Squarespace's Basic Plan Has a 2% Transaction Fee (Wix Doesn't)

Squarespace Charges 2% Per Sale on Its Basic Plan

<cite index="12-2,12-17">Squarespace charges 2-3% transaction fees on its Basic plan, while Wix charges 0% transaction fees on all paid plans.</cite> I see a lot of small business owners look at Squarespace's $19 per month Basic plan and think they found a deal. Then six months later they realize the real cost was buried in the fine print.

If you sell $5,000 a month through your site, <cite index="12-18">Squarespace's Basic plan would cost an additional $100-$150/month in transaction fees alone.</cite> That turns a $19 plan into a $119 to $169 plan, and you didn't get a single extra feature for that money.

The pattern is clear: cheap monthly pricing with fees that scale as you grow. The more you sell, the more you pay. <cite index="12-19">To eliminate those fees on Squarespace, you need the Core plan at $23/month or higher.</cite> At that point you might as well compare the real cost of renting a site forever versus owning one outright.

Photo by Towfiqu barbhuiya on Unsplash

Why Template Platforms Use Transaction Fees

Transaction fees are how platforms make money when you make money. It sounds fair until you realize you're paying them for using your own website. If I charge $1,499 to build a custom site, you own it. There's no monthly rent, no transaction fee, no escalating cost as your business grows. You keep 100% of your revenue.

Wix figured out that charging 0% transaction fees wins customers. <cite index="12-2">Squarespace still charges 2-3% on its Basic plan.</cite> <cite index="14-12,14-13">The 2% transaction fee on Basic sounds small, but it adds up quickly if you make regular sales, and Core is the safer choice because it removes that fee.</cite>

The hidden cost compounds. You're already paying for the platform, the domain renewal, email marketing add-ons, and now a slice of every sale. None of that builds equity. When you stop paying, you lose the site, the URL, the customer data, everything.

What You Actually Own When You Rent a Site

Nothing. You own nothing. Squarespace owns the code. They own the hosting. <cite index="17-2">If your 2026 renewal looks higher than expected, it's most likely because your account has finally caught up with plan restructuring, or because add-ons like domain registration and Google Workspace email are stacking on top of your base plan.</cite> Every year the price can shift. <cite index="15-1">Some users on legacy promotional pricing are seeing effective increases of 50% or more when their renewal hits, because they're absorbing both a price hike and the plan restructuring Squarespace quietly rolled out in 2025.</cite>

You can't take your site with you. You can't move it to another host. If you decide to leave, you rebuild from scratch. Every review you earned, every blog post you wrote, every product you loaded, all of it locked behind a platform that can raise prices, add fees, or change the rules whenever it wants.

That's the trade you make with a template platform. Low barrier to entry, high cost of exit.

How Much a Custom Site Actually Costs

I charge $1,499 for most full custom websites. Focused builds start at $999. Most go live in days. No monthly fee. No transaction cut. You own the domain, the code, the hosting login, everything. If you want to move it, you can. If you want to hire someone else to maintain it, you can. If you want to shut it down, you can do that too.

Let's compare real costs. Squarespace Basic at $19 per month with a 2% transaction fee on $5,000 in monthly sales costs you $1,428 the first year (12 × $19 = $228, plus 12 × $100 = $1,200 in fees). The second year, another $1,428. By year three you've paid $4,284 and you still own nothing.

A $1,499 custom site with $120/year hosting costs you $1,619 the first year, $120 the second, $120 the third. After three years you've spent $1,859 and you own everything. You saved $2,425, you kept 100% of your revenue, and you're not locked into a platform that can change the deal.

The math only gets worse as you grow. The custom site saves you more money every year. The Squarespace site costs you more.

When Renting Makes Sense and When It Doesn't

If you're testing an idea and you don't know if it'll work, a $19 Squarespace plan might make sense for 90 days. If you're not selling anything and you just need five pages live fast, fine. But if you're serious about the business, if you plan to sell online, if you want to grow past $5,000 a month, renting is expensive and owning is cheaper.

<cite index="17-7">Squarespace is still a solid platform if you value ease of use and professional design, but it's no longer the automatic budget choice for small businesses it once was.</cite> The transaction fees make it one of the more expensive ways to run a small online store, and the lock-in makes it risky if you ever want to leave.

If you've been paying Squarespace for two years and you're tired of seeing that 2% disappear every month, that's exactly the kind of thing I help people fix. Free quote at mausandco.com/start if you want to see what a custom site with no rent and no fees would actually cost you.