Compare
Framer vs Astro
Framer is the best design tool on this list and the hardest to get anything out of. Both of those are true at once, and which one matters depends on who needs to change the site next.
- Price
- From $5,000
- Timeline
- Typically 4–6 weeks
- Included
- 30 days of hypercare
- Code
- In your name
Output
Migration trace
Sample run
northwind.example
- 01 Read the Webflow site
- 02 Map pages, CMS fields and redirects
- 03 Draft an Astro pull request
Pull request
The NewBase Stack
Astro, Sanity and Cloudflare. Sample only. This page does not open a pull request.
Site check
Not live
Not run on the sample
This trace is a sample of a migration. The site check has not run. Paste a Webflow URL and only this pane can go live.
- Platform
- Checked address
- Sitemap entries
- Mobile performance
Reasons
Move to Astro, The NewBase Stack, when
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The people who need to change the site cannot open the design tool.
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The site needs behavior the canvas cannot express, so it is being bolted on.
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You want the front end in version control beside everything else you ship.
Differences
Four things that change when the site becomes a codebase.
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Source of truth
The canvas stops being the source of truth
Framer The canvas the published site
Astro Repository components review deploy
A Framer site exists inside Framer. There is no project file to read, no stylesheet to inherit, and no way for anybody outside the tool to see how a page is built.
In a codebase the layout is text: reviewable, diffable, and editable by somebody who was not there when it was made.
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Responsive rules
Responsive behavior becomes a system
Framer Element breakpoint element breakpoint
Astro One system applied everywhere
Framer sets behavior on individual elements at each breakpoint, which is exactly why the sites look right and why there is nothing to read.
Rebuilt, the rules become a system applied consistently, which is slower to write once and much faster to change forever after.
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Code components
Code components stop being the exception
Framer Canvas code component the escape hatch
Astro Component the ordinary case
Framer lets you drop React into the canvas, and on most sites that escape hatch is where the interesting behavior ended up.
In an Astro codebase that is not an escape hatch, it is the ordinary case, and those components come across as components rather than as embeds.
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Motion
Motion becomes a decision rather than a default
Framer Setting effect another effect
Astro A decision written reviewed or deleted
Effects are a setting on the canvas, so sites accumulate them: things fade because fading was free.
Written out, each one has a cost somebody can see, and the audit usually keeps the two that carry meaning and deletes the eleven that were decoration.
Compare
Capability by capability.
| What is being compared | Framer | Astro |
|---|---|---|
| Design control | Framer A canvas, and it is an unusually good one | Astro Components, styled in code This is the row Framer wins outright for most teams. If the site's value is that a designer changes it directly and often, moving is a downgrade dressed as an upgrade. |
| Content model | Framer Framer CMS collections, defined in the editor | Astro Content Collections, a headless CMS, or files |
| What Framer hands over | Framer No portable frontend codebase. CMS content exports, the site itself is rebuilt from the published result | Astro The repository is the site: components, routes, styles and configuration in code your team controls The single largest practical difference from Webflow, which at least hands you HTML and CSS. A Framer migration starts from the rendered page and the CMS data, not from a download. |
| Where interactions live | Framer Effects and transitions configured on the canvas | Astro CSS, JavaScript or a motion library, written |
| Code components | Framer React, written in Framer and dropped onto the canvas | Astro Ordinary components in the codebase Code components are the one thing that ports with its logic intact. They are React already, so they are rewritten rather than reinvented. |
| Who maintains it | Framer Framer, including the hosting and the runtime | Astro Your team owns the build, the deploy and the dependencies |
Questions
Framer and Astro, answered.
Can I export my Framer site?
Not as a portable frontend codebase you can move into Astro. Content can be extracted, but the layout, the responsive behavior and the interactions built on the canvas all have to be reconstructed. That is why a Framer migration is a rebuild rather than a code conversion, and it is the single most important fact about one.
Is Astro faster than Framer?
It can be, and speed on its own is a weak reason to migrate: a well built Framer site is already fast. The architectural difference is control. In a Next.js or Astro codebase you decide what JavaScript ships, when it runs and which pages need it. If performance is the only problem with the site you have, I would measure it before recommending a rebuild.
What happens to my CMS content?
Collections export as CSV, which carries the fields and loses the relationships between them. Authors, categories and anything pointing at another collection arrive as text and get reconnected once the new model exists, which is the same failure mode as a Webflow multi-reference export.
Will the site look the same?
That is the goal and it is achievable, with one caveat worth saying plainly: rebuilding from the rendered page means matching what the site does rather than reading how it was made, so the first pass is compared at several widths against the live site rather than assumed correct.
How long does it take?
Four to six weeks for a typical marketing site, then 30 days of post-launch checks. The inventory takes longer than on other platforms because there is no project file to read, and the rebuild is faster because Framer sites tend to be clean and small.
Let me plan your next step.
I can scope a migration. Send a brief and I will reply by email with next steps.