If you have asked three companies what a website costs, you have probably had three very different answers: a few hundred pounds, a few thousand, and a number that made you put the phone down. If you run a business and you are trying to work out a sensible budget without overpaying or buying something that cannot do the job, here is a straight answer.
We build websites, online stores and platforms, so we quote across this whole range and see what each band actually buys.
The short answer
Most UK business websites in 2026 land in three broad bands:
- A do-it-yourself builder: roughly £0 to £500 in your first year, plus your time.
- A freelancer or small build: roughly £1,000 to £5,000.
- A studio-built bespoke site: roughly £5,000 to £20,000, and higher for a store or a platform.
Large agencies quote above that again, often £25,000 and up. None of these numbers is the right price on its own. The right price is the one that matches what the site has to achieve.
Why the range is so wide
A website is not one thing. The word covers a one-page brochure a plumber puts up in a weekend and a booking system that takes payments, manages stock and handles thousands of visitors a day. When a quote goes up, you are usually paying for one or more of these:
- Design drawn for your business rather than dropped into a template.
- Custom features: bookings, payments, a store, member logins, integrations with tools you already use.
- Content and structure built to be found on Google, not just to look tidy.
- The number of pages and templates that have to be designed and built.
- People who will still answer the phone in a year.
A cheap quote is not automatically bad and an expensive one is not automatically better. The gap almost always comes down to how much of the above is included, and how much is bespoke rather than off the shelf.
What a website costs to run
The build is not the whole cost, and the guides that quote a single figure tend to skip the rest. Budget for a domain (usually £10 to £20 a year), hosting (from a few pounds a month on a builder to £20 to £100 for a bespoke site), and a care plan if you want someone keeping it secure and current (commonly £30 to £200 a month).
If you want the site to climb on Google rather than just exist, ongoing SEO is a monthly cost too, not a one-off. It is optional, but ranking rarely happens on its own. For a shop, the store platform itself may carry a monthly fee on top.
How to work out what you need
Before you ask anyone for a quote, answer three questions:
- What does this site have to do? Bring in enquiries, sell online, take bookings, look credible to a certain kind of client. The job sets the band.
- How much does it matter? A website that is your main source of customers justifies more than a digital business card.
- What does it need after launch? Someone to run it and help it rank, or are you happy to leave it alone.
Match your budget to those answers rather than to a round number, and quotes stop looking random. A £1,500 quote and a £12,000 quote are usually answering two different questions.
If you would find it useful, we offer a free review of your current site: a written look at what is holding it back and what a rebuild would need to fix. It is a straightforward way to sense-check a budget before you commit.
The short version. A UK website in 2026 costs anywhere from nothing to tens of thousands, because the word covers a weekend template through to a custom platform. Work out what the site has to do, add the running costs, and the right band becomes obvious.
If you are weighing up a build in Cheshire or across the North West, you can start a project with us for a straight answer on what yours would take.