Harsh

There's no dearth of web development outsourcing companies. But joining hands with just any agency means you risk losing money, time, website performance and SEO edge. That's exactly why we are here with this article, to ensure you don't pick the wrong agency.

Here, we talk about the top 5 web development outsourcing companies in 2025 and also give you 6 questions you can ask an agency to find out if they are the best one for your brand.

Without further ado, let's begin.

Top 5 Web Development Outsourcing Companies in 2025

We created this list of the top 5 web development outsourcing companies in 2025 after evaluating over 15+ agencies from around the globe based on parameters like the services offered, standout features, reviews and the industries they cater to. Read on to know more about the top 5 web development outsourcing companies you can outsource to in 2025:

TL;DR:

1. ThunderClap

Best for: B2B brands looking for end-to-end WebFlow development support.

ThunderClap is a premium WebFlow web development agency based in India and a recipient of prestigious awards like Webby and CSS awards. The brand has a proven track record of serving B2B brands like Amazon, Storylane, RazorPay, Deductive.ai, Z47 and Shopline. 

They offer end-to-end web design and development services, including strategy, branding, UI/UX design, copywriting, CRO, web development, website migrations and maintenance.

Standout Features of ThunderClap

• Enterprise WebFlow partner: ThunderClap is an enterprise WebFlow partner with a proven track record of managing over 55 enterprise-grade projects. As an enterprise partner, they can access exclusive features and receive training to stay updated on the latest WebFlow best practices and strategies.

• 30-day post-launch support: ThunderClap offers all its clients a 30-day free post-launch support to ensure their websites are optimized for best results. They implement CRO and SEO best practices during this period to boost performance and conversions.

• Founder-led teams: Unlike most web development agencies where junior teams handle projects, ThunderClap follows a founder-led model. Each project is personally managed by a partner, leading to fewer back-and-forths, faster timelines, and better outcomes from day one.

• 24*7 support: ThunderClap offers 24*7 support through Slack to all its customers for timely resolution of issues and bottlenecks. It uses project management tools like Notion and to ensure its clients have transparency about the progress at every point.

• Scalable designs and competitive timelines: As an agency that gives equal importance to aesthetics and functionality, ThunderClap offers scalable designs that can be reused across the website. On top of that, they provide faster turnarounds, between 8 to 12 weeks, for most websites.

Industries catered to: SaaS, VC, B2B services, FinTech, AI

Notable Client Projects:

Storylane: ThunderClap helped Storylane revamp its visual identity to truly reflect its brand maturity and attract more enterprise customers. After the revamp, the brand witnessed a 36% increase in website impressions and a 30% boost in demo requests.

Deductive.ai: ThunderClap collaborated with Deductive.ai, a stealth mode startup founded by two ex-MAANG members, to build a cohesive brand identity. Post revamp, the website received many industry recognitions, and the engagement increased by 10x. 

Z47: Z47 joined hands with ThunderClap after their rebrand from Matrix Partners to fine-tune their positioning to match an Indian audience. The brand saw a 50% increase in website engagement and a 54% increase in active users after the revamp.

Reviews:

"The ThunderClap team is responsive, meets deadlines, and goes beyond expectations - it's a solid partner for any B2B company looking to scale their brand." (Website)

Also read: Outsourcing Web Development: Cost-Benefit Analysis for Startups & Enterprises

2. Beetroot

Best for: Brands looking for a sustainable web development agency to build low-carbon websites.

Beetroot is one of the top 5 web development agencies in Sweden, according to Clutch. It offers various custom web development services like WordPress development, mobile app development, AI/ML data management and UI/UX services. The agency takes a sustainable approach to website development by supporting reforestation initiatives to compensate for unavoidable CO2 emissions.

Standout Features of Beetroot

• Custom web development solutions: Beetroot offers 3 types of web development solutions, dedicated development teams, project-based solutions and tech upskilling workshops. Project-based solutions are great for one-off projects, while dedicated development teams are for brands looking to expand their in-house capabilities.

• HR support for seamless collaboration: Regardless of your chosen plan, the agency offers HR solutions to manage your development team effectively. This means they handle everything from onboarding to payrolls, so you can focus on what matters the most, web development.

• On-demand team scaling: The agency allows you to upscale or downscale your team based on your requirements. This makes it a great option for brands with varied web development needs.

• Competitive timelines: Like ThunderClap, the agency has faster turnarounds, between 2 weeks and 12 weeks, based on the size of the project.

Industries catered to: EdTech, Healthcare, GreenTech, and Ecommerce, and FinTech

Notable Clients:

‍Land Life Company, Normative, Life4me+, Warpin

Reviews:

"What we were looking for and found with Beetroot was close cooperation and proper employees. It's always hard to start up a development team, and it doesn't matter whether it is in Sweden or Ukraine. However, working with Beetroot, we can scale the benefits of someone taking care of all the administrative work, HR functions, or things like renting an office in Kyiv." (Website)

3. Clay

Best for: Premium enterprise brands looking for a branding cum web development agency

Clay is one of the best web development outsourcing companies in the USA that has served over 500+ clients in 14 years. They offer branding and web development services for established enterprise brands and high-growth startups looking to scale.

 Standout Features of Clay

• End-to-end branding solutions: As an end-to-end creative agency, it handles everything from strategy, branding, UI/UX design, content production, website development and maintenance and interactive experiences.

• Futureproof designs: One of the striking things the agency boasts about is its futureproof designs that remain untouched even after 5 years of its launch. This shows that their websites and apps are scalable and well ahead of their times.

• Cofounder-led teams: Like ThunderClap, the projects are founder-led and not managed by junior teams. This means faster strategic decisions and better results in a shorter period with fewer iterations.

• AI-driven design approach: Clay uses AI to streamline workflows and build scalable design systems. In other words, the agency uses AI in every step of the design and development process to collaborate better and drive the best results.

Industries catered to:

‍Fintech, B2B and enterprise brands, Crypto, Web3, E-commerce, Electronics, Startups and VC.

Notable Clients:

‍Slack, Snapchat, Fivverr, Streetbeat and Meta

Reviews:

"Clay functioned as part of our team, helping to crystalize our vision and delivering incredible results in a record time." (Website)

Also read: 5 Common Challenges of Web Development And How Webflow Solves Them

4. Evrone

Best for: Brands with complex website architecture 

Evrone is a custom web development company based in Berlin that has led over 400+ web development projects and won around 150 awards. It offers a full range of web solutions, such as web development, UI/UX design, app development, DevOps, and QA. The brand is a thought leader in the tech industry and regularly contributes to open-source projects.

Standout Features of Evrone

• Updated tech stack: Evron's tech stack includes frontend frameworks like React.js and Vue.js, backend frameworks like Ruby on Rails, Python, Java and PHP and automations like RabbitMQ and GitLabCI. An updated tech stack signals the capability of the brand to build future proof and scalable designs.

• Agile approach: The agency adopts an agile approach to web development, seeking frequent feedback from clients after each development cycle. This ensures faster delivery and great client satisfaction.

• Post-launch support: Like ThunderClap, Evrone offers support after launch to ensure everything is up and running as planned.

Industries catered to:

‍eHealth, EdTech, Fintech, HR-tech, Retail and Video Streaming

Notable Clients:

‍KFC, Gett, CoinTransfer, Mokka and AtomHR

Reviews:

‍"We decided to bring in external specialists for this project and chose Evrone. Their expertise and experience proved invaluable, and we are highly satisfied with the collaboration!" (Website)

5. Baunfire

Best for: Mid-market and enterprise brands looking for web development and marketing solutions

Baunfire is a US-based web development and marketing agency with prestigious awards like Awwards, ADDY and AFF awards under their belt. The services they offer include website design, UI/UX design, website development, marketing collaterals, motion graphics, content management and SEO services.

Standout Features of Baunfire

• Responsive and functional designs: Like ThunderClap, the brand creates stunning designs that are functional and responsive. This means their designs are optimized for mobiles, better UX and higher conversions.

• Seamless collaboration: According to some reviews on Design Rush, the agency is known for its seamless collaboration with its clients with its automated workflows and project management tools. The agency also makes an effort to ensure their design and development work in tandem and not as silos.

Industries catered to:

‍FinTech, Electronics, AI, Cloud Computing, and SaaS

Notable Clients:

‍Google, NetGear, Lumana, Replicant AI, Incorta, and Instabase

Reviews:

‍"Baunfire was able to translate our engineers' technical requirements into an easy-to-use website." (Website)

6 Discovery Questions to Ask Web Development Agencies to Find the One for You

Shortlist at least 3 web development outsourcing companies from the above list and book discovery calls with them. During the discovery call, ask these 6 questions to figure out if an agency is the right match for you.

