Cost guide · updated 2026
How much does a website cost in the UK?
The honest answer is that a small business website costs anywhere from £200 to £30,000 in its first year, and the gap has less to do with quality than most people assume. This page explains exactly what drives the number, so you can read a quote and know whether it is fair.
The short answer
For a typical UK small business site of five to fifteen pages, expect roughly:
- £0–£600 a year if you build it yourself on Wix or Squarespace, plus 40–80 hours of your own time.
- £1,500–£6,000 upfront for a freelance designer, plus hosting and support.
- £5,000–£25,000 upfront for a design agency, plus a monthly retainer.
- £540–£1,440 in year one on a pay-monthly plan like ours, with everything included.
If a quote sits well outside those ranges in either direction, that is not automatically wrong — but it is worth asking why.
What it costs in year one
Upfront build cost plus twelve months of running it. This is the number worth comparing, because a low build fee with a high monthly bill is not cheap — it is just deferred.
Bars show the range from the low to the high end of each route. Indicative UK ranges for a small business site — not a survey.
| Route | Upfront | Ongoing | Changes | Time to live | Your time |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Design agency | £5,000–£25,000 | £150–£600retainer | £75–£150/hr | 8–16 weeks | 10–20 hrs |
| Freelance designer | £1,500–£6,000 | £20–£80hosting & support | £40–£85/hr | 3–8 weeks | 10–25 hrs |
| DIY site builder | £0plus 40–80 hours of your time | £16–£45subscription | Includedyour own time | 2–8 weeks | 40–80 hrs |
| Pay monthly with us Us | £0 | £45–£120everything included | Includedchanges included | 2–3 weeks | 2–4 hrs |
Where these numbers come from. They are indicative UK ranges for a small business website of roughly 5–15 pages, based on published rate cards and the quotes clients show us when they come to compare. They are not a survey, and your own quotes may land outside them. Our own prices are exact, because they are ours.
The seven things that actually drive the price
Two quotes for the same brief can differ by a factor of five. Almost always, the difference comes down to some combination of these.
1. How many people are involved
This is the single biggest factor and it is rarely discussed. An agency quote may cover an account manager, a project manager, a designer, a front-end developer and a strategist. That is five people’s time and five people’s overhead. A freelancer is one person. Neither is wrong — but you are paying for the org chart, not just the website.
2. How much is bespoke
A design drawn from scratch for your business costs more than a theme configured to look like it. For some businesses the bespoke work pays for itself; for a sole trader who needs to be findable and credible, it often does not. Ask which you are getting, because plenty of quotes at the £4,000 mark are theme work sold at bespoke prices.
3. Page count and content depth
Five pages is a different job from fifty. But page count matters less than most people expect — the tenth service page takes a fraction of the time the first one did. Where cost really climbs is unique content: bespoke photography, detailed case studies, technical specifications.
4. Who writes the words
Copywriting is routinely £150–£600 a page when bought separately, and it is the line most often quietly dropped to win a job on price. If your quote does not mention copy, assume you are writing it. That is fine — you know your business better than a copywriter does — but budget your own time for it, and read our guide to writing it first.
5. Functionality beyond pages
Online payments, bookings, memberships, customer logins, stock control, integrations with your accounting software. Each is genuinely a piece of software, and each roughly doubles the testing burden. This is where £2,000 quotes become £12,000 quotes, legitimately.
6. What happens after launch
A site that is hosted, monitored, backed up, updated and edited monthly costs more to deliver than one handed over on a memory stick. Compare like with like: a £1,500 build with no support is not cheaper than a £45 a month plan until you have priced what you will spend keeping it alive.
7. Whether anyone is doing SEO
“SEO included” can mean a genuine content and structure plan, or it can mean a plugin was installed. The first is worth real money. The second is worth nothing and is on more quotes than you would think. Ask precisely what will be done and what will be reported.
The costs a quote usually leaves out
The build fee is often the smaller half of what a website costs you. These are the lines that turn up later, and what they typically run to.
| Cost | Typical UK price | On our plans |
|---|---|---|
| Domain name | £10–£20 a year | Included |
| Hosting | £60–£400 a year | Included |
| SSL certificate | £0–£150 a year | Included |
| Premium theme & plugin licences | £100–£500 a year | Not used — hand-built |
| Stock photography | £50–£300 one-off | Sourced for you |
| Copywriting | £150–£600 a page | Included on key pages |
| Small text or price changes | £40–£150 an hour | Included every month |
| Security fixes after a hack | £300–£1,500 one-off | Our problem, not yours |
| Rebuild when the platform ages out | £2,000+ every 3–5 years | Kept current, no rebuild fee |
Not every provider charges every one of these, and a good freelancer will bundle several. The point is to ask, in writing, which of them apply to you before you sign — because the answer is what turns a £2,000 website into a £4,000 one. There is more detail in the hidden costs of a cheap website.
The five-year number nobody shows you
Websites are not bought once. Look at the same four routes across the period you will actually own the site, and the ranking changes.
