Many website platforms advertise that you don’t need to worry about backups. That sounds great for busy business owners who just want their site to work and don’t want to think about the technical side of running a website. But there is an important question that often gets overlooked when choosing a website builder. It is not just about design tools or ease of use. It is about ownership.
If your website breaks tomorrow, do you actually own a copy of it that you can restore?
That question matters more than most people realize. Websites break for many different reasons. An update can cause a conflict. A design change can remove important content. A migration can fail. Sometimes a simple mistake during editing can take down a page that was generating real leads for your business.
Many business owners assume their platform is automatically protecting them from situations like this. In reality, we regularly see sites where something breaks and there is no usable backup to restore. When that happens, the only option is often rebuilding pages manually or trying to piece together lost content. One of the things we focus on at Barefoot Build is making sure our clients always have reliable backups in place so their website can be restored quickly if something ever goes wrong.
When something like that happens, the real question becomes very simple.
If something goes wrong, do you have control over a full backup of your website?
Ownership of your website often comes down to this exact point. A backup is not just a safety net. It is proof that you truly have access to the files and content that make up your site.
The answer to that question depends heavily on the platform your site is built on. Let’s look at how backups work on some of the most common website builders and what that means for ownership.
Wix
Wix automatically saves versions of your site using a feature called Site History. If you make a mistake while editing your site you can restore an earlier version of the design. This works well for simple editing changes and is helpful for users who are managing their own site inside the Wix editor.
The main limitation is when it comes to ownership and backups.
- You cannot download a full backup of your website
- You cannot move the site to another platform
- Your website only exists inside Wix
For many users this is perfectly fine. Wix is designed to be simple and easy to manage. One trade off is that the platform maintains control of the environment your site lives in.
Squarespace
Squarespace protects your website at the platform level. Their servers store your content and maintain the infrastructure that keeps the site online.
That said, Squarespace does not provide a traditional backup system that you control as the site owner. So,
- You cannot create a full downloadable backup of the entire website
- Restoring older versions of the full site is limited
- Only certain types of content can be exported
In practice this means your website lives fully inside the Squarespace ecosystem. Recovery options depend on what the platform allows rather than a backup that you personally control.
Shopify
Shopify is a powerful platform built specifically for e commerce. Like many hosted platforms it manages the infrastructure and security behind the scenes so store owners can focus on selling products rather than managing servers.
At the same time, Shopify does not provide built in full site backups that store owners can download and restore independently. Many store owners rely on third party apps if they want additional backup protection.
For most stores this works well and the platform handles the technical side of hosting. It still means the platform controls the environment where the website and store data live.
Webflow
Webflow offers version history and strong hosting infrastructure. Users can restore previous versions of a site within the platform which is helpful when design changes need to be rolled back.
However, exporting a full working site backup with all functionality is more limited and often depends on how the site was built. Many dynamic features rely on the Webflow environment, which means the website remains tied closely to the platform itself.
WordPress
WordPress works differently because you control the website files and database. Your website exists as a collection of files and data that can be backed up, stored, and restored whenever needed.
With the right setup you can have:
- Automatic scheduled backups
- Full downloadable copies of your entire site
- One click restores if something breaks
- The ability to move your website to a new host at any time
In simple terms, you actually have a full copy of your website that you control. That level of access is what makes true website ownership possible, because the site is not locked inside a single platform.
TL;DR
Different platforms solve different problems. Wix and Squarespace are built for simplicity and convenience. They remove a lot of the technical responsibility and keep everything inside their ecosystem. Shopify focuses on e-commerce and provides a powerful store platform with managed infrastructure. WordPress focuses on flexibility and ownership, which includes having full control over your website backups and the ability to move or restore your site whenever needed.
WordPress Is Not Always the Right Choice!
At Barefoot Build, we work almost exclusively with WordPress, but we are the first to say that WordPress is not the right choice for everyone. Some new businesses truly benefit from the simplicity of a platform like Wix or Squarespace. For the right situation, those platforms can work very well and allow a site to be launched quickly with minimal technical setup.
That said, we have yet to be proven wrong about one thing. For the types of businesses we work with, WordPress continues to be the strongest all around option. It gives our clients more flexibility. It allows their site to grow with their business. Most importantly it gives them full ownership of their website and their backups.
Curious why we believe that so strongly? Reach out to Barefoot Build and we would be happy to walk you through it.