1. What's your experience working with brands like ours? What kind of results did you help them achieve?

Asking these questions helps you gauge their expertise in handling your specific requirements. Agencies with prior experience working for brands from the same industry are well aware of your industry's trends and best practices.

However, ensure the solutions they offer are unique and not cookie-cutter ones. One way to do this is to ask them to share at least 3 examples.

2. What does your tech stack look like?

A web development agency's tech stack is a mirror of the kind of websites they build. An updated tech signals their ability to build scalable, futureproof designs in competitive timelines.

3. Who will be the main point of contact for this project?

Dedicated project managers are a must-have for web development projects to avoid unwanted back-and-forths and reduce completion time. While having direct access to the designers may feel like a perk, it can sometimes become an extra bottleneck especially when they lack the full picture. A project manager ensures smoother coordination, faster decisions, and better use of everyone's time.

4. Are you competent enough to handle scope expansion or tighter deadlines?

The agency you choose should be agile enough to handle scope expansion like additional webpages, marketing collaterals or features (in case of apps) or tighter deadlines without compromising quality. However, consider it a red flag if they are okay with unrealistic demands like cutting turnaround time to a third.

5. Who owns the assets after the website handoff?

​​Ideally, you should be the sole owner of all assets after the website handoff to ensure you can scale without being dependent on a particular agency in the future. At ThunderClap, we provide clients full ownership and intellectual property rights after the handoff.

6. How do you charge for tweaks and iterations after launch?

This gives you an idea of their post-launch support and maintenance plans. Agencies like ThunderClap offer a 30-day free post-launch support to ensure the websites deliver the desired results.

Final Thoughts

Now that you are armed with the right questions, what are you waiting for? Start booking discovery calls with the best web development agencies from the lot. And if ThunderClap is one of them, book a discovery call right away! Our discovery calls are super detailed and we walk you through all these questions and much more even before you ask. See you on the other side!

FAQs

1. How much does it cost to pay someone to build a website?

There's no one-size-fits-all pricing for web development. The pricing depends on a lot of factors, like the extra services you need, the website builder tool you use, and the number of web pages involved. However, if you are looking to build a no-code website on WebFlow, it usually starts from $5000.

2. Can you outsource web development?

Yes, you can outsource web development to web development agencies. These agencies let you hire a team of developers to work for you or handle the project end-to-end. Outsourcing helps teams cut hiring costs and bank on the expertise and skillset of web developers with experience working for brands like yours.

3. How to find the best web development agency for your brand?

To find the best web development agency that best suits your needs, follow these steps:

1. Go to Clutch or DesignRush to find the best-ranking web development agencies in your desired location.

2. Compare them against parameters like core services, portfolio, reviews, industries they cater to and standout gestures.

3. Shortlist the best ones and book discovery calls. During the discovery call, ask them detailed questions about their expertise, working style, development philosophy, handoff and maintenance policies.

4. Finalize the one that best matches your needs and budget.

4. How to outsource web development?

To outsource web development, start by defining your requirements, including the services you need, timeline, and budget. Next, look for an agency that aligns with your goals and has relevant industry experience. While evaluating agencies, pay close attention to their project management approach, communication style, and post-launch support to ensure a seamless collaboration.

5. Why outsource web development?

Outsourcing web development helps you cut down costs, leverage the agency’s industry expertise, and fast-track project completion. It’s also a great option for companies with varied web development needs, as it allows you to scale or downscale your team without hiring.

WebFlow integrations are essential to get the best out of your websites and maximize conversions. But with countless integrations in the market, resembling peas in a pod, it is not easy to find the right ones for your business.

As one of the premium WebFlow web development agencies that has spent knee-deep in client projects, we have tested more tools than we care to admit. And a few have earned a permanent spot in our workflow. 

In this blog, we share this list of the top 7 Webflow integrations to supercharge your website's performance and conversions. But before we begin, let's get to the basics.

What are WebFlow Integrations?

WebFlow integrations are third-party tools you can connect your websites with to improve their performance, user experience and conversions. These tools enhance the capabilities of WebFlow websites by priming them for specific functions like generating leads, handling payments and managing workflows. You can integrate them through API or tools like Zapier.

What are the Benefits of WebFlow Integrations?

Here are the top 3 reasons why you should use WebFlow integrations:

1. To automate workflows

With WebFlow integrations, you can automate repetitive tasks involved in sales and marketing and focus on revenue-generating activities. For instance, lead management integrations let you automate every step of the conversion process from the moment a visitor lands on your website. This includes syncing contact data with CRMs, triggering Slack alerts for new leads and sending follow-up emails.

2. To scale your websites

WebFlow integrations are perfect for increasing the capabilities of your websites as your business grows without rebuilding them from scratch. It is an easier and cost-effective alternative to hiring developers to make your websites more enhanced. For instance, to automate the workflow in your websites, you can integrate Zapier instead of hiring backend developers to do it.

3. To improve user experience and conversions

By integrating the right set of tools for workflow automation, behavior analytics, payments and lead capture, you can make your websites more advanced without sacrificing speed. This leads to a faster website that delivers a smooth user experience, driving conversions and reducing bounce rates.

Top 7 Webflow Integrations to Supercharge Your Website's Performance and Conversions

Here are the top 7 WebFlow integrations the ThunderClap team swears by. Add these integrations to your WebFlow websites to ensure a seamless user experience and higher conversions.

1. Hubspot 

Best For: Small, mid-market and enterprise-level brands looking to streamline lead and customer management.

Integration Difficulty Level: Hard

Hubspot is a CRM that offers a suite of tools and integrations for marketing, sales and customer service teams to function together. This means that by adding the Hubspot-WebFlow integration to your website, you can automate lead management and streamline your customer support.

For simple websites, the integration can be added through a tracking code. For more complex enterprise websites, you should either use a third-party tool like Zapier or natively integrate them via API.

Here are some Hubspot features and how they help you:

Hubspot Forms: Lets you add personalized forms with custom fields to websites for lead data collection. This data is then automatically added to your CRM to avoid duplicate entries and maintain a centralized lead database.

Lead Notifications: Alerts you through email or Slack whenever a new lead signs up. This helps your sales team take prompt action at the right time.

Behavioral Analytics: Tracks how users engage with your websites and gives you clarity on what's working and what's hurting user experience.

Lead Nurturing and Engagement: Lets you set up workflows to send personalized emails and follow-ups to leads based on their interaction and intent.

Customer Feedback: Offers a range of tools like NPS and surveys to collect user feedback and optimize your website for performance and conversions.

Shared Inbox: Has a centralized space to manage customer emails, support tickets and queries. This helps your customer success team collaborate better and offer prompt service.

2. Zapier

Best For: Small, mid-market and enterprise brands looking for ways to automate WebFlow tasks.

Integration Difficulty Level: Easy

Zapier is a no-code web automation tool that lets you connect your websites with over 1000s of third-party tools. It enables you to set up automated workflows called 'Zaps' by integrating two or more tools via WebFlow's API.

Integrating Zapier to a WebFlow website is easy and doesn't require much technical knowledge. However, you might need some technical know-how to set up Zaps with multiple steps and tools.

Here are some of the essential Zaps you can set up on your website using the Zapier-WebFlow integration:

WebFlow + LinkedIn Conversations: With this zap, a conversion event is sent to LinkedIn ads manager every time a lead gets captured through WebFlow forms. The ads manager uses this intel to optimize ad delivery, improving your chances of conversions.

WebFlow Forms + WebFlow CMS: With this zap, every form submission is automatically published as a new item on the website. This is a great option for review submission forms as each new review gets added as a new post to the review collections in real time.

Google Sheets + WebFlow CMS: Whenever a new row is added to a specific Google Sheet, its contents are automatically published to the assigned collections page. For instance, when you update a sheet with blog titles and content, it's published to your WebFlow blog collection.

Airtable + WebFlow CMS: Similar to the Google Sheets + WebFlow CMS zap, this automation tracks your Airtable bases and publishes content from new records directly to specified WebFlow collections.

3. Google Analytics

Best For: Small, mid-market and enterprise brands wanting to improve website conversions and user experience.

Integration Difficulty Level: Easy

Google Analytics (GA) is a free tool for tracking website engagement and priming your websites for better user experience and conversions. Integrating it into your WebFlow website lets you gain insights like the best-performing content, average time spent, and user drop-off points. With this data, you can double down on what works and fix issues that hurt conversions.

WebFlow's built-in GA integration is best for simple websites that only require basic analytics like page views and traffic sources. 

