When I first started developing websites, I started where most people start — Squarespace. It’s the one I saw everywhere on the Subway on my commutes to and from class. I really fell in love with the idea of website development and content writing at this stage, it showed me the entrance to a world that I can combine by creative side and my CS degree (or so I thought going into Squarespace). I won’t lie, Squarespace did teach me an insane amount about website development. Very quickly, I realized the major problem(s) with Squarespace sites — cookie-cutter slow loading websites. So I started my journey to find better technology for making websites, and to even make the process easier. By the end of this, you will why speed isn’t just a developer’s obsession, its a catalyst to your business’ earnings.
The honest truth about WordPress, Squarespace, and plain HTML
Squarespace is one of the easiest, and most beautiful website creation platforms. It was the perfect stepping stone into the web design world. I still use it on some client sites, for those who insist on it. It’s easier to maintain than WordPress and more secure if you’re a novice. For someone who just wants to get off the ground, I will always recommend Squarespace.
The problems with Squarespace began when you begin to want some custom solutions for your site. The whole business model of Squarespace is that you’re basically just renting your site. They load a lot of javascript on your initial load, and that leads to mediocre speeds by default.
After Squarespace, I transitioned my job’s website to WordPress. It was extremely powerful, for the time being. The learning curve wasn’t too difficult and the editor was something I’ve been familiar. The many plugins definitely made the transition that much easier.
And that’s where the problems began. Plugins, the bane of any WordPress site. While they’re extremely powerful and you are only limited by the plugins you use, they are also a lot of bloat that you load into your website. Not to mention, one faulty plugin will basically break your website until you can pinpoint the issue. It’s a more involved process than using Squarespace to manage a website for sure.
For my personal projects, I used HTML/CSS/JS to develop my websites. It was blazing fast, but it’s not exactly practical for when you build websites for clients. Plus, there’s so many other frameworks I can use to build a more complex apps for clients that would be an easier workflow for them.
Each of these methods of developing a website has taught me a lot. It was a great progression into really learning what makes a ranking website. These platforms even taught me what kind of designs people favor when they want to launch a business or a passion project or anything else for that matter.
How Your Website Speed Affects Everything
Let’s consider some facts:
Besides for e-commerce websites, I always use the following analogy when thinking about websites, “A slow website is like a store with a door that sticks. Some people push through. Most walk away.” However, in the space of e-commerce websites the website is actually a store. Being able to capture a client’s attention for those websites is of the utmost importance.
Have you ever tried opening a website on your phone and it takes about a million years to load everything? I know I just turn off the app at that point and go and do something else. On mobile, a website loading fast is about the most important thing to capture leads or even just have someone read the contents of your website. At least with desktop, you are primed to do a higher level of thinking even if you’re just scrolling around. You spend more time looking at one thing at a time on desktop than you would on mobile (where scrolling past to new things is the norm).
When I wanted to transition this company’s website from HTML/CSS/JS static pages, I was on the hunt for a new framework that would produce load speeds of under 3 seconds on every build. Speed was the ultimate goal. I also wanted something that would be modular enough and have the ability to connect to a CMS for content editability. I first went down the route of React, as everyone would recommend. React is amazing! But for me, I wanted more granular control over on-page SEO and even faster load speeds.
Thus, I landed on… ASTRO!
What Astro Actually Is And Why It’s Different
Astro is designed to build websites that are just static files. No databases, no servers spinning up everytime someone visits, and most importantly, nothing to hack.
Most frameworks (most of the time called “JavaScript Frameworks”) do exactly that — load JavaScript first, which is detrimental to page load speeds. Astro does exactly the opposite. It is a static website page that loads with zero JavaScript by default.
Building my website on this framework allowed me to get page performance ratings of 97 on Mobile and 100 on Desktop. A true testament to Astro’s performance in the real world. You can even run the performance for this website yourself, just to see what I’m talking about.
I also made one distinct decision to make load speeds even faster. I used the Cloudflare CDN to deliver the website to visitors from a server that is nearest to them. As of 2025, at least 20% of all websites in the world use the Cloudflare CDN to deliver their content. I wanted a secure and fast content network to deliver my website.
How Editable Is It Really?
The #1 concern that a business owner would have, especially when they are not a technical person, is “If it’s so custom, am I locked out of my own website?” I can see this being a true train of thought since Squarespace and Wordpress give you full editability from the start. A business owner that doesn’t manage websites or are not technical would be weary of having to hire a developer to maintain their site.
That’s where Sanity.io comes in. It’s basically like a Google Docs that allows you to edit the contents of your website, autosaves the content, and you have control over publishing versions. You also get to log in to your backend with actual secure passkeys or sign-on methods.
With the combined speed of Astro and the granular control over the backend with Sanity.io, website content becomes unstoppable. Matter of fact, this blog is being written and published through our Sanity.io portal right now!
Is Astro Right For You?
I’ll be straight with you: no.
If you're running a large e-commerce store with thousands of SKUs and dynamic inventory, you probably need a different solution. If you're building a complex web app, Astro isn't the right tool either.
But if you're a local service business, a professional, a studio, a restaurant, a school, or really any small business where your website's job is to make a great first impression and show up on Google, Astro is probably the best thing you're not using yet.
Want To Know Where Your Site Stands?
I run free PageSpeed audits for local businesses. I'll pull your score, show you exactly what's slowing you down, and tell you whether it's worth fixing or rebuilding. No pitch, no obligation, just useful information.
If that sounds useful, reach out here. I'll get back to you within a couple days.