Cargo vs SmugMug — Platform Benchmark

45.4

Cargo

26 sites

WINNER

31.4

SmugMug

12 sites

Score Summary

Avg AI Readability

42.5 37.7

Avg Security

16.7 33.3

Avg Efficiency

56.0 28.4

Avg Total Score

45.4 31.4

Avg Structure

32.5 19.4

Avg Load Complexity

81.9 34.8

Avg Lighthouse

53.3 31.7

Best Site Score

55.1 42.3

Worst Site Score

30.7 23.1

Cargo SmugMug

Performance by Industry

Average total score for each platform within shared industries.

Industry	Cargo	SmugMug
Architecture	51.6 3 sites	—
Corporate-personal	43.8 2 sites	32.7 3 sites
Design	44.4 1 sites	—
Film & Video	51.9 1 sites	—
Photography	44.3 19 sites	31.0 9 sites

Comparison Insights

Overall Verdict

Cargo meaningfully outperforms SmugMug by 13.9 points on average. This reflects a consistent quality gap across their sites.

Dimension Edge

Cargo leads in: AI Readability, Efficiency, Structure, Load Complexity, Lighthouse. SmugMug leads in: Security. Cargo has a broader performance advantage across dimensions.

Opportunities for improvement

Cargo could target Security to close the gap.
SmugMug could target AI Readability, Efficiency, Structure, Load Complexity, Lighthouse to improve.

Industry-by-Industry Results

Cargo wins in 2 of 5 shared industries, suggesting its advantage is consistent rather than driven by a single vertical.

Sample Size Consideration

Cargo has 2.2× more audited sites than SmugMug. Larger samples surface more variation and may pull averages toward the mean, so this comparison should be read with that in mind.