How much does a website cost? Price bands and what really makes the difference

Tuesday morning, an enquiry arrives through the contact form: “Good morning, we’d like to redo our company website. How much does it cost?”. No other details. That afternoon the same company forwards us two quotes it already has: one for 1,800 euros, the other for 14,000. The owner wants to know whether the second is daylight robbery or the first is too good to be true. Often it’s neither: they’re two different products going by the same name.

The short answer: a website can cost a few hundred euros a year if you build it yourself with a builder, a few thousand euros with a freelancer, roughly 5,000 to 20,000 euros with an agency for a company website, and more for a bespoke project with integrations and several languages. These are ranges for the Italian market, useful for getting your bearings, not our price list. What moves the price most is the number of page templates, who produces the copy and photos, languages, connections with the CRM and management system, accessibility, technical SEO and moving the old site. And every year there are costs to factor in: hosting, domain, maintenance, licences.

I handle the first calls with the companies that contact us and prepare the quotes. In this article I set out what I find myself explaining most often: what lies behind the figures and how to compare two offers on the same basis.

How much does a website cost in Italy, on average?

There’s no real average, because “website” covers very different things: from a tradesperson’s single page to a three-language site connected to the management system. It’s more useful to think in bands, based on who does the work and how much work is involved.

Band	Who builds it	Indicative range (one-off)	Who it makes sense for
DIY	You, with an online builder	A subscription of a few tens to a few hundred euros a year	Newly opened businesses, little content, time to spend on it
Freelancer	A single professional	Around €1,000-5,000	Brochure site with a few pages, copy and photos ready
Agency	A team with several skill sets	Around €5,000-20,000	Company website that needs to generate leads, with copy, SEO and measurement
Bespoke	Agency or development team	From around €20,000 upwards	Complex catalogues, many languages, integrations, a reserved area

The figures are indicative and exclude VAT, based on what we see in the quotes companies show us and the enquiries we receive. The bands overlap: an experienced freelancer can cost as much as a small agency, and a simple agency site can come in under 5,000 euros. They help you understand the order of magnitude, not decide whether a quote is right.

The row that matters most isn’t the price. It’s the last column: each band makes sense for a particular kind of need. Problems arise when people ask for a band-three site on a band-one budget, or pay for band four for a site that needed a lower one.

What do you get in each price band?

DIY with a builder

Online builders (the platforms where you build a site by dragging blocks around) cost little in money and a lot in time. You pay a subscription, choose a design template, write the copy and upload the photos. It works if you have few pages, clear ideas and someone in the company with a couple of free days. The limitations come later: customisation is difficult, speed depends on the platform, connections with other software aren’t always available, and the site lives inside a subscription that isn’t easy to leave.

Freelancer

A good freelancer follows the project from start to finish and usually costs less than an agency, because there’s less overhead. In this band the price often covers design and development on an existing template, while copy, photos, SEO and measurement are down to you or charged separately. The point to clarify is continuity: who steps in if the freelancer is on holiday, has changed jobs or has too many clients in the same month.

Agency

At an agency, several people work on the same site: someone who writes, someone who designs, someone who develops, someone who handles SEO and data. You pay for the coordination and the combined skills. In return, the site should launch with a structure designed for Google, copy written around customers’ searches, tracked conversions and a plan for after launch. If these items don’t appear in the quote, you’re paying an agency price for lower-band work.

Bespoke project

Bespoke means the site isn’t built from a template but from code written for that project, or that it includes features templates don’t cover: configurators, reserved areas, catalogues with hundreds of products in several languages, two-way connections with the management system. The cost goes up because every piece has to be designed, developed and tested. It makes sense when speed, control and integrations really matter to how the company works, not to have “something unique” in the abstract.

What pushes up the price of a website?

When two quotes are far apart, the difference almost always lies in one of these items. Some are visible; others stay hidden until you ask.

Number of pages and, above all, templates

The number of pages matters less than the number of different templates. Twenty service pages built on the same template cost much less than twenty pages that are all different. When we ask “how many pages?”, what we really want to know is how many types of page: home, service, case study, article, contact, product page. Each template has to be designed, developed and tested on phone and computer.

Copy and photos

This is the most underestimated item. A site with copy supplied by the client and stock photos costs less than one with copy written by a copywriter around the words customers search for and photos taken at the company. But copy is also what decides whether the site brings in leads. In many projects it’s the main cause of delays: the site is ready, the copy isn’t.

Languages

Each extra language isn’t just a translation. Addresses, menus, forms, confirmation emails and SEO all have to be handled for each market. Machine translation reviewed by a person costs less than professional translation, but for technical or sales content a review by someone who knows the industry and the language is always worthwhile.

Integrations with CRM, management system and other software

A form that sends an email is simple. A form that creates the contact in the CRM, assigns it to the right salesperson and triggers an email sequence is something else. The same goes for bookings, price lists read from the management system, and reserved areas for dealers. Integrations often account for a large part of the budget, and if they’re missing you pay later in hours of copying and pasting. When they’re needed, we design them together with the site as part of our development and integrations work.

