Your draft has no clock
Squarespace gives you 14 days. An Atelier201 draft is free for as long as you like, and you can send preview links to your partner or a client. You only pay when the site goes live.
All comparisons
Atelier201 vs Squarespace
A site you own, a free draft with no clock, and a full history of every change. Squarespace has no revision history at all.
Choose Atelier201 if
- You want a full history and one-click rollback.
- You want to leave with the whole site if you ever leave.
- You want more than 14 days to decide.
- You want more than two people to edit.
- You want your own AI agent to do the work.
- You want a design made for your business, not a shared template.
Stay on Squarespace if
- You chose it for a template you still love.
- You run a store or Acuity bookings from it.
- You don't mind sharing your template with the florist across town.
Atelier201 and Squarespace, side by side
Based on each company's public pages and docs, November 2026. A check means it does the job, a dash that it does so partly or for an extra fee, and a cross that it doesn't, or that we couldn't find it.
| What you need | Atelier201 | Squarespace |
|---|---|---|
| You own the codeHand it to a developer or an agent, any day | A standard Astro project in its own Git repository | No. Styles and templates stay on Squarespace |
| Export the whole siteHost it anywhere, without asking | Code, content and media, on any plan, even a draft | An XML of some pages and one blog. No styles, custom CSS or store pages |
| Complete CLIFrom an empty folder to a live site, in a terminal | Create, pull, push, preview, publish and roll back | No official CLI that we could find |
| MCP server and REST APIEverything the dashboard does, for agents and scripts | Included, on every plan | No official MCP server that we could find |
| Your own Claude, ChatGPT or GeminiNo second AI bill | Your agent does the work. Its calls cost nothing here | No official way to connect one that we could find |
| Built-in AI assistantFor people without their own agent | 1,000 credits a month, 5,000 at sign-up | 10 credits, once, on Basic |
| CollaboratorsYour team, your clients, your freelancer | Unlimited, at no extra cost | 2 contributors on Basic |
| Edit without AI or codeA new price takes ten seconds | A form made from your content, or click the text on the preview | Visual editor |
| Review before anything goes livePeople and agents work on a draft | Nothing is live until you publish. Share a preview link first | Preview in the editor |
| Full version historyUndo anything, including an agent's work | Every change is a version. Roll back the live site in one click | No revision history. Deleted pages can come back within 30 days |
| Free draft, no clockPay when the site goes live | Free for as long as you like, with preview links | 14-day trial, then pay |
| Several languagesHreflang and sitemaps follow | Included, with no fee per language | Weglot, paid past 2,000 words, or duplicated pages |
| Lighthouse performance on mobileStatic Astro pages, with almost no script | 100 on the real sites we measured | 30 at the median |
| Ready for AI searchPages ChatGPT, Claude and Perplexity can read | Sitemap, llms.txt, JSON-LD and a Markdown copy of every page, by default | Sitemap, and an llms.txt you create and turn on |
| Built-in analyticsVisitors, pages, sources, AI referrals | Included, and sets no cookie | Built in |
| Nothing to maintainNo server, plugin or database on the visitor's path | Static files on Cloudflare's network | Hosted by Squarespace, with nothing to update |
| Template galleryPick a look by eye | A design made from your description | The reason people choose it |
| Selling onlineStore, fees handled | Not offered yet | Yes. 2% fee on Basic, 0% from Core |
What a year costs
Atelier201
€90a year, or €9 a month
- Team editing
- Unlimited members
- AI included
- 1,000 credits a month, and your own agent is free
Squarespace
€171a year on Basic, billed annually
- Team editing
- 2 contributors on Basic
- AI included
- 10 credits, once, on Basic
Prices exclude VAT on both sides and come from each company's pricing page, seen from Germany.
Lighthouse performance on mobile
Page weight
JavaScript
Ten times lighter than the median Squarespace page
The median Squarespace site scores 30 for Lighthouse performance on mobile and weighs 3,572 KB. The real Atelier201 sites we measured score 100 and weigh up to 351 KB. One photographer who moved to Astro reports going from 38 to 93.
Where the numbers come from
Competitors: HTTP Archive medians, September 2026. Atelier201: three Lighthouse mobile runs on each of two real sites, November 5, 2026, with the heavier site's weight. On real visits, 71% of Squarespace sites pass Core Web Vitals on mobile.
Three differences that matter
An export that includes the site
Squarespace exports an XML file in WordPress format: some pages, one blog, no styles, no custom CSS, no store pages. Atelier201 gives you the whole Astro project, Git history included, on any plan.
A design made for your business
The risk with a template is the florist across town having the same one. Atelier201 generates a design from what you tell us, following a design manual, and you judge it on a free preview.
What customers say about Squarespace
Chosen by us from public reviews and Reddit. Every quote links to its source.
Overall, I'm regretting using squarespace for the hidden fees/random rules.
When Squarespace took over maintenance of my domain from Google Domains, I lost the ability to send email with my domain address from Gmail.
I switched from SquareSpace to Astro. Converted my first website and lighthouse performance went up from 38 -> 93!
Moving from Squarespace
Squarespace's XML covers part of a site, so the practical route is to let an agent or our assistant rebuild it from your public pages.
What comes across
- Text and photos from your live pages
- Blog posts, from the XML export or your live pages
- Your domain. If it came from Google Domains, check its nameserver settings first
- Old addresses, through redirects
What doesn't
- The template's look
- Store, memberships and Acuity data
- Video and audio hosted on Squarespace: upload or embed them again
Questions
Is Atelier201 cheaper than Squarespace?
Yes: €90 a year against €171 for Basic on annual billing, both before VAT. Unlimited collaborators, analytics, several languages and 1,000 AI credits a month are included.
Does Squarespace have version history?
No. Squarespace's help center says it has no revision history or auto-save when editing, and that deleted pages can be restored for 30 days. On Atelier201 every change is a version you can restore, and you can roll the live site back in one click.
Can I export a Squarespace site?
Partly. Squarespace exports an XML file with some page types and one blog. Style settings, custom CSS, drafts, store pages and video blocks don't come across. That's why moving usually means rebuilding from your public pages, which an AI agent does quickly.
Does Atelier201 have templates?
No gallery. You describe your business and get a first version with its own design. You can name sites you like, and change anything afterwards.
What about my domain from Google Domains?
It's yours, now managed by Squarespace. Point it at Atelier201 with a DNS change, or transfer it. A CNAME change is often the simpler first step.
Does Atelier201 limit traffic?
The plan is sized for 50,000 visits a month. A site is never cut off for going past that: you're told, and offered more.
Is Atelier201 a good Squarespace alternative for SEO and AI search?
Every Atelier201 site is static HTML built with Astro, served from Cloudflare's network, with an XML sitemap, hreflang, JSON-LD structured data, llms.txt and a Markdown copy of every page. That makes it easy for Google, ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity and other answer engines to read and cite, which is what generative engine optimization (GEO) and answer engine optimization (AEO) are about.
Can I build my website with Claude, ChatGPT or Gemini?
Yes. Connect your own AI agent, such as Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini, Cursor or Codex, through the MCP server, the CLI or the REST API. It can create the site, edit pages and content, run a build and prepare publishing. Those calls cost nothing on Atelier201, so you don't pay for AI twice. People without an agent can use the built-in assistant.
Do I own my website and its code?
Yes. Each site is a standard Astro project in its own Git repository. You can pull it with the CLI or export code, content and media at any time, on any plan, then run npm ci and npm run build and host it anywhere. There is no vendor lock-in.
