The Difference Between WordPress And Blogger
Probably not a day goes by on a blogging forum somewhere that the question is asked. While you may have figured out where my preference lies. The question of which blogging platform is better may be a bit of a partisan issue. Loyalist on both sides will defend their chosen platform like people defend their political ideology. In my humble opinion a self-hosted WordPress blog is the best option for both beginner and advanced bloggers alike.
Both Blogger and WordPress offer free hosting on either blogspot.com for Blogger and WordPress.com for WordPress. Both of these have somewhat limited options as far as additional features and commercialization for making money with the free blog hosted on their servers. Your blog can be shut down if they don’t like your content. So you don’t really have full control of your own intellectual property.
If you are going to get serious about blogging then hosting your blog on your own domain is the best choice. If you started on a free service and want to move to your own domain the web is full of guides about moving a blog to your own domain and hosting. There are countless guides online about moving a free blog to a self-hosted WordPress on a domain for a reason. Many people who started on the free hosted sites that got serious about blogging ends up either moving their blog or regretting they used a blog hosted anywhere else but a site they have full control over.
For self-hosted blogs on your own domain the options offered by WordPress and the lack of them in Blogger are the big differences. Both can be very easy for a beginner to use for making an occasional post and if that is all you will be doing then it may not matter. However the scalability of WordPress and the features that can be added as the blog site evolves and the blogger gets more serious about blogging is where WordPress really stands apart.
WordPress is an open source code content management system that anyone can use and edit for free. WordPress is self-contained when installed on your site and is not dependent on any other outside source to maintain and run. Blogger blogs on your own website are still accessed on and the script is controlled by the blogger site. In very basic terms you create a post on Blogger and it is allowed access to your hosting account to create the post. The Blogger blog may be shown on your domain but it is really just sending the content to your hosting account from the Blogger site.
The look of a blog is very important to most people as well and there are thousands and thousands of free WordPress themes available. And to look at some of them you couldn’t tell they were a blog. Changing a WordPress theme is as simple as uploading it to your server and clicking on the theme from the dashboard. Items on the WordPress sidebar can be added, moved and changed very easily within the WordPress dashboard using sidebar widgets. There is no need to edit the themes code to change or reorder the sidebar items. Changing your WordPress theme will maintain all the content, links and sidebar items. I don’t know how many themes are available for Blogger but if you edited your themes HTML or CSS, changing the theme, or template as Blogger calls them, it will loose any customization. Oh and I can usually spot a Blogger blog a mile away.
Other options available in WordPress:
- Custom Permalinks – using only the category and the post title in the posts URL looks better and helps with SEO.
- Plugins – Plugins add new features and functionality to the blog. These can be added as the blog evolves.
- Static Pages – The option to create a page that will not go into the blog loop like a post. Using a static page for the main blog page, a WordPress blog can be used like a regular website in fact I have recently converted a PIPS site to WordPress using this option.
- Self Pinging – WordPress has a built-in pinging option with plugins available to enhance it. You can also add and remove the individual sites that you want pinged. Blogger blogs need pinged manually and using different services to ping may send duplicate pings to some sites.
I have seen arguments that Blogger blogs get indexed faster by Google than WordPress blogs but I have seen no true evidence of that. A self-hosted WordPress blog will also get indexed fairly quickly if setup correctly. One thing I have experienced with all my WordPress blogs and even while researching blogging on Google: I have yet to see very many free Blogger blogs show up in the top of a Google search. Have you?
Similar Posts:
- Dude Where’s My Blog
- WordPress Blogging The Proper Setup And Use
- What To Blog About How To Come Up With Blogging Content
- What Is Blogging Understanding What A Blog Is
- Basics About Blogging
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Comments
I can contend that Blogger blogs get indexed quite fast, now as for before Wordpress blogs, that remains to be seen. I haven’t updated my blogger blog for quite some time and it still has a PageRank of 3. Google likes blogger, that’s for sure. I would say that WordPress is easier for SEO because you can change the title tags, but that’s it. Either one is good, you decide! Regards!
