Best website builders for foundations and grantmakers (2026)

What you fund and last year's grantees, how to apply with the deadline and the form, how to give with monthly gifts if you take them, the trustees and the money in plain words, the annual report as a page, a private page for the board and a contact page with a map. Our foundation business plan runs the numbers on a family foundation's first years, and our foundation website inspiration gallery shows real foundation sites built that way.

For a foundation, the answer at the top of this page, computed from the nine tests: the builder with the most points leads, and the table shows every mark. Google shows nonprofit builders and galleries for the foundation search, which is why the five scored here are the general ones every page in this series scores; a foundation that raises money from the public has the same needs as a charity, and our best website builders for nonprofits page scores events with RSVP in place of the private board page. A grantmaking foundation that takes no public gifts reads here and weighs the giving row lightly.

Build it on a builder with a free plan and take gifts through a giving platform that charges a fee per gift rather than a subscription: Wix's free plan publishes on a wixsite.com address, and our best free website builders page scores what ten builders let you publish without paying. The giving test above scores the builder's own form: Wix, Squarespace and WordPress.com take one-time and monthly gifts built in; on GoDaddy a gift is a PayPal button or a GoFundMe section, and on Zarla a payment link for a set amount or your giving platform embedded. Zarla is free to build and preview, and you pay when you publish, on the Premium plan.

It isn't a rule anyone enforces; it's the fundraiser's observation that about 80 percent of the money comes from about 20 percent of the donors, which for a foundation usually means a handful of families or the founding gift. The website's job follows from it: the big gifts come from a meeting, and the page's part is to make the meeting easy to ask for and the small gifts easy to give monthly, which is the giving test above. The money rules that are enforced are the ones in the next question.

In the US it's the public support test: a public charity shows the IRS, on Schedule A of its Form 990, that at least a third of its support over five years comes from the general public, government or other public charities rather than a few donors, and a charity that fails it is reclassified as a private foundation. A family foundation funded by one family doesn't try to pass it; it is a private foundation by design, and the rule it lives by instead is the minimum distribution, about 5 percent of its investment assets paid out in grants and expenses each year. Say which you are on the site, with your EIN. Confirm the details with your accountant, and with your national regulator's rules outside the US.

Building and previewing one can cost nothing on most builders here; a live site on your own domain costs money on every one, and the cost question below gives each builder's own US price. The nonprofit platforms ChatGPT names charge for the tools around the site: Morweb's own site (read October 26, 2026) promises "Strategic, mission-driven nonprofit websites—without complexity." and its pricing page says "We offer three different setup packages for each price point on our plans (Starter, Grow or Engage)." without a monthly figure, so the price is a quote; it isn't scored here. Zarla is free to build and preview, and you pay when you publish, on the Premium plan. An agency build is the other route, and costs what an agency charges.

Wix, on these tests: 15 of 18 to WordPress.com's 14. Both write a first draft with AI and edit it by chat, both take one-time and monthly gifts built in, both keep a page private and both send posts to subscribers; the difference is the office: Wix keeps price quotes, invoices and payments together, where WordPress.com has a payments block and needs a plugin for quotes and invoices, and its local search is plugins too. For a foundation that invoices nothing, the two are closer than the points suggest. The table above has every mark, and the order is computed from them rather than chosen, so read the scores rather than take our word for it.

Asked twice on October 26, 2026 about a charitable foundation, ChatGPT named the same five both times, Wix first, then WordPress, Squarespace, Webflow and Morweb, and said "If your foundation awards grants, consider adding a dedicated grant application and review workflow."; it didn't name Zarla, though its second answer cited our nonprofits guide as a source. Yola has no foundation list; its nonprofit list (last updated September 18, 2026) ranks Yola first, then Wix, Squarespace, GoDaddy and Strikingly, and names its limits: "No native donation payment processing or donor database tools" and "Not designed for large fundraising campaigns with complex backend or CRM requirements". WebsiteBuilderReport (updated April 2026) names Squarespace for nonprofits with Wix as runner-up. None of those pages scores the builders on the same tests, which is what the table above does; read the marks, not the names.

With Zarla, the first draft takes about 30 seconds: every page, written for your foundation, including a contact form and a map on the contact page. What's left is your programs, your grantees and the trustees' photos. Wix, Squarespace, GoDaddy and WordPress.com can also write a first draft with AI; how long the rest takes depends on how much you set up yourself. We haven't timed them side by side yet.

Wix, WordPress.com and Squarespace have it built in. It takes another tool or a workaround on GoDaddy (PayPal donate buttons or a GoFundMe section; no donation form); Zarla (no donation form; set-amount payment links, or embed your donor platform). We read each on the builder's own pages on October 24, 2026, and re-checked them on October 26, 2026.

Wix, WordPress.com, Squarespace and GoDaddy have it built in. Zarla can't do it. We read each on the builder's own pages on October 12, 2026, and re-checked them on October 26, 2026.

Building and previewing one can cost nothing on most builders; a live site on your own domain costs money on every builder here. Wix: Core, the cheapest plan with bookings, is $29/mo billed yearly. Light is $17/mo without bookings, and there's a free plan on a wixsite.com address. WordPress.com: Personal is $4/mo billed yearly; form file uploads need Business, $25/mo billed yearly. Plugins can add their own cost. Squarespace: Basic is $19/mo and Core $29/mo, billed yearly, after a 14-day free trial. Online booking is a separate Acuity Scheduling subscription. GoDaddy: Websites + Marketing plans are priced by country, and GoDaddy's page didn't show us a US price, so check it for yours. Zarla is free to build and preview, and you pay when you publish, on the Premium plan. Each price is the builder's own, read on its pricing or help pages (September 28, 2026); check it for your country before you buy.

Yes: Wix placed first of five here, with 15 of 18 points. Of the tests that are particular to foundations, it gets a tick on "Gifts with monthly giving", "A private page for the board and grantees" and "A blog and an email newsletter". The catch: bookings need the Core plan rather than the cheapest one, and pages for each town you serve are yours to write.