In 2026, a professional website redesign typically costs between $10,000 and $150,000, with most small- to midsize business projects landing between $30,000 and $50,000, though a basic template refresh can start near $3,000 and an enterprise rebuild can exceed $250,000. How much does a website cost really depends on scope, but that range holds true across most industries we work with at Fratzke.
The number that applies to your business comes down to page count, custom design versus template, functionality, and who builds it, all of which we break down below with real dollar figures, not vague ranges.
Quick-Answer Price Ranges by Project Type
Here's how much it costs to build a website or redesign one, broken down by the project types we see most often.
- DIY builder (Wix, Squarespace): $0 to $500 plus a monthly subscription. Best for solo founders testing an idea before committing budget.
- Template plus freelancer: $2,000 to $10,000. Best for small businesses on a tight budget who still want a professional look.
- Custom small-business site or redesign: $10,000 to $50,000. Best for most SMBs that want a real result, not a placeholder.
- Custom e-commerce: $25,000 to $100,000 or more. Best for online stores with complex catalogs, inventory sync, or custom checkout flows.
- Enterprise rebuild: $75,000 to $250,000 or more. Best for large organizations with multiple integrations, regional sites, or strict compliance needs.
What Drives the Cost of a Website Redesign
Website design agency cost and DIY cost both come down to the same set of variables. Understanding them before you request a quote is what separates a business that budgets accurately from one that gets blindsided by a change order three weeks into the project.
In our work scoping redesigns for mid-market and enterprise clients, the projects that stay on budget are almost always the ones where these factors get priced out individually during discovery, rather than bundled into a single lump-sum number nobody can explain later.
Scope and Number of Pages
More pages mean more design decisions, more content, and more development hours. A five-page brochure site costs meaningfully less than a fifty-page site with service-specific landing pages, a blog, and a team directory, often in the range of $150 to $500 per unique page template.
For example, a blog with one repeatable layout for 40 posts costs far less than 40 pages with distinct designs. Don't cut pages purely to save money if those pages are the ones ranking for the keywords bringing in traffic today.
Custom vs Template Design
This is one of the biggest cost drivers in the entire project. A template or theme runs $2,000 to $10,000 and gets you live faster, but it limits customization and looks similar to competitors using the same theme.
Custom design runs $10,000 to $100,000 or more, depending on complexity, but it fits your brand precisely, scales as you grow, and differentiates you in a crowded category.
For a company where the website is a primary sales tool, custom design tends to pay for itself. For an early-stage business still validating its offer, a template is often the smarter starting point.
Content, Copywriting, and Media
Content is the most underestimated line item in a redesign and the most common cause of delays. Professional copywriting runs roughly $100 to $300 per page, photography ranges from $500 to $3,000 for a shoot, and video production runs $1,500 to $10,000 or more per video.
Writing your own copy saves money upfront, but it's also the single biggest reason redesign timelines slip past their launch date. If your team doesn't have bandwidth to write 20 pages of new copy in three weeks, budget for a writer instead of hoping the schedule holds.
Functionality and Integrations
Custom features like booking systems, cost calculators, gated portals, e-commerce checkout, CRM or ERP integrations, and AI chatbots each add development, testing, and long-term support work. Simple integrations like a form connected to HubSpot might add $500 to $1,500, while a deep ERP or CRM integration with custom data mapping can add $10,000 or more.
Each feature you add should tie back to a specific business outcome, since functionality is one of the easiest places for a fixed-bid project to become an unbudgeted one. A gated resource library, a client portal with login credentials, or a self-service quoting tool each sound like a single line item on a proposal. However, each of them requires ongoing maintenance and security patching once the site is live, which is a cost that belongs in your annual budget, not just your launch budget.
Content Migration and Replatforming
Migrating content means moving every page, image, and metadata field from your old site into the new one without losing what's already ranking. Replatforming, or moving from one CMS to another, adds even more work, including URL structure changes, and every old URL needs a redirect map to point search engines and visitors to its new home.
