Theo vs Zarla for a small business website (October 2026)

The scorecard

Tally: Theo 4, Zarla 2, even 1, split 1. Each round was judged on who does the work after the site is live, what the owner keeps on leaving, and what it costs each month; Zarla's side comes from its pricing, help and terms pages read on October 2, 2026.

Round 1: Who builds the site

Zarla's AI writes the copy, picks a design and assembles the pages from a typed description; its pricing page says the build takes about a minute. The Free plan lets the owner edit and preview that draft indefinitely on 75 one-time AI credits per site, and publishing to any address, a Zarla address included, needs a paid plan.

Theo builds from a chat description as well, or from the address of a site the business already runs, matching its look. Its first preview usually takes minutes; the owner refines it in chat and publishes when it reads right, and that first build is free, before the 30-day Starter trial.

Round result: even.

Round 2: Who makes changes after launch

On Zarla, a change after launch is a typed request to its AI, and each request draws on a monthly allowance: about one credit for a chat edit, about ten for a new page and about fifty to redo the whole site, from 400 credits a month on Premium Website Builder or 1,500 on Business Website Builder. Paid accounts can buy top-ups, which never expire.

On Theo, the owner, or anyone the owner invites as a collaborator, types the change in plain English and Theo makes it. Small edits use a few chat credits, a new page more and a redesign the most, from 1,500 credits a month on Basic, 4,500 on Starter and 7,000 on Pro; top-up credits roll over and never expire. Both products take typed requests and meter them, so the round turns on the size of the meter: Theo's smallest allowance equals Zarla's largest, and on Starter and Pro the weekly growth pages are written outside it, using no credits at all.

Round result: Theo.

Round 3: Who does the SEO and growth work

Zarla sets up the technical side on every plan: sitemaps, meta tags and schema, a Google Business Profile sync and a local search checklist with an AI coach. Paid plans add a site report by email and a check of what ChatGPT and Google's AI say about the business, monthly on Premium and weekly on Business, plus an AI blog writer and social post tools that the owner runs. Zarla's help pages name the rest as the owner's job, reviews, the Google Business Profile and new page content, and say the businesses that get found keep adding service pages.

On Starter and Pro, Theo takes on the part Zarla names as the owner's: the new pages. Each week it researches keywords and competitors, writes service pages, blog posts and landing pages, fixes the technical issues it finds, improves page speed and submits new pages to Google through Search Console. Each draft lands in the Growth tab, where the owner publishes it, and a weekly report lists what was done, none of it on chat credits. Reviews and listings stay with the owner on both products; Theo's Boost checklist walks the owner through Google Business Profile, Bing Places, Yelp and the rest. Theo's edge in this round is the weekly pages, fixes and submissions on Starter and Pro.

Theo's audit of 5,974 small business websites, The State of Small Business Websites 2026, puts a number on the trades market both products sell to: of the 373 home services and trades sites with search data, 39 percent got an estimated zero visitors a month from Google search. The audit does not break out Zarla sites; the figure describes the field, not either product.

An example of the workflow, not a customer result: a landscaping company with one services page. On Starter, the first drafts would be the pages the keyword research finds missing, such as paver patios, irrigation repair and a seasonal lawn care program, plus a post answering a question customers ask before they call. On Zarla, the owner decides which pages to add and asks the AI for each, at about ten credits apiece.

Search traffic builds over months, not weeks. Google's own guidance on hiring an SEO puts the payoff at four months to a year. In the first 30 days, expect the site live, the first pages published and submitted to Google, and impressions starting to appear in Search Console; clicks follow as the pages move up.

Round result: Theo.

Round 4: Sticker price

Zarla prices per site in US dollars, and its lowest monthly figures belong to prepaid 12-month and 36-month terms; every prepaid term rolls to the month-to-month rate when it ends. Each Zarla charge can be refunded within 30 days. Theo bills monthly with no term.

Round 4, continued: what each plan includes

Zarla Premium publishes to the owner's domain with 100 pages, 400 AI credits a month, a shop and bookings through the owner's Stripe, a monthly report and a Made with Zarla footer credit; Business adds unlimited pages, 1,500 credits, the weekly report and AI check, a lower sales fee, same-day support from a person and no footer credit. Theo Basic is the site, managed hosting and security and 1,500 chat credits; Starter adds the growth work and 4,500 credits; Pro adds 7,000 credits and more room for bigger changes, as Theo's pricing page sets out.

On the monthly figure, Zarla Premium at $29 month to month and every prepaid rate sit below Theo Basic, and Business at $49 sits above it; Premium month to month is the closest match to Basic in what it covers: the site, the hosting and an edit allowance.

Round result: Zarla.

