I'm a paying customer for both Kajabi and Webflow.
Recently I was asked by a student of mine, "What's the best platform for me to build my website, landing, and sales pages with?".
Because I use both platforms...
...I want to share with you my honest opinion and experience about each tool, and what the best option is for creating website pages.
Let's discuss:
Which One Is Cheaper In The Long Run?
Both platforms are engineered for different purposes.
The way I see it is that Webflow is for building websites and Kajabi is for selling digital products.
Because they're different services the prices can't be compared, otherwise it's like comparing a screwdriver to a spanner.
The cheaper option is Webflow, because you can start at $12/month:
And Kajabi starts at $119 a month:
But what you're getting is different; they're not the same services.
So I'd like to shift the focus onto the features and forget the price for now.
What Platform Is Easier To Use?
Both platforms have a learning curve to them, with one being much easier than the other.
Let's get into the specifics:
Interface & Usability
Both platforms offer a visual builder: you see your website being built in real time in front of you.
Let's start with Kajabi.
Kajabi is a simple interface with a drag-and-drop page building system. It's pretty basic at it's core but offers enough features for anyone who is happy to setup a basic page.
You can see Kajabi's designer below:
Kajabi doesn't allow you to edit the actual page, instead you make changes in the left side bar
You can see in the image above you would edit the text for my heading "Learn the skills to build..." there. Personally I find this very slow as you have to keep navigating between different sections and tabs to find the setting you want to adjust.
With Webflow, you edit directly on your page instead.
This is Webflow's Designer interface:
Here's a video showing you what it's like editing a page inside of Webflow:
Webflow's interface is a lot more overwhelming at first glance but once you've played around it's far more user friendly and easy to navigate.
Webflow also has extra features that are very helpful such as:
- Instant live preview: instantly see what your website looks like without having to publish it, where as on Kajabi you need to publish and visit the URL to see a 'real' live version
- Page navigation menu: select different pages to edit compared to Kajabi where you need to go into the backend and select the page you want to edit)
User Guides & Tutorials
Kajabi and Webflow both offer support and tutorials to ensure their customers are set up for success.
Both companies host a free online 'University', which includes video tutorials and courses you can join.
Here's an example of a course for Kajabi:
Here's an example of a course in Webflow:
Each lesson always has a link to a more in-depth article too inside of their Lesson Library:
Both are overall fantastic for anyone who isn't great with tech and needs hand holding.
I do give extra points here for Webflow's presentation of lessons, it's quite excellent.
Take this video as an example:
What Platform Has More Customization (Design Flexibility & Features)?
Webflow win's this category by a landslide.
The biggest problem is that Kajabi limits you when it comes to creating specific layouts and designs you want.
Webflow allows you to create any page and design it exactly the way you want it to, all without restrictions, theme limitations, or needing third party tools.
Having Design Flexibility is very important for any serious entrepreneur who wants to stand out and add more trust and credibility to their web pages.
Design flexibility: the ability to create anything without restrictions or roadblocks that limit you.
By being able to design your website with complete freedom, you never run into the frustrations of not being able to make your website look the way you want it, or not being able to place an element exactly in a specific spot.
Kajabi unfortunately, doesn't allow you to have complete design freedom.
Yes you can create a website page and choose what goes where. However, when it comes to customizing that design you're greatly limited.
With Kajabi an element is all ready pre-designed when you add it to your page.
For example, this is the 'Hero with Form' when added to your page:
You can only change some basic styling elements such as the background color, but can't change the spacing between text and so forth.
You can't even change your button font size without going into custom coding in the theme template files.
Whereas, Webflow allows you to create any layout and have full control over the design.
For example, if you wanted to create a hero section which includes a testimonial, and big button without writing a line of code, you can do that:
If you wanted to create this inside of Kajabi... there's no way of easily doing so without getting into custom coding — this can be a nightmare, slow, and run the risk of breaking the look of your site.
Kajabi puts you in this position of being stuck with their 'template' layout, which you have a small amount of customization options with.
Webflow gives you full freedom to design your web pages exactly the way you want them, which should be optimized for your audience and conversions.
Is There a Difference In Hosting Or Domain Connection?
