How much does a website cost in the UK? For a small business, a professionally built website usually costs between £1,000 and £3,000 from a freelancer, £3,000 to £10,000 from a small agency, and considerably more for online shops and custom systems. A DIY website builder starts at around £9 to £17 a month, plus your time.
Those ranges are wide because “a website” can mean anything from a one-page brochure to a booking platform. This guide breaks down what drives the price, the running costs people forget, how DIY compares with hiring someone, and how to get a quote you can trust. We’re a web design studio, so we’ll be upfront about our own prices too.
Key takeaways
- Most small business websites cost £1,000 to £10,000 to build, depending on who builds it and what it needs to do.
- Budget for running costs too: domain, hosting, updates, email and any paid apps, often £150 to £600 a year.
- DIY builders are cheapest upfront but cost you time, and you may outgrow them.
- Always get a fixed, written quote that says what’s included, who owns what and what changes cost later.
Website cost at a glance
| Route | Typical UK cost | Best for |
|---|---|---|
| Free website builder plan | £0, with ads and no custom domain | Testing an idea, not a real business |
| DIY website builder | £9 to £29 a month on most plans | Very small budgets, if you have time to build it yourself |
| Freelance web designer | £1,000 to £3,000 for a brochure site | Most local small businesses |
| Small agency | £3,000 to £10,000 | Bigger sites, more design and strategy |
| Online shop or custom features | £8,000 to £25,000 and up | Ecommerce, bookings and integrations |
Freelance and agency ranges are typical UK figures for small business projects. Builder prices are UK annual-billing prices from 2026 pricing guides, and Startups.co.uk’s 2026 website cost guide puts freelance rates at around £25 to £50 an hour and small agencies at £50 to £150 an hour.
What affects the cost of a website?
Two websites can look similar and cost very different amounts. These are the things that actually move the price.
Number of pages
A one to three page site is quick to plan, write and build. A 20-page site with separate pages for each service and area takes far longer, mostly in planning and writing rather than design.
Who writes the words
Copy is the most underestimated cost. If you supply finished text and photos, the build is faster and cheaper. If your designer writes the copy, expect to pay for that time, but it’s often money well spent, because words decide whether a site ranks and gets enquiries.
Custom design or a template
A good template adapted to your brand is perfectly fine for most small businesses. Fully custom design costs more and makes sense when your brand or your audience genuinely needs it.
Features and integrations
Online booking, payments, membership areas, quote calculators and connections to your CRM or accounts software all add time. A booking system, for example, needs availability rules, confirmations, reminders and testing on real bookings.
Online shops
Ecommerce adds product setup, payments, delivery rules, VAT and order emails, which is why shop builds sit at the top of the range. Platforms also charge transaction fees: Wix Payments is 2.1% plus 20p per UK card transaction, and Squarespace’s Basic plan adds a 2% store fee on top of card processing.
SEO and speed
A site built with search in mind from the start, with fast pages, clear structure and structured data, costs a little more upfront but saves expensive rework. Our page on website design and SEO explains what that involves.
Want an exact figure for your business? We price every website as one fixed quote before work starts, with simple sites from £499. Book a free call and you’ll have a number within a day.
The running costs people forget
The build is a one-off. These are the costs that carry on:
| Running cost | Typical UK cost |
|---|---|
| Domain name (.co.uk or .com) | About £10 to £20 a year |
| Hosting | £20 to £300+ a year, depending on quality |
| Updates, backups and security | From around £20 to £100+ a month if someone does it for you |
| Business email | Usually charged per person per month, separately from the website |
| Paid plugins or apps | £0 to £30+ a month each |
| Ongoing SEO | £250 to £1,200+ a month for local SEO, if you choose it |
Domain, hosting, app and SEO ranges come from published 2026 UK guides including Startups.co.uk’s 2026 website cost guide. Website builders bundle hosting into the plan but charge extra for some apps, and the free domain usually only lasts the first year.
Our own hosting, updates, backups and small fixes are £39 a month with no contract. You can read exactly what’s included on our website design and hosting page.
