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While Potion can help you quickly build an indexable site for free, Super can transform your Notion-based content into a fully-customized, professional website that attracts and engages visitors, and turns them into clients.
If creating a scalable, functional, branded website is your goal…
While third-party review sites and opinion pieces have their place, the only real way to compare two tools is to test them side-by-side.
And that’s exactly what we’ll do in this article — I’ll build basic sites with both Super and Potion, and highlight their capabilities and limitations using screenshots. By the end, you’ll know exactly what to expect from each website builder and which one’s right for you.
Let’s get started.
Ease of setup
Signing up with both tools is easy. You can fill a simple form with your name, email address, and password, and get started immediately.
While filling the form is the only way to start with Potion, you can sign up with Super using your Google or Apple credentials.
You’ll also see a chat option in the bottom right corner to help you set up your Super site.
After signing up, both tools ask you to enter your public Notion URL and domain name before taking you to their dashboards.
Ease of use
With Potion’s dashboard, everything is right there on the home screen - page list, custom code button, SEO settings, font size and color, upgrade button, etc.
The only settings not available on the home screen are navigation and site settings. Potion offers separate tabs for these, which we’ll cover in the next section.
Packaging almost all settings in one screen made Potion’s dashboard look cluttered for me. Super, on the other hand, has a much cleaner dashboard.
All elements of website building and optimization are organized into different tabs, making the dashboard more intuitive than Potion’s.
Super also provides a checklist to follow to build the first version of your site.
Clicking on any checklist item takes you directly to that section in the dashboard. Yep, it’s that intuitive.
Design and customization
Super provides a separate tab and a bunch of sub-tabs for customizing design, allowing for a more focussed design experience, while Potion’s design settings sit in the same view as the SEO settings.
Fonts
With 66 unique font styles, primary and secondary font settings, and the option to upload custom fonts, Super’s typography is richer compared to Potion that supports only 17 styles.
Set different font sizes for regular text, title, headings, and quotes with Super while Potion supports a fixed size - the font size of headers increases proportionally, matching the Notion version.
You can access Super’s font settings in the ‘Typography’ segment within the ‘Design’ tab.
Potion’s font options are available in the ‘Page Settings’ view indicating that they are not global. I couldn’t find a way to update the global font settings - it’s most likely supported through custom code.
Colors
Potion allows changing colors for the website’s text, background, and the navbar. Super additionally supports color variations for the footer, sidebar, Notion blocks, databases, scrollbar, and forms.
Super also supports dark mode, Potion doesn’t.
Super offers a curated set of color palettes, allowing you to quickly set an aesthetic color theme for your website even if you are not a designer. Simply click different options and finalize a theme. Super also automatically adjusts the hues for dark mode so you have absolutely nothing to worry about.
With Potion, however, you must set colors yourself. It works if you are a designer - if not, you would need to research good color combinations - match navbar with the page, button with the text, and spend time doing that without even being sure if the whole setup looks good. Super takes away this ambiguity.
Navigation
As displayed in the previous image, Potion supports Navbars - they can be sticky, have a shadow, and flaunt a CTA button.
Super supports many more navbar features.
1. You can choose from five navbar presets
2. Select the size of the navbar shadow
3. Set the navbar height
Furthermore, navigation support is not limited to headers, you can create and customize a footer and sidebar as well, making Super a top choice for anyone prioritizing deep customization.
Languages
Super supports 100+ languages and multilingual websites while Potion websites can only be in English. If you want to target more geographies, Super is your best choice.
Layout
Super provides total control over page layout. You can tweak:
1. Main page container width
2. Space between database columns
3. Curvature of edges of callout blocks, images, etc.
4. Callout and database padding
5. Headcover height
6. Text alignment
And more.
Potion, on the other hand, allows tweaks only to the container width.
SEO capabilities
Add metadata and URL slug on both tools is super easy. But there are some notable differences in the SEO capabilities.
Potion’s free plan supports page indexing, a feature available only with paid Super plans.
Potion’s paid plan supports redirecting 404 errors to a preset Notion page. You can set up your 301 and 302 redirects to any other site page through custom code.
Super, on the other hand, allows you to redirect 404s dynamically without writing code, right from the dashboard, allowing highly contextual redirects without increasing bounce rates.
It’s also worth noting that the Super free plan allows adding social preview for each page, while even the paid Potion plans support a single, site-level image. All your pages will display the same default image when shared on any social media platform.
In summary, Potion’s capabilities are at par with Notion SEO - quite rudimentary for most business purposes. Super, on the other hand, takes it a few notches up with more technical SEO features and engagement elements.
