Article · Wikipedia archive · Last revised May 31, 2026

Squarespace

Squarespace, Inc. is an American website building, hosting, and domain registration company based in New York City. It provides software as a service for website building, e-commerce, domain registration, marketing, and online scheduling. The platform allows users to use pre-built website templates, drag-and-drop editing, and artificial intelligence-powered design tools.

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Squarespace, Inc.
Headquarters in Manhattan
Type of businessPrivate
Type of site
SaaS-based hosting platform
Traded asNYSE: SQSP
Headquarters225 Varick Street
New York City, New York,
United States
Area servedWorldwide
OwnerPermira
FounderAnthony Casalena
CEOAnthony Casalena
IndustryInternet
ProductsWebsite builder and hosting service
RevenueIncrease US$1.01 billion (2023)1
Employees1,749 (2023)1
URLOfficial website Edit this at Wikidata
RegistrationRequired; subscription needed for certain features.
LaunchedJanuary 2004 (2004-01)

Squarespace, Inc. is an American website building, hosting, and domain registration company based in New York City.2 It provides software as a service for website building, e-commerce, domain registration, marketing, and online scheduling. The platform allows users to use pre-built website templates, drag-and-drop editing, and artificial intelligence-powered design tools.3

In 2003, Anthony Casalena founded Squarespace as a blog hosting service while attending the University of Maryland, College Park. He was its only employee until 2006 when it reached $1 million in revenue. The company grew from 30 employees in 2010 to 550 by 2015. Over the years, the company evolved to become more than a website builder, expanded internationally, and grew its employee base.4 It began trading on the New York Stock Exchange on May 19, 2021,5 and was taken private in October 2024. According to W3Techs, Squarespace is used by 2.5% websites worldwide.6 In its 2026 review of website builders, WIRED listed Squarespace as the "best website builder for most people," emphasizing its balance of usability and design flexibility.7

History

Casalena began developing Squarespace for his personal use while attending the University of Maryland.89 He started sharing it with friends and family members8 and participated in a "business incubator" program at the university.9 In January 2004, he launched Squarespace as do-it-yourself website builder for the public,910 with a $30,000 seed fund from his father,11 a small grant from the university,12 and 300 beta testers who paid a discounted rate.9131415 At that time, Casalena was the company's sole developer and employee, and worked out of his dorm room.914

In 2006, Casalena hired two full-time W2 employees, a principal designer and a customer support representative. By the time Casalena graduated in 2005,16 Squarespace was making annual revenues of $1 million.10 He moved to New York City, continued hiring, and had 30 employees by 2010.1015 That year, Squarespace received $38.5 million in its first round of venture capital funding led by Index Ventures and Accel Partners,17 enabling it to hire more staff, continue to develop its software,18 and double its marketing budget.8 From 2009 to 2012, it grew an average of 266% in yearly revenue.19 In April 2014, it received another $40 million in funding.2021 By 2015, it had reached $100 million in revenue and 550 employees.10

Squarespace purchased Super Bowl advertising spots from 2014228 to 2026.23 Its 2017 ad won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Commercial.24 In 2017, it signed a sponsorship deal with the New York Knicks to add the Squarespace logo to their uniforms.25

Squarespace acquired appointment scheduling company Acuity Scheduling in April 2019.26 In October 2019, Squarespace acquired Unfold, an app co-founded by Alfonso Cobo that allows users to editorialize their social media content.27 In April 2021, the company bought hospitality industry management platform Tock for more than $400 million.28 It sold Tock to American Express in June 2024.29

In early 2021, the company filed paperwork with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to go public through direct listing on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol "SQSP".303132 In March 2021, Squarespace raised $300 million in a round of funding led by Dragoneer, Tiger Global, D1 Capital Partners and Fidelity Management & Research Company with participation from existing investors. This funding round valued the company at $10 billion.33

On June 15, 2023, Squarespace concluded an agreement to purchase the Google Domains business, including approximately 10 million registered domain names.3435

In May 2024, Squarespace signed a deal with British private equity firm Permira to be taken private.36 The transaction was finalized in October 2024.37

Corporate affairs

Leadership

Squarespace is managed by CEO and Founder Anthony Casalena. Other key executives are:38