If you want to track custom events like the number of clicks or form submissions, integrate GA by pasting Google Tag Manager code into WebFlow's custom code field. For enterprise websites needing full control over the GA, you can add the GA tracking script in the same field.

Here are some GA features and how they help you:

Traffic Monitoring: Gives you information about the traffic sources of website visitors.

Session Duration Tracking: Tracks how long a user stays on your website to gauge their conversion potential and uncover any friction affecting user experience.

Real-Time Analytics: To track live interaction during marketing campaigns or product launches.

Behavior Flow Visualization: Gives you a visual map of how users interact with your website to help you identify drop-off points.

Custom Event Tracking: To track specific interactions users make on the website, such as video plays, scrolls, file downloads, etc.

4. Intercom

Best For: Small, mid-market and enterprise brands looking for ways to enhance customer support.

Integration Difficulty Level: Moderate

Intercom is one of the good webflow integrations. It is a customer messaging platform offering various tools to help customer success teams deliver faster, reliable and personalized support. With the Intercom-WebFlow integration, you can qualify prospects with bots and manage customer queries from multiple channels in a unified inbox.

Intercom doesn't natively integrate with WebFlow and you'll need to use third-party tools like Zapier or Relay.app.

Here are some Intercom features and how they help you:

Fin AI Agent: Takes the load off your customer success team by answering FAQs for prospects. This gives more time for the team to focus on critical issues that require prompt action.

Omni-channel Support: Lets you manage queries from multiple channels like emails, phone, chat or SMS from your website.

Fin Copilot: Acts like a personal assistant to your agents by offering them instant advice on resolving customer queries. It also helps fast track agent training by providing training materials and past agent conversations.

AI Insights and Reporting: Helps customer success managers monitor and grade agent performance holistically and individually. It also helps you identify the most common topics and peak activity periods to better prepare.

Workflows: To automate tasks included in the customer success workflow like routing, closing or snoozing conversations.

5. Calendly

Best For: Small, mid-market and enterprise brands looking for ways to increase the number of meetings booked through websites. 

Integration Difficulty Level: Easy

Calendly is a meeting scheduler that lets prospects book meetings with you directly from your WebFlow website, based on your availability. Adding the Calendly-WebFlow integration lets you skip the need for back-and-forth scheduling emails, increasing the chances of getting more meetings from high-intent leads.

You can embed Calendly in WebFlow as a direct link, inline embed, popup widget or text.  In addition, you can embed it through Zapier if you want to build Calendly-based workflows. Inline embeds and popup widgets are best for landing and pricing pages, while popup texts are ideal for blog posts and case studies.

Here are some Calendly features and how they help you:

Round-Robin Scheduling: Ensures all reps have an equal number of meetings by reassigning bookings based on individual availability. This helps reduce response times, helping you engage with prospects and customers at the right time.

Custom Branding: Lets you customize the calendar to match the look and feel of your website. This makes the website appear more credible and reduces friction associated with booking meetings.

Time Zone Detection: Detects time zones of your prospects and adjusts your availability accordingly to avoid time zone errors.

Event Types: Lets you set different types of meetings with varied durations and agendas. This means you can set up 1:1 and group meetings with multiple attendees based on your needs.

Custom Forms: Allows you to add custom forms to the meeting scheduler to collect specific information from your prospects.

6. Typeform

Best For: Small, mid-market and enterprise brands looking for ways to collect website user feedback seamlessly.

Integration Difficulty Level: Easy

Typeform is a user feedback tool that lets you add interactive, personalized forms, surveys and quizzes to your websites. Adding it to your WebFlow websites helps you collect user feedback without affecting the user experience.

WebFlow offers a Typeform plugin with its CMS and enterprise plans but comes with basic features. For advanced features and setting up workflows, you can integrate it directly via embed codes or Zapier.

Here are some Typeform features and how they help you:

AI Form Translator: Translates forms into over 25 languages to cater to a global audience.

AI Brand Kit: Helps you customize your forms to match your brand's colors, logos and typography. This helps your forms or pop ups appear like an extension of your website, improving user experience. 

Real-time Notifications: Notifies you via Slack or email whenever someone submits a form. This helps your team take prompt action based on the responses.

Clarify with AI: Helps you gain clarity on open-ended responses from users through tailored and specific follow-ups.

Real-time Analytics and Live Dashboard: Tracks the conversion rates of forms in real-time so you can optimize them for better performance.

Embedded Forms: Offers multiple placement options like inline, popups or slide-in to match the website layout and avoid friction.

7. Paypal

Best For: Small, mid-market and enterprise e-commerce brands looking for secure ways to accept payments on their websites.

Integration Difficulty Level: Moderate

Paypal is an intermediary payment platform that lets you make global transactions without the help of a traditional merchant account. Adding Paypal integration to WebFlow websites builds their credibility owing to the advanced security features it offers, such as seller and buyer protection and SSL encryption.

The easiest way to integrate Paypal to your website is using the Paypal Pay button. However, if you want to control the payment experience, integrating it via WebFlow CMS or API is a great option. For setting up automations, you can embed it via Zapier. 

Here are some Paypal features and how they help you:

Multi-currency Support: Supports over 100 currencies, allowing you to conduct global transactions in a hassle-free manner.

Recurring Bills: Lets you set up recurring payments to ensure continuous billing without any hiccups.

Fraud Protection: Offers seller and buyer protection to safeguard them from risks involved in global transactions like chargebacks or currency exchange fluctuations.

Reporting and Analytics: Gives insights on cash flow and trends so you can make informed marketing and sales decisions.

Buy Now, Pay Later Options: Lets clients purchase from you without the pressure of paying the full amount upfront. This is a great option for enterprise clients looking for flexible ways to buy high-value products.

Closing Thoughts

Choosing the right set of tools impacts your website performance and conversion. Use our list as a guiding star to choose the best WebFlow integrations that match your needs. And if you are looking for a WebFlow website development agency to help you implement them, we are just a call away.

As a Webflow enterprise partner and one of India's leading website design and development agencies with awards like Webby and CSS under our belt, we are equipped with the right skill set and tools to transform your website into a growth engine.

Companies can slash their web development costs by up to 70% when they strategically outsource and tap into global talent pools. Many companies default to building internal development teams, but the data paints a different picture. A single tech hire takes 20 business days on average. The total investment - from recruitment through training - can hit $40,000 per person. These figures don't include regular expenses such as salaries, benefits, or workspace costs.

Ever felt like building an in-house dev team is like buying a whole bakery just because you want a croissant? Outsourcing web development isn’t just about saving money (though that part’s nice too). It’s about staying lean, fast, and flexible. Depending on where you hire from, you can tap into top-tier expertise for anywhere between $50 to $200 an hour. This way, you don’t have to lock yourself into long-term contracts or overhead-heavy teams.

So maybe ask yourself, why pay full-time for talent you only need part-time? This piece helps break down the actual costs and advantages of outsourcing web development. You'll learn about proven frameworks and discover the right approach that matches your business scale and requirements.

Why Outsource Web Development: Strategic Benefits for Different Business Sizes

Companies of all sizes - from fresh startups to 10-year-old enterprises - gain major advantages by teaming up with external development teams. Business leaders now see outsourcing as much more than a way to cut costs.

1. Cost Advantages for Cash-Strapped Startups

Startups with tight budgets find a financial solution in outsourcing web development. Studies show companies can reduce development costs by 20% to 70% based on their outsourcing location. Several factors beyond hourly rates lead to these savings.

The numbers tell a clear story: an in-house development team costs about USD 1050.26 per hour, while European outsourced teams charge just USD 300.00 per hour. This huge gap comes from:

• No recruitment costs 
• Zero employee benefits, insurance, and taxes
• No extra office space or equipment costs
• No ongoing training expenses

These savings help early-stage companies launch on time instead of facing budget delays. 

2. Scalability Benefits for Growing Enterprises

Growing businesses find the most strategic value in scaling resources faster. Companies using outsourced teams adapt to market changes faster than those with just in-house teams.

This flexibility shows up in several ways:

• Team size adjusts quickly based on project needs without long hiring cycles
• Specialized talent joins for specific project phases without permanent contracts
• Work continues across time zones for non-stop development
• Different skills rotate smoothly as project needs change

Teams with relevant expertise come together quickly when launching new products or entering new markets. 

“ThunderClap played a key role in elevating our brand’s maturity and professionalism with the website revamp. The team is responsive, meets deadlines, and goes beyond expectations—a solid partner for any B2B company looking to scale their brand.”

