtable or github) but some do as you can make projects with it easily.

Vsble

"Beautiful Portfolio Websites Made Easy: The really easy website builder for visual artists. Get online with style in no time. Forever free" .

They have nice animations on their home, this is one of the key features they offer:

Video landing pages & animated effects
Quick Fonts & Colors Adjustment
Professional features & security
Ethical & GDPR ready analytics.
Switch designs with a single click.

I like the look of their templates and the showcase. There are two pricing plans available.

Readymag

Design and publish in your website. A a browser-based design tool to build company websites, landing pages, editorials, portfolios and whatever you need with whatever layout you prefer.

Some site examples made with Readymag. Features and learn section. It´s not cheap, check out pricing options.

Pixel Together

The website builder for visual thinkers: for startups, for portfolios, for cafes, for business, for coming soon sites, for non-profits, you can see templates. This is another Drag&Drop online editor with nice features.

There are many pricing options, choose yours.

Webydo

The Complete Website Builder & CMS for Designers. I like how they present features, elegant. They have even a user form to suggest new features or integrations or an Agency version. Themes are nice and clean. The blog is really helpful. Prices are not cheap, but you have more, see them here.

Vev

A collaborative visual editor for creatives to build interactive websites.
Ready to be published anywhere. A powerful online collaborative editor built for teams. It has Design, Code and Content editor

Take the Product tour to enjoy and get it touch with Vev. Showcase is not only about design but also for strategy.

Here a set of different videos to learn about Vev:

Pricing options available here.

Froont

The most flexible web design tool: Design responsive landing pages and publications, export them as static pages or host them yourself.

Showcase with many fullscreen projects. There is one feature I like, component built-in. Here the pricing options to get started.

They just launched Froont Instant, "is all about integration with your existing services to help you add new capabilities to your products and grow your business. Both products — Instant Page Builder and Page Customizer can be embedded directly into your service with our powerful APIs. The user interfaces are intuitive and easy to use so that users can get the results instantly".

uCraft

Some nice fullscreen options on their showcase and templates. eCommerce integration, logo-maker, bloggin platform, and so on. A feature I like is multilingual content.

See pricing options.

FolioHD

Could be another alternative. Has smart themes and some integrations.

Here pricing plans.

Semplice

Semplice is based on WordPress, a creation of Tobias Van Scheneider made for Studios & agencies, UX designers, Artists & illustrators, 3D designers, Filmmakers & animators and Photographers.

Here you are the showcase, also has nice integrations and features. There are three possible price plans now: Single, Studio and Business.

There are other platforms I also found, some just closed as Heek, Worka or TheGrid, and other not really portfolio builders that I discarded (you could use them anyway): Webnode, Duda, Voog, Macaw, LiquidBox, Orson, Variant, Slides, Zoho, PageCloud, Strikingly, Bookmark, PixelHub, Constant Contact, Carrd, Tilda.

Also there are some nice sites specially for writers or bloggers, such as Medium (yes your are here right now!), Ghost, Jeklyllrb, Write, Svbtle, Blot, Telescope, SmallVictori, Bloggi, Postach, Imprint or Shosho.

Final question: How to choose a portfolio builder?

If you have reached this point, you will be wondering if there is a benchmark or if there are some graphics comparing this builders. Yeah maybe there are some, but it is changing so fast, especially with noCode tools that I hardly recommend them.

You may answer some questions to clarify your option:

What is your main rol?

Maybe you are a UX Designer, a writer, a photographer, a motion graphics specialist, a UI Designer. There is a niche for all.

Which features do you need?

Think about integrations. Are you selling something? Maybe look for e-commerce, do you need a Data Base? Are you blogging constantly? A contact form?

Can you code?

You could add some animation with CSS, or dive into noCode tools.

What about layouts?

Do you like dark mode? Just white?

Price

Are you going for a free solution or do you think on a pro account?

Time

How long are you going to be building your site? Maybe you want something fast or you want to make different releases.

What Is the Best Self Designing Website Builder

Source: https://uxplanet.org/best-portfolio-websites-builders-4d0900d1a78f