E-commerce

An online shop is a project in its own right: catalogue, payments, shipping, returns, invoicing, connection to the warehouse. The cost depends on the number of products and variants, payment methods and integrations. We’ll cover this in a dedicated article on e-commerce costs; for now it’s enough to know that “let’s add a shop too” changes the price band.

Accessibility under the European Accessibility Act

An accessible site can be used with just a keyboard, with a screen reader, with enlarged text and readable contrast. European Directive 2019/882, transposed into Italian law by Legislative Decree 82/2022, makes accessibility mandatory from 28 June 2025 for many services sold online to consumers, such as e-commerce. Microenterprises providing services (fewer than 10 people and annual turnover or balance sheet of up to 2 million euros) are exempt. In Italy, the supervisory authority for services is AgID, the national digital agency, which has prepared dedicated guidelines. We explained who is affected and what the law requires in our article on the European Accessibility Act.

On cost: building an accessible site from the outset costs little extra. Making a site accessible after it was built without this in mind costs much more, because components, colours and forms often have to be redone.

Technical SEO and speed

A site can be beautiful and invisible. Technical SEO is the work that lets Google read and understand the pages: URL structure, titles and descriptions, structured data, sitemap, pages that load quickly. Speed is measured with Core Web Vitals, the three indicators Google uses to assess what a page is like to use. In a cheap quote this part is often “included” but not described: ask what it covers.

Migration and redirects from the old site

If the site already exists and gets visits from Google, the rebuild has to be treated as a house move. Every old URL must lead to the corresponding new page with a permanent redirect. Google recommends keeping redirects in place for at least a year and warns that, for a medium-sized site, it takes a few weeks or more for the new URLs to replace the old ones. A badly handled move is the most common reason leads drop after a new site goes live. Mapping hundreds of URLs takes hours of work, and it’s right that it should appear in the quote.

Summary: how much each item weighs

Item	When it weighs little	When it weighs a lot
Page templates	3-5 templates, reused	Many pages, all different
Copy and photos	Supplied by the client, ready	Written from scratch, photo shoot
Languages	One	Three or more, with SEO for each market
Integrations	A form that sends an email	CRM, management system, reserved area
Accessibility	Planned from the start	To be retrofitted on an existing site
Technical SEO	New site, few pages	Large site, lots of content
Migration	No previous site	Hundreds of URLs with visits from Google

How much does it cost to maintain a website every year?

The build quote is a one-off expense. But the site keeps costing money after launch, and this part needs budgeting from the start.

Hosting. This is where the site lives. Options range from cheap shared hosting to managed servers or cloud platforms, which cost more but handle traffic better and are faster. For a company site with few visits, little is needed; for an e-commerce site or one with lots of requests, it’s worth spending a bit more.

Domain. The site’s address, renewed every year. It costs little, but it must be registered to the company, not the supplier: if you change agency one day, the domain has to stay yours.

Maintenance. Updates to the system and components, backups, security and performance checks, small fixes. On WordPress, updates are frequent and skipping them exposes the site to risk. Maintenance is usually paid as an annual or monthly fee, or by the hour.

Licences. The WordPress software is free and open-source, but professional themes and plugins often come with an annual subscription. Depending on the case, you may also need a cookie banner and consent tool, paid fonts, transactional email services, or subscription e-commerce platforms.

Improvements. New pages, tests on the pages that lose the most people, content for SEO. They aren’t compulsory, but a site left untouched for three years loses ground. Our article on UX marketing explains how to work on pages so that visitors actually do something.

An example, made up for illustration: a 9,000-euro company website, with hosting and maintenance at 1,200 euros a year and 300 euros of licences, costs 15,000 euros over four years. A 3,000-euro site with no maintenance, which has to be rebuilt after two years because nobody updated it, can cost more over the same period. It always pays to think about the cost over four or five years, not just the first payment.

How do you read and compare two website quotes?

Two quotes can only be compared if they describe the same work. The total price on its own tells you nothing. When a company forwards us the quotes it has already received, we always do the same exercise: we put the items side by side.

What to check	Question to ask yourself	Warning sign
Separate items	Does the quote say what you pay for each part?	A single “complete website” figure
Copy	Who writes it, and based on which searches?	Copy not mentioned
Page templates	How many templates and how many pages are included?	“Unlimited pages” with no detail
SEO	What does it cover: structure, titles, structured data, speed?	“SEO included” with no description
Measurement	Conversions tracked and a compliant cookie banner?	No reference to data
Accessibility	Does the site meet WCAG 2.1 level AA?	Accessibility not mentioned, or an “accessibility plugin” as the only solution
Migration	Mapping of old URLs and redirects?	Missing, if you already have a site with visits
Ownership	Do the domain, accounts and code remain yours?	Accounts kept by the supplier
After launch	What does maintenance cost and what does it cover?	No annual cost given
Revisions and timing	How many revisions, and a schedule with milestones?	Neither one nor the other

An example comparison

Let’s go back to the two quotes from the beginning, with numbers made up for illustration. The first, for 1,800 euros, includes a ready-made design template adapted to the company’s colours, five pages, copy supplied by the client, no migration and no reference to SEO or measurement. The second, for 14,000 euros, includes user journey design, six page templates, copy written for twenty-five pages, two languages, connection of the form to the CRM, mapping of 180 old URLs with redirects, accessibility and tracked conversions.

