If you are here to know about the best free blogging sites in 2020? Then this article is definitely for you.
With the emergence of blogging nowadays, everybody is eager to start a blog in 2020. Blogging has already seen its hype and is still seeing it at present.
What I would like to mention first and foremost is that all the websites listed here are all great tools, but you’ll need to spend at least around $5 to get started as an absolute and sturdy blogger.
So, this article will have all the details about best and free blogging sites.
What is a domain and Web Hosting?
Web domain is the specific address which your website will be known as. There are no two sites with the same domain.
Web Hosting refers to storing your website’s data and content, like videos, photos, and other media online.
#1 WordPress.org (One of the best and free blogging sites)
There are two platforms one is WordPress.org(good and free), and the other is WordPress.com
(NO features plus it is paid!). In this article, I will be discussing only WordPress.org and not WordPress.com.
WordPress claims that 33% of the web is built on WordPress. More bloggers, small businesses, and Fortune 500 companies use WordPress than all other options combined.
As 38% is built on WordPress, I can say only one thing that “It’s huge!”
You definitely would have heard about WordPress at least once in your life as it is completely free.
What is WordPress?
Firstly, WordPress is a free website builder and is only one of the best blogging sites because most of the websites are running due to WordPress.
In 2003, Mike Little and Matt Mullenweg started WordPress built on PHP and MySQL when looking for a personal publishing system. Nowadays, 38% of the websites use WordPress, and the number is increasing day by day. It is the number one choice of scientists, web developers, bloggers, and designers.
Now, as you have seen how it originated, it’s time to explore its features!
Pros of WordPress:
- Good for people who want to create their own websites but don’t know any sort of coding
- WordPress is flexible and malleable. It can be used to make almost any kind of website, and perhaps that is the only reason for its success.
They have a set of free and paid plugins, aka extensions, which you can use to make your website. And the number of plugins accurately is above 55,000, which is huge. And if you don’t find a suitable plugin for the website you are making. You can hire developers to make one for you.
- It will be $20 minus $20i.e., $0 for your website’s CSM
- Has an exclusive feature—Spam blocker.
- Supports SEO plugins of which the most popular and in active use is Yoast SEO
- It has a broad area where you can customize the widgets of your website
- There is literally no limitation as you wouldn’t have a high learning curve
- The UI is best among all other available website builders
Cons of WordPress:
- Not good for techno-savvy people
I must say that although you get WordPress for free, you need a hosting service. Never mind any hosting service charges because there are many hosting out there, which are as cheap as $2 per month. The official hosting recommendation from WordPress goes to Bluehost.
WordPress already comes with many pre-made themes that you can choose and add to your website. The most interesting thing is that they can also be customized, respectively. WordPress has both free and paid themes.
Let’s make this article more interesting by exploring some unbelievable facts about WordPress:
- WordPress nowadays provides more than 75% of the CMS usage, and thus it acts as a dominative point in the CMS industry
- WordPress is licensed around the GPL license, which means you can download it for free, modify its source code(the code upon which WordPress is based on) and distribute it
- They run a wide network of Devs and don’t have any particular CEO as Google has
- WordPress is available in 68 more languages—which gives the idea that devs worked real hard on it
- It offers serious job-opportunities for developers, and it helps them earn their living
- WordPress has official events going around the globe which is popularly known as Wordcamp
- They run something called WordPress Swag, where they sell their merch! Their products range from sunglasses to stickers, from hoodies to phone pop-sockets, they also sell t-shirts, caps, and pins. They even provide discounts for bulk orders. All you need to do is mail them about your bulk order.
My thoughts on WordPress:
WordPress, of course, is a good choice for you, for the following things:
- You want to build a website and build traffic and online of it
- You need a professional look without spending big $$$
- As WordPress is so popular, you will find almost every other plugin required for your needs, such as lead generation, secure payment gateway, SEO, or email marketing e.t.c.
- You are your website’s boss. You can choose your practices to build a loyal audience and not depend on other practices.
- WordPress is also flexible-because, unlike other platforms, you can do it yourself and make any website out of it using its wide variety of features.
So, shall you use WordPress?
Hell yeah! But no, if you have no experience with technology.
#2 Blogger
Blogger is one of the first blogging sites which has been found. Blogger, when founded, was known as BlogSpot. It is only for bloggers who are looking to build an audience and have fun.
But Blogger has been depreciating most bloggers because it doesn’t offer a huge pack of features.
Pros of Blogger:
- Easy to set up. You just need to sign up, pick a theme, and ta-dah! You are ready to start.
- Simplistic and minimalistic interface, and it is what defines bloggers. Even a person with no experience in blogging may start a blog with a blogger.
Cons of Blogger:
- No such heavy features like WordPress, which makes it outdated
- Bad customer service
- No way to get a large amount of audience as you would have using WordPress.
To monetize, Blogger is easy but to earn after the monetization process; it is hard. Because when people nowadays think of Blogger, they think that it is outdated. Ultimately they don’t enter your site!
There is also much-outdated content present on Blogger, which contributes to the depreciation of its previous beauty.
My thoughts on Blogger:
- You can use it for a very little amount of money
- It’s good because you don’t have to pay to get started
- It will be hard to change from Blogger to WordPress in the future, so you must take a careful move.
Shall you use Blogger?
Well, it’s up to you. You may want to start on it because it doesn’t have a pack of features but it is easy to start.
#3 Medium
Medium was published in 2012 by Evan Williams, and it is growing ever since.