                                                                                      
- Anand Vatsya, Product Marketing, Storylane

3. Access to Specialized Expertise Without Long-Term Commitments

Quality doesn't suffer despite the cost savings. Outsourcing connects you with expert talent that's rare or too expensive locally. Companies can build dream teams for specific projects, thanks to this geographic specialization. Outsourced developers also bring experience from different industries, which improves their problem-solving skills. 

4. Focus on Core Business Activities While Experts Handle Development

The biggest strategic win, though hard to calculate, lets you focus on core business goals. Deloitte reports that outsourcing helped 57% of companies concentrate on their main business activities.

Your internal teams can focus on what matters most when they're not caught up in technical web development:

• Creating product strategy and innovation plans
• Building stronger customer relationships
• Improving market position and competitive analysis
• Finding new business opportunities

This focused approach pays off beyond the current project. You retain control through regular updates and feedback, but the outsourced team handles daily project management. This frees your internal resources for strategic priorities.

Comprehensive Cost Analysis of Web Development Outsourcing

Base hourly rates don't tell the whole story about development outsourcing costs. Decision-makers need a detailed cost analysis to see if outsourcing fits their budget and business goals.

Direct Cost Comparison: In-House vs. Outsourced Development

This big gap comes from several factors beyond basic salaries. Companies hiring in-house developers must pay for:

1. Recruitment expenses: U.S. companies spend USD 4129.00 on average per hire
2. Onboarding and training: These add extra costs upfront
3. Employment taxes and benefits: These make the base salary 2.7x higher 
4. Office space and equipment: U.S. businesses pay USD 700.00 monthly per employee for overhead 

The total investment stays much lower with outsourcing, even though hourly rates might seem high at first.

Hidden Costs of Web Development Outsourcing

Outsourcing saves money, but businesses should watch for these less obvious expenses:

Communication Overhead: Different time zones, languages, and cultures can slow things down. This leads to:

• Extra work from misunderstandings
• Longer project times
• More management effort

Quality Assurance: Independent QA might cost USD 1000.00-3000.00 if it's not part of the vendor's package. Make sure you know what your agreement covers.

Project Management Costs: Many companies don't realize how much internal help they need to run outsourced projects. This includes:

• Clear project briefs 
• Progress tracking
• Feedback systems

Knowledge Transfer: Good documentation and training help maintain the project, especially if you plan to bring it in-house later.

Compliance and Security: Projects with sensitive data need security testing and compliance checks. 

Smart outsourcing means looking past basic hourly rates and adding up all these potential extra costs.

Regional Cost Variations: US vs. Europe vs. India

Development costs vary widely across the world, with each region offering different benefits:

If you want to outsource web development, India remains attractive for cost savings. Indian web developers earn about USD 6500.00 yearly, far less than Western developers. This explains why many Fortune 500 companies choose India for outsourcing. 

Long-Term ROI Calculations for Outsourced Projects

ROI for outsourced development goes beyond immediate savings. The real value shows in long-term business results.

A good ROI calculation should:

1. Add up total costs: Include vendor fees, communication costs, and internal management
2. Track cost savings: Look at cuts in labor, infrastructure, maintenance, and technology versus in-house options
3. Check revenue changes: Watch how sales and customer retention improve
4. Review strategic benefits: See how outsourcing helps you create, grow, and adapt

Most companies see about 20% ROI from outsourcing web development. This beats typical capital costs, but results depend on project type and management style.

Regular checks of key metrics help improve ROI. Watch things like:

• Development speed
• User adoption
• Revenue growth
• Market expansion
• Product innovation

Pick the right vendor and manage projects well. Outsourcing web development can save money now and pay off big later. 

💡Pro Tip: You can book a free website audit + consultation with ThunderClap to figure out a strategy that works with your unique requirements.  

How to Outsource Web Development Successfully: A Step-by-Step Framework

Defining Clear Project Requirements and Objectives

You should create detailed documentation of your project scope before you approach any outsourced web development company. Start by:

1. Identifying specific goals and deliverables that your website must achieve
2. Creating wireframes or mockups to visualize the desired outcome
3. Specifying desired features, functionalities, and design standards
4. Defining your budget, timeline, and key milestones

Researching and Vetting Potential Outsourced Web Development Companies

Finding reliable partners needs investigation beyond surface-level promises.

• Portfolio and past work examples that show relevant industry experience

• Client testimonials and reviews in the industry 

• Technical expertise that matches project requirements

• Communication skills and cultural compatibility

Establishing Communication 

Communication makes or breaks outsourcing relationships. Miscommunication remains the main cause of project failures. Our approach tackles this challenge by:

• Identifying overlap hours when both teams can work together despite time zones
• Selecting the right communication tools (Slack, Microsoft Teams, etc.)
• Setting up regular check-ins with predefined agenda items
• Creating clear escalation paths to resolve potential conflicts

Setting Up Proper Legal Protections and Contracts

Legal frameworks need careful attention to protect intellectual property rights. Our top priorities for outsourcing web development include:

• Non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) to protect sensitive information
• Clear intellectual property ownership provisions in contracts
• Data protection and security protocols that comply with relevant regulations
• Detailed payment terms and milestone-based deliverables
• Dispute resolution procedures and applicable governing laws

Implementing Quality Assurance Measures

Quality control presents the biggest challenge in outsourcing. Our quality assurance approach includes:

• Setting measurable standards
• Regular testing cycles throughout development
• KPIs to review partner performance
• Automated testing, where appropriate

Choosing the Right Outsourcing Model for Your Business Needs

Each model has unique benefits based on your project needs, control preferences, and resource availability.

Dedicated Development Teams: When and Why They Work Best

A dedicated development team becomes part of your company and works only on your projects long-term. This setup works great for companies with complex projects that could grow bigger.

Dedicated teams add the most value when:

• Your project needs deep business context understanding
• You want continuous development beyond 6 months
• Your needs change often
• You've grown past the startup phase and want to scale quickly

This setup gives you the benefits of an in-house team without the hassle. You lead the team while your partner handles hiring, HR, and setup.

The costs stay simple: team members charge by the hour, and you pay for actual work done. You know exactly what you're paying for and keep full control of development priorities.

Project-Based Outsourcing for Defined-Scope Projects

Project-based outsourcing makes sense for projects with clear goals and requirements. Your external partner delivers the complete project from beginning to end.

This method works best when:

• Your project has clear boundaries
• You don't want technical experts in-house
• You want to work with a high-ownership set of people with  limited involvement in daily development
• Your project has specificity in terms of timeline

Your vendor estimates costs, gets your go-ahead on specs, and assigns the right people. The best part? You get your finished product without managing developers. You just provide feedback and general direction.  

💡Pro Tip: Agencies do this day in, day out. They’ve already solved problems like yours dozens of times so you’re not just buying execution, you’re buying speed, foresight, and fewer mistakes. That’s a competitive edge you can’t always build in-house.

Staff Augmentation to Boost Your Existing Team

Staff augmentation helps when you want to add specific skills or more people to your current development team. This model lets you bring in external talent right into your team structure.

This option shines when:

• Your development team needs quick expansion
• You can't find specific technical skills locally
• You want to keep direct control
• Your in-house team needs extra help temporarily

You get access to qualified software engineers through development agencies without extra operational costs while keeping direct management. The developers work directly with you, just like regular employees, while avoiding traditional hiring costs. 

Hybrid Models: Combining In-House and Outsourced Resources

Hybrid models are perfect for:

• Complex projects with many parts
• Businesses needing round-the-clock development
• Companies handling sensitive data alongside regular features
• Organizations wanting balanced control and flexibility

You keep strategic control while accessing global talent by mixing onshore and offshore teams. You might keep core product work in-house but outsource testing, design, or maintenance.

Your unique business situation determines the best outsourcing model. Look at your project needs, control preferences, available resources, and long-term goals before deciding. Many successful companies change their approach over time, starting with project-based work before switching to dedicated teams as they grow. The right outsourcing model helps your business get immediate benefits and long-term value from web development outsourcing.

The Bottomline 

Web development outsourcing gives startups and enterprises clear benefits. 

Look at success stories like WhatsApp and GitHub - they grew rapidly through outsourcing. These companies got amazing results by choosing the right partners, setting up clear communication, and maintaining strong quality standards. Their success proves that outsourcing works best as a mutually beneficial alliance rather than just a way to cut costs.

ThunderClap can help build your world-class B2B website. We work with the top 1% of developers, designers, and copywriters to accelerate your growth. Our system will help you get the most from outsourcing while keeping risks low. 

We have worked with leading B2B brands like Razorpay, Shopline, Plivo, and Storylane. These companies trusted us to build high-performing websites, and we delivered strong results. 

