Short answer: The cost of a website depends mostly on how many kinds of page it needs, who writes the text, what it has to connect to (payments, bookings, a CRM, a stock system) and whether it runs in more than one language. A custom design, an editable CMS and moving from an old site also push the price up.
Ask five studios what a website costs and you will get five numbers that have nothing to do with each other. That isn't because four of them are lying. It's because "a website" can mean a single page with a contact form, or a shop in three languages that talks to your warehouse. Both are websites. Only one of them takes a weekend.
We won't give you a number in this article, because any number we wrote here would be made up. What we can do is show you what moves the cost up and down, so that when quotes arrive you can tell which one is cheap because it's efficient and which one is cheap because half the work is missing.
What affects the cost of a website?
How many different kinds of page you need
Page count matters less than people think. Twenty blog posts built from one template cost roughly the same as two. What costs money is each new kind of page: a home page, a service page, a case study, a pricing table, a careers page with its own form. Each one has to be designed, built and tested on its own.
So when you list what you need, list the types, not the total. "Home, about, five service pages that look alike, contact" is a much smaller job than the word "nine" suggests.
Who writes the words
This is the one that catches people out. If you hand over finished text, the studio designs around it. If you don't, someone has to interview you, write, rewrite and get it approved, and that is real work with real hours attached. A quote that doesn't mention copy either assumes you'll supply it or assumes "lorem ipsum" will do. Ask which.
Whether you need to edit it yourself
A site that only a developer can change is cheaper to build and more expensive to live with. A content management system lets your team change a price, add a page or swap a photo without calling anyone. Setting one up properly, with sensible fields and limits so nobody can break the layout by pasting a Word document into it, takes time. Whether that time is worth it depends on how often your content changes.
What it has to connect to
Every integration adds work: online payments, a booking calendar, your CRM, a newsletter tool, a stock system. Some are a few lines of setup. Others involve an old system with patchy documentation and one person at the vendor who answers email on Thursdays. If a quote treats "connect to our CRM" as a small line item, ask what happens if the CRM turns out to be awkward.
Languages
A second language needs more than a translated copy. It needs its own URLs so search engines can find it, a way to switch between versions, text that fits when German turns out longer than English, and someone to keep both versions in step. Multilingual sites are very doable. They're just not free.
How custom the design is
A good theme with your logo and colours is a legitimate choice for plenty of businesses. A design made from scratch around your customers and your content is a different job. Neither is wrong. The trouble starts when a quote is priced like the first and described like the second.
Speed, accessibility and search basics
A site that loads quickly on a cheap phone, works with a keyboard and a screen reader, and can be read properly by Google doesn't happen by accident. Some studios build this in as standard. Some leave it out and sell it back to you later as an "optimisation package". Ask whether it's included.
Moving from an old site
If you already have a site with some search traffic, replacing it means mapping old addresses to new ones so you don't lose what you've built up. On a small site that's an afternoon. On an old one with years of blog posts it can be a project in itself.
What usually doesn't matter as much as you'd think
- The number of pages, as long as they share a template.
- Animations, if they're small and purposeful. Big custom ones are another story.
- The colour of the logo. It is easy to debate it for longer than the site takes to build.
How do you read a website quote?
A quote is only useful if you can compare it with another one. Here's what to look for.
Is the scope written down?
A good quote lists what's included: which page types, which features, which integrations, how many rounds of changes. A vague quote is cheaper on paper because nobody has committed to anything yet. You find out what was missing when you ask for it and get a second invoice.
What's explicitly excluded?
The "not included" list is often more honest than the "included" one. Copywriting, photography, translations, hosting, ongoing updates. None of these are unreasonable to exclude, as long as you know before you sign.
Who owns what at the end?
Ask who owns the code and the designs once you've paid, and whose name is on the hosting, domain and analytics accounts. The answer should be yours, in writing. If the studio holds everything in its own accounts, leaving them later gets awkward and sometimes expensive.
What happens after launch?
Sites need updates, security patches and the occasional fix when a browser changes something. Some quotes include a period of support. Some don't mention it at all, which usually means you'll pay by the hour when something breaks. Neither is wrong, but you should know which one you've got.
How are changes handled?
You will change your mind about something. Everyone does. A good quote says how many rounds of feedback are included and what happens after that, so a change of heart doesn't turn into an argument.
Questions worth asking before you sign
- Which page types are included, and which are built from the same template?
- Who writes the text, and who finds the images?
- Can we edit content ourselves, and how?
- Which integrations are included, and what if one is harder than expected?
- Are speed, accessibility and basic search setup part of the job?
- Whose name are the accounts in, and who owns the code once it's paid for?
- What does support look like after launch?
Cheap, expensive and right
The cheapest quote is sometimes the right one. If you need a clean five-page site and the studio does that well, there's no reason to pay for more. The expensive quote is sometimes right too, when it includes work the others quietly left out. The only quote that's always wrong is the one you can't compare, because you don't know what's in it.
So before you look at the total, look at the list. Then look at the total.
Sources
- Google Search Central, Managing multi-regional and multilingual sites, on giving each language version its own URL.
- Google Search Central, How to move a site, on mapping old URLs to new ones with permanent redirects.
- W3C, Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2, which covers keyboard access and compatibility with assistive technology such as screen readers.
If you'd like a quote you can actually compare, tell us what the site needs to do and we'll write back with questions, then a scope and a price in writing. The web development page has more on how we work, or you can book a free call. We reply within 24 hours.