Done wrong, this step can erase years of accumulated search rankings overnight. Done right, it typically adds $2,500 to $15,000 depending on site size and platform complexity, and it's not optional if you're changing CMS platforms.
SEO and AI-Search Readiness
Building for search from day one, meaning clean site structure, fast Core Web Vitals scores, and proper schema markup, prevents expensive fixes after launch. In 2026, that list has grown to include AI-search readiness, including answer-first content structure, FAQ schema, and clean, crawlable HTML that AI models can read and cite.
Fratzke's own research on digital marketing strategy found that visitors arriving from AI search convert at a meaningfully higher rate than standard organic traffic, which makes this a revenue factor, not just a technical checkbox.
Building AEO and GEO readiness into a redesign from the start typically adds $2,000 to $8,000, far less than retrofitting it into a site later. For a deeper look at how these two disciplines work together, see our guide to answer engine optimization.
Accessibility and Compliance
Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) compliance, meaning your site works with screen readers, keyboard navigation, and sufficient color contrast, adds design and QA work but is increasingly a legal requirement, not a nice-to-have. Federal website accessibility lawsuits climbed to more than 3,100 filings in 2025, up over a quarter from the year before, and small and mid-sized businesses now make up the majority of defendants, not just large corporations.
Building WCAG 2.1 AA compliance into a redesign typically adds 10 to 20% to the design and development cost. Retrofitting it after a lawsuit or demand letter costs far more.
Who Builds It
DIY, freelancer, agency, and in-house are the four paths, and each one changes your total cost by a wide margin. The next section breaks down exactly how much each option costs and who it fits best.
In 2026, a professional website redesign typically costs between $10,000 and $150,000, with most small- to midsize business projects landing between $30,000 and $50,000, though a basic template refresh can start near $3,000 and an enterprise rebuild can exceed $250,000. How much does a website cost really depends on scope, but that range holds true across most industries we work with at Fratzke.
The number that applies to your business comes down to page count, custom design versus template, functionality, and who builds it, all of which we break down below with real dollar figures, not vague ranges.
Quick-Answer Price Ranges by Project Type
Here's how much it costs to build a website or redesign one, broken down by the project types we see most often.
- DIY builder (Wix, Squarespace): $0 to $500 plus a monthly subscription. Best for solo founders testing an idea before committing budget.
- Template plus freelancer: $2,000 to $10,000. Best for small businesses on a tight budget who still want a professional look.
- Custom small-business site or redesign: $10,000 to $50,000. Best for most SMBs that want a real result, not a placeholder.
- Custom e-commerce: $25,000 to $100,000 or more. Best for online stores with complex catalogs, inventory sync, or custom checkout flows.
- Enterprise rebuild: $75,000 to $250,000 or more. Best for large organizations with multiple integrations, regional sites, or strict compliance needs.
What Drives the Cost of a Website Redesign
Website design agency cost and DIY cost both come down to the same set of variables. Understanding them before you request a quote is what separates a business that budgets accurately from one that gets blindsided by a change order three weeks into the project.
In our work scoping redesigns for mid-market and enterprise clients, the projects that stay on budget are almost always the ones where these factors get priced out individually during discovery, rather than bundled into a single lump-sum number nobody can explain later.
Scope and Number of Pages
More pages mean more design decisions, more content, and more development hours. A five-page brochure site costs meaningfully less than a fifty-page site with service-specific landing pages, a blog, and a team directory, often in the range of $150 to $500 per unique page template.
For example, a blog with one repeatable layout for 40 posts costs far less than 40 pages with distinct designs. Don't cut pages purely to save money if those pages are the ones ranking for the keywords bringing in traffic today.
Custom vs Template Design
This is one of the biggest cost drivers in the entire project. A template or theme runs $2,000 to $10,000 and gets you live faster, but it limits customization and looks similar to competitors using the same theme.