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this is really the finest way to differentiate between blogger and wordpress, thanks for this information
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Yes, the debate between Blogger and Wordpress does seem like it will be around for quite some time. Simply because Blogger is here to stay and so it Wordpress. Your information is useful for those looking for the features and benefits you posted. Yet, there are some blogspot (free Bloggers) who will keep their platform regardless of the all the advantages that Wordpress seems to offer.
It sort of reminds me of the Democrats and Republicans. No matter how eloquently each presents their case that theirs is the better party over the other one, when its all said and done, rarely will one convert to the other side. I don’t think staying with what you’re committed to, makes it a bad decision, it just comes down to a matter of individual preference.
Being a member of the blogspot community, I have seen many of these sites rank high in Google based upon the keyword or search being made. Matt Cutts, an expert who works for Google still maintains a blogpspot site even though he has other self hosted blogs. I’ve also seen some nicely themed Blogger sites that didn’t look so generic. So take it a little easy on us Blogger loyalists.
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Jeff, you’ve pointed all differences very well. I use wordpress just because there’re plenty of plugins you could use. Many of them are “SEO necessary” and many provide better usability.
I found the toplist of 100 blogs and 50% were wordpress based. Blogspot was only mentioned three times.
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I think the biggest difference is the option of being able to use plugins… Wordpress’ plugins can make a blog be a lot more than a blog, while Blogger offers people just a blog… Ceteris paribus, people who need a simple blog just to blog and nothing else could use either a Blogger account or a wordpress.com account and it wouldn’t be such a difference; But when it comes to the self hosted wordpress vs Blogger, Blogger doesn’t stand a chance because of the option to extend wordpress…
Open source software is always the best choice
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this shows clarity of difference between blogger and wordpress. thanks for this wonderful article
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I am with you Jeff on this, a self owned domain is always better for blogging. If you own a domain it means you have full control on it, you can do any thing you want. And as far as indexing is concern I don’t think there is an issue with it. Google always like blogs that update its content frequently.
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Good differentiation between Wordpress and Blogger ! Personally I like Wordpress. Lot of developer are working for wordpress plugins so it is quite easy to the plugins.
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I prefer WordPress. I’m a beginner and WordPress is easy to use and there are so many other users, that if there’s ever anything I don’t understand or want to fix/change, I can find easy ways to do so (like this blog). Blogger lacks a lot of great options that WP provides.
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Another important point to remember with Wordpress is you arne’t allowed to have ads. Blogger is a lot free-er in that regard.
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Jeff Replied:
May 29th, 2009 at 7:46 am
True for the free versions on their hosting, but I am referring to using both platforms as a self-hosted option. On the free WP version there is very little tolerance for ads especially Google ads and Blogger is a little more open especially to Google ads since its owned by Google.
With a self-hosted blog you can have as many ads as you want and not worry about getting your blog shut down. This is another case for having your blog, no matter what platform, on your own domain and hosting that you control.
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this is a very nice article, shows difference between wordpress & blogger but i believe blogger is easy to use option.
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this is good one, i can clearly differentiate now between these two
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I think WordPress is more friendly fo novice
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the sheer amount of plugins and themes makes them easy to tell apart
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I agree with Digo, if you´re starting blogging WordPress it´s a little more friendly.
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Both are good platforms but if you are blogging for money you should definitely host on your own domain. If you host your blogger or WP blog on a free domain than you can set up a great little money maker and poof! It can be removed since you don’t own it!
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Hands down, you get more customization with wordpress and much more freedom to do what you will with a self-hosted blog.
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Word press blogs are very simple to set up and I recommend that you use your own domain to do so. Wordpress has loads of functions, features and plugins to make it worthwhile.
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Awesome post.This is an appropriate article giving good information about the difference between word press and blogger. Word press is user friendly and has many many functions and features which the others do not have. Keep writing, waiting for some more good posts from you.
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For me, your hosting is not an issue. What really matter is your domain name. How about after blogging for a year, you decided to move to paid hosting. Wouldn’t it be a pain since you can’t use your old .blogspot.com or .wordpress.com domain anymore.
At last, you need to start all over again to make your domain name valuable.
PS:You can use your own domain name at blogspot however you need to pay a decent amount to use your own domain at wordpress.com.
