IMcreator

Free - IM Creator offers a free option. It is about as tantalizing as the other free website options offered by other website builders. It gives you 50mb of hosting and a site that is a subdomain of IM Creator.

Premium - The premium plan has a few different pricing options. You can choose how often you are billed, and that determines how much you pay. These are the pricing options

If you pay biannually (twice a year, not every two years) then you pay $9.95/month.

If you pay yearly then it is $7.95/month.

If you pay once every two years (also biannually) $6.95/month.

If you pay every three years they will charge you $5.95/month.

All of these prices are for the same plan. The premium plan gives you unlimited hosting and bandwidth, ten custom email addresses, and better support options.

Pro & Whitelable - This is IM Creator’s most expensive option at $250/year. It allows freelancers to rebrand IM Creator as their own product to sell to clients. You also get better support options.

These pricing options are quite odd. If you don't want to be stuck with IM Creator for three years, some of the pricing plans won't really be worth it. If you are committed to IM Creator as a platform then they are a great value.

Squarespace

$8/month - This is Squarespace’s least expensive package. They throw in a free domain with an annual purchase.

$18/month - This gives you more options if you are running an online store.

Squarespace does not have many pricing options, and they may are slightly more expensive, but they give you a fully featured website for eight dollars a month. Some of the less expensive options sacrifice features to cut their cost.

Pretty much any Squarespace plan is better than IM Creator.

IMcreator

IM Creator has many more templates than Squarespace, but they are not nearly as nicely designed. They do range in quality, and there is a certain amount of sifting though bad designs b3fore you find one that suits your purposes.

The editor is sparse and can't actually do all that much. It is drag and drop and open ended, but the design elements you can add don't extend the functionality of the sites much at all. That said, they are very easy to create.

These websites will never be as good looking or as fully featured as Squarespace.

Squarespace

Squarespace's minimal interface means that there is a bit of a learning curve when first trying to use the software. Some elements are not labeled as clearly as they should be, and that causes some confusion at first. It isn't that much of a problem once you get used to the interface, but it is frustrating at first.

The templates are wonderful. They are all fully featured websites even before you edit a single thing. Squarespace's templates are the best of any of the website apps we've reviewed. They blow IM Creator out of the water.

IMcreator

IM Creator websites look pretty good for what they are, but they mostly just show pictures and text.  They don't really do much.

The mobile sites are disappointing. First of all, they have completely separate sites for mobile browsing, so you'll have to design two websites instead of one. The templates don't automatically show mobile sites when they are loaded on a mobile device.

The sites are great for people who want to showcase their work, but beyond that they don't really have much functionality.

Squarespace

Squarespace sites work very well on the frontend. They are easy to navigate, and they don't have any glaring performance issues.

They are also all mobile optimized, so you will never have to worry about your site looking weird on a smartphone. Squarespace understands that having a good mobile site is just as important as having a good desktop site. IM Creator does not have the same mobile functionality.

Squarespace has a much more sophisticated frontend than IM Creator.

IMcreator

The interface has nothing going on. At all. It is just a black background that asks you if you want to edit your site and a list of templates. That is it.

They don't even offer any statistics to spice up the interface. IM Creator is extememly bland and the lack of features here make it not very useful at all.

Squarespace has so much more to explore than IM Creator.

Squarespace

Squarespace's interface is minimal in the same way as their editor, and it has a similar learning curve. Not everything is labeled very clearly, so it can be a little confusing at first.

Unlike IM Creator, Squarespace's backend actually has features. They have a statistics page and account pages, as well as space to add third party integrations.

Squarespace has a much better interface than IM Creator. There is so little going on in IM Creator's website that one wonders if they even want anyone to use their software.

IMcreator

The free plan has hosting only up to 50MB, which is very very little. The paid plans will give you unlimited hosting. You may host to your heart’s content.

Of course it isn't hard to host sites that are as simple as the ones made in IM Creator.

If you want SSL encryption, you'll have to buy a certificate and install it yourself. IM Creator does not offer it as an option for their websites.

Squarespace

Squarespace has unlimited hosting with all of its plans. They want to make it as simple as possible to make a pretty, pretty website.

Squarespace develops its own integrations and add ons. This makes their platform more secure since they don't have to worry about other developers dictating how the add ons interact with Squarespace. The closed ecosystem really helps to beef up security.

Squarespace also offers SSL encryption on checkout pages for their eCommerce options. They don't offer sitewide SSL, but they at least have some, which is more than can be said for IM Creator.

IMcreator

You can only get your statistics from third parties. They do allow you to track statics though Google Analytics. You have to fill out a small form to get it up and running. It would be nice to see some statistics from IM Creator, but judging by the state of their website that is a bit too much to hope for.

Squarespace is much better about getting you the numbers.

Squarespace

Squarespace has its own reports section. They give you a wealth of data: basic traffic data, mobile views, subscribers, referrals, popular content, and search engine queries. That is a good amount of stuff, especially compared to no statistics whatsoever, which is what IM Creator offers you.

You can also use third party application to track your traffic, and they will provide more information than Squarespace. However, there is enough on Squarespace's statistics page to get started.

IMcreator

There is no real extensibility to speak of in IM Creator. There aren't any extensions.

IM Creator is pretty useless for anything except the most basic of websites. Squarespace doesn't have that many integrations, but some is more than none.

Squarespace

Squarespace makes it own integrations, so it doesn't have that many add ons. This is for a couple of reasons. They don't want to have any jarring design inconsistencies, and having the Squarespace team make their own integrations makes the platform more secure.

They don’t have a PayPal integration, which is a blow to eCommerce.

There are also third party integrations for Squarespace, but use at your own risk. Squarespace won't be able to help you if something goes wrong.

IMcreator

IM Creator offers support tickets, a FAQ, forums, a downloadable manual, and one hundred and twenty-three how to articles. They are very proud of the one hundred and twenty-three how tos. And why not? One hundred and twenty-three is an awful lot of how to articles.

They don't have any person to person support available. Squarespace has much better support with their live chat.

Squarespace

Squarespace has a number of support options. They provide how-to videos, forums, and a huge knowladgebase. The how-to videos are pretty useful for complete beginners. They will get your site up and running.

They also have live chat Mon-Fri 3am - 8pm EST, and are available through email. The chat is a little sluggish sometimes, but the email is very responsive.