  • Courtenay O'Connor, General Counsel
  • David Lee, Chief Brand and Creative Officer
  • John Colton, Chief Technology Officer
  • Nathan Gooden, Chief Financial Officer
  • Angela Crossman, Chief People Officer
  • Paul Gubbay, Chief Product Officer
  • Raphael Fontes, Senior Vice President, Customer Operations
  • Roberta Meo, Vice President, Channels and Services
  • Kevin Doerr, SVP, Head of Domains & Applications
  • Josh Groth, SVP, Growth

Products

Website builder

Squarespace was initially built for creating and hosting blogs.13 In 2011, Squarespace was upgraded to version 6, with new templates, a grid-based user interface, and other enhancements.18 Version 7, which went live in 2014, replaced its coding backend with a drag and drop interface,3940 and added integration with Google Workspace (formerly G Suite and Google Apps for Work) and Getty Images.21 The platform includes responsive templates and integrated SEO tools. In 2026, Squarespace was ranked as the "best all-around website builder" by SiteBuilderReport for a range of site types including small businesses, portfolios, and online stores.41

E-commerce

E-commerce functionality, such as integration with Stripe for accepting credit card payments, was added in 2013.42 Additional commerce features were added in 2014 and beyond, including payments integration and analytics.43 In 2023, Squarespace introduced a native payment solution to expand its commerce infrastructure.44

Domains

Squarespace started selling domains in 2016. In 2023, it acquired the Google Domains business, adding approximately 10 million domains under management.35 The acquisition significantly expanded its presence as a domain registrar, and is now one of the largest domain providers worldwide according to Domain Name Stat.45

Artificial intelligence

Starting in 2024, Squarespace introduced AI-driven features for automating website layout generation, AI-generated copy suggestions, SEO recommendations and content optimization.4647

