Pub Site is one of the best-known website builders made for authors, and with good reason. If you are reading this, you are probably either using it and wondering what else is out there, or weighing it against the alternatives before you start. This guide covers what Pub Site does well, what it costs, the alternatives worth a look (free and paid), and a few questions that make the choice easier.
A word on where we stand: Draft Margin is one of the alternatives, and it is listed below with its limits. Every price on this page was checked on each service’s own website on 16 October 2026, in US dollars unless stated. Prices change, so check before you choose.
What Pub Site does well
Pub Site was built by FSB Associates, a firm of book publicists, and it shows. It is shaped around what an author actually puts on a website rather than around pages and blocks.
- Books are built in. Each book gets a page that can hold several formats, with buy buttons for the booksellers you choose, and you can set a featured book and sort books into categories.
- The rest of an author’s kit is there too: a blog, a tour calendar for events, a photo gallery, a mailing-list signup with guides for Mailchimp and MailerLite, and your social feeds.
- You can sell books directly, through PayPal, with shipping settings, at no extra cost on top of the subscription.
- The themes are made for authors, with preset colour schemes and home-page layouts, and a colour and font editor for changes of your own.
- One flat price includes hosting, after a 14-day free trial that needs no card.
- People in publishing like it. Its endorsements come from publishers, agents and others in the trade, and its ease of use is widely praised.
If you want an established, author-specific builder with a shop and an events calendar, and the price suits you, Pub Site is a sound choice.
What it costs, and what to check
- $19.99 a month on its website after the trial (its terms say $19.95), billed monthly. We found no annual plan. That is about $240 a year, or $1,200 over five years.
- Your own domain is bought separately from a registrar, at roughly $10–20 a year, and pointed at Pub Site once your account is paid for.
- Payments are non-refundable, under its terms.
- Series are not mentioned in its help pages. If you write series, try setting one up in reading order during the trial.
- Leaving: we found nothing in its terms or help pages about exporting a site. If that matters to you, ask before you start.
None of these is unusual for a paid builder. They are simply the things worth knowing before you commit.
Why authors look elsewhere
Usually for one of four reasons: the price, over many years, for a site that may change little; wanting a free or cheaper plan while the first book finds its readers; wanting more control over the design; or wanting a clear way to take everything with them if they ever leave.
The alternatives
BookBub Author Websites
Free, with no time limit, from the book-deals service many readers already use. A page is created for each of your books. The Pro plan, at $7.99 a month billed annually or $9.99 monthly, adds series pages and a built-in newsletter, with a 14-day trial. A natural choice if you already keep a BookBub author profile.
Zenpage
Free, one site per account, and it lets you use your own domain. It can sell ebooks, audiobooks and print direct with no commission (the card processor’s fees still apply), and connects to six newsletter services. Zenpage publishes its own comparison of author builders, so read that with the same care as this one.
Tertulia for Authors
Paid, with no free plan: Basic at $7.99 a month and Pro at $15.99 a month, both billed annually ($9.99 and $19.99 monthly), with a 14-day trial. It handles unlimited books and series pages, and Pro sells ebooks, audiobooks and print direct with no fee per sale.
The Authors Guild Sitebuilder
For members of the Authors Guild only: membership is $149 a year ($100 for emerging writers), hosting is $12 a month and a domain $22 a year, and setup is free for new members. The Guild can also build the site for you. Worth a look if you would value a writers’ organisation behind your website.
A Books2Read author page
Free from Draft2Digital, and created for you when you make universal book links, which send readers to every store from one address. You can add a bio, a photo, a featured book, social links and a newsletter link. Books2Read sets the page’s structure, though, and there is no blog and no domain of your own. It is a good listing to have, but not a website.
Carrd
Simple one-page sites. Free with a “Made with Carrd” footer; your own domain needs Pro Standard, at $19 a year. A tidy choice for a debut author with one book, and quickly outgrown by a series.
Squarespace or Wix
General website builders with beautiful templates. Squarespace starts at about €11 a month on its Basic plan, billed annually; Wix’s Light plan starts at about $17 a month. Neither has anything built in for books or series, so you lay out each book page and reading order by hand.
WordPress
The most flexible option of all. Self-hosted, with a free book plugin such as MyBookTable or Novelist, it can do almost anything, and you look after it. WordPress.com, the hosted version, starts at $4 a month billed annually, and every paid plan now allows plugins. Our guide to WordPress and hosted builders weighs the two approaches in money and in hours.
Having it built for you
If you would rather not touch it at all: in the UK, Troubador builds a five-page author site for £399 plus VAT, including the first year’s hosting; in the US, Gatekeeper Press offers a full custom build for $2,499, then $29 a month for hosting after the first year. A freelance designer typically charges €1,000–5,000. In every case, ask who updates the site afterwards, and what that costs.
Draft Margin
Ours. Free, with no ads, no trial and no paid plan, and the page on why it is free explains how. You fill in your books and series, and a designed theme lays them out: series in reading order, every book on its own page with its buy links and sample chapters, the next release on the home page with its preorder links, a blog, a newsletter signup for your own mailing-list service, and whole books in chapters for readers who join as Members. One button exports everything you have made. The limits are real: a fixed choice of themes, no shop, and no custom domains yet, so your site lives at yourname.draftmargin.com for now.
Side by side
| Service | Price | Best for |
|---|---|---|
| Pub Site | $19.99 a month | An established author builder with a shop and events |
| BookBub Author Websites | Free; Pro from $7.99 a month | Authors already active on BookBub |
| Zenpage | Free | Selling direct on your own domain without paying for the site |
| Tertulia for Authors | From $7.99 a month | Many books and series, and selling direct on Pro |
| Authors Guild Sitebuilder | $12 a month, plus membership | Guild members, or anyone who wants it built for them |
| Books2Read | Free | A listing to go with a real website |
| Carrd | Free; $19 a year with your domain | A debut with one book |
| Squarespace, Wix | From about €11 a month | Design freedom, for a fee |
| WordPress | From hosting costs | Control over everything, and the upkeep that comes with it |
| Draft Margin | Free | Books, series and Members chapters, with no ads and no fee |
How to choose
Six questions settle most of it.
- Do you want to sell books directly? Then you need a shop: Pub Site, Zenpage, Tertulia Pro, or WordPress with a shop plugin.
- Do you need your own domain on the first day? Most paid options let you connect one; Zenpage does so for free. If you can start on a subdomain, more free options open up.
- How many series do you write? Choose a builder that knows what a series is, so the reading order is kept for you instead of typed by hand.
- What will it cost over five years? A monthly fee that looks small adds up; work out the total.
- How would you leave? Check that you can take your books, posts and mailing list with you.
- Who will keep it up to date? If the answer is you, choose the one you will actually enjoy opening.
New to all of this? Start with our guide to making an author website, which covers what any author site needs, whichever builder you choose.
Our honest summary
If you want a polished, established author builder with a shop and a tour calendar, and $20 a month suits your budget, Pub Site does the job well. If you want a shop on your own domain without paying for the site, look at Zenpage. If you already use BookBub, start with its free plan. And if you want a free site that knows books and series, with no ads, no upsell and a clean way out, and can live with a subdomain for now, open the live demos, with real books in them.