I build every website by hand. No WordPress, no Wix, no Squarespace, no page builders. Just code. People ask me about this a lot, usually with a look that suggests I might be making my life harder than it needs to be.
So here's an honest comparison. I'm not going to pretend WordPress is terrible. It runs over 40% of the internet. But I'm going to explain why I don't use it, why that matters for the businesses I work with, and when WordPress might genuinely be the better option.
what wordpress actually is
WordPress is a content management system. It started as blogging software and evolved into a general-purpose website platform. You install it on a server, pick a theme, add some plugins, and you've got a website. Millions of businesses use it. It works.
The appeal is obvious. You can build a site without writing code. You can edit content through a visual dashboard. There are thousands of themes and plugins for everything from contact forms to booking systems to online shops. For a lot of businesses, especially ones with content teams or regular updates, it makes perfect sense.
the problems nobody mentions
Speed. A typical WordPress site loads 20 to 40 files before the visitor sees anything. The theme loads, the plugins load, jQuery loads, font libraries load, analytics scripts load. A hand-coded site loads what it needs and nothing else. The difference is measurable. Google measures it. Your visitors feel it, especially on phones.
Security. WordPress sites get hacked. A lot. Not because WordPress itself is insecure, but because the plugin ecosystem is a mess. Every plugin you install is code written by someone else, maintained to varying degrees, and potentially full of vulnerabilities. I've seen client sites with 30 plugins installed where half of them haven't been updated in two years. That's 30 open doors. A hand-coded site has no plugins, no database, and no login screen to attack.
Updates. WordPress needs constant maintenance. Core updates, theme updates, plugin updates, PHP version updates. Skip them and you're exposed. Do them and something might break because one plugin isn't compatible with the latest version. It's a treadmill. A hand-coded site doesn't need updating unless you want to change the content.
Bloat. WordPress themes come with features you'll never use. Slider libraries, icon packs, animation frameworks, font stacks. Your site loads all of it whether you need it or not. A hand-coded site contains exactly what your business needs. Nothing more.
A WordPress site is like buying a house with rooms you'll never use. You're still heating them, maintaining them, and paying insurance on them.
what hand-coding gives you
Performance. My sites typically load in under a second. Not because I'm using expensive hosting or a CDN. Because there's less to load. Every line of code exists for a reason. Google rewards fast sites with better rankings. Visitors reward fast sites by actually staying.
Control. When I build a site, I know exactly what every line of code does. If something needs changing, I change it. I don't need to find a plugin that sort of does what you want, configure it, hope it doesn't conflict with another plugin, and then style it to match your theme. I just write the code that does what you need.
Security. No database to inject into. No admin panel to brute-force. No plugins to exploit. The attack surface is essentially zero. Your site is a collection of files that the server sends to the browser. That's it.
Longevity. HTML, CSS and JavaScript have been around for decades and they're not going anywhere. A hand-coded site built today will still work in ten years without touching it. A WordPress site built today will need hundreds of updates in that time, and there's a real chance something in the plugin or theme ecosystem will break along the way.
when wordpress is the right choice
I'm being honest here. WordPress is better if you need to publish content frequently and you want to do it yourself through a dashboard. If you're running a news site, a large blog, or an online shop with hundreds of products, WordPress (or something like it) makes more sense than hand-coding every page.
It's also the right choice if you want to manage your own site and you're not willing to email someone when you need a change. WordPress gives you a login and a visual editor. Hand-coded sites give you a web designer who makes changes for you.
For most small businesses with 5 to 15 pages that change a few times a year, hand-coding is faster, cheaper to maintain, more secure, and produces a better result. That's the market I work in, and it's why I made this choice.
what about the cost?
A hand-coded website from me starts at £499. A WordPress site from an agency typically starts at £1,000 to £3,000, plus ongoing maintenance costs, plugin licences, and hosting that needs to be powerful enough to run WordPress properly.
My fully managed option is £30 a month. That includes hosting, SSL, email forwarding, security and any content changes you need. There's no equivalent in WordPress-land that doesn't involve either paying someone to manage the updates or doing it yourself and hoping nothing breaks.
The ongoing cost of a WordPress site is almost always higher. Most people don't realise that until they're already on it.