How Much Is a Website in the UK? What It Really Costs
A simple small business website in the UK typically costs £800 to £4,000 as a one-off project, or a setup fee plus £30 to £150 a month if hosting and management are bundled. Ecommerce, booking and custom work sit higher. There is no single price because you are buying pages, features and ongoing care, not a fixed product.
Typical prices in the UK
A five page brochure site is a different product from a shop or a booking system. The bands below are what I see from freelancers and small studios, not from large agencies. Use them as a working range, not as a quote.
| Type of site | Typical one-off build | Typical monthly route |
|---|---|---|
| DIY builder such as Wix or Squarespace | No build fee | £12 to £45 a month for the platform |
| Simple 5 to 8 page brochure site | £800 to £2,500 | Setup £200 to £800, then £40 to £90 a month |
| Small business site with forms, blog or gallery | £2,000 to £5,000 | Setup £400 to £1,200, then £60 to £120 a month |
| Booking or membership features | £3,000 to £8,000 | Setup £600 to £1,500, then £80 to £180 a month |
| Small shop, under 50 products | £3,500 to £10,000 | Setup £800 to £2,000, then £80 to £200 a month |
| Custom or multi-location work | £8,000 to £25,000 and up | Usually quoted, not a standard package |
National agencies sit above these bands. A £99 complete website sits below them and is a different product: a thin template, few pages, and little help after launch.
What a one-off quote usually covers
Design, build and a set number of amends. It often excludes a year of hosting, professional copy, photography and updates after you go live. Missing items are not free. They become extra invoices or your own time.
What a monthly plan usually covers
A setup fee for the build, then a monthly price. In the UK that monthly figure commonly includes hosting, software updates and some ongoing management. That is why £70 a month is not comparable with £10 a month hosting. You are paying for a person and a process, not only disk space.
What actually moves the price
Page count is a weak guide. Ten pages that share one layout cost far less than five pages that each need a different layout, form or integration.
- Unique layouts. Extra templates mean extra design and extra testing on phones.
- Words and photos. Your copy and your photos keep the fee down. A writer, a photographer or stock licences add hundreds, sometimes thousands.
- Features that are not pages. A contact form is cheap. Booking, card payments, member logins, live stock and links to your diary or accounts are not.
- Theme versus original design. A well adapted theme is faster and cheaper. Original design costs more and takes longer.
- Speed, accessibility and mobile behaviour done properly. Skipping these looks cheaper on the quote and costs you enquiries.
- Who you hire. A junior freelancer will quote less than a senior designer who will still pick up the phone in two years.
Paying once or paying monthly
Both routes are valid. Pay once if you have the budget, want the files from day one, and will arrange hosting and updates yourself or buy them separately. Pay monthly if you cannot put thousands down, or you want the site genuinely hands-off: hosting, updates and day to day changes handled for you.
A one-off fee looks lower until you add hosting, updates and your time. A monthly fee looks higher until you notice it already includes those. Compare both over 24 months, not over launch week.
A £1,500 one-off site plus £20 hosting and £50 of updates a month is £3,180 over two years. A £90 monthly plan with a £500 setup is £2,660. Put your own quotes into the same sum.
I build both ways for small businesses: one-off projects, and pay-monthly plans with a setup fee then a monthly price that includes hosting, updates and ongoing management. Specific figures are on arlowebstudio.com, because they depend on the site.
Read any monthly contract before you sign. Some firms own the website for as long as you pay. Cancel, and you leave with your domain at best. Others will export the site if you give notice. That clause is worth more than a £20 gap in the monthly fee.
Costs that continue after launch
The build is the visible number. These keep arriving:
- Domain name. £10 to £15 a year for most .co.uk and .uk names. Register it in your business name, not the designer's.
- Hosting. £5 to £30 a month for a small WordPress site on decent shared or managed hosting. Bargain £2 hosting is where sites stall and get compromised.
- SSL. Almost always included with hosting. Do not pay a separate certificate upsell without asking why.
- Updates and security. WordPress, plugins and themes need patches. Ignore them and you eventually pay a recovery invoice.
- Business email. Google Workspace or Microsoft 365 is typically £5 to £11 per mailbox per month. Cheap hosting mail still causes avoidable problems.
- Fresh content. New services, photos, legal pages, price lists. Your time or a fee.
If you self-manage a brochure site well, a realistic year is £150 to £400 for domain and hosting, plus your time. If you pay for maintenance, £30 to £150 a month is common, or you use a bundled monthly plan and stop stacking invoices.
How to arrive at a figure that will not unravel
- Write down the pages you need at launch, not a wish list for year three.
- List every feature that is not a page: form, booking, shop, login, map, blog, payments.
- Say who writes the copy and who supplies photos. Leaving this open is how quotes go stale.
- Decide whether you will log in and edit the site, or you want changes made for you.
- Match that list to the table. Three special features means you are not in the simple brochure band, even with six pages.
- Add 12 months of domain, hosting and updates to any one-off quote before you compare it with a monthly plan.
- Ask whether VAT is on top. If the supplier is VAT registered, add 20%.
Take that list to every conversation. You will get fewer fantasy quotes, and the ones you do get will be easier to line up.
Why two quotes can be thousands apart
One person is using a theme, your words and stock images, with two rounds of amends. The other is designing original layouts, writing, shooting, testing on real devices and including a year of hosting. One quote is build only. The other is build plus care. They are not the same purchase.
Ask for a split: design and build, copy, visuals, hosting for 12 months, updates for 12 months, and extras. If a quote cannot split those, you cannot compare it with the next one. I would not take the lowest number if the scope is vague, and I would not pay a full one-off fee up front with no staged payments and no written page list.
Frequently asked questions
How much does a basic small business website cost?
Most brochure sites in the UK land between £800 and £5,000 one-off, or a setup fee plus £40 to £120 a month if hosting and management are bundled. Shops, booking and custom features sit higher. Add VAT if the supplier is registered.
Is a £500 website enough?
Sometimes, if you accept a template, supply all the copy and photos, and keep the page count low. It will not cover original design, ecommerce or ongoing management. Domain and hosting still sit on top of that £500.
Is paying monthly cheaper than paying once?
It is easier on cashflow. Whether it is cheaper over three years depends on the monthly fee and whether you would have paid for hosting and updates anyway. Add 24 months of running costs to the one-off quote before you decide.
Who should own the domain name?
You should. Register it in your business name and keep the login. If the designer registers it for you, get it transferred before you pay the final invoice. A domain is cheap. Losing it is not.
Do I still pay after the site launches?
Yes. Domain, hosting and updates do not stop. Budget £150 to £400 a year if you self-manage a simple site well, or £30 to £150 a month if someone else maintains it. A bundled monthly plan replaces those separate bills.
Should I mention that I might add a shop later?
Yes. Bolting ecommerce onto a brochure site you never planned as a shop often costs more than building the shop properly once you already know you will sell online. If it is only a maybe, say so, so the build can leave room without you paying for a full shop now.