Pros of Medium:
- You will build a loyal audience base; actually, they already have an audience pre-made for you
- You will be distraction-free as there will be no hassle for you to design your website
- If an editor picks up your content, then it will get high exposure and a large number of visits
Cons of Medium:
- The audience is not truly yours
- The people who are looking for content can easily get distracted because there are many other people’s content too
Medium has a system for allowing only a few visits to an account for free after that, the person viewing Medium has to subscribe to a paid plan. But as the content is not editorially picked. I don’t think many people pay and use it. So, it is both a pro and a con for Medium.
My thoughts on Medium:
- Good for people who want to start a blog immediately
- Good for people with no prior experience
- Go, get started now!
Shall you use Medium:
Yes. Period.
#4 Tumblr
Tumblr will be your perfect pick if you write content that is mostly centered around images and videos because Tumblr themselves recommend publishing content that is not text-oriented.
Since its start in 2007, it has also gained huge prominence. It is an absolute free blogging website.
What you will publish in Tumblr will be called “Tumblelog” as they call it. The posts are generally short. It is more like a social media rather than an actual blogging platform.
Pros of Tumblr:
- It is very easy to publish content on Tumblr as you would need only around 10-11 minutes to publish your content. The interface is quite minimalistic, and after adding all textual content and the visualized content, what you will need to do is just kick that publishes button. Your post is live now!
- You can interact with fellow bloggers, which is a good thing because many bloggers feel lonely working from home.
- You can make money with affiliate marketing, and Tumblr has no problem with that
- Good for personal bloggers
Cons of Tumblr:
- It takes time to get followers
- Text-based content is not valued as visualized content
- Not good for long-form articles and posts
- It represents somewhat a social media site like twitter, but it has a little more long content.
My thoughts on Tumblr:
- You can get started easily
- Beginner-friendly. Yes, it has literally no learning curve as the interface is way simplistic.
- It allows monetization. So, it’s good.
Shall I use Tumblr?
If you are looking to get started instantly and your content is not textual-based, you should definitely need to check out Tumblr. On the other hand, if you plan to use it for your business or brand promotion online, it will be an exceptional failure for sure.
It is not one of the best free blogging sites for businesses but perfect for personal use.
#5 Weebly
Weebly is a free website and e-commerce service, which helps people with creative ideas and mindsets to make their thoughts into reality.
Weebly was started in the year of 2007, and they have their headquarters in San Francisco. Square acquired Weebly in 2018.
Pros of Weebly:
- Easy to use for non-techno savvy people
- It is best when used to display a portfolio or sell products of your brand online
- Awesome themes to use for building a good website and engaging readers
- The collaboration of many people can be done on Weebly, which is a plus point being added to its features list
- Awesome for starting an e-commerce site
Cons of Weebly:
- Not extremely flexible. Yes, it’s true. As you would have customized heavily with WordPress, it does not seem like you will be able to do that with Weebly.
- Weebly blocks traffic. Yes. Russia and Ukraine can’t view your website. So if you are planning to center your blog around those regions, you need to change your mind.
Weebly currently is powering more than 50 million blogging sites around the globe for free.
My thoughts on Weebly:
- Everything is good and bad equally on Weebly. Additionally, their design section is quite limited and will disappoint designers.
- If your website is based around photos and videos, you may want to quit Weebly as the editor is a real obstruction in this.
Shall I use Weebly?
Obviously, yes, because practical use will get you a greater insight than my theoretical approach of breaking.
#6 Ghost
Ghost is always described as a free blogging platform, which is a simpler alternative to WordPress. It was founded in 2003 as a platform focused in and around professional publishing. But of course, Ghost has seen an upshot in the number of visitors.
Their financial data is also displayed on their website as they claim to be a free blogging website. They focus on bringing a revolution and prominence in online media and journalism. They have their website in Singapore, but they have a team all over the world.
Pros of Ghost:
- Has many plugins
- Its interface is similar if we compare to Medium
- It is lightweight
Cons of Ghost:
- Steep learning curve. It takes real-time to learn the full functionality of the website
- The set-up is somewhat complicated
My thoughts on Ghost:
- Yes, it is worth checking out as a blogger. Because it is extremely similar to WordPress CMS just with a minimalist approach
Shall I use Ghost?
Yes and no like every time…
It depends upon your needs, and as long as you don’t try it yourself. You are not likely to see any change.
My Final Thoughts
It’s really tough to choose free sites or platforms to begin blogging on as there are so many to choose from.
I always say this to everyone and will say it to you also that our brain is the best tool that will help us in our blogging journey. No matter how expensive or free plan you choose to get started as a blogger, what you need to establish your presence in the blogosphere is to check out a niche, more preferably micro-niche, and then writing quality blogs. Yes. Internet is flooded with tonnes and loads of blogs similar to your blog, and what readers look for while reading is the quality of a blog.
Blogging is now living and breathing with us, and it is yet to see even more growth in the near future. If you are looking for an absolutely free place to start on right now. Then it will be Medium, Tumblr, and Ghost.
Whether you have a business and you want to build your online presence, or you are looking to set up your portfolio, or maybe you offer freelancing jobs. It will be good for you to start a blog in 2020.
I would obviously suggest using WordPress if you are serious about seeing blogging as your career in the future. If you are up to something else, then you can choose the other websites. Start Now, because lost time is never found again.
Thanks for staying with me till the last.
So here’s your reward—lots of best wishes.
