Content Infrastructure or Visual Publishing?
Short answer: Sanity is the better fit when one content source has to feed several apps, sites and channels through APIs; Framer is the better fit when the website is the main channel and marketing should ship pages without a front-end release.
TL;DR: our take:
Cédric Moore
Managing Founder at Trueform
Framer
Framer combines a visual design canvas, structured CMS, managed hosting, and publishing workflow in one place. Teams can create responsive pages, shape the presentation around their content, manage metadata, and publish changes directly, making it a strong choice when the website itself is the primary channel.
Curious what it costs? Our published prices start at $25K for a full Framer marketing website.
Architecture
Visual builder, CMS, and managed hosting together
Content modeling
Structured collections designed for a living website
Design workflow
Design, content, and publishing in one visual canvas
Publishing speed
Page and content updates ship without a front-end release
Hosting and delivery
Managed hosting and optimization are built in
Best for
Design-led marketing sites that need to evolve quickly
What does Framer do differently from Sanity?
Sanity powers developer flexibility; Framer drives fast visual design.
Is Framer more than a headless CMS?
Framer turns structured content into live sites without front-end builds.
Design and publish from one canvas
Build reusable page sections, CMS collections, and campaigns without splitting the visual system from the publishing workflow.
Keep the web stack intentionally simple
Responsive design, metadata, redirects, hosting, and delivery are integrated instead of assembled around the CMS.
Give marketing meaningful ownership
The team closest to the audience can keep landing pages, comparison pages, and editorial content current without waiting for a development release.
When to use which
Use Sanity when:
You need one content source to serve several apps, sites, and channels.
A development team owns your custom front end, integrations, and release pipeline.
Your content model requires deep customization, permissions, or enterprise integrations.
You value composable content infrastructure more than visual publishing autonomy.
Use Framer when:
Designers and marketers need to launch and refine web pages independently.
Campaign velocity, conversion work, and continuous iteration are priorities.
Your website is a design-led marketing experience rather than a custom application.
You want hosting, performance, and publishing in a simpler managed workflow.
Coming from a different stack?
Compare Framer to:
Astro
Short answer: Astro is an open-source framework developers use to build fast, content-driven sites in code; Framer is a visual platform where marketers design, edit and publish the site themselves. Choose Astro if engineers own the website, Framer if marketing should.
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Craft CMS
Short answer: choose Craft CMS when developers need a fully bespoke content model and own the templates; choose Framer when marketing should design, edit and publish pages without a release. Both can run a serious company site; the difference is who owns change.
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OpenAI Codex
Short answer: OpenAI Codex helps developers write and change code; Framer is where a design and marketing team builds, edits and publishes the website itself. Use Codex for custom software, Framer for a marketing site the whole team keeps improving.
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Claude Code
Short answer: Claude Code helps developers explore, write and change code from the terminal; Framer is where designers and marketers build, edit and publish the website themselves. Use Claude Code for custom software, Framer for a marketing site your team keeps improving.
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Replit
Short answer: Replit is a browser-based workspace for building and deploying software; Framer is a visual platform for designing and publishing marketing websites. Pick Replit for an app or internal tool, Framer for a polished site your marketing team runs.
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Lovable
Short answer: Lovable turns prompts into app prototypes; Framer is built to design, publish and keep refining a company marketing website. Use Lovable to test a product idea, Framer for the site that sells it.
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Squarespace
Short answer: Squarespace is the quicker choice for a simple, template-based site with built-in commerce or bookings; Framer is the better choice for a distinctive B2B or SaaS marketing site that grows with CMS content, localization and testing.
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Wix
Short answer: Wix makes it easy to get a site online with templates and built-in business tools; Framer is the better choice for a distinctive B2B or SaaS marketing site your team keeps shaping, testing and localizing.
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Contentful
Short answer: Contentful is a headless CMS for composable, multi-channel content and needs a separate front end; Framer combines visual design, CMS and hosting for fast, search-ready marketing sites. Miro is moving its marketing site from a complex headless setup to Framer with us.
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WordPress
Short answer: WordPress is free, open-source software you host, update and extend with plugins; Framer is a visual platform with hosting, CDN and CMS built in. Choose WordPress for full server control or a plugin-heavy setup, Framer for a fast marketing site your team edits without maintenance.
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Webflow
Short answer: both are visual builders with a CMS and hosting. Framer works like a design tool, with localization, A/B testing and analytics built in; Webflow works like a visual developer environment with CSS-level control. Gather moved from Webflow to Framer with us in two months.
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