Bars show the range from the low to the high end of each route. Indicative UK ranges for a small business site — not a survey.
| Route | Year 1 | 3 years | 5 years |
|---|---|---|---|
| Design agency | £6,800–£32,200 | £10,400–£46,600 | £14,000–£61,000 |
| Freelance designer | £1,740–£6,960 | £2,220–£8,880 | £2,700–£10,800 |
| DIY site builder | £192–£540 | £576–£1,620 | £960–£2,700 |
| Pay monthly with us | £540–£1,440 | £1,620–£4,320 | £2,700–£7,200 |
Two things are worth noticing here, and we would rather point them out than hope you miss them.
DIY stays cheapest in cash, always. Nothing we sell beats £16 a month on price alone. If your requirements are simple, your time is genuinely free, and you enjoy the fiddling, a site builder is a perfectly rational choice and we will tell you so on the phone.
Paying once beats paying monthly eventually. On our own numbers the crossover is around year four. If you have the capital and intend to keep the site a long time, a one-off build is the cheaper route and we sell that too, from £1,495.
What the five-year table leaves out is the rebuild. Most small business sites are rebuilt every three to five years because the platform ages, the plugins stop being maintained, or the design dates. On the agency and freelance routes that is another build fee. On a maintained plan it is not, because the site never gets to that state.
What your kind of business should expect to pay
Rough guidance by situation, assuming you want a site that is fast, findable and brings in enquiries rather than one that merely exists.
Sole trader or new business
Five pages, one core service, a phone number that rings. You need credibility and a Google Business Profile more than you need a bespoke design.
Sensible budget: £45–£60 a month, or £1,500–£2,500 one-off. Be sceptical of anything over £4,000.
Established local business, several services
Ten to fifteen pages, a page per service, proper local SEO, and someone keeping it current as the business changes.
Sensible budget: £75–£100 a month, or £2,500–£5,000 one-off plus a care plan.
Online shop
Products, payments, delivery rules, stock. Genuinely more work, and the ongoing side matters more than the build — a shop that breaks at 6pm on a Friday costs you real money.
Sensible budget: £120–£250 a month, or £4,500–£12,000 one-off. Under £2,000, expect a template.
Funded startup or national brand
Brand strategy, custom design systems, integrations, a marketing team to support. This is the case where an agency genuinely earns its fee.
Sensible budget: £15,000 and up. If that is you, hire an agency — we would tell you the same on the phone.
How to read a quote properly
Whoever you are considering, including us, the same six questions will tell you what you are buying. Send them by email and keep the replies.
- What is the total cost in year one, and in year three? Not the build fee. Everything.
- Who owns the domain, the content and the site files? The answer should be “you” for at least the first two.
- What does a small text change cost, and how quickly is it done? This predicts whether your site will still be accurate in two years.
- What is it built on, and what happens when that needs updating? If the answer involves premium plugin licences, ask who renews them.
- What exactly does “SEO included” cover? Ask for the list of deliverables, not the adjective.
- Can I see a site you built two years ago? Anyone can show you a launch. Fewer can show you something that has aged well and is still ranking.
A quote that is a single line and a single number. Not because it is dishonest, but because it gives you nothing to hold anyone to. A one-page breakdown of what is included is the minimum you should accept from anyone, at any price.
We publish our own prices in full for exactly this reason, and the cost estimator will give you a number for your situation in about thirty seconds without you speaking to anyone.
Common questions about website costs
Why do website quotes vary so much for the same brief?
Mostly because of how many people are involved in delivering the work, and how much of the site is designed from scratch rather than adapted from a template. A five-person agency and a solo freelancer can produce a comparable result for a simple brochure site, at very different prices, because their cost bases are entirely different. Scope creep in the quote itself is the other big factor: strategy workshops, brand work and content production are often bundled in without being separated out.
Is a £500 website worth it?
Sometimes. At that price you are buying a template configured by one person, with your content dropped in, and no ongoing support. For a brand new sole trader who needs a credible presence quickly, that can be perfectly adequate. The risk is what happens afterwards: no hosting arrangement, no backups, no one to call, and often no access to your own files. If you buy at that level, make sure you own the domain and get a copy of the site.
How much should a small business website cost per month to run?
If you own the site outright, budget £15 to £40 a month for hosting, SSL, backups and someone keeping the software patched. If you also want changes made for you and someone monitoring performance, £45 to £120 a month is the normal range in the UK. Anything under £10 a month is unmanaged shared hosting, which is fine for a hobby site and a poor idea for a business that depends on enquiries.
Should I pay monthly or pay once for a website?
Pay monthly if cash flow matters more than ownership, if you want changes and support included, or if you would otherwise put the project off for another year. Pay once if you have the capital, expect to keep the site for four years or more, and are comfortable arranging your own hosting and updates. On our numbers the crossover is around the four-year mark.
Do I need to pay for SEO separately?
Not at the start. A well-built site with proper page structure, fast loading, sensible content and a correctly configured Google Business Profile will do most of the work for a local or small business, and that should be part of the build rather than an add-on. Paid ongoing SEO becomes worth it when you are competing nationally, in a crowded market, or for terms with real commercial value behind them.
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