Side by side, they’re no longer “cheap” and “expensive”. They’re two different projects. The right question becomes: which of these items does my company really need? If the current site brings in leads from Google, migration isn’t optional. If the salesperson copies enquiries into the CRM by hand, the connection pays for itself quickly. If the company has two people and sells only in Italy, perhaps the second language can wait.

What questions should you ask before signing a quote?

These are the questions we recommend asking any supplier, us included. The answers say much more than the price.

1. What needs to happen on the site? A good supplier asks you this before talking about design: quote requests, bookings, enquiries from dealers.
2. What will you build it on, and why? WordPress, a builder, custom code: each makes sense in different cases. Ask them to explain the choice based on who will update the site.
3. Who writes the copy, and when? If it’s down to you, ask when it’s needed and in what format.
4. What happens to the pages on the old site? Ask how they handle URLs and redirects, and who checks Search Console after launch.
5. Is the site accessible? Ask which standard they follow and how they check it.
6. Who owns the domain, hosting, accounts and code? They must stay with the company, with admin credentials.
7. How much does it cost every year after launch? Hosting, maintenance, licences: everything in writing.
8. How many revisions are included, and how much do extra ones cost?
9. What are the milestones, and what do you need from us to meet them?
10. Can I see a site you’ve built and talk to the people who use it?

When is it worth spending less, and when isn’t it?

Spending little makes sense when the site plays a small role: a local business that works through word of mouth, a newly founded company that just needs to exist online, a project to test before investing. In these cases a builder or a freelancer with a ready-made template is enough, and the budget saved goes further elsewhere.

It’s worth investing more when the site is the channel through which sales leads arrive, when advertising campaigns send paid traffic to it, when there are several markets or when the site needs to talk to other software. There, a slow or confusing site loses more every month than was saved at the start.

There’s also a case where the right advice is not to rebuild the site at all: when the current one works and delivers results. Sometimes two new pages and a bit of work on speed are enough.

Mistakes to avoid

Asking “how much does it cost” without saying what you need. Without goals, number of templates, languages and integrations, any figure is a guess. Write half a page on what the site needs to do and who will update it.

Comparing only the total. Two quotes with different items can’t be compared. Put them in a table, item by item.

Forgetting the annual costs. Hosting, maintenance and licences go into the budget from day one. Think about the cost over four or five years.

Leaving the domain and accounts with the supplier. If you change one day, you must be able to take everything with you without asking permission.

Rebuilding the site without a migration plan. If the old site gets visits from Google, you lose them without redirects.

Putting off the copy. It’s the most common cause of delay. Decide straight away who writes it and when.

Treating accessibility as an extra. Planned from the start it costs little; retrofitted later it costs much more.

Checklist before asking for a quote

• What needs to happen on the site (leads, bookings, sales) and how you’ll measure it.
• A list of the types of page you need and, if there is one, the current site to be moved.
• Languages and markets.
• Software the site needs to talk to (CRM, management system, bookings).
• Who writes the copy and supplies the photos.
• Who will update the site after launch.
• An indicative budget for the build and for annual costs.
• The date by which the site must be online, and why.

Want a quote you can compare item by item?

We start with a call to understand what the site needs to do, who will use it and what already exists. Then we send you a quote broken down by item, with the annual costs in writing and what isn’t included, so you can compare it with others. We build sites on WordPress or with custom code, accessible and with tracked conversions: you can see how we work on our Websites and e-commerce page and, if you’re in Piedmont, on our page about website development in Turin.

You can book a call with Federico or write to us via the contact form.

Frequently asked questions

How much does a website cost for a small business?

It depends on what it needs to do. A brochure site with a few pages and copy ready to go sits roughly in the freelancer band, between 1,000 and 5,000 euros. A company website with copy, SEO and forms connected to the CRM usually moves up into the agency band. These are market ranges, not price lists.

How much does website maintenance cost?

It depends on the platform, the size of the site and what the service includes: updates, backups, security checks and small fixes. It’s usually paid as an annual or monthly fee, or by the hour. Always ask what’s included and what’s charged separately.

Freelancer or agency for a company website: which is better?

A freelancer usually costs less and is fine for simple sites with content ready to go. An agency brings together several skills, such as copy, SEO, development and measurement, and ensures continuity if one person isn’t available. The choice depends on how much the site matters to sales.

Does a website have to comply with the European Accessibility Act?

From 28 June 2025 the obligation applies to many services sold online to consumers, such as e-commerce. Microenterprises providing services are exempt. Even where it isn’t mandatory it pays off: an accessible site is easier for everyone to use, and building it that way from the start costs little extra.

Will I lose my Google rankings if I rebuild my website?

Only if the move is handled badly. All the old URLs need mapping and permanent redirects need setting up, which Google recommends keeping for at least a year. After launch, Search Console is checked so that errors can be fixed.

How long does it take to build a website?

It depends on pages, languages and integrations, and almost always on how quickly copy and photos arrive. A good quote includes a schedule with milestones and says what’s needed from you to meet it.