Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

Hexo VS VuePress

Compare Hexo VS VuePress and see what are their differences

Hexo logo Hexo

A fast, simple & powerful blog framework, powered by Node.js

VuePress logo VuePress

A static site generator by Vue.js 🛠️
  • Hexo Landing page
    Landing page //
    2021-10-14
  • VuePress Landing page
    Landing page //
    2022-01-30

Hexo features and specs

  • Speed
    Hexo is a static site generator, meaning it can generate and serve content rapidly compared to traditional CMS (Content Management Systems). This results in faster page load times and better performance.
  • Markdown Support
    Hexo uses Markdown for content creation, making it simple for users to write and format text easily. Markdown is widely used and allows for a clean separation of content and formatting.
  • Customization
    Hexo provides a high degree of customization through its robust plugin system and theme capabilities. Users can easily extend functionality and change the look and feel of their site.
  • SEO Friendly
    Hexo generates clean, static HTML files which are easily indexable by search engines. This makes it an SEO-friendly solution for creating websites and blogs.
  • Open Source
    Hexo is an open-source project, which means it's free to use, and you can contribute to the project or modify the source code to suit your needs.
  • Deployment Flexibility
    Hexo supports a variety of deployment methods including GitHub Pages, Heroku, Netlify, and others, making it easy to publish your site.

Possible disadvantages of Hexo

  • Learning Curve
    While Markdown is easy to use, the overall setup of Hexo and understanding its configuration files can be challenging for beginners, especially those unfamiliar with static site generators.
  • Dependency on Node.js
    Hexo relies on Node.js and npm (Node Package Manager), so you need to have these installed on your machine. This dependency can be a barrier for people not familiar with JavaScript or the Node.js ecosystem.
  • Content Management
    Unlike traditional CMS platforms like WordPress, Hexo does not provide a built-in content management interface. All content is managed through files, which can be less convenient for non-technical users.
  • Build Times on Large Sites
    For very large websites with lots of pages and posts, the build times in Hexo can become lengthy as all files need to be regenerated each time a change is made.
  • Limited Ecosystem
    While Hexo has a decent number of plugins and themes, its ecosystem is not as vast as some other static site generators or CMS platforms like Jekyll or WordPress. This could limit your options for extending your site.
  • Version Compatibility
    Updates to Hexo or its plugins can sometimes lead to compatibility issues, requiring users to spend time debugging and resolving conflicts, which can be frustrating.

VuePress features and specs

  • Markdown-Centric
    VuePress is designed to work seamlessly with Markdown, offering a simple and intuitive way to create and manage documentation.
  • Vue.js Integration
    Being built on Vue.js, VuePress allows for easy integration of custom components, which can enrich the documentation with interactive elements.
  • Default Theme
    VuePress comes with a well-designed default theme which is optimized for technical documentation out-of-the-box.
  • Static Site Generation
    VuePress generates static HTML files for every page, which can be deployed easily and offer better performance and SEO.
  • Extensive Plugin Ecosystem
    A wide array of plugins is available, making it easy to add extra functionalities like search, analytics, and much more.
  • Hot Reloading
    Thanks to Vue.js, VuePress enjoys hot-reloading, providing a fast and interactive development experience.
  • Ease of Deployment
    Static files generated by VuePress can be deployed on any static site hosting services like GitHub Pages, Netlify, or Vercel.

Possible disadvantages of VuePress

  • Learning Curve
    Users not familiar with Vue.js might find it challenging to fully leverage VuePress's capabilities.
  • Limited Default Themes
    While the default theme is robust for documentation, there are limited built-in themes, which may require custom development for more diverse needs.
  • Plugin Management
    Managing a large number of plugins can become complex and may introduce compatibility issues or bloat.
  • Configuration Complexity
    Advanced configurations can become complex and may require a deeper understanding of both Vue.js and the VuePress ecosystem.
  • Community Size
    VuePress's community is smaller compared to some other static site generators like Jekyll or Hugo, which might limit the available support and resources.
  • Performance for Large Sites
    For very large sites with thousands of pages, build times can become considerably long, requiring additional configuration and optimization.
  • SEO Limitations
    While static HTML improves SEO, dynamically generated content through Vue components may require additional configuration and optimization to be SEO-friendly.

