Web Design
How much does a website cost in the UK?
Owen Measures · · Updated · 9 min read
It is the first question almost everyone asks, and the honest answer is that it depends. Not as a dodge, but because a website is a job of work rather than a product off a shelf, and the size of the job is what you are actually paying for.
So rather than a single number, here is what websites genuinely cost in the UK in 2026, broken down by the kind of site you need, what makes the number move, and what to budget once it is live. My own prices are in here too, because a guide to pricing that hides its author's pricing is not much of a guide.
The short answer
Most UK small businesses pay between £800 and £3,000 for a professional website built to be found on Google. Below roughly £500 you are usually buying a template with your logo dropped into it. Above £5,000 you are usually paying for either a genuinely complex build or an agency's overheads.
Those bands hold across the country. What changes by region is not really the price of the work, it is how many people are bidding for it.
There is also a second way to pay. Instead of one bill up front, some studios, mine included, build the site and look after it for a monthly fee. Mine is £199 to start, the £99 setup fee and your first month, then from £100 a month with a 12-month minimum. More on that below.
What each type of site costs
The single biggest driver is what the site has to do, not how many pages it has. These are the three shapes almost every small business build falls into.
- Brochure or service site, £800 to £2,000. Five to ten pages, a contact form, and the job is to explain what you do and make you easy to reach. Most trades, professional services and local businesses need exactly this and nothing more.
- Booking led site, £1,000 to £3,000. Everything above plus a real booking system, availability, confirmations and reminders. Salons, clinics, consultants and anyone whose diary is the business.
- Online shop, £1,300 to £6,000 and up. Products, stock, payments, delivery rules and tax. The range is wide because a ten product shop and a configurable made to order product are not the same job at all.
If you are selling online, the cost is decided by the awkward parts rather than the pretty ones: accurate stock, delivery calculated properly, and tax that is right for the country buying. My web design for online shops page goes through what actually drives that number.
That booking figure assumes a fairly standard calendar. If what you actually need is booking or scheduling logic a page builder cannot model, multiple resources, tiered pricing, a client portal behind a login, or software rather than a site, that is a different kind of project with its own scope and price. See custom web development for what that covers.
What actually moves the price
Two sites can look similar and cost wildly different amounts. These are the things that make the difference.
Whether the copy is included. The most underestimated factor and often a four figure swing on its own. Writing good copy for a business you have just met takes real time, and plenty of quotes quietly assume you will supply it.
Template or built from scratch. Adapting a template is measured in hours. Designing around your business is measured in days. Both produce a working site, and only one of them looks like you.
Page count, though less than people think. Ten pages is not double the work of five, because the design system is built once and the pages are then assembled from it.
Functionality. A contact form is nothing. Booking, payments, member logins or a product catalogue each add real work, and each one adds testing as well as building.
Whether SEO is in the build. Some quotes include the technical foundations, some sell them afterwards for £500 to £1,500. Two quotes can look identical and differ by a grand once you ask. Mine includes Foundation SEO on every build at no extra cost, because a site nobody can find is not finished.
Freelancer, agency or do it yourself
The same website costs three quite different amounts depending on who builds it, and the cheapest option is not automatically the worst. Google publishes its own guidance on hiring for this, including the questions to ask and the promises that should worry you. It is not written to sell you anything, which is rare in this corner of the internet.
- Doing it yourself, £150 to £400 a year. A platform subscription and your own time. Genuinely fine for a brand new business testing an idea. The real cost is the fifty or sixty hours you will not get back, and a site that usually does not rank.
- Freelancer or small studio, £800 to £3,000. You deal with the person doing the work. Faster decisions, no account management layer, and the quality depends entirely on who you pick, so look at their recent work rather than their homepage.
- Agency, £3,000 to £15,000 and up. Bigger teams, more process, more people in meetings. Worth it for complex builds or when you need several disciplines at once. Overkill for a six page service site, and you will feel it in the invoice.
For most small UK businesses the middle option is the right one. If you are weighing it up, the fair question to ask any of the three is not what it costs, but what happens after launch when you want to change something.
Why the cheapest option often is not
A £400 site that never appears in search has not saved you £500. It has cost you £400 and produced nothing, and you will pay again within a year or two to have it done properly.
That is not an argument for spending as much as possible. It is an argument for spending enough that the thing works, which for most small businesses is less than they fear and more than the cheapest quote in the inbox.
