Weebly
| Company type | Division |
|---|---|
| Industry | Web hosting, Web development |
| Founded | 2006 |
| Founder | David Rusenko, Chris Fanini, Dan Veltri |
| Headquarters | San Francisco , United States |
Area served | Worldwide |
Key people | David Rusenko (CEO), Chris Fanini (CTO), Dan Veltri (Chief Product Officer) |
| Products | WYSIWYG website builder, web hosting services, e-commerce tools, mobile apps |
| Parent | Block, Inc. |
Weebly, a division of Block, Inc., is a United States-based web hosting service and web development firm headquartered in San Francisco, California. Established in 2006 by David Rusenko, Chris Fanini, and Dan Veltri, the company provides WYSIWYG website building tools alongside hosting services. Rusenko held the position of CEO, Fanini acted as CTO, and Veltri was Chief Product Officer.
History
Weebly was created with the goal of making website creation more accessible. The initial development began in early 2006 at Pennsylvania State University by Rusenko, who met Fanini there. By June 2006, an invitation-only beta was launched, followed by a private beta phase in September. Prior to its acquisition by Block in 2018, Weebly had secured approximately $35 million through angel investors and venture capital. Co-founder Dan Veltri departed from the company in 2018.
In March 2007, Weebly launched an updated WYSIWYG editor, introduced "Pro" account options, enabled Google AdSense monetization, and added support for Google Chrome and Safari. By 2010, the platform expanded its language offerings to include French, Italian, Spanish, and Chinese, and incorporated JotForm for form building. The release of Weebly Carbon on October 1, 2015 enabled plugin integration capabilities. In 2016, Weebly strengthened its emphasis on e-commerce through Weebly 4 and the Weebly Promote marketing suite.
As demand for e-commerce features increased, Weebly implemented tax calculation tools, integrated with Shippo, introduced Facebook Ad creation functionalities, enhanced email marketing options, added lead capture and abandoned cart recovery features, launched Mobile 5.0 for on-the-go store management, and deepened integration with Square’s payment processing system.
Initially criticized for omitting CSS/HTML editing capabilities, Weebly addressed this gap by adding such functionality in 2009.
The company expanded its physical presence in 2015 by establishing a warehouse in San Francisco and subsequently opened a Berlin office around 2015/2016 to better serve European customers.
In 2018, Square, Inc. (now known as Block, Inc.) acquired Weebly for roughly $365 million in a combination of cash and stock. At the time of acquisition on June 4, 2018, Weebly supported millions of users with over 625,000 paying subscribers. As of March 2025, Weebly powers approximately 0.5% of websites globally.
Product
Weebly’s site builder functions within web browsers using a widget-based interface featuring drag-and-drop capabilities. While storage capacity is unlimited, individual file uploads have size limits. The platform automatically creates mobile-friendly versions of websites and supports both blogging and e-commerce functionalities. Users may publish sites under various top-level domains such as weebly.com, com, net, org, co, info, or us.
Mobile applications for Android and iOS allow users to track website analytics, update blog content, and manage online stores. Advertising can be integrated easily along with visitor analytics via Weebly’s native tools or Google Analytics. The platform also includes built-in newsletter marketing features and offers multilingual support covering English, French, Spanish, Italian, German, Portuguese, Polish, Norwegian, Dutch, Danish, Swedish, Chinese, Japanese, Russian, and Turkish (as of 2020).
Awards and recognition
Weebly has earned acclaim for its contributions to web development, including being listed among TIME's 50 Best Websites in 2007 and receiving coverage in prominent outlets such as Forbes and Business Insider. Despite these accolades, the platform has encountered censorship issues in certain nations and has applied geo-blocking measures in multiple areas.
Censorship
In December 2014, the Indian authorities blocked access to Weebly due to concerns over the dissemination of ISIS-related propaganda on the platform. Service was reinstated across India on December 31, 2014.
Weebly enforces geo-blocking that restricts login capabilities for both users and site owners in various countries. While the complete list remains undisclosed, confirmed blocked locations include Côte d'Ivoire, Iran, Russia, Turkey, Ukraine, along with extensive parts of the Middle East, West Africa, and Central Africa.