Every week someone asks me the same question with a nervous laugh: "So what's this actually going to cost me? My friend got a site for $600 and my cousin got quoted $15,000."
Both of those numbers can be legitimate. Here is the breakdown I give clients, with real prices for what things actually cost in 2026.
The four price tiers
| Tier | Typical price | What you actually get |
|---|---|---|
| DIY page builder | $0 to $500/year | You build it yourself on Wix or Squarespace. Your money goes to subscriptions and your time. |
| Template site, done for you | $500 to $2,000 | A developer takes an existing template, adds your text, logo, and photos. Live in under a week. |
| Custom small business site | $2,000 to $6,000 | Designed from scratch for your business. Custom booking or quote forms. Fast, mobile-first, SEO set up properly. |
| Custom web app / e-commerce | $6,000 to $20,000+ | Logins, payments, inventory, dashboards. This is software, not a brochure. |
What moves you between tiers
The price is not really about page count. A 5-page site and a 12-page site cost almost the same to build. What actually moves the number:
Payments or booking. The moment money or scheduling flows through your site, complexity jumps. Stripe integration, test transactions, refund handling, timezone math for bookings. Budget at least $1,500 extra on top of a base site.
Custom design. If you want a site nobody else has, someone designs it screen by screen. That is 30 to 50% of a custom project's cost and it is worth it when your look matters to your customers.
Content. Who writes your pages? Who takes the photos? If the answer is "you, at night," fine. If a professional does it, add $500 to $2,000. Content is the number one reason projects drag past their launch date.
Integrations. Connecting your site to your existing tools: your CRM, your invoicing, your email list. Each connection adds $300 to $1,000 depending on how modern the tool is.
The recurring costs nobody mentions
The build is a one-time cost. These are not:
- Domain: $10 to $20 per year
- Hosting: $100 to $300 per year for a small business site (more for big e-commerce)
- Email with your domain: $6 to $12 per user per month
- Updates and small changes: $200 to $600 per year on a maintenance plan
Run away from anyone who quotes you $0/month hosting forever. That usually means your site sits on their servers and you cannot leave.
Where the money is wasted
I have inherited a lot of projects. The same three wastes show up again and again:
- Paying custom prices for a brochure. If your site has not changed in 2 years and brings no leads, you needed the $1,500 template, not the $10,000 custom build.
- Paying template prices for a real business tool. If your site needs to process orders, a $900 template job will get rebuilt within a year. I have done those rebuilds. They cost more than doing it right the first time.
- No budget left for content and launch. People spend everything on the build and nothing on photos, copy, or getting the site in front of anyone. A beautiful site nobody finds is a very expensive business card.
How to get a quote you can compare
Ask every developer the same five questions:
- Is the design custom or template?
- How many revision rounds are included?
- Is content (text, photos) included or my job?
- What does hosting and support cost after launch?
- Who owns the site and code when it is done?
The quotes will suddenly be comparable. The developer who answers all five without dodging is the one worth hiring.
My honest rule of thumb
If your website's job is "exist so people can find my hours," spend under $2,000. If its job is "bring me customers," invest in the $3,000 to $6,000 range and treat it like an employee who works 24/7. If its job is "be my business," that is a web app, and you should budget like it.
Want a real number for your project instead of a range? I quote fixed prices before any work starts. Tell me what you are building and I will break down the cost line by line.