Bootstrap vs WordPress – Everything You’ve Ever Wanted to Know!

So you’re ready to start developing your website, but you don’t know where to start. If you’re here, you’re probably a beginner. Good news! You don’t have to know everything about web development to build a basic, beautiful web page. Two options for building are Bootstrap and WordPress. If you aren’t sure which is the right choice, let’s find out in our Bootstrap vs WordPress review.

ALSO READ: Pros and Cons of WordPress – The Ultimate Guide To WordPress CMS

Bootstrap vs WordPress: Overview

Asking which is better isn’t exactly the right question. Both can be used alone or to complement each other. It’s a matter of what your purpose is.

WordPress vs Bootstrap Framework

The framework for Bootstrap is an HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, three classic web development languages for front-end development. You can build an ultra responsive, mobile-first website. It’s dynamic and responsive and requires a little more knowledge of front-end development.

WordPress is a content management system used to build blog style, dynamic websites. You can use basic HTML and CSS, but overall the framework is a template that allows you to position elements of your blog on a page. There are plugins and extensions for other functionalities.

Winner: Tie

Bootstrap vs WordPress Ease Of Use

Bootstrap takes a little more experience with coding. Many people already have a basic HTML and CSS knowledge, and you need to add a Javascript element to your language library. It could take a little bit longer to get your system up and running because of the required background knowledge.

WordPress requires no prior knowledge to implement a theme and get your website up and running. To take full advantage of themes, you’ll want to develop a basic knowledge of HTML and CSS to help tweak your themes. If you never learn a single strand of either, you can still develop a website.

Your startup cost and time are significantly less than Bootstrap.

Winner: WordPress

WordPress vs Bootstrap User Experience

Bootstrap isn’t as readily pretty as WordPress because the community in WordPress has spent a lot of time developing dynamic user experiences. However, the potential for Bootstrap is higher because you have so much more control over the dynamics of your website.

WordPress displays better across larger screens because of most templates and themes and their setups. If you’re designing for primarily a computer experience, WordPress is going to offer a dynamic user experience.

Bootstrap is a mobile-first framework. If you’re mainly looking for easy compatibility between a desktop and a mobile or tablet experience, Bootstrap really shines. It’s capabilities deliver that without losing key elements of your website’s user experience.

Winner: WordPress for desktop experiences. Bootstrap for multiple platforms.

Bootstrap vs WordPress Flexibility

If you don’t know anything about coding, working within WordPress should give you enough flexibility to bring your website to life. You may not have complete control because WordPress themes have specific capabilities, but you do have an open source framework to tweak.

Bootstrap allows you to create websites entirely from scratch. You theoretically could even build a template for WordPress using Bootstrap although you might pull your hair out from bloated code. You can build your website from the ground up to your exact specifications.

The potential for Bootstrap is far greater than WordPress. However, unless you’re looking for something really unique, most of what WordPress offers should cover Bootstrap’s primary offerings as well.

Winner: Bootstrap

WordPress vs Bootstrap: The Good And The Bad

Okay okay. You just want the critical details here. Let’s break it all down.

WordPress

We recommend WordPress for people who aren’t going to build a webpage from scratch and don’t need a mobile first design. It’s great for getting up and running in a single afternoon without having to learn a bit of design language.

WordPress Pros:

• No design language required
• Easily scalable
• Thriving community with plenty of extensions, templates, and plugins
• Open source CMS

WordPress Cons:

• You’re limited by what the template offers
• No official support. Since you didn’t build it, you may not always be able to get things to work

Bootstrap

We recommend Bootstrap for design compatibility across multiple platforms. It’s also good if you’ve got some previous javascript experience and would like complete control over your build.

Bootstrap Pros:

• Highly customizable
• Provides a dynamic user experience
• Allows you to tweak elements specific to your purpose
• UI is better than WordPress

Bootstrap Cons:

• Requires knowledge of programming languages
• Can take a lot more time to get set up

Final Thoughts

Bootstrap vs WordPress may not be the right question. Really, it’s a matter of how you’d like to design and why you’re developing your site. WordPress is excellent for getting started quickly with minimal start-up cost and minimal background language. It’s an excellent way for beginners to get started.

However, if you take the time to master Bootstrap, you’ll be thrilled at your basic programming language skills.