DIY website builder or hiring a web designer?
Website builders like Wix and Squarespace have made DIY sites genuinely usable. For the right business, they’re a sensible start. The real comparison isn’t the monthly fee, though. It’s your time and what the site brings in.
| DIY builder | Web designer | |
|---|---|---|
| Upfront cost | Low | £1,000+ |
| Your time | 20 to 60+ hours to do it well | A few hours of input |
| SEO and speed | Depends on your skills | Should be built in |
| Ownership | Tied to the platform | Should be yours to move |
| Best for | Testing an idea, very tight budgets | Businesses that rely on the website for enquiries |
If you’re weighing up platforms, our guide to WordPress vs Wix vs Squarespace compares them honestly, including where each one falls down.
Red flags in a website quote
- No fixed price. “It depends” is fine on the first call, but you should get a written figure before work starts.
- The designer owns your domain or hosting. Both should be in your name, with the designer added as a user.
- No mention of copy, photos or SEO. If it isn’t listed, assume it isn’t included.
- Long contracts for hosting. Care plans should be easy to leave.
- Very cheap and very fast. A £200 site in two days is usually a template with your logo swapped in.
Our guide to the questions to ask a web designer gives you a checklist to take into those first calls.
How to get an accurate website quote
- Write down what the site is for: calls, quote requests, bookings or online sales.
- List the pages you think you need and the towns or services you want to be found for.
- Gather what you already have: logo, photos, reviews and any existing copy.
- Note any features, like booking, payments or a members’ area.
- Ask two or three designers for a fixed quote, and compare what each one includes, not just the price.
It also helps to know how long a project takes, so you can plan around it. Our guide to how long it takes to build a website covers typical timelines.
Three example website budgets
To make the ranges more concrete, here are three typical small business projects and roughly where they land. These are illustrations, not quotes, but they reflect the kind of work we see most often.
A local tradesperson
A plumber or electrician needs four or five pages: home, services, areas covered, reviews and contact. The focus is a fast mobile site with tap-to-call, clear service areas and a Google Business Profile set up properly. From a freelancer or small studio, this usually sits at the lower end of the range, with modest running costs.
A play café or venue with online booking
Here the website is also the till. It needs live availability, deposits or payments, confirmation and reminder emails, and a way for staff to manage sessions. That’s more planning and testing, so it sits in the middle of the range or above. We built exactly this for Little Lincoln, a role play café in Lincoln.
A clinic or professional practice
A clinic or law firm usually needs a page for each treatment or service, team profiles, credentials and careful handling of enquiries under UK GDPR. The page count and the writing drive the cost more than any feature, which puts these projects in the middle of the range. You can see an example in our Guildford ENT case study.
In every case, the cheapest option isn’t the one with the lowest build price. It’s the one that brings in enough work to pay for itself, and doesn’t need rebuilding in two years.
What WRKFLW charges
We keep it simple. A one to three page website starts from £499 as a fixed quote. Bigger sites and features like booking systems are quoted on a free call. Hosting, updates, backups and small fixes are £39 a month with no contract, and the domain, website and accounts are always in your name. See our full website design services for what’s included.
Frequently asked questions
How much does a small business website cost in the UK?
Typically £1,000 to £3,000 from a freelancer and £3,000 to £10,000 from a small agency, with online shops and custom features costing more. DIY builders start from around £9 to £17 a month.
How much does a website cost per month?
Expect roughly £15 to £60 a month for domain, hosting and basic upkeep, or more if someone manages updates, security and changes for you.
Is a cheap website worth it?
Sometimes. A simple, well-written site can work very well. The risk with very cheap sites is poor speed, weak SEO and the designer owning your domain, all of which cost more to fix later.
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Do I have to pay VAT on a website?
Only if your web designer is VAT registered, in which case VAT is added at the standard rate. Check whether a quote includes or excludes VAT before comparing.
Need a fixed price you can plan around? Tell us what you need and we’ll quote it properly, with no surprises later.
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