Custom design runs $10,000 to $100,000 or more, depending on complexity, but it fits your brand precisely, scales as you grow, and differentiates you in a crowded category.
For a company where the website is a primary sales tool, custom design tends to pay for itself. For an early-stage business still validating its offer, a template is often the smarter starting point.
Content, Copywriting, and Media
Content is the most underestimated line item in a redesign and the most common cause of delays. Professional copywriting runs roughly $100 to $300 per page, photography ranges from $500 to $3,000 for a shoot, and video production runs $1,500 to $10,000 or more per video.
Writing your own copy saves money upfront, but it's also the single biggest reason redesign timelines slip past their launch date. If your team doesn't have bandwidth to write 20 pages of new copy in three weeks, budget for a writer instead of hoping the schedule holds.
Functionality and Integrations
Custom features like booking systems, cost calculators, gated portals, e-commerce checkout, CRM or ERP integrations, and AI chatbots each add development, testing, and long-term support work. Simple integrations like a form connected to HubSpot might add $500 to $1,500, while a deep ERP or CRM integration with custom data mapping can add $10,000 or more.
Each feature you add should tie back to a specific business outcome, since functionality is one of the easiest places for a fixed-bid project to become an unbudgeted one. A gated resource library, a client portal with login credentials, or a self-service quoting tool each sound like a single line item on a proposal. However, each of them requires ongoing maintenance and security patching once the site is live, which is a cost that belongs in your annual budget, not just your launch budget.
Content Migration and Replatforming
Migrating content means moving every page, image, and metadata field from your old site into the new one without losing what's already ranking. Replatforming, or moving from one CMS to another, adds even more work, including URL structure changes, and every old URL needs a redirect map to point search engines and visitors to its new home.
Done wrong, this step can erase years of accumulated search rankings overnight. Done right, it typically adds $2,500 to $15,000 depending on site size and platform complexity, and it's not optional if you're changing CMS platforms.
SEO and AI-Search Readiness
Building for search from day one, meaning clean site structure, fast Core Web Vitals scores, and proper schema markup, prevents expensive fixes after launch. In 2026, that list has grown to include AI-search readiness, including answer-first content structure, FAQ schema, and clean, crawlable HTML that AI models can read and cite.
Fratzke's own research on digital marketing strategy found that visitors arriving from AI search convert at a meaningfully higher rate than standard organic traffic, which makes this a revenue factor, not just a technical checkbox.
Building AEO and GEO readiness into a redesign from the start typically adds $2,000 to $8,000, far less than retrofitting it into a site later. For a deeper look at how these two disciplines work together, see our guide to answer engine optimization.
Accessibility and Compliance
Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) compliance, meaning your site works with screen readers, keyboard navigation, and sufficient color contrast, adds design and QA work but is increasingly a legal requirement, not a nice-to-have. Federal website accessibility lawsuits climbed to more than 3,100 filings in 2025, up over a quarter from the year before, and small and mid-sized businesses now make up the majority of defendants, not just large corporations.
Building WCAG 2.1 AA compliance into a redesign typically adds 10 to 20% to the design and development cost. Retrofitting it after a lawsuit or demand letter costs far more.
Who Builds It
DIY, freelancer, agency, and in-house are the four paths, and each one changes your total cost by a wide margin. The next section breaks down exactly how much each option costs and who it fits best.
Website Design Agency Cost vs Freelancer vs DIY
Website design agency cost isn't automatically the right answer, and it isn't automatically the wrong one either. The right choice depends on project complexity, timeline, and how much ongoing support you'll need after launch.
- DIY builder: $0 to $500 plus subscription. Best for the earliest stage businesses with the tightest budgets and simplest needs.
- Freelancer: $50 to $150 per hour, or $2,000 to $15,000 per project. Best for small, well-defined projects with a clear scope and no complex integrations.
- Agency: $15,000 to $150,000 or more per project. Best for growth-critical or complex builds that need design, development, strategy, and QA running in parallel.