Hexo videos

Tsunami by Hexo One Hitter Weed Review

More videos:

  • Review - Hexo Corp. Cannabis Original Stash OS.220 1 Ounce review Indica Blend
  • Review - HEXO Corp. - HEXO Stock Chart Technical Analysis for 06-16-2020

VuePress videos

VuePress - Static Site Generator

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to Hexo and VuePress)
Blogging
52 52%
48% 48
CMS
42 42%
58% 58
Blogging Platform
58 58%
42% 42
Developer Tools
0 0%
100% 100

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare Hexo and VuePress

Hexo Reviews

We have no reviews of Hexo yet.
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VuePress Reviews

Top 10 Next.js Alternatives You Can Try
VuePress prioritizes simplicity to increase your project’s workflow without hassling into complex methods. It allows you to generate pre-rendered static HTML to present responsive pages. Moreover, you can customize your site without any configuration; just run the commands to create the directory inside your docs directory.
15 of the Most Interesting Vue UI Component Libraries for 2023
The use of VuePress opens up a lot of possibilities for your project — like automating your documentation process. It is easy to integrate into your existing application, too. However, a considerable drawback is that SEO support is still new, and the documentaiton does not focus on this topic yet.

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, VuePress should be more popular than Hexo. It has been mentiond 33 times since March 2021. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

Hexo mentions (21)

  • Crosspost! Publishing to Dev.to From My Personal Blog
    My website is a static site built with Hexo and served through GitHub Pages. Hexo's documentation isn't the best, but with a little digging, I found that, in the years since I last used it, they've provided a pretty robust first-party plugin for generating RSS and ATOM feeds. - Source: dev.to / 9 months ago
  • Ask HN: Looking for lightweight personal blogging platform
    There's also hexo [1]. I saw that on Matt Klein's website [2] and the theme looked pretty clean. [1] https://hexo.io [2] https://mattklein123.dev/2020/03/08/2020-03-07-new-website/. - Source: Hacker News / over 1 year ago
  • Hexo, WebFinger and better discoverability
    In my case, the latter is not possible because this blog is a static site, generated via Hexo and hosted on GitHub. It simply lacks a modifiable active server component. - Source: dev.to / over 1 year ago
  • Nuxt 3 - showcase your sites
    Previously I've used Nuxt2 and even sooner - hexo.io. Source: over 2 years ago
  • Building a static blog using Jekyll & Strapi
    To make their creation easier, numerous open-source static websites generators are available: Jekyll, Hugo, Gatsby, Hexo, etc. Most of the time, the content is managed through static (ideally Markdown) files or a Content API. Then, the generator requests the content, injects it in templates defined by the developer and generates a bunch of HTML files. - Source: dev.to / over 2 years ago
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VuePress mentions (33)

  • Top 10 Vue.js libraries you should be using in 2025
    VuePress is a minimalistic Vue-powered static site generator optimized for technical documentation and websites with a focus on content. It is suitable for creating documentation websites, blogs, and other content-focused projects. - Source: dev.to / 5 months ago
  • Fusion – a hobby OS implemented in Nim
    I use VuePress[0]. You can find the source code for the site here[1]. [0] https://vuepress.vuejs.org [1] https://github.com/khaledh/khaledh.github.io. - Source: Hacker News / 10 months ago
  • Free project idea - documentation framework!
    VuePress - when I searched if it's supporting what I want (conditional rendering), the first result is a bug issue opened 4 years ago, so it doesn't seem to be a good option. Source: about 2 years ago
  • Using links in markdown to navigate files through directories.
    I'm new to IA Writer, and I'm wanting to use it to draft posts for my Vuepress site. Source: over 2 years ago
  • Create a Static Site using VitePress for Beautiful Help Documentation
    VitePress is listed in the documents as VuePress' little brother, and it is built on top of Vite. For those that don't know Vite is a build tool that aims to provide a faster and leaner development experience for modern web projects so it might sense to pair it with a static site generator such as VitePress. One of the original problems with VuePress was that it was a Webpack app and it took a lot of time to spin... - Source: dev.to / over 2 years ago
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What are some alternatives?

When comparing Hexo and VuePress, you can also consider the following products

Hugo - Hugo is a general-purpose website framework for generating static web pages.

Forestry.io - A simple CMS for Jekyll and Hugo sites.

Jekyll - Jekyll is a simple, blog aware, static site generator.

GatsbyJS - Blazing-fast static site generator for React

Sanity.io - Sanity.io a platform for structured content that comes with an open-source editor that you can customize with React.js.

Ghost - Ghost is a fully open source, adaptable platform for building and running a modern online publication. We power blogs, magazines and journalists from Zappos to Sky News.