Performance
Homepages are usually content-heavy and slow to load. So the best way to check page speeds of Super and Potion is by analyzing load times of their homepages. I did that with Google PageSpeed Insights:
Desktop Page Speed
Super - Loads in less than 3 seconds and scores higher than Potion in ‘Performance’, ‘Accessibility’, and ‘Best Practices’ parameters.
Potion - Loads in 5 seconds with a very low score in the ‘Performance’ parameter.
Mobile Page Speed
Super’s homepage loads in 13 seconds while Potion’s take 17 seconds. The score for all parameters is the same for both the pages.
Super
Potion
Page rendering
As per my observation, all Notion blocks render perfectly with Super, both on mobile and desktop. The rendered version is an exact replica of the published page - the layout is accurate, links are clickable, and the page does not look like a clone of its Notion version.
Furthermore, you can easily toggle between the desktop and mobile versions, and also access the draft in full-screen with the click of a button.
My Potion render was way off target, though it might be an exception. The table was compressed, the FAQ blocks wouldn't expand, and the links were not clickable. The live version was only slightly better with H3-text FAQ blocks expanding on click.
Also, to reflect Notion edits in Potion’s render, I had to refresh the whole dashboard page, because there’s no option to refresh just the render.
I also observed that changing font size or style does not reflect in Potion’s rendered version but does so immediately in Super.
Analytics
Super offers its own analytics platform - Super Analytics - at a cost of $10 per month for 10,000 page views. Alternatively, you can integrate your add Google Analytics to Super easily and track numbers there.
Potion integrates with analytics tools through custom code but does not have a built-in analytics platform.
Support
Super provides multiple avenues to get help - a detailed knowledge base, user guides, active Discord server, and a vibrant website building community.
And if that doesn’t help, you can access support from real people, not bots, within 10 minutes on average. Just click on the chat button within the dashboard or even the website to reach support.
You can also opt for Super’s website consulting services if you prefer hands-free website building. Super’s team builds it for you.
Potion has a detailed knowledge base and fifteen guides but there’s no chat support. They provide email support as indicated on their dashboard and ToS page.
CMS Access
Super’s Team’s capability allows you onboard your team into Super at an extra cost. Potion limits you to single person usage. If your marketing team is more than one person, creating with Super might make more sense. Each team member gets access levels you set, providing complete control on website edits.
Pricing
Absolute terms
Super is about 20% more expensive than Potion on average. Super’s personal plan costs $12 per month per site while Potion’s ‘1 Site’ plan costs $10 per month - both paid annually.
The difference in price is more pronounced for users planning to build more than 1 site. Potion’s ‘3 Site’ plan costs $8 per site per month. Its ‘Up to 8 sites’ plan costs $6 per site per month - billed annually.
Return on Investment
Price alone doesn’t tell the full story, you need to check what you get in return. While Super, no doubt, costs higher, it offers many more features and deep controls that you expect from a modern website builder.
The extra dollars that you spend on Super, get more than compensated by reduced developer costs spent on replicating use-cases in Potion that are available readily in Super’s dashboard.
Super saves you hours - whether it's designing a branded website, integrating tools, or just getting things to work smoothly. You skip headaches and frustrations that come with a lower-grade CMS, and pay a little more for that.
In summary, Super, for most reputable and scaling businesses, is much cheaper than Potion for the value it offers.
Get the best returns for your investment in a website builder
Which one to choose - Super.so vs Potion.so
Super is better for scaling websites that need deep customization, all-round control, top-notch branding, and ease of use, while Potion is great for those who want to build multiple small, static websites at low cost.
Super is the best option for membership sites, multilingual sites, and businesses that want their whole team on the CMS with varying access levels.
Final thoughts
While we covered many capabilities and limitations of both tools, the list is not exhaustive. Bear in mind that features not mentioned are comparable in both - password protection, responsive, good collection of templates, for example.
In summary, Potion is a potent Notion website builder but it falls short of many must-have and niche features. On the other hand, Super is an established brand in the Notion-website building space - it is upgraded based on customer feedback accumulated over years, filling many gaps.
It packs a punch with its niche features which might look too small to be ignored but together they add up to make a big difference in user-experience. Factors like proper page rendering, clutter-free dashboard, one-line description of settings, etc.
And with features like dark mode, built-in analytics, team access, and membership support, Super isn’t just the best Notion website builder - it’s one of the most capable CMS platforms available today.
- Custom design
- SEO options
- Instant page load