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Yes it true that wordpress has gone past blogger now and there are many options in wordpress as you have explain. The static pages available in Wordpress is also a big different because I was using blogger earlier and wanted to make a static site with blogger but wasn’t possible,but the main advantage I find in blogger is that it’s more user friendly and good for beginner bloggers.
-Ben.
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I personally have experienced using Blogger,
and I am contented with it. Maybe for bloggers
who plan on becoming professional bloggers,
Wordpress is more advisable. I have nothing against
Wordpress, especially because I have not tried
using it, but I am happy with Blogger. Cheers!
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i agree with digo, WP is more friendly ^^
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The main difference I always notice is that WP is a lot more customizable. If I wanted to start a quick simple blog I’d use blogger. For everything else I’d go with WP.
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I have used Blogger before when I am still a newbie in the blogging world. And now, Wordpress has become very popular. Both work great by the way. But I still prefer Wordpress because it has all that I need.
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The truth remains that Blogger and Wordpress have a lot of similarities, though many claim they prefer wordpress, i use both.
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Hi..Jeff
I think WordPress is more friendly then others
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Google definitely tends to favor those shiny new Blogger blogs. Always a good idea to have a blog on there. However wordpress is definitely far superior to blogger and much more powerful.
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his shows clarity of difference between blogger and wordpress. thanks for this wonderful article
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I use both blogger and wordpress. I don’t think Google shows preference for one or the other. A hosted wordpress blog gives you much more flexibility. Blogger is pretty good for someone just learning the ropes or for someone that doesn’t need the flexibility of wordpress, for whatever reason. If you plan to “go pro” or have serious intentions for your blog, I’d vote to definitely go the paid web hosting route.
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Hi, Well, if u want u owner blog in you hosting u will install WordPress, is the best way, Wordpress hav a lot of features more than Blogger.
Blogger is an basic blogging system, y cant install plugins, extras and more, with WordPress in you hosting u will install extra plugins, and lots of comforts for write and put videos and pic’s.Thnx
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Jeff Replied:
July 29th, 2009 at 1:50 pm
What kind of language is this that you speak? You are the English butcher.
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There is no doubt that Blogger gets more juice then any other platform I mean they are owned by Google the bot lives inside blogger this is why you can get such fast indexing. But to have control of your site and not be on a propitiatory system is way worth the fact that you might need to do a bit more then in Blogger.
Vic
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Jeff Replied:
August 14th, 2009 at 7:43 am
That is the big myth with no way to prove it. Google doesn’t play favorites that way.
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Google definitely tends to favor those shiny new Blogger blogs. Always a good idea to have a blog on there. However wordpress is definitely far superior to blogger and much more powerful.
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Jeff Replied:
August 17th, 2009 at 6:03 pm
MYTH!! Show me the proof, any proof at all.
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About an year ago I switched from Blogger to Wordpress with less sweat than I expected, and quite glad I did.
But I couldn’t help noticing that page indexing was a bit faster for Blogger sites than Wordpress ones. Has someone noticed the same thing too? Also, what about PR? Could it be that a site built with Blogger gets a higher page rank than a similar one made with Wordpress (considering same content and backlinks)?
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Wordpress is the way to go so you can have more control. For example ebay does not allow you to sell on blogger.com anymore.
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Completely agree with most of the comments. Wordpress is just miles away from blogger. It’s just superior and powerful. The plug-in support of Wordpress really makes it much more awesome. Cheers
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I recently moved from blogger to WordPress. And WordPress is simply the best. Other CMSs are not even close to WordPress. But if you want to have a simple CMS service blogger is the choice.
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Jeff, you’ve made some very good points about WordPress. I was surprised to hear that other people are claiming Blogger gets indexed faster than WP. In my experiences, WP blogs get indexed rapidly. Most posts seem to be index within a day or two, so I’d be curious to hear actual times for Blogger blogs.
I agree with some of the other comments (and it sounded like you were leaning towards it) that it doesn’t make sense to create a blog that isn’t self-hosted. Too many lost SEO benefits, monetization opportunities and ownership/control issues.
Thanks for the post! Looking forward to reading more.
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