After years of building business websites with WordPress, I kept running into the same issues. Here’s why I switched to Astro—and why you might want to consider it too.
WordPress has been the go-to for business sites, but it comes with baggage:
- Plugin updates that happen more often than actual content updates
- Broken layouts after plugin updates
- Growing maintenance costs as sites get complex
- Security vulnerabilities that keep you up at night
- Ongoing server costs
Even plain HTML/CSS sites had their issues:
- Updating headers and footers across multiple pages
- Managing news posts and maintaining consistency
- Optimizing JavaScript and CSS bundles
After working with modern frameworks like React, going back to WordPress or plain HTML felt painful. The dev experience gap was too big to ignore.
Why Astro Works
Astro is built for “content-driven websites”, such as blogs, marketing sites, e-commerce. Its “zero JS by default” approach and modern frontend architecture make it fast and SEO-friendly out of the box.
Here’s why it’s great for business sites:
Performance That Actually Matters
Astro focuses on displaying content. This philosophy shines for all business sites with company info, services, case studies, and blogs—basically etc.
The zero-JS-by-default approach means Lighthouse scores of 90-100 are achievable. When you have dozens or hundreds of pages, speed isn’t optional.
Islands Architecture
Astro uses component-based design where you “add islands of JavaScript where you need interactivity” (per the docs). This means:
- Split headers, footers, and reusable parts into components
- Use any framework (React, Vue, Svelte) only where needed
- Scale your site as it grows without rebuilding everything
Low Learning Curve
.astro files look like HTML and CSS. If you know those, you can build with Astro. The file structure is simple, and the syntax is familiar.
But you also get modern conveniences:
<ul>
{
news.map((newsItem) => (
<li>
<a href={newsItem.url}>{newsItem.title}</a>
</li>
))
}
</ul>And those WordPress problems? Solved:
- Reduced security risk (no PHP backend to exploit, no database to attack)
- Deploy to Cloudflare or Netlify for near-zero hosting costs
- No more plugin update nightmares
For more, check out Why Astro? in the official docs.
What Sites Work Best
Beyond business sites, Astro is ideal for:
- Manufacturing companies, law firms, agencies
- Recruitment sites, product pages
- Startups, dental clinics, media sites, landing pages
If your site has:
- Infrequent updates (0-2 times per month)
- 10-50 pages
- Mostly static content
Astro is probably a good fit.
Real-World Examples
Here are some sites built with Astro (from the official Showcase and others):
- NordVPN: Long landing page with tons of content. Page transitions stay fast.
- Cloudflare: Smooth homepage animations. 50+ pages with no performance issues.
- Mitsue-Links: Multi-language support, case studies, seminars, news—all loads quickly.
- Geolive Group: Video hero section, IR info, large site structure. Still smooth.
- Shueisha 2027 Recruitment Site: Heavy content pages with fast load times and smooth scroll animations.
The CMS Question
Astro doesn’t have a built-in admin panel like WordPress.
For client projects, non-developers need a way to edit content.
Current solutions:
Headless CMS Use services like Sanity and Contentful. Editors work in the CMS, Astro pulls content via API and renders it.
Git-Based CMS Decap CMS or Tina CMS provide browser-based editing while keeping content in GitHub as Markdown files.
Headless WordPress Keep WordPress as the editing tool, but let Astro handle the frontend. You get fast sites with familiar editing.
See Use a CMS with Astro for more options.
Try It Yourself
I built a business site template with Astro that’s ready to use:
View Demo | Get Template
It includes:
- Essential pages out of the box
- Component-based architecture
- Responsive design
- SEO optimization
- Lighthouse score: 100 across all metrics