Do not forget the running costs
The build is one off. Keeping it going is not, and this is the part most quotes leave you to discover on your own.
- Domain, £10 to £15 a year. Renews annually, and it should be registered in your name, not your designer's.
- Hosting or platform plan, £130 to £200 a year. A brochure site sits at the lower end, bookings and ecommerce at the upper, because they need the plan that supports them.
- Business email, £5 to £10 a month. Worth every penny over a free address for anyone quoting for work.
- Transaction fees, if you sell. Typically 1.4% to 2.9% per sale, charged by the payment provider rather than by your designer.
Ongoing SEO is separate again, and for a site you own it is optional. For a lot of local businesses the technical foundations plus a well kept Google Business Profile do most of the work. A monthly plan suits a different owner: one who would rather not look after the site at all, and wants hosting, changes and SEO upkeep handled for one monthly price. That is what mine covers, set out below.
Five questions to ask before you accept a quote
Most unpleasant surprises come from things nobody asked about rather than things anybody hid. These five flush out almost all of them.
- Who writes the copy, and is it in this price?
- Is this a template, or is it designed specifically for your business?
- What SEO is included, and what costs extra afterwards?
- Can I edit the site myself once it is live, without paying you?
- Who owns the domain, the hosting account and the finished site?
The last one matters more than it sounds. If the answer is anything other than you, ask why before you sign anything.
What I charge
I offer two routes, and one question decides between them: do you want to edit the website yourself?
If not, a monthly plan: a custom site built on Astro, hosted by me, with SEO kept up and small changes done for you. It is £199 to start, the £99 setup fee and your first month, then from £100 a month for a services site with Standard SEO, up to £250 a month for a bookings or ecommerce site with Performance SEO. There is a 12-month minimum, then it rolls monthly on 30 days' notice.
If you do want to edit it yourself, a Wix site bought outright: from £800 for a services site and from £1,000 for bookings or ecommerce, with Foundation SEO included, Advanced SEO from £300, and a fixed quote agreed in writing before work starts. Wix hosting, £130 to £200 a year, is paid to Wix in your name. No VAT to add either way. The full breakdown is on my pricing page.
A site can be live in as little as two weeks, and most small business sites within four, from the day I have your content; larger ecommerce or custom builds run four to eight weeks. I have been doing this in Medway since 2016, and there are 160 five-star reviews across Google, Wix, Facebook and other review sites if you want to check that before speaking to anyone. You can also see what I have actually built.
If you want a fixed number for your own project rather than a range, get in touch. No obligation, and you will get a figure rather than an estimate.
Frequently asked questions
Is a cheap website ever worth it?
If you need a placeholder while you get going, yes. If you need it to bring in work, rarely. A cheap site usually means a template that is slow, generic and hard to rank, and the money is gone either way.
How much does a website cost per month?
It depends which way you pay. For a site you own outright, the running costs are typically £15 to £30 a month once you include domain, hosting and business email; an online shop costs more to run, mostly because of transaction fees of roughly 1.4% to 2.9% per sale. On a monthly plan the fee covers the site itself too: mine is from £100 a month after a £99 setup fee, with hosting, SEO upkeep and small changes included, on a 12-month minimum. Every plan is on my pricing page.
How much should a small business spend on a website?
£800 to £3,000 for a professional custom site built to generate enquiries. Below about £500 you are usually buying a template with your logo on it, and above £5,000 you should be getting something genuinely complex in return. Or, if you would rather not pay up front, a monthly plan from £100 a month after a £99 setup fee, on a 12-month minimum.
How much does an ecommerce website cost in the UK?
From about £1,300 for a straightforward shop with a modest range. Custom logic, product configurators and international tax handling push it well beyond that, because those are real development rather than configuration.
Is Wix cheaper than WordPress?
Usually cheaper to run and to maintain, because hosting, security and updates are handled for you rather than being your problem. WordPress can be cheaper to host and more expensive to keep alive. The build cost depends far more on the designer than the platform.
What is not included in most quotes?
Copywriting, photography, hosting and post launch changes are the four most commonly excluded. Always ask what sits outside the price before you agree it.
How long does a website take to build?
In as little as two weeks, and most small business sites within four, from the day I have your content. Larger ecommerce or custom builds run four to eight weeks. Content is almost always the thing that decides the timeline, not the building.
Thinking about your own site?
I build websites for businesses that are designed to get found and get enquiries.
Book a free consultation