With over 129 successful website launches and 10+ industry-recognized awards, we offer end-to-end web design solutions, including web strategy, copywriting, UI/UX design, CRO and SEO optimization, web development, website migration, and maintenance. Our average project completion time ranges from 8 to 12 weeks, exceeding the standard industry timelines. 

Let us show you the works on a 30-minute discovery call

This guide will not represent your exact WordPress setup and its migration path since every WordPress installation is unique - through its use of themes and plugins that help bring the site to life.

It is meant to help provide a direction; acquaint yourself with the terminologies, nuances, gotchas, and trade-offs involved; to help you feel more confident with your decision-making. 

The choice of a more optimal platform will determine your website’s trajectory, and by extension, your business’ too. It will significantly affect how and to what intensity does your company assign resources to it, how often, and how many headaches the company or the digital team experiences.

There is no right or wrong choice. It’s about the requirements and the most optimal and effective solution for your business. Our goal here is to aid in that.

This guide comes from our personal experience of working with WordPress exclusively for several years (pre-FSE era) and in the recent years, migrating many WordPress sites, of different shapes and sizes, to Webflow.

‍Note: The information mentioned in this article is as of our understanding of the current (at the time of writing this) architecture and features offered by both platforms. Features and techniques may change over time, and while we will attempt to update the article as things change, we’d recommend doing your due diligence too.

Difference between Webflow and WordPress

You can think of Webflow v/s WordPress similar to Mac v/s Windows respectively. Due to their fundamental nature and architectures, they have different advantages and pitfalls.

Webflow

Just like a Mac, Webflow is a custom platform, not openly distributed to be installed as a software on any server, but a proprietary tool only offered on their hardware. 

This gives you a tight-knight, well-built, thoroughly tested software that is focused on ease-of-use, pre-configuring things (making technical decisions) on your behalf, protecting you from malwares, and offering this entire service as a subscription package.

It comes with a trade-off of potential limitations for your use case, and giving up the majority of control over technical decisions.

The platform can be extended by connecting it with third-party applications, and some additional on-site features via their App marketplace.

WordPress

WordPress, like Windows, is a distributed software to be set up on servers and configurations (systems) of your choice. 

It gives you choice of your own servers, its setup and configuration, modifying WordPress to your liking and use case, and an open platform to install an extension software (plugin) of your liking. You have full access to the underlying codebase and database.

So here, you get more variety, power, and freedom, but at the expense of complexity, malware/virus exposure, and higher chance of system crashes.

What Webflow can be used for

Webflow is simple to use and quick for marketing websites, but if your goal is to build something that resembles more of a web app – like complex forums, membership sites, social networks, directories – you need to weigh the respective trade-offs.

It is possible to build many of these with Webflow, but not just with Webflow alone, i.e. you have to put multiple 3rd party solutions together, and all of them will need to be configured correctly and work in sync in order to achieve the desired functionality.

So, the success of its implementation then depends on your service provider – the developer – and their ability to identify and break-down feature complexity, past experience with the 3rd party tools (same or similar ones), and judgement of the involved trade-offs.

This gets into the realm of no-code.

No-code tools come with their own upsides and risks.

Upsides of no-code tools

• Easy to use
• Secure
• Quick to implement, update, maintain

Risks/Trade-offs with no-code tools

• Monthly subscription costs
• Software startup going out of business

This is different than WordPress plugins. If WordPress is like a machine, then WordPress plugins are built to fit within and extend that machine, whereas the low-code tools are like separate instruments to be orchestrated to work in sync by the developer. So, the developer’s role, ability, and decision-making becomes very important here.

Summary:
Want to migrate a Marketing website? Choose Webflow confidently without worrying much. Have some complex functionalities or something resembling a web app? Will need a thorough inspection of the trade-offs to make a decision accordingly.

Difference between Webflow and WordPress

Advantages Webflow has over WordPress

All the subpoints below compound into an overall experience that can differentiate between smooth sailing and frequently occurring frustration.

Secure (Hack-proof)

Webflow

Webflow doesn’t have any directly exposed backend systems or open-source code. Your website is a static package hosted via AWS with no direct backend entry-points to exploit.

Sure, being a multi-tenant application, it does have its backend setup and systems, but it’s closed-source, and goes through strong security checks and periodic routines (more specifically - pentesting and certification from an external security agency every 6 months, besides regular security checks and updates; find details here).

There are some frontend vulnerabilities possible, like XSS or CSRF via frontend forms (a potential vulnerability for any web application or site), but those systems are in regular monitoring and has security defences in place.

A Webflow site cannot be directly hacked individually at the system level, unless you somehow give your Webflow login details to a hacker. This is similar to how a hacker cannot hack your individual Facebook or Google account.

WordPress

WordPress being a software that you manually install on a server opens up vulnerabilities at multiple levels for an individual:

• Server misconfiguration
• Core vulnerabilities
• Plugin vulnerabilities or trojans (plugins intentionally built and distributed as malware) - the most common

Being such a popular open-source platform being used on billions of websites has both its advantages and disadvantages - it’s amongst the biggest targets for hackers, and there are tons of white-hat security researchers and teams working specifically full-time to monitor and save the platform from exploits.

Historically, if we look at statistics of the last 3 years, there have been over 7,000 vulnerabilities in 2022, 10,000+ in 2023, and over 15,000 in 2024 in the entire WordPress ecosystem. The vulnerabilities usually target free plugins and themes, and often include popular names that majority websites use. Here’s the entire historical log of WordPress vulnerabilities - https://wpscan.com/statistics/ - a project put together by Automattic, the parent company who created WordPress.

Easier to use

With Webflow, you get everything ready to build and launch. A GUI that builds exactly as you see in the designer. Other options easily configurable via website settings, all options readily available. What’s not there is a thing that you cannot control; simple as that.

This doesn’t mean Webflow sites can’t have complexity. CMS’ (database) can potentially have a learning curve, depending on your use case, requirements, and how it was set up by the person building the site. Though, this is the highest level of software abstraction without losing total control over data structuring and management so, it is inevitable.

Contrast that with WordPress, where you have tons of options for every requirement - whether related to look (themes) or functionality (plugins).

No Hosting Headaches, Broken Sites, or Downtime

A major decision that you have to make with WordPress even before building your website is - where to host your site. There are lots and lots of companies providing WordPress specific hosting, some authentic, while some others making shady marketing claims, not coming through in practice.

This is further exacerbated by the affiliation system. Most hosting companies provide affiliate income on getting new customers to sign up with them. This means many blog articles that you may see and read recommending WordPress hosts may be incentivized by just the money part, without thoroughly testing and stating their authentic experience about the host. This is a common practice in the WordPress ecosystem, one that we have personally seen shape up over time, along with their consequences.

A poor choice of host would mean frequent downtimes, especially when your website traffic sees a spike (more visits from people in a short duration). 

Combine that with frequent cache misconfigurations and problems (discussed in the next point) and hacking vulnerabilities, you’ve opened your organization to a plausible probability of your brand reputation taking a negative hit in such a situation; potentially losing visitors’ trust, and/or even customers.

Webflow being a service that offers hosting as a part of its package, and a guaranteed uptime (along with a solid record of over a decade), you minimize that potentially-hurting probability into a rare possibility.

Inbuilt CDN

On top of integrated hosting with high uptime, Webflow also provides global CDN, at no additional cost, from Amazon AWS and Fastly. These are the same services that power the majority of the internet and your favourite apps (Uber, Spotify, Netflix, etc.). You don’t have to pay for and configure a custom CDN for faster websites.

No Cache Problems

WordPress users categorically have 2 long-standing issues related to caching – choosing a proper caching mechanism that fits your hosting setup, and effectively clearing up to serve updates to the site visitors.

First, choosing an optimal caching plugin is a long trial-and-error process by itself. Many WordPress specialised hosts come with their own cache plugins pre-installed or with recommendations, but may not be fully configured. Other times, you have to search and try multiple of them before you end up with an optimal one… until it breaks something and you’re onto the search for the next. 

This has been my personal experience over 5 years of actively using WordPress - starting with WP Super Cache, jumping to W3 Total Cache, to WP Rocket, to WP Fastest Cache (used for a significant time), jumping to Super Page Cache for Cloudflare, and then onto Lightspeed Cache. More cache plugin jumps than the number of years spent actively using WordPress… 

In this entire duration, things frequently broke. Either some site parts weren’t showing updated content, or configuration problems would cause the site to appear broken (as CSS and JS asset links would break). And I wasn’t the only one. You’ll see plenty of forum posts and cache guide comments complaining about site break and anxiety surrounding caching.

