Nobody enjoys asking this question, because the honest answer is always "it depends" and that sounds evasive. So let us put actual numbers to it.
The ranges you will actually be quoted
For a professionally built small business website in 2026, most quotes land between $1,000 and $5,000. Larger or more complicated builds — ecommerce, booking systems, anything with a login — run higher, often well past $10,000.
Do-it-yourself builders sit at the other end: roughly $16 to $50 a month for the platform, with your own time as the real cost. Subscription or "website as a service" arrangements, where a agency builds and maintains the site for a monthly fee, typically run $100 to $400 a month, with full-service plans reaching around $500.
The bills nobody mentions in the quote
The build price is the part everyone focuses on, and it is not where most businesses get caught out. The recurring costs are:
- Hosting — anywhere from a few dollars a month to a few hundred, and the cheap end is cheap for reasons you discover at the worst moment.
- Domain renewal — small, but a lapsed domain takes your site and your email down together.
- SSL certificate — often included now, but check.
- Maintenance — updates, backups, security patches. Commonly $50 to $200 a month, and the thing people skip.
- Content changes — if every price update means an invoice, you will stop making them, and the site will go stale.
Added together, the ongoing side commonly runs $1,100 to $5,000 a year. Over three years that can exceed the original build.
Why cheap sites often cost more
A $500 website is usually a template with your logo dropped in, no thought given to what your customers search for, and nobody looking after it afterwards. It exists, which feels like progress, but it does not bring in work. Two years later it needs replacing and you have paid twice.
The right question is not "what does a website cost" but "what does it need to earn back".
If a fencing contractor wins one extra job a month from their site, almost any sensible build pays for itself quickly. If it wins none, even $500 was wasted.
What actually drives the price
- Number of pages — largely because each one needs writing, and writing is the slow part.
- Custom design versus template — a real design process costs more and looks like your business rather than everyone else's.
- Functionality — a brochure site and a booking system are different projects entirely.
- Content — if you supply the words and photos, it is cheaper. If someone has to write them, that is real work.
- SEO — a site built to be found costs more than one that merely exists.
Questions worth asking any quote
- What happens after launch, and what does that cost?
- Do I own the site and the domain outright?
- Can I edit content myself, or is every change billable?
- Is hosting included, and who fixes it when it breaks?
- What exactly is included in the price, in writing?
Any agency worth hiring will answer all five plainly. If the answers are vague, that is the answer.