Creating a website for yourself, even a simple one, can be time-consuming. For years, I have wanted to set up a site for my freelance writing business with links to published articles, but with daily deadlines and other obligations, I have never been able to find the time. Now, a new AI-powered tool from WordPress could tackle the task for me.

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Unveiled on Thursday, the free WordPress AI Website Builder is designed to help you create a relatively basic website in a few minutes. WordPress cautions that the tool is not quite ready to craft e-commerce sites or sites with complicated integrations, though that capability seems to be coming. For now, the Website Builder is geared toward the following people:

• Entrepreneurs and small business owners who want an online presence but do not want to develop it from scratch;
• Freelancers and creators who need an online portfolio that looks good;
• Bloggers and side hustlers who want to share their ideas on the web; and
• Developers who would like to present ideas to clients.

It's free, with caveats

WordPress is offering the Website Builder for free; however, there is always a price to pay. With the free trial you get 30 AI prompts in total to create, expand, and revise your site. Want more? You will have to buy a WordPress hosting plan to get an unlimited supply of prompts.

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Further, you can build and modify your site as you like, but to actually launch and host it you will need apaid WordPress hosting plan . For this, you must subscribe to a Premium plan that runs$18 a month or$8 a month for a full year, or a Business plan that will cost you$40 a month or$25 a month for a full year.

How to get started

To get started, set up a WordPress account at theWordPress.com site if you do not already have one. Next, log in to WordPress and browse to theAI Website Builder page . At the prompt, type a description of the site you want created. For example, I told the AI I wanted a site to showcase my freelance writing business and links to published articles.

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Next, the AI asks what you want to call your site. It then confirms your name and description, which you can change at this point. Otherwise, tell the AI to design your site. After the site is completed, you will want to adjust certain aspects. In my case, I liked the basic layout of the site but wanted to tweak some of the visual elements. Of course, I also needed to personalize it by adding my own photos and images and setting up the links to published articles.

Here, WordPress displays step-by-step screens to help you change the layout, pick the right colors, and select a font. With each element you choose, your site is immediately updated to reflect the change. After that process, you can fine-tune your site by asking the AI to add, remove, or update it, but remember that you get only 30 prompts for free. Otherwise, you can manually edit the site to customize it.

Hosting plan

When you are ready to launch your site, that is when you will have to pony up for a hosting plan. With either the Premium or Business plan you get a free domain for the first year. You can then launch your site or keep refining it until you are happy with it.

Overall, I was satisfied with the AI builder's first attempt to create my site. 

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Of course, there is only so much an AI can do. I would have to put in more time and work to personalize the site or chat with the AI to request specific changes, and though you ultimately have to pay to host the site, 8 dollars a month for a full year of the Premium plan is not too pricey. 

Would I consider moving forward with the site? Maybe. It is certainly worth trying and may give me the push I need to finally launch the site I have been planning for years.

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