Why I switched from Blogger to WordPress

Around six months ago I permanently moved from Blogger* to WordPress. I think I had something like thomaslittleblog.blogspot.com (it matched my channel at the time). I had many reasons for the switch, mostly because I was interested in using a new tool, but also because I had heard more praise for WordPress. Here is a comparison of the two:

Where WordPress is best

• UI - WordPress definitely has a far nice design to the administrator section and comes with much nicer templates by default. The Dashboard takes up the full width of my screen (on any resolution) and the editor is fantastic, offering a ‘Full Screen UI’, which allows me to write without distraction – providing Gmail, Google Reader or Google+ aren’t flashing at me!
• Editor - In some ways the Blogger editor is probably a little better as it is more centered towards HTML and the Blogger platform, however the WordPress editor is a lot easier to use and allows for far more complex blog posts.
• Graphs - WordPress has an absolutely fantastic graphing system for statistics, but it isn’t as complex as Blogger’s
• Getting people to my blog - For some peculiar reason results for WordPress.com blogs tend to appear higher in search results, and so more people actually go on my blog. Despite the fact the quality of my writing has improved, WordPress seems to be better at getting people there – the Global Tags feature probably also helps. Having said this, WordPress won’t do it all for you and you do need to use social networks and good writing skills too. One of the main reasons people ever got to my Blogger blog was through the ‘Next Blog’ (which took them to a random blog) button.

Where Blogger is best

• Statistical Logging - Whilst WordPress kindly logs almost everything, Blogger does log everything – and I mean everything. It has a Stats system that it is probably based off of Google Analytics. I can see hour by hour reports of people coming to my blog (compared to day by day with WordPress), which can be hugely useful sometimes.
• Ease of use - Blogger probably makes it easier to set up and manage a blog, but I don’t like the UI as much. The main reason it is so easy is probably because it links in quite well with users’ Google Accounts, so it is simple for Gmail users to quickly make a blog.

Both are, of course, very good blogging platforms, but I prefer WordPress, which is probably why you are on WordPress.com and not anywhere else.

*Yes, I do know that it’s proper name is Blogspot, but I’ve always gone to blogger.com, so that is the one of the grown to know.