Both Kajabi and Webflow allow you to host your website directly with them (no need for external companies to be involved).
They also allow you to use your own domain with them, for example I use learn.aaronward.com for my Kajabi website (where I sell and host my online courses) and aaronward.com for my main website, blog, landing, and sales pages.
There are no restrictions when it comes to doing either or with each platform.
The only difference is that with Kajabi you instantly get hosting and the option to connect your custom domain, as it's included with your monthly fee.
Webflow instead allows you to create your website for free and gives you a webflow.io domain for that period (for example www.aaron-ward-website.webflow.io).
When the time is right you can purchase a Webflow hosting plan which will give you the option to connect to your domain.
Does One Company Have Better Support?
I'm an active customer for both platforms, and I can't praise the support of both companies enough.
They both go above and beyond to ensure you're setup for success from day one, and have any issues that come up resolved quickly and easily.
There is no winner in my eyes, because they're both great.
But let's quickly cover them:
Email Support
Both platforms offer email support: it's quick, friendly, and helpful.
There's not much more to say.
Live Chat
Webflow doesn't have live chat at this time (sad face).
Kajabi however does offer live chat support for it's customers, which can be very helpful for those more technical tasks or any issues.
Community Forums/Group
Both Kajabi and Webflow offer a community platform to connect with others and employees at the companies.
Kajabi offers a Facebook Group and Webflow has their own forums where you can ask questions on both and get support.
Are There Any Must Know Restrictions?
There are not too many restrictions I haven't covered already.
To highlight the biggest restriction, it's the limited design customization that Kajabi offers compared to Webflow.
However, Kajabi includes Wistia to host your videos, which are free of any advertisements (vs YouTube) and you can control what is shown on the player.
Here's an example of what the Wistia player looks like:
This Wistia video subscription comes 'free' with your Kajabi account.
With Webflow you can still upload videos, however you are limited to either embedding a YouTube or Vimeo link, or you can upload a small video of 30MB which can only be used as a background video.
You may be asking "Kajabi lets you sell products, can Webflow also handle selling products?".
The answer is yes, Webflow has an eCommerce plan that lets you sell both physical and digital products.
Otherwise there's nothing else I can think of in terms of restrictions.
Do They Both Offer SEO Support?
Kajabi and Webflow both include options to optimize your pages for ranking in search engines like Google.
Webflow is better though, because you can build pages exactly the way you want them (optimized for SEO).
Firstly because you don't get code bloating. This is when you use a theme that has unnecessary or extra code for elements that you never use, resulting in a slower loading side.
While Kajabi is still fast at loading pages, it's nice knowing with Webflow that your pages are not being handicapped due to extra 'site weight'.
This is why I only use Kajabi for hosting my online courses for my customers, because they don't need to be ranking in the search results like my sales pages hosted on my Webflow site.
Both platforms do however give you choice over your SEO settings, such as page title, meta, slug, alt text for images, heading tags, and more.
The Final Verdict: Kajabi VS Webflow, What's The Better Platform?
"At the end of the day, no one wants to spend more time or have more frustrations then they have to when building website pages".
My personal — and professional — opinion is to use Webflow if you want a seamless experience building websites and pages.
Webflow will take a bit more time to learn, but in the long run it's the best option and tool to be using (if you're on WordPress currently, consider making the switch!)
If you're still on the fence, do you think having a more professional, unique, and on-brand website is better for lead generation and sales?
My answer is "Yes" and hopefully yours is too.
You can click here to create your free Webflow account and give it a test run (it's free so there's nothing to loose).
How I Use Kajabi & Webflow Together
Because I use both Kajabi and Webflow you might be wondering "why both?".
Here's why:
I use Webflow for creating all my important website pages. Pages such as my blog, home, about, contact, coaching, landing, and products are all built inside of Webflow and hosted on my aaronward.com domain.
Kajabi is used for managing my digital training products: the checkout page, creating customer accounts, and hosting my online courses over at learn.aaronward.com.
Therefore, on any page where I'm offering a free training or paid product, I simply link my buttons to my Kajabi checkout page URL's.
Both platforms have their purpose and both do an incredible job at serving it.
However the winner for creating website pages is Webflow.