What Does a Website Cost?
What drives the price of a website in Ontario, and how I scope and quote a project.
Pricing a website is a lot like pricing a renovation. The cost depends on how much you're changing, how custom the work is, and how much of it you can handle yourself.
Most of the price comes down to a handful of decisions, and you control several of them.
I'm not going to put a price list here, because a number without a scope attached is misleading. What I can do is explain what moves the price, so that when you start collecting quotes you know what you're comparing.
What Drives the Cost
These account for almost all of the difference between a small quote and a large one.
How many pages, and how different they are
Twenty pages that share three templates cost far less than eight pages that each need their own layout. The number of distinct designs matters more than the raw page count.
Custom design versus a template
Starting from a purchased theme is cheaper up front. Designing from scratch costs more and produces something that looks like your business rather than like three thousand other businesses. If you're weighing this because you've outgrown Wix or Squarespace, the arithmetic is a little different and that page covers it.
Functionality beyond pages
A contact form is trivial. Online bookings, user accounts, member-only content, applications with approval steps, or a searchable directory are each a piece of software in their own right, with the development time to match.
Ecommerce
Selling online adds payment processing, product data, inventory, tax and shipping rules, order management, and a checkout that has to be tested properly. It's usually the largest single cost multiplier.
Integrations
Anything that has to connect to another system, like a CRM, an accounting package, a booking platform, or an email service, adds work you won't see on the finished site but that still takes time to build.
Content
If you supply finished text and images, that's time I don't bill for. If someone has to write your service pages and source photography, that's a cost too, and it belongs in the quote rather than appearing as a surprise later.
Comparing Quotes Properly
I'm not saying spend more for its own sake. Plenty of businesses are well served by a modest build. Just make sure you know what is and isn't included, so you're comparing like with like.
A very low quote usually means a narrower scope than you're picturing: a template rather than a custom design, SEO and performance work left out, or content treated as your responsibility. None of those are automatically dealbreakers, and for some businesses they're exactly the right trade-off. You just want to know which one you're buying before you sign.
The thing to watch for is the work that's cheap to do during a build and expensive to add afterwards.
What's Included in Every Site I Build
These come with every build, and they're the parts most often left out of a cheap quote.
- Mobile-first responsive design, tested on phones of different sizes rather than assumed to work
- Technical SEO groundwork: page titles, meta descriptions, structured data, clean URLs, XML sitemap
- Performance work so pages load fast on a phone, not just on your office wifi
- Accessible markup, readable contrast, and working keyboard navigation
- A contact form with spam protection that reliably reaches your inbox
- Analytics set up so you can see what's happening after launch
- A walkthrough at handover so you know how to use what you paid for
How I Scope and Quote a Project
The price is agreed in writing before any of the build starts.
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A conversation
We talk about what your business does, who you're trying to reach, what isn't working now, and roughly what you're able to spend.
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A written scope
I write down what the project includes and, just as importantly, what it doesn't. If something on your wish list isn't worth the money, I'll say so at this stage.
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A fixed quote
One number for the agreed scope, with the payment schedule and any ongoing costs written out. If the scope changes later, we agree on the change and its cost before I build it.
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Build and launch
Design, development, your review, revisions, testing, and launch. You deal with me throughout, not with an account manager relaying messages.
If money is tight, don't buy a cheaper version of everything. Build less, and build it properly.
Getting the Most for Your Budget
In practice that means a smaller site done well, which will earn more than a big one that's slow and hard to find. Here's how I'd spend a tight budget.
- Start with the pages that make you money.
- Write your own content if you can, since nobody knows your business better and it saves money.
- Skip the features you can't yet prove anyone wants.
- Then add to it once the site is bringing in work, using money the site earned.
Common Questions About Cost
Ask About Your ProjectWhy won't you just put prices on the page?
Because the range is too wide to be useful. A five-page site for a contractor and a membership platform with payment processing are both "a website", and one figure would either scare off the first client or badly underquote the second. Once I understand your project, I'll give you a fixed quote.
Do you charge hourly or a fixed price?
Fixed price for defined projects. Once we've agreed on the scope, you get a number, and that number is what you pay. Hourly billing puts the risk on you and rewards me for working slowly, which is backwards. For ongoing work after launch, or open-ended discovery on a complex system, hourly makes more sense, and I'll say so up front.
What is the cheapest way to get a website?
A DIY builder like Squarespace or Wix. If your budget is tight and you need a simple presence online, that's a reasonable starting point, and I'll tell you so rather than sell you something you don't need. Hiring a developer makes sense when you need custom features, pages that load fast, control over your own code, or a site that has to compete in local search against businesses spending money on theirs.
Why do quotes for the same project vary so much?
Usually because the projects aren't the same. One quote might be a template with your logo dropped in; another might include content strategy, custom design, custom development, testing, and SEO groundwork. When you compare quotes, compare what's inside them: who writes the content, who does the design, whether SEO is included or an upsell, what happens after launch, and who owns the code at the end.
Are there ongoing costs after the site launches?
Yes, and they're worth asking about up front with anyone you hire. At minimum you need hosting and a domain name, which are usually modest annual costs. Beyond that, plan for occasional updates and security patching. I'll lay out the ongoing costs before you commit, so there are no surprises at the first renewal.
Do you require a deposit?
Yes. Projects are typically split across a deposit to start, one or more milestone payments, and a final payment at launch. The exact split depends on the size of the project and we agree on it before any work begins.