I built websites on WordPress for years, writing the code underneath it myself, as a freelancer and a contractor. I haven't finished a WordPress build in four or five years, and it isn't because I forgot how. I stopped because, for a local service business, I think the platform should be the last thing you decide, not the first. It isn't a grudge: I still do performance work on existing WordPress sites.
Where WordPress is the right call
WordPress suits a site that's mostly content: a publisher, a large resource library, anything with an editorial team publishing most days. If that publishing routine already exists and people know it, moving them somewhere else can cost more than it saves. In my experience, that's where WordPress earns its place.
Where it can cost a service business
An electrician, a clinic or a cleaning business needs a site that explains the work, shows proof and makes it easy to ring or book. In my experience that's a fixed set of pages that doesn't change much week to week, not a publishing operation. For a site like that, I've found WordPress can bring costs the business never asked for.
None of that makes WordPress bad. It's a price, and the question is whether your business gets anything back for paying it.
- Extra code. Every plugin (add-on software that gives a WordPress site extra features) can add its own scripts, which are small programs the visitor's phone has to run before the page settles.
- Upkeep. Plugins need updating, and somebody has to own that job. One that's fallen behind can be a way in for attackers, and I've written a security notice about one.
- Sameness. In my experience, a WordPress site can start to look like everyone else's.
What I build on instead
Everything I build now is custom code. For most service-business websites that means Astro, a tool that builds the pages ahead of time, so the visitor's phone receives finished pages instead of assembling them. For anything more like an app, such as customer accounts or live data, I use a heavier tool called Next.js.
I start with what the business needs: its customers, its services, its positioning, its brand. Then I choose the lightest, most maintainable way to deliver it.
What I've measured
In September I compared a site I'd built with the WordPress site that replaced it, for the same local business. Both homepages carried eight images. After that they differed. The page I'd built loaded 11 files and no scripts. The WordPress page loaded 79 files, including 24 scripts that came to about half a megabyte.
It wasn't a controlled test, because the content wasn't identical, and the WordPress page was the lighter of the two in total size, about 1.2 MB against 1.4 MB. What differed was how much code the phone had to run. The full comparison has the detail and says what it doesn't prove.
So the benefit I can point to is small and specific: fewer files to load and less code to run, in one comparison. I haven't run a controlled test of WordPress against anything else, so I won't claim a platform makes a site faster on its own.
The short version
Easy to build isn't the same as right for the business.
Five questions before you agree a platform
Whoever is quoting you should be able to answer these in plain English.
- Who edits what, and who protects the rest?
- Whose job are the updates, and what happens if nobody does them?
- How does a real site they've built perform on a phone? Run Google's PageSpeed test (a free tool that times how fast a page loads on a phone) on it three times, a few minutes apart, and keep the middle result.
- What does the path from first visit to enquiry look like on this site?
- Who owns the code, and the hosting (the place the site is stored), if you part ways?
Where to start
Write down, in one sentence, what your website has to do for your business. That sentence is the brief. Then put the five questions above to whoever's quoting you.
Questions local business owners usually ask next
Thinking about a lean custom build?
If your WordPress site is slow, hard to look after or no longer fits the business, I'll look at it and tell you straight whether it needs a fix or a rebuild. If it's a rebuild, I'll build it around what your business needs.