Websites and hosting decision
Siter.io
A capable developer can build a useful static-site editor + hosting pipeline, but reproducing Siter.io's collaboration features, polished editor UX, Figma plugin and e-commerce completeness would take substantially more effort, so keeping the paid service is reasonable for full functionality.
Visit website↗Open-source builds that already do this
Every project below is open source and already does this job today. Fork one, self-host it, or take the parts you need — the build prompt further down assumes an empty file, and this is the shortcut past that. Licences differ; check the one on each card before you ship.
What a replacement has to do
- Author a page in a visual editor, save/publish it, attach a domain and collect form submissions.
What it still won’t have
- Official Figma Plugin (Figma Plugin)
- Realtime collaboration
- Built-in hosting + managed SSL
- E‑commerce features (cart & checkout)
- Some advanced editor polish (SVG editing, animations presets)
What remains hard
- Product polish and ongoing maintenance
First-year cost
Keep paying
Paying is—cheaper in year one.
On cash alone, building overtakes the subscription at 3 seats.
Money you would actually spend
Time you would spend
—
What you would spend
What we assumed
The verdict above measures whether you could build it. This one is only about money.
Runnable build prompt
Build a minimal no-code website-builder using React for the editor, Node.js + Express for a small API, PostgreSQL for metadata, and Netlify (or Vercel) for hosting the published static output. In scope: a drag-and-drop canvas with layers/groups, component palette (text, image, button, video), save/load page JSON, publish pipeline that renders static HTML/CSS/JS and deploys to a static host with custom domain and automated Let's Encrypt TLS, and a simple forms endpoint that stores submissions and forwards to an email webhook. Out of scope: real-time collaborative editing, full Figma plugin (provide an importer that accepts exported Figma JSON only), e-commerce checkout. Include input validation, error handling, and unit/integration tests for editor save/load, publish pipeline, and forms endpoint.
How we checked
How the score was reached
- Partly verdict base52
- An open-source build was found+5
- 4 cited sources+3
- Price verified on pricing page+3
- 3/3 assessment runs agreed+4
- Evidence score67
The base comes from the verdict. Everything under it is a check that either happened or did not, and each one is a fact frozen in this record rather than a judgement made at render time — so the same evidence always produces the same number.
How scoring works →Cited sources · 4
Every page the run actually retrieved.
- official productSiter.io official product
- official pricingSiter.io pricing
- open sourcewebstudio-is/webstudio
- open sourcenotionnext-org/NotionNext
Integrity checks
What held up, and what did not.
