A business website costs between $400 and $2,000 to build for most small businesses in 2026. A simple brochure site of up to five pages sits near the bottom of that range. A content-managed site with service pages, a blog and lead capture sits in the middle. A large site, an online store, or one with integrations and membership areas sits at the top. Beyond the build, a domain and hosting add roughly $50 to $300 a year, paid from your own accounts.
That range is wide because the word "website" covers a one-page template and a custom web application equally. The rest of this article breaks the number down so you can place your own project in it before you ask anyone for a quote.
What sits in each price band
$400 to $700: a focused site
At this level you get a landing page or a small site of up to about five pages, with a custom design rather than an unmodified template, a content management system so you can edit text yourself, basic SEO setup and analytics. This suits a new business that needs a credible presence quickly, a single-service company, or a campaign that needs one strong page.
What you do not get at this level is depth: not many pages, no complex functionality, and limited content production. If you supply your own copy and images, a site like this moves fast.
$700 to $1,200: a working business site
This is where most small business websites land. You get ten to fifteen pages, individual service pages, a blog, lead capture forms wired to your inbox, and full conversion tracking so you can see which pages produce enquiries. The design is custom and built as reusable components, so adding a page later is cheap.
The extra cost over the lower band is mostly content and structure. More pages means more design, more writing and more SEO work per page. This is the level that can actually carry a marketing programme, because there is somewhere for search and ad traffic to land.
$1,200 to $2,000: a large or integrated site
At the top of the small business range you get large sites, multi-language builds, a Shopify or WooCommerce store, membership or gated areas, or integrations with a CRM or booking system. Ecommerce development sits here once you factor in product setup, payments, shipping and tax configuration.
Above $2,000 you are usually into web application development rather than a website: custom dashboards, portals and tools priced by user roles and business logic rather than page count.
What actually pushes the number up
Four things move a website quote more than anything else:
- The number of unique page designs. Twenty pages built from three templates is cheap. Twenty pages that each need their own layout is not.
- Custom functionality. A contact form is standard. A booking calendar, a member area, a product configurator or a live integration each add real build time.
- Content. If you write the copy and supply images, the build is faster and cheaper. If the agency writes it, that is a line item that scales with page count.
- Whether the foundations are included or extra. A quote that looks low may exclude SEO setup, analytics, a content management system and a handover session. A quote that looks higher may include all of them. Compare what is in the scope, not just the total.
The costs that come after launch
The build is a one-off. Living with the site is not:
- Domain: about $10 to $20 a year.
- Hosting: $5 a month for a small static site, $20 to $30 or more for a busy content-managed one.
- Platform licences: a hosted store platform or a premium plugin has its own monthly fee.
- Maintenance: updates, backups and security patches, either handled in-house or on a small retainer.
At MarkLogix these are all paid from accounts registered in your name, so nothing is locked behind ours and you can move at any time.
Is a cheap website a false economy?
Sometimes. A very low price almost always means a shared template, no custom design, no SEO configuration and no handover. For a placeholder while you get started, that is a reasonable trade. If the site needs to rank in search, load in under two seconds and turn visitors into enquiries, those are the things you are actually paying a higher price for, and adding them to a cheap site after the fact usually costs more than doing them once.
The more useful question is not "what is the cheapest site" but "what is the smallest site that does the job", then building that properly.
How to size your own project
Before you ask for a quote, write down: how many pages the site genuinely needs, whether any of them need custom functionality, who will write the content, and whether you need a store or an integration. That list places you in one of the bands above and turns a vague "how much is a website" into a specific conversation.
If you want that conversation, tell us what you are trying to build. You will get an indicative price in writing within 12 hours, and our full pricing is published so you can size a budget first.