References

References

  1. "Squarespace 2023 Annual Report (Form 10-K)". U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. February 28, 2024.
  2. "Squarespace Offices / A+I". ArchDaily. July 31, 2018. Retrieved January 30, 2021.
  3. Roach, Jacob. "I Let Squarespace's AI Builder Design a Website for Me. Here's What It's Like". Wired. ISSN 1059-1028. Retrieved April 24, 2026.
  4. "Squarespace 20th Anniversary". timeline.squarespace.com. Retrieved May 6, 2026.
  5. Giles, Margaret (May 19, 2021). "What to Know as Squarespace Goes Public". Morningstar.com. Retrieved May 19, 2021.
  6. "Usage statistics and market share of Squarespace". w3techs.com. Retrieved March 11, 2022.
  7. Roach, Jacob. "Want to Start a Website? These Are the Best Website Builders". Wired. ISSN 1059-1028. Retrieved May 6, 2026.
  8. Cole, Samantha (May 21, 2014). "How Squarespace's CEO Pivoted to Scale for Millions". Fast Company. Retrieved January 7, 2018.
  9. "About Us - Squarespace".
  10. Clifford, Catherine (April 22, 2016). "How Squarespace Went From a Dorm-Room Project to a $10 Million Web Publishing Platform". Entrepreneur. Retrieved January 7, 2018.
  11. "UMD Alumnus Company Squarespace to Run Inaugural Big Game Ad". UMD Right Now :: University of Maryland. February 1, 2014. Retrieved January 30, 2021.
  12. Patterson, Dan (June 30, 2016). "How Squarespace became a multimillion dollar publishing giant". TechRepublic. Retrieved January 30, 2021.
  13. "How Squarespace became a multimillion-dollar publishing giant". TechRepublic. June 30, 2016. Retrieved January 7, 2018.
  14. Caumont, Andrea (September 13, 2004). "Squarespace Lets Users Manage Multi-Page Web Sites". The Washington Post.
  15. Rusli, Evelyn (July 13, 2010). "Squarespace Raises $38.5 Million From Accel, Index Ventures". TechCrunch. Retrieved January 7, 2018.
  16. "Alumni Hall Of Fame | UMD Department of Computer Science". www.cs.umd.edu. Retrieved April 24, 2026.
  17. "Squarespace Raises $38.5 Million From Accel, Index Ventures". TechCrunch. July 14, 2010. Retrieved January 30, 2021.
  18. "Squarespace 6: Rebuilt From The Ground Up To Take On WordPress, Tumblr And Everyone Else". TechCrunch. October 21, 2011. Retrieved January 7, 2018.
  19. "Fast 50". Crain's New York Business. October 7, 2013.
  20. Zipkin, Nina (February 15, 2018). "The Founder of Squarespace Explains Why You Don't Want to Raise As Much Money as Possible". Entrepreneur. Retrieved January 30, 2021.
  21. Warren, Christina (October 7, 2014). "Squarespace Ramps up its Tools to Compete with Wordpress". Mashable.
  22. "UMD Alumnus Company Squarespace to Run Inaugural Big Game Ad". research.umd.edu. Retrieved January 30, 2021.
  23. Nudd, Tim (February 4, 2026). "Inside Squarespace's darkly comic gem of a Super Bowl ad with Emma Stone". AdA ge.
  24. "Squarespace's Super Bowl Ad With John Malkovich Wins the Emmy for Best Commercial". AdWeek. September 11, 2017. Retrieved January 26, 2018.
  25. Soshnick, Scott (October 10, 2017). "Knicks Team Up With Squarespace for Patch Sponsorship Deal". Bloomberg.com. Retrieved February 13, 2018.
  26. Ha, Anthony (April 23, 2019). "Squarespace makes its first acquisition with Acuity Scheduling". TechCrunch.
  27. Ha, Anthony (October 22, 2019). "Squarespace acquires social media authoring startup Unfold". TechCrunch.
  28. Roof, Katie (April 1, 2021). "Squarespace Buys Tech Startup Tock for $400 Million Plus". Washington Post.
  29. Sawers, Paul (June 21, 2024). "Squarespace sells restaurant reservation system Tock to American Express for $400M". TechCrunch. Retrieved April 24, 2026.
  30. "Squarespace confidentially files for stock market listing". Reuters. January 27, 2021. Retrieved January 30, 2021.
  31. "Website-building company Squarespace confidentially files to go public". Business Insider. Retrieved January 30, 2021.
  32. Novet, Jordan (April 16, 2021). "Website maker Squarespace files to go public on NYSE through direct listing". CNBC.
  33. Azevedo, Mary Ann (March 16, 2021). "Squarespace raises $300M at a staggering $10B valuation". TechCrunch.
  34. Li, Abner (June 15, 2023). "Google Domains shutting down, assets sold and being migrated to Squarespace". 9to5Google. Retrieved June 15, 2023.
  35. "Squarespace Enters Definitive Agreement to Acquire Google Domains Assets" (Press release). PR Newswire. June 15, 2023. Archived from the original on June 15, 2023. Retrieved June 15, 2023.
  36. "Software company Squarespace being taken private by Permira in $6.9 billion deal". Associated Press. May 13, 2024.
  37. Sawers, Paul (October 17, 2024). "Permira completes Squarespace acquisition after upping bid to $7.2B". TechCrunch.
  38. "Our Team". Squarespace. Retrieved January 9, 2020.
  39. Nudd, Tim (October 20, 2014). "Squarespace's Radical Update Is Like a Blank Canvas. So Its New Ads Are, Too". Adweek.
  40. Rhodes, Margaret (October 7, 2014). "The New Squarespace is a UX Dream that Eliminates the Backend Entirely". Wired.
  41. Benjamins, Steve; Mendpara, Juhil (January 3, 2026). "Best Website Builders". SiteBuilderReport.
  42. Summers, Nick (February 14, 2013). "Squarespace Adds Commerce Tools To Its Website Builder". The Next Web. Retrieved January 7, 2018.
  43. Novet, Jordan (April 16, 2014). "Don't forget about website runner Squarespace. It just raised $40M". VentureBeat. Retrieved January 7, 2018.
  44. PYMNTS (October 4, 2023). "Squarespace Adds Payments to Serve the Needs of 'Long Tail' eCommerce Sellers". PYMNTS.com. Retrieved April 27, 2026.
  45. "Domain Name Registrars List - Domain Name Stat". domainnamestat.com. Retrieved April 27, 2026.
  46. Inc, Squarespace. "Squarespace Refresh 2024: Introducing a New Era for Entrepreneurs". www.prnewswire.com. Retrieved April 27, 2026. {{cite web}}: |last= has generic name (help)
  47. Ha, Anthony (October 6, 2024). "Website builder Squarespace says it's training its AI tools with curation and taste". TechCrunch. Retrieved April 27, 2026.
External links