Ask “what’s the best website builder for a contractor?” and page one, read on 23 September 2026, is the builders answering for themselves — Wix, Squarespace, Yola and a string of “best builders” lists — plus a forum thread of owners asking the same thing. None of them says what the contractors already ranking in a real local market actually use. So I looked under the hood of 266 of them.
Mostly WordPress. On 23 September 2026 I read the homepages of the 266 working websites of the roofers, plumbers, heating and cooling companies, electricians, landscapers, painters and remodelers Brave Search lists in seven West Michigan towns, and identified the platform from each page’s own code. 130 (49%) run self-hosted WordPress; 82 (31%) are on a hosted builder — Wix 30, Duda 16, Squarespace 11, GoDaddy 10 and a handful of others; 11 sit on a marketing agency’s platform; 4 are a franchise’s national site; 9 are custom builds; 24 I could not identify.
The platform shapes some of what ends up on the page, in both directions. Hosted builders carried business schema more often — Wix 20 of 30, Squarespace 8 of 11, Duda 10 of 16 — than self-hosted WordPress (51 of 130), because builders tend to write that markup for you. WordPress sites were far more likely to show reviews on the page (36 of 130, against 0 of 30 on Wix and 1 of 16 on Duda), partly because review plugins are common there and partly because one HTML fetch cannot see a widget a builder draws by script. No platform guaranteed the basics. What matters more than the logo is that you own the domain and the account, can move the site, and put what a customer looks for on the first screen.
We build on whatever serves the business and hand over the keys either way: our contractor sites start at $999 for up to three pages, and who owns your website and domain explains what to insist on with anyone.
“Which platform?” is usually the first question an owner asks and the least important one to get perfect. Every platform on this list can hold a fast, clear, honest site, and every one of them also hosts sites that bury the phone number. The real questions are who controls the account, what it costs to leave, and whether whoever builds it puts the right things on the page. Counting what the local competition actually runs on at least takes the guesswork out of the first question.
The sites come from the same 23 September 2026 reading as the roofing websites page: the first ten Brave Search local listings for seven trades in eight towns (Walker returned none), one fetch of each homepage with curl. A website listed under two trades counts once. Pages that were parked, blank, placeholders or someone else’s site are not in the 266. The platform is named from the page’s own fingerprints — a hosted builder’s asset address or generator tag (static.wixstatic.com, static1.squarespace.com, irp.cdn-website.com and the like), WordPress’s /wp-content/ paths, a framework’s build files — and the matching line is kept for every site in the receipts file. 21 different platforms turned up; 3 more sites name a tool of their own that is not on the list.
| Platform (23 Sep 2026) | Sites | Of 266 |
|---|---|---|
| WordPress (self-hosted) | 130 | 49% |
| Wix | 30 | 11% |
| Not identified (custom or unknown) | 24 | 9% |
| Duda | 16 | 6% |
| Squarespace | 11 | 4% |
| GoDaddy Website Builder | 10 | 4% |
| Hibu (agency platform) | 7 | 3% |
| Next.js (custom build) | 6 | 2% |
| Webflow | 4 | 2% |
| A franchise's national site | 4 | 2% |
| WordPress.com (hosted) | 3 | 1% |
| Shopify | 3 | 1% |
| HighLevel (agency CRM) | 3 | 1% |
| Weebly / Square Online | 2 | 1% |
| UENI | 2 | 1% |
| Astro (custom build) | 2 | 1% |
| HubSpot CMS | 1 | 0% |
| Joomla | 1 | 0% |
| other (names its tool: Xara HTML filter v.10.0.8.5) | 1 | 0% |
| Drupal | 1 | 0% |
| other (names its tool: CMS Made Simple) | 1 | 0% |
| Hostinger Website Builder | 1 | 0% |
| Treehouse (agency platform) | 1 | 0% |
| Gatsby (custom build) | 1 | 0% |
| other (names its tool: Catapult Web Services) | 1 | 0% |
Three things stand out. WordPress is the default: 130 of 266, more than all the hosted builders together. Among hosted builders Wix leads with 30, and Duda — which describes itself as a platform for agencies, hosting companies and software vendors building client websites (duda.co, read 23 September 2026) — is next with 16. And the agency platforms (11) are a category of their own: the site lives inside the marketing company’s system, which matters the day you want to leave.
