Start with how the site will actually be used
Before comparing platforms, it’s worth answering a few simple questions:
- Who will update the website, and how often?
- Is it mainly a brochure site, or does it need to do things, like bookings, accounts or payments?
- How important is search and page speed to your enquiries?
- Will it need to connect to other tools, like a CRM or email platform?
- Is this a site for the next year, or the next five?
The answers usually point to the right choice far more clearly than any feature comparison.
WordPress: familiar, flexible, and easy for teams to edit
WordPress still powers a huge share of the web, and for good reason. Most people have used it, there’s a plugin for almost everything, and content editing is straightforward.
It’s a good fit when:
- Lots of people need to edit pages and posts regularly
- You need features like WooCommerce, memberships or subscriptions
- You want a large ecosystem of tools and support
The downside is that WordPress is easy to overload. Too many plugins, heavy page builders and bloated themes are the main reasons sites become slow and fragile. Built carefully, with a clean theme and only the plugins it genuinely needs, it’s still a very solid option.
Next.js: for websites that behave more like apps
Next.js is a framework built on React. It’s ideal when a website needs to be more than pages of content, things like logged-in areas, dashboards, complex search, or deep integration with other systems.
It’s a good fit when:
- The site has app-like features or lots of dynamic data
- You’re a startup or product business that expects to keep building features
- Performance and SEO matter, but so does flexibility
Content is usually managed through a headless CMS rather than a traditional admin area, which works brilliantly once it’s set up, but it’s a different way of working that suits some teams more than others.
Astro: fast, focused, and built for content
Astro is newer, and it’s become one of my favourite tools for marketing websites. It sends as little code to the browser as possible, which means pages load quickly by default rather than needing lots of optimisation afterwards.
It’s a good fit when:
- The website is mainly content, services and lead generation
- Speed and Core Web Vitals are a priority
- You want a site that’s secure, low-maintenance and cheap to host
It’s actually what I’ve rebuilt the Rhino Websites site with. Blog posts like this one are simple files, there’s no database to patch, and pages load almost instantly. Content can still be managed through a CMS if a team needs it.
You don’t always have to pick just one
Some of the best setups combine platforms. A common example is keeping WordPress running behind the scenes for something like WooCommerce, while the public-facing website is rebuilt in Astro or Next.js for speed.
That approach lets a business improve the part customers actually see, without disrupting the systems that already work, like payments, subscriptions or customer accounts. It can be a sensible, lower-risk way to modernise rather than replacing everything at once.
The questions that matter more than the platform
Whichever platform you choose, the result depends far more on how it’s built:
- Is the structure clear and easy to extend?
- Has performance been considered from day one?
- Can your team update content without fear of breaking things?
- Is there a sensible plan for hosting, security and updates?
A well-built WordPress site will outperform a poorly built Next.js site every time, and the other way around.
Final thoughts
Choosing a platform shouldn’t be about what’s fashionable. It should be about what fits the way your business works today, and what it’ll need as it grows.
If you’re weighing up options for a new website or a rebuild, I’m always happy to talk it through. A free consultation is usually enough to work out what makes sense, with no pressure either way.