With so many server setup combinations with your hosts, some functions may work or make sense for some setups, but not for others - things like Memcaching, Redis, Object Cache, etc. It’s such a common configuration issue that you’ll see tons of guides telling you how to set up different WordPress caching plugins, many of them suggesting different setups for the same plugin.

TLDR; Something as fundamental as caching is a complex mess with WordPress, because of the sheer configuration possibilities of your setup.

Nothing like this exists at all for Webflow. As it is a simple static site on the frontend, it is cached as expected, automatically, and correctly flushed when you publish an updated version (including the dynamic parts like CMS and server redirects). Your latest website updates delivered to your visitors instantly; no grievances or issues, still maintaining all the performance benefits of caching your site.

No Periodic Manual Software Updates or Plugin Complexities

Third-party WordPress plugins may or may not be built up to the high coding and security standards. Even if they are, it still risks vulnerabilities with different versions of WordPress and other plugins. As we saw before, WordPress plugins are the most common targets for hacking WordPress websites.

And to ensure your site stays updated with all the latest security patches of WordPress and its plugins, you have to regularly login to the dashboard and run the updates manually. Only after updating will you know if there’s any clash between any of the plugin combinations that you have installed, and if they do (which is a common occurrence), the website breaks. Surprise!

To help mitigate this, many hosts provide a separate staging environment to test the updates and then roll to your live site. More busywork to do, which has no direct relation to or have a positive impact on your website or business.

This is where a significant amount of time of an in-house or external WordPress dev goes - maintaining your WordPress site just so it won’t break. That is where you spend a significant amount of your money, or time, or both.

None of these complications or problems exist with Webflow. No plugins, no manual updates to do, no compatibility clashes, no site breaks. Simple.

Trade-offs with Webflow

It’s not all roses. If your requirement is simple and straightforward, you may likely have an amazing experience with Webflow. But oftentimes, there are features that a website needs that may not be natively possible with Webflow. That’s a trade-off that you buy into.

Remember that Webflow is a software provided as a service. So naturally, even if they can, they won’t build everything that your particular project needs, as they have their own vision of what the Webflow software is supposed to be and how it shall work. A software needs to balance feature-set, complexity (both end-users’ and technical debt), and many more aspects and align it with their long term vision. 

There are over 1700 requests in their wishlist board as of April 2025. Although most are reviewed, and many have 3rd party solutions, there are a few critical ones that may either come later or never see the light of the day. And it doesn’t matter if it comes later when you have to build and launch your site today. So, you’d have to opt for workarounds in such cases.

Webflow has a helpful forum, and chances are, somebody might have come across the limitation that you too have a requirement of. So, if you’re building the site yourself with Webflow, it would be helpful to first search around to see if the platform supports everything that you’re looking for. 

If you want to get the site built by a professional Webflow dev team, they may have experience and know-how about most requirements that Webflow may/may not support, and workarounds for them.

Some commonly faced tradeoffs:

• CMS Nesting limitations
• Site search customization inability
• No server side logic execution ability
• Custom/large assets upload
• Inability to extend the platform much to your liking besides 3rd party solution - somewhat possible using their API

Some uncommon tradeoffs:

• Hosting location
• Ecommerce feature-set

Summary of differences between WordPress and Webflow

Content Migration

Content in WordPress can be added in many forms: 

• WordPress native post types
• theme/plugins created Custom Post Types (CPT)
• usage of plugins like Advanced Custom Fields / Pods to create your own CPT schema.

Aside from the WordPress native Posts and Pages, custom post type examples may include - Forms, Documentation, Design Templates, Redirects, etc. (most of them created by plugins that you install).

Overall steps to migrate content from WordPress to Webflow:

1. Identify content/CPTs to migrate
2. Export data from WordPress as CSV
3. Create appropriate CMS setup in Webflow with respective fields
4. Preparing the data for import - format the exported data to match the structure and data-types that Webflow needs
5. Run the import
   
   1. Fix/facilitate anomalies or unsupported content manually
6. Correct URL paths using 301 redirects

Tip: Keep your WordPress site live while you go through the migration process. This way, importing images will become easier. Otherwise, they’ll need to be uploaded to some publicly accessible cloud storage for Webflow to auto-import images.

1. Identification of Content to migrate

There are 2 ways to identify that:

1. Is it an area that allows you to add new items?
2. Does it look similar to where you add Blog Post/Pages?

Some plugins may alter the view of the post add screen interface to make it look differently, but if you’re adding in new content there, it’s most likely a custom post type.

You can think of them as databases, or what Webflow calls “CMS Collections”.

Note: Not all post types may make sense as a database and may require a different approach to the feature. E.g: Forms, Design Templates. If it isn’t a direct article form of content, it’ll fall under this other category whose data or functionality migration depends upon its use-case.

After you identify all the content sources you want to migrate, then look for the following parameters:

• URL Structure, i.e permalink format
• Type of Data structure, i.e. the schema of your post type
  
  • Do we have any complex data structures like Repeater fields?
• Format and flow of data structure

Types of Content not directly supported in Webflow

The following are some content types that would need a different database structure approach to migrate, and would hence change the way you interact with it in the new platform:

• Repeater fields - fields that allow you add or more groups as needed
  
  • These may be used in WordPress as a part of your theme/ACF (Advanced Custom Fields plugin) setup for repeating content like cards, numbered lists, etc. where the count of item is variable and it intends to give you flexibility to add as many as you want.
• Audio/Video File upload
  
  • Any assets other than PDF documents under 10mb are to be externally hosted and linked as a URL

2. Exporting Data from WordPress as CSV

WordPress natively only allows you to export content as XML. So, to generate a CSV for your data, you’ll need to use a 3rd party plugin.

One reliable plugin to export WordPress data in CSV is WP All Import.

Once you install it, you can generate CSV files with fields of your choice from the database and download it.

Though, if you’re not used to the field naming, and have a couple of custom post types to be exported, the process of identifying the correct database fields can get fairly complicated.

There’s no one definitive guide to help you with it. You’ll have to go by instinct and trial-and-error looking at the name of the field, and determining whether that’s the correct one or not.

The WP All Import plugin does provide a “Preview” option after adding in fields, which shows you recent data for those fields from the WordPress database before export.

There are some videos and articles online that can help you navigate and export content using the WP All Import plugin.

If you’re using any other plugin to export from WordPress as CSV, the interface, details, and steps for that will differ accordingly

3. Creating CMS setup in Webflow with respective fields

Before being able to import the content, the very first requirement is to create CMS Collections (databases) for your data chunks (Post Types).

This won’t necessarily translate to an exact 1-1 copy of your WordPress CPT setup.

Example - “Posts” from WordPress has Categories and Tags features inbuilt, but in Webflow, you’ll need to create separate CMS Collections for Posts, Categories, and Tags and reference the Categories and Tags fields from Posts.

You can either pre-create CMS Collection fields too if you know all the fields and their field types it can translate to (can be done with the help of your export), or the Webflow interface will allow you to create new fields for the CMS Collection on the fly when you import the CSV data.

CMS Reference fields

If you’re migrating data into collections where the data is supposed to be a dynamic and recurring reference to another CMS Collection (e.g: Categories and Tags for Posts), your fields will need to be in the following format:

• Single Reference field - field value shall be the slug of the referenced CMS Item
  
  • E.g: If you have a Category called “Next” whose slug is “next”, the import value in the Category cell for that Post should be next
• Multi-Reference field - field value shall be the slugs of referenced CMS item, separate by commas
  
  • E.g: If you have Tags called “Editor’s Desk” with slug “editors-desk”, “Recommended” with slug “recommended” belonging to a post, the import value in the Tag cell should be
    editors-desk; recommended

Preparing the data for import

Importing of your data will need to happen in stages.

All your WordPress content won’t automatically go and set up by itself at once. It’ll require data formatting to alter your existing data in the format that Webflow supports for its fields.

Refer to this article from Webflow documentation to learn more about fields and their format support details.

Note: CSV import file for Webflow needs to be smaller than 4MB. If your export data is larger, break it down into separate files of smaller chunks.

Tip: A spreadsheet software like Google Sheets or Microsoft Excel will be of great help to format and alter the exported data to suit the required format for import. Also, you can greatly benefit from AI tools like ChatGPT to help you with the formulation to format your data.

(We prefer using Google Sheets since it is easy access, in the cloud, and has seamless AppScript integration to write and execute custom Javascript code and functions on data.)

Order of Importing

If you have data that is supposed to have references to other CMS collections, import those other CMS collections before this one.

Example - Categories and Tags CMS Collections should be imported before you import Posts, because Posts is supposed to refer to data from Categories and Tags, so those need to first exist to be linked; otherwise, the Posts import will fail.