Many website platforms advertise that you don’t need to worry about backups. That sounds great for busy business owners who just want their site to work and don’t want to think about the technical side of running a website. But there is an important question that often gets overlooked when choosing a website builder. It is not just about design tools or ease of use. It is about ownership.
If your website breaks tomorrow, do you actually own a copy of it that you can restore?
That question matters more than most people realize. Websites break for many different reasons. An update can cause a conflict. A design change can remove important content. A migration can fail. Sometimes a simple mistake during editing can take down a page that was generating real leads for your business.
Many business owners assume their platform is automatically protecting them from situations like this. In reality, we regularly see sites where something breaks and there is no usable backup to restore. When that happens, the only option is often rebuilding pages manually or trying to piece together lost content. One of the things we focus on at Barefoot Build is making sure our clients always have reliable backups in place so their website can be restored quickly if something ever goes wrong.
When something like that happens, the real question becomes very simple.
If something goes wrong, do you have control over a full backup of your website?
Ownership of your website often comes down to this exact point. A backup is not just a safety net. It is proof that you truly have access to the files and content that make up your site.
The answer to that question depends heavily on the platform your site is built on. Let’s look at how backups work on some of the most common website builders and what that means for ownership.
Wix
Wix automatically saves versions of your site using a feature called Site History. If you make a mistake while editing your site you can restore an earlier version of the design. This works well for simple editing changes and is helpful for users who are managing their own site inside the Wix editor.
The main limitation is when it comes to ownership and backups.
- You cannot download a full backup of your website
- You cannot move the site to another platform
- Your website only exists inside Wix
For many users this is perfectly fine. Wix is designed to be simple and easy to manage. One trade off is that the platform maintains control of the environment your site lives in.
Squarespace
Squarespace protects your website at the platform level. Their servers store your content and maintain the infrastructure that keeps the site online.
That said, Squarespace does not provide a traditional backup system that you control as the site owner. So,
- You cannot create a full downloadable backup of the entire website
- Restoring older versions of the full site is limited
- Only certain types of content can be exported
In practice this means your website lives fully inside the Squarespace ecosystem. Recovery options depend on what the platform allows rather than a backup that you personally control.
Shopify
Shopify is a powerful platform built specifically for e commerce. Like many hosted platforms it manages the infrastructure and security behind the scenes so store owners can focus on selling products rather than managing servers.
At the same time, Shopify does not provide built in full site backups that store owners can download and restore independently. Many store owners rely on third party apps if they want additional backup protection.
For most stores this works well and the platform handles the technical side of hosting. It still means the platform controls the environment where the website and store data live.
Webflow
Webflow offers version history and strong hosting infrastructure. Users can restore previous versions of a site within the platform which is helpful when design changes need to be rolled back.
However, exporting a full working site backup with all functionality is more limited and often depends on how the site was built. Many dynamic features rely on the Webflow environment, which means the website remains tied closely to the platform itself.
WordPress
WordPress works differently because you control the website files and database. Your website exists as a collection of files and data that can be backed up, stored, and restored whenever needed.
With the right setup you can have:
- Automatic scheduled backups
- Full downloadable copies of your entire site
- One click restores if something breaks
- The ability to move your website to a new host at any time
In simple terms, you actually have a full copy of your website that you control. That level of access is what makes true website ownership possible, because the site is not locked inside a single platform.
TL;DR
Different platforms solve different problems. Wix and Squarespace are built for simplicity and convenience. They remove a lot of the technical responsibility and keep everything inside their ecosystem. Shopify focuses on e-commerce and provides a powerful store platform with managed infrastructure. WordPress focuses on flexibility and ownership, which includes having full control over your website backups and the ability to move or restore your site whenever needed.
WordPress Is Not Always the Right Choice!
At Barefoot Build, we work almost exclusively with WordPress, but we are the first to say that WordPress is not the right choice for everyone. Some new businesses truly benefit from the simplicity of a platform like Wix or Squarespace. For the right situation, those platforms can work very well and allow a site to be launched quickly with minimal technical setup.
That said, we have yet to be proven wrong about one thing. For the types of businesses we work with, WordPress continues to be the strongest all around option. It gives our clients more flexibility. It allows their site to grow with their business. Most importantly it gives them full ownership of their website and their backups.
Curious why we believe that so strongly? Reach out to Barefoot Build and we would be happy to walk you through it.