Round 5: Site plus the work on Zarla and on Theo, per month

This round asks what it costs each month to have the weekly pages, fixes and submissions done rather than set up and handed over. On Theo that is Starter at $69.99 a month, one bill with the weekly work inside it and nothing to add; Pro, at $129.99, buys more pages and posts each week, not a different arrangement.

On Zarla there is no second figure to add, because no done-for-you service is documented on Zarla's pricing, help or agency pages. Premium at $29 month to month, or Business at $49, buys the site, the hosting and the tools; an owner who wants the pages written each month hires a writer or an agency on top, at a price Zarla does not set.

Round result: Theo.

Round 6: Online store

Zarla's paid plans run a shop and a booking calendar inside the site, settled through the owner's own Stripe account; Stripe's card processing applies, and Zarla adds 2 percent on Premium or 1 percent on Business, 0.8 percent on bookings.

Theo does not process payments or run bookings. What it offers a seller is a connected Shopify or Wix store on every plan: the Theo site shows the products, prices and stock with a cart, the buyer checks out in the store, and the owner manages the catalog there, clicking Refresh my products after a change. Bookings link to the tool the business already runs. A store on Theo carries two bills: Shopify's Basic plan is $39 a month, or $29 a month paid yearly, as of October 2026, so a Theo Basic site with a Shopify Basic store comes to $68.99 a month by arithmetic, and a Starter site with one to $108.99.

A Zarla shop owner who moves the site faces the same ordered choice as any platform seller. Shopify is the first option, because Theo connects to it directly; the Shopify connection page describes the setup. The second is to keep the Zarla shop, Stripe account and all, at shop.yourdomain.com and give the main domain to the Theo site. The third, if the address change is too hard, is to leave the Zarla site and shop as they are and add a separate Theo site on a subdomain such as blog.yourdomain.com.

Round result: Zarla.

Round 7: Domain and email

A paid Zarla site goes live first at a Zarla address; the owner then connects a domain they own or buys one through Zarla, and on 12-month and longer terms the domain's first year is included in the prepaid price. A domain bought through Zarla is registered to the owner and can be transferred away; the purchase is final, with no refund, and renews yearly at a rate Zarla's current pages do not list. Zarla sells no email.

A Theo site is published on a temporary address until the owner's domain points at it; the domain can be one they hold or one bought inside Theo. Theo walks the owner through pointing the root and www versions at the site, turning off forwarding and parking at the registrar and leaving the email records alone; the old site keeps serving until the records update, usually within a few hours. Theo includes no free domain year and sells no email either.

This round splits by who is reading it. An owner starting from nothing gets a domain's first year inside a prepaid Zarla term, which Theo does not include; an owner bringing a site whose domain is already registered finds that both products leave it where it is, and neither sells email.

Round result: split.

Round 8: Ownership and leaving

Zarla's terms say the owner retains ownership of the content they create and upload, including what the AI generated. What leaves with the owner is narrower: the contacts list downloads as a spreadsheet; backups restore inside Zarla only; a site can be transferred to another Zarla account; and no export of pages, products or orders is documented in Zarla's help or terms. A canceled site stays live to the end of the paid period, then comes offline, with its pages, leads, photos and settings kept in the account for a later re-subscription; the terms also allow a termination to delete the account and its content.

Theo's answer is wider than a contacts file: the owner owns the site and its content, and on every plan can copy the site and its images to move elsewhere; Pro adds read-only access to the site code through GitHub. There is no long-term commitment, and the cancellation confirmation shows the date the subscription ends.

Round result: Theo.

How to move from Zarla to Theo

Zarla documents no site export, so the move starts from the live address. Keep the Zarla plan paid until the last step; see the moving to Theo hub for the general case.

1. Run the free audit on the Zarla site. It shows the site's estimated search traffic and which pages are worth redirecting.
2. Give Theo the Zarla site's address. Theo builds a preview that matches the look and brings the text and images across; redirects for the old Zarla addresses that still get traffic go in once Search Console is connected. Download the contacts from Zarla as a spreadsheet before closing the account.
3. Point the domain at Theo. A domain bought through Zarla is already registered to the owner, so it moves like any other; the Zarla site stays live until the records change.
4. Connect Google Analytics and Search Console on the live domain, then cancel Zarla. On Starter and Pro the growth work switches on once the domain and both connections are in place.

The bottom line

Theo wins the tally, 4 rounds to 2 with 1 even and 1 split, and wins the round this comparison turns on: who does the search and content work after launch. On Starter and Pro, Theo researches the keywords each week, writes the service pages, posts and landing pages, fixes the technical issues it finds and submits the new pages to Google, and the weekly report lists what was done. Zarla's plans set up the technical side and leave the new pages to the owner, and no done-for-you service is documented on Zarla's pricing, help or agency pages; reviews and listings are the owner's on both products. Zarla takes the sticker price and the store rounds on its own facts. Prices and terms as of October 2, 2026.

Frequently asked questions