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It’s no secret that we love our cloud tools here at WebsiteToolTester.com. And if you’ve been reviewing website builders, hosting providers, live chat software and other website tools as long as we have, you’ll start to notice that a handful really are a cut above the rest.
We decided it was time to honor those providers, and give them recognition they deserve for providing the awesome services that they do.
So, without any further ado, we’re proud to announce the winners of the WebsiteToolTester Awards for 2021…
Best Website Builders
Best Website Builder: Wix
Wix has been our top-rated website builder for some time now, and it looks like 2021 will be no exception. There’s very little to fault with Wix – its templates are excellent, its editor flexible, and features unparalleled. Whether you’re building a blog, online store, portfolio, restaurant site, Wix is more than equipped to help you do that.
Best Website Builder for Ease of Use: Jimdo
Taking out the award in the Ease of Use category is none other than Jimdo! This website builder’s fast and intuitive editor, strong commitment to implementing beginner-friendly features, and impressive AI-powered builder Dolphin, all contribute to its unmatched ease of use.
Best Ecommerce Solution: Shopify
We’ve yet to find an ecommerce platform that combines ease of use and flexibility as Shopify does. With a solid range of ready-to-go templates, no product or bandwidth limits, and integrated solutions such as Shopify Payment and Shopify Shipping, Shopify is a complete solution that can help you scale your online store quickly and easily.
Best Photography Sites for Pros: Pixpa
If you’re a professional photographer looking to build a website, our top recommendation would be Pixpa. This photography website builder offers some seriously advanced features – the most noteworthy being its Client Galleries, which allows clients to view and download images, provide feedback, and even make purchases. It also provides some excellent templates and a wide range of useful integrations.
Best Hosting Providers
Best Hosting Provider: SiteGround
SiteGround’s performance, support and features are truly impressive. In fact, we even use SiteGround for several of our own projects here at Tooltester. That’s why it’s our #1 pick for Best Hosting Provider. For medium-sized and larger websites, we have no hesitation in recommending it.
Best Hosting Provider for WordPress: WP Engine
As longtime WordPress users ourselves, we’ve found WP Engine to be unrivalled in reliability, security and support. As well as having excellent safeguarding features, it also scores extremely well in page speeds and uptime.
Best Hosting Provider for Value for Money: DreamHost
In our reviews, we found DreamHost to provide the best value for money. For its small price tag, it offers unlimited storage and bandwidth, backups, 24-hour support, and free SSL certificates. Overall, a solid service at a great price.
Best Hosting Provider for Server Speed: SiteGround
In addition to taking out our top award for Best Hosting Provider, SiteGround also won in our Server Speed category. In our tests, we found them to be the fastest, with an average page loading speed of 2.10 seconds.
Best Hosting Provider for Support: Kinsta
Kinsta’s customer support for WordPress hosting is excellent. It’s available 24/7 (via chat), and its support agents are always helpful and efficient. Its online resources are also very useful.
Best Hosting Provider for Cloud Hosting: Cloudways
Cloudways gets our award for Cloud Hosting, thanks to its flexibility. You can choose to have your site hosted on one of five different data center providers, switch providers depending on your needs, and buy hosting on an hourly basis. A truly unique solution.
Best Live Chat Tools
Best Live Chat Tool: LiveChat
Taking out our top award in this category is LiveChat. Aside from offering a slick interface and a great user experience, it also includes fantastic features such as an integrated help desk, mobile app, and chatbot (at an additional cost). We thoroughly enjoyed testing this one out.
Best Live Chat Tool for Ease of Use: Olark
Olark gets our vote for Best Ease of Use. We liked the look and feel of Olark’s user interface and its chat client, and found it very intuitive and straightforward to use. But we really loved its automation features (or ‘targeted chat’ as Olark calls them), letting you send automatic messages to visitors who are visiting specific pages.
Other Website Tools
Best Quiz Maker: Interact
Quizzes are a fantastic add-on tool for websites, and our favorite quiz maker of all is Interact, which we use on our own site. Top features of this powerful quiz maker include: unlimited quizzes on all plans, branching logic, 800+ templates, and email marketing integrations. Plus, there’s also a free plan.
Best Quiz Maker for Pros: Outgrow
If you’re looking for a powerful, professional quiz maker, Outgrow would be our pick. In addition to quizzes, it also provides interactive content templates such as calculators, chatbots and tailored recommendations. You also get advanced reporting and integration with over 1000 marketing tools. Very impressive.
Best Rank Tracker: Accuranker
Although we’ve used many rank trackers in our own projects and found each one to have its own strengths, we believe that Accuranker is most deserving of this title, as it offers the most advanced features – on-demand ranking updates, tracking for multiple search engines (including YouTube), automated reporting, and more. If you’re serious about SEO and have the budget to invest in it, Accuranker is the rank tracker we’d recommend.
Best Rank Tracker for Value for Money: SE Ranking
SE Ranking is our pick for Best Value for Money. Alongside the rank tracker, you get additional features such as website audit, backlink monitoring & checking, and even a tailored marketing plan – all for an affordable price.
Best Podcast Hosting for Budding Podcasters: Buzzsprout
Buzzsprout is all about making it easy for new podcasters to get started. With an intuitive interface, straightforward integrations with iTunes and Spotify, easy-to-read stats, and transparent pricing, Buzzsprout gets our award for Best Podcast Hosting for Budding Podcasters. Extra features such as your own site, transcription services, and “Magic Mastering”, also help to make it a solid choice for beginners.
Best Explainer Video Maker: Vyond
Need to use videos to explain a slightly more complex product? Explainer video software can help you do that, and our #1 choice is Vyond. With plenty of great features, such as modern templates, icons, and material, Vyond can help you create engaging animations to really bring your products to life. We highly recommend this video maker.
Best Website Building Tools Of 2021: Conclusion
Building a website has never been easier, and thanks to the tools we’ve listed above, you can now easily and affordably enhance your website, in ways that would have required a much larger investment in the past.
2020 certainly was the year of the unexpected, and with more time spent at home than ever, the boom in people creating their own websites and blogs wasn’t surprising. So, it’s great to know that there is a solid range of website builders, hosting providers, and other website add-ons to help them do that.
We’ve had a blast reviewing all these tools, and look forward to seeing them continue their success in 2021.
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