Webflow wins for marketing sites under 100 pages where marketers need design control without plugin maintenance (cost £1,299–£15k). WordPress wins for content-heavy sites with complex CMS needs and existing WordPress ecosystems (cost £1,499–£14,999). Next.js wins for performance-critical applications, programmatic SEO at scale (1000+ pages), or SaaS / e-commerce with complex business logic (cost £3,999–£100k+). For most SME marketing sites, Webflow is the right call. For SaaS marketing sites at scale, Next.js. For content-heavy editorial sites, WordPress.
Visual builder + production HTML/CSS output. Marketer-friendly CMS. Hosted at Webflow's CDN. Price: £19–£36/mo + build cost (£1,299–£15k for bespoke build).
Wins: marketers can edit without dev support; clean code output; secure-by-default (no plugin attack surface); Lighthouse scores 95+ out of the box.
Loses: vendor lock-in (you can't easily migrate Webflow to non-Webflow hosting); CMS limit 10,000 items per collection; e-commerce features weaker than Shopify; subscription costs add up at scale.
Self-hosted CMS with massive plugin ecosystem. Has powered >40% of the web since 2016. Price: hosting £5–£30/mo + plugins + dev cost (£1,499–£14,999 for bespoke).
Wins: maximum flexibility via plugins (anything WooCommerce, LMS, multi-locale, complex content modelling); huge talent pool of WordPress devs; massive community; Gutenberg block editor is genuinely good now.
Loses: plugin maintenance tax (security patches, conflicts, bloat); performance often suffers vs Webflow / Next.js; security attack surface is large; total cost of ownership often higher than expected.
React framework for production web apps and marketing sites. Hosted typically on Vercel. Price: hosting £0–£25/mo (free tier generous) + build cost (£3,999–£100k+).
Wins: best-in-class performance (Cache Components, RSC, Edge); programmatic SEO at scale (1000+ pages, dynamic routing); SaaS-grade ops (full backend, auth, payments, custom logic); aligned with React talent pool; first-class developer experience.
Loses: requires developer for content updates (or pair with headless CMS like Sanity / Strapi); higher initial build cost; not marketer-friendly CMS without additional tooling.
"Next.js 16 with Turbopack and Cache Components delivers Lighthouse 95+ at scale. Webflow performs well at low scale; Next.js performs at any scale. WordPress with proper hosting and caching can perform; defaults are slow."
Marketing site under 100 pages, marketer-edited content, you don't need plugin-level customisation: Webflow.
Content-heavy editorial site, multi-author, complex content modelling, plugin-based features (LMS, WooCommerce subscription): WordPress.
Performance-critical SaaS marketing site, programmatic SEO at scale, custom backend / auth / payments: Next.js.
Hybrid: Next.js + Sanity CMS = performance + marketer-edited content. Right for funded SaaS scaling beyond 200 pages.
Webflow: hosting £36/mo + build amortised £6,000/yr + ongoing £299/mo retainer = £9,000/yr.
WordPress: hosting £200/mo + plugin renewals £800/yr + dev maintenance £5,000/yr + build amortised £5,000/yr = £13,200/yr.
Next.js: Vercel free / £25/mo + build amortised £15,000/yr + ongoing £1,500/mo retainer = £33,300/yr.
Next.js has highest TCO but delivers value at scale (programmatic SEO, app integration, performance) the others can't match. Below £2m revenue, Webflow wins TCO. Above £5m revenue, Next.js wins value.