How much does a website cost in the UK?

The short answer

In 2026, a professionally designed and built website for a UK small business costs roughly £2,500 to £6,000. Below that you’re usually looking at a template with your logo on it; above it you’re into online shops with many products, custom tools, or agencies with account managers to pay for.

My own websites start at £2,800 and most finish between £2,800 and £4,500. That’s the range this guide is built around, but the point of it is to help you judge any quote, not just mine.

The three ways to get a website

The DIY option isn’t free. Count your own hours honestly, and remember that the hard part of a website isn’t dragging boxes around, it’s deciding what the pages should say and how a stranger gets from landing on the site to contacting you. A builder gives you the boxes; it can’t make those decisions for you.

The agency option often buys you people rather than a better website: a project manager, an account manager, and a designer and developer who may never speak to each other. For a small business that overhead rarely pays for itself.

What actually drives the price

Whichever route you take, these five things move the number more than anything else.

• Number of pages. Each real page needs planning, writing, designing and building. Five pages and fifteen are very different jobs.
• Who writes the words. Copywriting is the most underestimated cost. If you supply finished text, the price drops; if you want it written, budget £150–£300 a page.
• What it connects to. Linking a booking system, payment provider or newsletter tool you already use is usually included. Building something custom is not, and it’s where quotes jump.
• Selling online. A handful of products with secure checkout is a modest addition. Hundreds of products with stock, delivery rules and returns is a different project.
• Branding. If you don’t have a logo and colours yet, they have to come from somewhere. Brand identity done properly is £1,500 upwards and is worth doing before the website.

What my prices include

For a like-for-like comparison, here’s what sits inside a £2,800 website from me: a page plan built around your goals, design for phones, tablets and computers, search foundations (titles, descriptions, speed, structure, sitemap), your existing tools connected, accessibility to recognised standards, editing set up if you want it, launch on your domain, and 30 days of free fixes. The design, code and content are yours once the final invoice is paid.

Half is due to begin and half at launch. I’m not VAT registered, so nothing is added on top.

The running costs nobody mentions

A website is never quite a one-off purchase. Budget for these every year:

• Domain name: £10–£20 a year.
• Hosting: £0–£30 a month depending on the platform. Mine is from £20 a month and includes security updates and backups.
• Email: £5–£12 a month per mailbox for a proper business address.
• Updates: either your own time, or pay-as-you-go help. I charge £55 an hour with the cost agreed first.
• Services you connect: booking, payment or newsletter tools each have their own monthly fee.

Ask whoever you’re talking to for all of these in writing. A low build price with high mandatory monthly fees is a common pattern.

How to tell a fair quote from a bad one

• Does it say what’s included? “Website: £3,000” tells you nothing. A fair quote lists pages, features, who supplies what, and dates.
• Who owns it afterwards? You should. If the quote is quiet on this, ask. Some arrangements mean you can’t leave without losing the site.
• Is the domain in your name? Always. Never let anyone else register it for you.
• What happens if you go quiet, or they do? Good terms cover both. Mine are public.
• Can you see real work? Not mock-ups. Live sites you can click around on a phone.
• Is search mentioned at all? If the quote doesn’t cover page titles, speed and structure, you’ll pay someone else to fix it later.

So what should you spend?

If the website is going to bring in work, and for most small businesses it’s the first thing a new customer looks at, then £3,000–£4,500 for a site that’s planned, written and built around your business is a sound investment that should last five years or more. If one extra job a month pays for it, the maths is not complicated.

If you’re not sure which route is right for you, ask me. The first conversation is free, and if a DIY builder is genuinely the right call for your situation, I’ll tell you.