Different content types, their support, and formatting

TinyMCE / Rich Text Content

This is your standard blog article or page content (text) where you have headings, bullet lists, formatting like bold and italics, blockquotes, etc.

WordPress doesn’t store paragraph tags in the database for rich text content. So, the export of rich text fields doesn’t contain HTML paragraphs. The content will still be in HTML format (links, images, bold, italics, etc. preserved), but the paragraph breaks will be standard line breaks (like the ones added by Enter keypress), as that is how they’re stored in the WP database.

WordPress formats paragraphs on the server on the fly using a function, so we will need to run our exported rich text content using that same function so that our end formatting is full HTML. If this is not done, no paragraphs will be preserved on importing into Webflow and all the paragraphs will merge (except when separated by headings/blockquotes).

Here’s the JavaScript version of the  wpautop() function (that WordPress uses to generate paragraphs) - https://gist.github.com/ediamin/19ef0a4b0bff2dbfd7676c916d7dcd2a

You can run it in Google Sheets AppsScript, using it as a formula to reformat your exported rich text content in a new field.

Gutenberg Blocks Content

If using the Gutenberg editor, that adds most contents directly as HTML to your articles. There may still be some custom shortcode content in it.

Gutenberg HTML data, when imported as Code Embed, may be preserved by Webflow. The styling will still need to be manually added to either global code or in the Webflow GUI by creating those respective classes.

Shortcodes

If you were using plugins that give you the ability to add dynamic content (things besides standard text, images, tables), they’re likely added via shortcodes to your page/article content. Examples of that may be buttons, image galleries, etc.

Shortcode content will be imported as plain text and not the resulting dynamic data.

Depending on what your shortcode content is, you can run search/replace regex on your content from your import sheet to either just remove the text from the content, or replace it with some resulting HTML in Code Embed if it can be converted consistently. 

Other options are:

• see if the functionality can be replicated by creating one or more additional fields in the Webflow Collection List (CMS database)
• let go of the shortcode functionality

WordPress Galleries in Articles

Since gallery images are added as shortcodes, your WordPress export will show gallery embeds as shortcodes containing IDs of images.

In Webflow, you can’t have a gallery of images within Rich Text content. It’ll either need to be individual images one after another, or a separate multi-image field.

To convert gallery shortcodes to image URLs and import them in either format is not straightforward. Here are the steps that it involves:

1. Download a map of Media Library image attachment IDs and their respective URLs
   
   1. This can’t be done natively or with any plugins, so you’ll need to write and execute a custom PHP script that fetches this data from the database (WP_Query class) and download the map as a CSV
2. Write and execute formulae for the following in your import sheet:
   
   1. Extracting comma separated gallery image attachment IDs out of the [gallery …] shortcode (using regex)
   2. Replace the IDs with the map of ID-URL data obtained in the previous step (by importing that CSV into your working import sheet; will need combination of functions like VLOOKUP, ARRAYFORMULA, TEXTJOIN)
      
      1. have them semicolon separated if you wish to add it in the multi-image Webflow field
   3. Put this new image URLs string into its respective column
      
      1. Replacing [gallery… ] shortcode with URLs if images needed in the rich text field
      2. Or putting the entire semi-colon separated image URLs string into a new multi-image field column

Tables

Tables are not supported by the Rich Text GUI in Webflow. They will need to be added as Code Embeds, and further edits to be done as HTML to preserve them.

Steps on how to do that are mentioned in the next subsection here.

Images

Any images (e.g: featured images) for an individual image field need to be set as URLs in your import file, and Webflow will automatically import them.

Note: The images need to be less than 4MBs otherwise they won’t be imported.

Multi-Image Gallery/Lightboxes (separate plugin content)

Any image gallery or lightboxes can be set up in a multi-image field in Webflow. Import format needs to be image URLs separated by semi-colons.

Up to 25 images are supported in a multi-image field.

Lightbox can be set up for the gallery images when designing the page.

PDF documents

PDFs cannot be programmatically imported.

For PDFs in a separate file field, those will need to be uploaded manually.

For PDF links in the article content, here’s what you can do:

1. Find and create a list of all PDF link sources on your WordPress site
   
   1. Doable by using regex to extract .pdf links from your article content in the import sheet
2. Download all the PDFs to your computer using your OS CLI
   
   1. Terminal utilities like wget or curl can be used to bulk download files from the given URLs
3. Compress if needed and upload them to the Webflow Assets area 
   
   1. Files need to be under 10MB
4. Copy all the Webflow asset links one-by-one to create a map of old PDF links with new
5. Replace the old links with new in the content
   
   1. Can be done using spreadsheet formulae

Audio/Video files

Webflow doesn’t allow hosting of audio/video files in CMS. The only video upload feature is for background videos and that has a max limit of 30MBs. That can be used in a way to host videos on Webflow and replace the links, but those videos need to be published on the site for them to be active, and there are other complications.

A better bet is to host audio and video on external platforms. 

Webflow has a Video CMS field supporting Youtube and Vimeo. Other sources will need to be added as a URL field in the CMS with manual code to wrap it in a <video> tag on the frontend.

To privately host videos, Vimeo is often the preferred choice. Other options include services like Wistia (though that integration will require custom code embed with the player), or CDNs like BunnyCDN, Cloudflare Stream, etc.

Article Excerpts

If your design has article excerpts to be shown (common for blog posts list page), this is another thing that WordPress handles dynamically on the server. To show excerpts on your Webflow site, you’ll need to create a new field in the CMS Collection for excerpts, and pre-generate excerpts using formulas in Google Sheets / Microsoft Excel.

Depending on how much content you want to show, your formula can differ, and you’ll also need to clean up HTML tags from the rich text to show the excerpts as plain text.

Note: Directly outputting the entire article’s rich text on the Webflow site hiding the remaining content using CSS is a big no-no because it’ll create duplicate content (SEO issue).

Here’s what a Google Sheets AppScript function for generating excerpts and cleaning up HTML can look like:

/**

* Returns 50 words of article summary

*/

function getArticleSummaryInWords(htmlContent) {

 // Remove HTML tags

 var textContent = htmlContent.replace(/<[^>]+>/g, '');

  // Split text into words

 var words = textContent.split(/\s+/);

  // Take the first 50 words

 var wordCount = words.slice(0, 50).join(' ');

  return wordCount;

}

You can run the above function as a formula on your rich text content to generate summary text.

Note: This means that excerpts for new future CMS items cannot be auto-generated and will need to be manually inputted, unless you run some no-code workflow on item publish (using Make or a similar tool) that runs similar code and auto-updates the excerpts.

If you don’t want to go through this route, then excerpts will need to be removed from the site.

Other Gotchas

There are unsupported content types/HTML tags like line dividers that won’t natively work in Webflow. Although it won’t break your import, the line breaks and any unsupported HTML elements will be stripped out and removed from the article.

These too can be converted to Code Embeds to preserve them. 

Example - From our experience, Webflow seems to strip out line divider tags (<hr>) entirely even when added as Code Embeds. In such a case, there’s no other way to programmatically import such content.

Importing content as Code Embeds in Webflow

A frequently occurring use case of HTML content that is not natively supported in Webflow is tables.

To support those, you’ll need to add them as Code Embeds for them to preserve their styling in Webflow.

To do that, run a function in your import sheet that wraps your table HTML within <div data-rt-embed-type='true'></div>

So, your end table markup within the HTML content should look like:

```

<p>some content</p>

<div data-rt-embed-type='true'>

<table>

<tbody>

<!-- table html content →

</tbody>

</table>

</div>

<p>following content</p>

```

This shall import the tables and preserve them in Webflow.

Note - The table (or any custom code content) styling will need to be manually set in Webflow either via GUI or custom CSS as we’re only importing data. That doesn’t import the elements' styling.

Also, further edits of the table (or any Code Embed content) will need to be done as HTML as there are no GUI provisions for those elements within Webflow.

5. Run the import

Fairly straightforward:

• Export the individual import sheet as a CSV file, the current one for the Collection that you want to import
  
  • Remember that max import file size is 4MBs, so divide the prepared data into multiple sheets if needed
• Open your CMS Collection in Webflow where you want to import the data
• Click the Import button
• Drag and drop your prepared CSV data sheet
• Map the fields
  
  • check the right side preview to confirm data parity
• Run the import

Tip: Have your import CSV column name match the field names (exactly; case-insensitive) so that Webflow can automatically map the fields when you add your CSV sheet for import.

Tip: It’s always beneficial to take a backup of your Webflow project when offered before data import, as a precautionary measure.