Most WordPress sites are assembled with a page builder plugin rather than hand-built themes. Of the 130 WordPress sites, Elementor is the most common (58).
| Page builder on the WordPress sites | Sites | Of 130 |
|---|---|---|
| Elementor | 58 | 45% |
| none detected | 30 | 23% |
| Divi | 21 | 16% |
| WPBakery | 7 | 5% |
| Avada | 5 | 4% |
| Astra | 3 | 2% |
| Beaver Builder | 3 | 2% |
| Bricks | 2 | 2% |
| GeneratePress | 1 | 1% |
A page builder is neither good nor bad for a small business site. It is worth knowing which one you are on, because the builder, not WordPress itself, decides how hard the site is to edit later and how much code each page carries.
Builders tend to write the schema for you. WordPress sites more often show the reviews.
For every platform with at least ten sites, here is how many carry four things a customer or a search engine looks for, from the same homepage reading. Small groups swing a lot, so read the columns as a range, not a ranking.
| Platform | Sites | Business schema | Tap-to-call | FAQ | Reviews shown |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| WordPress (self-hosted) | 130 | 51 of 130 | 107 of 130 | 18 of 130 | 36 of 130 |
| Wix | 30 | 20 of 30 | 21 of 30 | 1 of 30 | 0 of 30 |
| Not identified | 24 | 11 of 24 | 19 of 24 | 4 of 24 | 5 of 24 |
| Duda | 16 | 10 of 16 | 15 of 16 | 1 of 16 | 1 of 16 |
| Squarespace | 11 | 8 of 11 | 8 of 11 | 1 of 11 | 0 of 11 |
| GoDaddy Website Builder | 10 | 4 of 10 | 6 of 10 | 0 of 10 | 0 of 10 |
| All 266 sites | 266 | 123 of 266 | 210 of 266 | 38 of 266 | 53 of 266 |
Two differences are big enough to mean something. Business schema: 20 of 30 Wix sites, 8 of 11 Squarespace and 10 of 16 Duda carry it, against 51 of 130 self-hosted WordPress sites — hosted builders tend to generate it from the business details you enter, while on WordPress someone has to add it. Reviews and FAQs run the other way: 36 of 130 WordPress sites show reviews and 18 of 130 carry an FAQ, against 0 of 30 Wix and 0 of 11 Squarespace sites showing reviews. Part of that is real — review and FAQ plugins are everywhere on WordPress — and part is this method: a builder that draws a review widget by script after the page loads shows one HTML fetch nothing, so the builder counts are floors. Either way, no platform guarantees the basics and none prevents them, which is why the checklist on the roofing page matters more than the logo in the footer.
| Question | Why it matters | What to insist on |
|---|---|---|
| Who owns the domain? | A listing that points to a lapsed domain sends your customers to a stranger. | The domain registered in your name, with your login. |
| Who owns the account? | Agency platforms keep the site inside their system. | Your own account, or a written export and hand-over clause. |
| Can you move it? | WordPress sites move between hosts; hosted builders mostly do not. | Know the exit before the start. |
| Who edits it? | An owner who cannot change a phone number waits on someone else. | A builder or editor you can use yourself. |
| What is on the first screen? | That is what the customer sees; the platform is invisible to them. | Phone, service area, licence, reviews, a way to ask for a quote. |
The sites. Brave Search API local results for seven trades in eight West Michigan towns, read 23 September 2026; homepages fetched with curl the same day; parked, blank, placeholder and taken-over domains excluded. Platform per site, with the matching line of code: ops/search/measurements/local-sweep/platforms-2026-09-23.json; signals per site: <trade>-west-michigan-2026-09-23.json. Business names stay in those files; this page publishes totals only.
Page one. Brave Search web results for “best website builder for contractors”, read 23 September 2026: builders’ own pages and “best builders” lists, one forum thread, none measuring a local market.
Our own terms. The service pages of this site as published: Starter Site from $999.
WordPress. Of 266 West Michigan trade websites read on 23 September 2026, 130 (49%) run self-hosted WordPress, 82 use a hosted builder such as Wix (30), Duda (16) or Squarespace (11), 11 sit on a marketing agency’s platform and 9 are custom builds.
The one whose account and domain you own, that you can edit yourself, and that lets you put your phone number, service area, licence and reviews on the first screen. In the 23 September 2026 reading, hosted builders carried business schema more often than WordPress and WordPress sites more often showed reviews, but no platform guaranteed the basics and none prevented them.
Both run working trade sites in West Michigan: 130 of 266 read on 23 September 2026 run WordPress and 30 run Wix. WordPress moves between hosts and has more builders to choose from; Wix is simpler to run and harder to leave. Decide on ownership, editing and exit, not on the logo.
Send me your website. I'll tell you the platform, who holds the domain and account as far as the public record shows, and what it would take to move it if you ever needed to.
Works whether or not you end up working with me.