Note: If you have existing CMS Items that you want to replace on re-import, have the “Item ID” field in your import sheet, and get them to match the Item IDs of the respective Webflow items. This way, Webflow will offer an option to replace existing CMS items.

Fixing any import issues

Some rows may be skipped if there are formatting issues with its content, or if the data is not as expected (e.g: incorrect CMS reference field value). In case of errors, Webflow will provide an error message along with a log of items that were skipped and its reason.

If the reason is missing, try re-importing that item. If it still fails, look into its content format to confirm.

If nothing works, it’ll need to be added manually.

5.a. Manually fixing/facilitating unsupported content types

The details about all different types of content data, their support in Webflow, and alternative solutions are mentioned above (here). Anything from that list which doesn’t work out programmatically in your case will need to be added manually. Or opt for either dropping that feature, or making an alternative tradeoff.

6. URL permalink parity and management

WordPress can accommodate any form of complex URL paths, including dynamic data in the path URLs. 

Webflow only supports a consistent static folder based structure without any possibilities of path overlaps between static and dynamic pages.

So, it's a common requirement to set up 301 redirects for your WordPress URLs when migrating to Webflow.

This does affect SEO temporarily, and if done correctly, things should be back to usual in a few months.

A common example is a blog path with year/month/date permalink folder structure.

For instance - example.com/blog/2024/06/01/article-slug

You cannot have such a permalink in Webflow. So, the closest possible redirect would be example.com/blog/article-slug

Note: It’s currently not possible to do 302 temporary redirects in Webflow

Clashing URL paths

Continuing from the above example, say if you want a main blog archive (list) page on example.com/blog, you can have the CMS structure path also having /blog path. But you then cannot have any other static subpages or subfolders under /blog like /blog/category/{{category-name}}, /blog/popular, etc.

In case you have any such URLs, you’ll need to create new URL paths for them and set up the respective 301 redirects.

301 redirects

Webflow provides a straightforward interface for setting up 301 redirects in the project settings area. Learn more about redirects here from this Webflow university article.

• For 1-1 redirects, you just need the source and destination path. 
• For wildcards (redirecting a pattern of URLs programmatically), guidelines are given in the Webflow University article.

A use case for wildcards would be the aforementioned example of dynamic blog path, whose redirect setup in Webflow would look like:

• Source: /blog/(.*)/(.*)/(.*)/(.*)
• Destination: /blog/%4

If you don’t want to risk URLs that may match a similar global pattern of 4-level nesting but are not supposed to be redirected to the blog, one way to approach it is to create separate redirect entries for each year subfolder that we have the blog articles for. Like:

• /blog/2019/(.*)/(.*)/(.*) -> /blog/%3
• /blog/2020/(.*)/(.*)/(.*) -> /blog/%3

and so on…

Note: Webflow’s redirect regex isn’t the standard regex but a custom syntax, only allowing a catch-all pattern. There’s no provision to define complex regex to target numbers and specific patterns.

Tip: For adding bulk redirects, prepare a spreadsheet with 2 columns - old and new (relative paths; without the hostname), export it as CSV, and use Finsweet’s browser extension to upload the CSV, which will add all the redirects at once.

Custom functionalities, i.e. plugins and theme features

An average WordPress site has ~25 plugins installed! This shows that WordPress, in its native barebones form, isn’t sufficient as a platform to build an organisation’s production-grade website.

It’s similar to how smartphones are incomplete and not as usable on a day-to-day basis without any apps.

Being the core pillars of WordPress’ extensibility, these are what add most of the feature set that help make your WordPress site the way it is. From caching, to social sharing icons, analytics code, SEO, forms, image optimisation, popups, and more..

But, not all plugin and theme functionalities from WordPress may be directly replicable in Webflow as-is, or perhaps even needed to be replicated! Webflow is natively packed with a bunch of the core features needed to launch a production-grade modern website.

Note: There are nuances to feature-set, and you won’t get exact feature parity in most cases. Separate plugins and services are specialised, and usually offer more bells and whistles than natively implemented features on a platform like Webflow. That said, the equally important part is to determine whether you actually need those extra features or is the native functionality sufficient.

Some of the most popular plugins that are required/used on most WordPress site come as native platform features in Webflow. This includes:

• Security, firewall, malware protection, login limitation plugins
  
  • E.g: WordFence, Sucuri, Limit Login Attempts
• Technical SEO
  
  • E.g: Yoast, Rank Math, All In One SEO
• Caching
  
  • E.g: WP Super Cache, WP Total Cache, Lightspeed Cache, WP Rocket
• Forms
  
  • E.g: Contact Form 7, Ninja Forms, WP Forms, Gravity Forms
• Form spam control
  
  • E.g: Akismet, Advanced Google reCAPTCHA
• Image Optimization
  
  • E.g: WP Smush, Shortpixel, Kraken, Optimole, Imagify
• Page Builder/Designer
  
  • E.g: Elementor, Bricks, Oxygen, Gutenberg add-ons
• Popups Builder
  
  • E.g: Optin Monster, Icegram
• Translation/Localization
  
  • E.g: WPML, TranslatePress
• Page Redirects
  
  • E.g: Redirection

You’d notice a pattern in these - the most fundamental aspects of a website are covered natively by Webflow; most offered as a part of their hosting package without any extra costs. Whereas, although most WordPress plugins have free versions, they usually run on a freemium model, and the bills for anything beyond the basics start raking up pretty quickly.

Comments system

Unlike WordPress, Webflow doesn’t come with a commenting system. So, you’d have to opt for a 3rd party tool like Disqus to add comments to your Webflow blog. 

Migrating native WordPress comments to Disqus is easy using their WordPress plugin.

E-commerce

Most e-commerce sites on WordPress run on WooCommerce, and that comes with an ecosystem of plugins of its own.

Although Webflow provides e-commerce functionality inbuilt, it has its own limitations. It may easily match the core feature set of WooCommerce, but anything that you add using WooCommerce add-ons, is likely not possible natively with Webflow.

WordPress Plugin features in Webflow and their limitations

Native implementation of features on a platform comes with trade-offs. They’ll never be in full feature-parity with custom 3rd party specialised solutions.

In a case where you need more than what Webflow natively offers, you can always look to incorporate similar 3rd party alternative solutions that can help you get what you need. These would usually be SaaS tools that come with a monthly subscription of their own.

Below are some examples of commonly needed features on a website, their Webflow native equivalent and limitations, and some potential alternative softwares to replace that feature-set.

Image Optimization

Image Optimisation, although a 1-click native feature in Webflow (for both static page assets and CMS images), is a core-functionality implementation.

It does not address advanced fine-tuning. Things like:

• Auto-compressing newer image uploads
• Periodic auto-compress
• Image Resizing

If you want those automation and resizing features, you can set up some 3rd party service like Pixie or Optily. They have their own trade-offs, but do the job well.

Forms

Webflow Forms are very powerful and flexible with total control over design and setup, but there are a fair number of nuanced limitations if/when you need complex setups on production sites.

For starters, Webflow forms only support capturing text data and files, and does not allow for features like payments, signature, etc. File upload limit is 10MB. If you’re looking for anything beyond text data capturing, you’d need to use a 3rd party form tool like Jotform, Tally, Typeform, etc.

If you want to build conditional fields, multi-step form, quizzes and/or anything involving live and dynamic calculations, it may or may not be possible using 3rd party JS library extensions. There are several of them like:

• Superform
• Formly
• ...lots of custom cloneables on Webflow marketplace

The choice of the ideal library/external form tool depends on the requirements and acceptable trade-offs.

Then there are some other limitations or potentially unexpected behaviors to note, like:

• No separate access control for non-admin team members to view form submissions
• Checkbox values from the same group being recorded as separate column values
• Cannot send per-form custom email notification receipt to the form submitter

Tip: Webflow forms data can be connected and sent to other softwares using data automation tools like Zapier, Make, etc.

Popup Builders

With the help of standard HTML structure and IX2, you can easily build modals/popups in Webflow. It doesn’t require any special separate tools. Combine it with Webflow Forms and you can have custom lead magnet popups of any kind.

If you’re looking for a dynamic lead magnet system like auto-triggering popups on a timer, specific repeated page visit, time of day, etc., that is possible to achieve by writing custom JS that facilitates the requirement.

If you want analytics for your popups to measure their effectiveness, you can potentially integrate the trigger of the popup with Google Analytics or any event-driven analytics tracking software.

So, for popups, it is possible to build and meet the majority of the complex features natively in Webflow.

Now you have a complete roadmap to carry out your WordPress to Webflow migration. Need help? Talk to us and we will get our best Webflow experts to assist you!