- In-house hire: $70,000 to $120,000 or more per year in salary. Best for organizations that need constant, ongoing website work rather than a single project.
Be honest with yourself about scope before choosing. A freelancer building a ten-page site with a locked scope and no custom integrations can deliver excellent results at a fraction of agency cost.
But a project with multiple stakeholders, custom functionality, and a hard launch deadline usually benefits from an agency's project management and QA layer. That's because the cost of a missed deadline or a broken integration tends to outweigh the hourly rate difference.
For organizations running constant updates across a large site, the math changes. An in-house hire often makes more financial sense than paying agency rates for every minor change. A hybrid model can work too, where an agency handles the build and an internal team owns ongoing operations.
If you're evaluating whether to bring a redesign in-house or hire out, our guide to B2B website design walks through how to structure that decision.
Ongoing Website Costs After Launch
A website is not done at launch. Budgeting for the build alone and forgetting the recurring costs is one of the most common ways redesign budgets fall short in year two.
- Hosting: $20 to $500+ per month, depending on traffic volume and whether you're on shared, managed, or enterprise-grade infrastructure.
- Domain: $10 to $50 per year.
- SSL certificate: Often included with hosting, or $50 to $200 per year if purchased separately.
- Maintenance and support: $100 to $2,500+ per month, covering plugin updates, bug fixes, and CMS patches.
- Security monitoring: $20 to $200 per month for malware scanning and firewall protection.
- Content updates: Varies widely, from a few hours of internal staff time to a $500 to $2,000 monthly retainer with an agency.
- Ongoing SEO and AI-search maintenance: $1,000 to $10,000+ per month for mid-market and enterprise programs.
A workable rule of thumb is to budget 10 to 20% of your build cost per year for maintenance and improvements. If your redesign costs $40,000, plan on $4,000 to $8,000 annually to keep it secure, fast, and current.
Skipping this line item doesn't make the cost disappear; it just defers it until something breaks, usually at the least convenient moment, like a plugin conflict that takes your site down during a product launch or a missed security patch that turns into a breach notification.
Treat this as protecting the investment you already made, not as an unwelcome surprise. A website is not a one-time purchase the way a piece of office furniture is. It's closer to a vehicle where the sticker price gets you in the door, but fuel, insurance, and maintenance keep it running for years rather than months.
Businesses that build the ongoing line item into their first-year budget rarely feel blindsided by it. The ones that don't are the ones calling their developer in a panic when something breaks two months after launch.
The Cost of Not Redesigning
Every conversation about redesign cost eventually turns into a conversation about the cost of doing nothing, and that comparison usually favors the redesign.
An outdated site quietly erodes trust before a visitor reads a single word of copy. It also costs measurable revenue.
Portent's analysis of over 100 million page views found that e-commerce sites loading in one second convert at more than 1.8 times the rate of sites loading in two seconds, a gap that compounds fast across thousands of monthly visitors. Aging, unpatched platforms carry security risks that grow every month they go unaddressed, and a site built on outdated SEO practices loses visibility in both traditional search and the AI-powered answers now shaping early-stage research.
A brand that no longer matches the business behind it sends the wrong signal to exactly the buyers you're trying to win. None of this means panic. It means the honest comparison is never "redesign versus free." It's "redesign versus the compounding cost of an aging asset."
How to Budget for a Redesign and Calculate ROI
Turning a cost estimate into a decision means thinking about the website as a revenue asset, not a line item to minimize.
Start with the 5 to 10% of revenue rule. Most growing businesses invest that share of annual revenue into their website and digital presence combined.
From there, prioritize the features and pages that drive your specific goal, whether that's lead generation, e-commerce sales, or brand credibility with enterprise buyers, and phase the rest into a later release rather than cramming everything into one launch. Starting with a strategy phase before any design work begins prevents the expensive mid-project pivots that blow up both the budget and the timeline.
This same framework works whether your primary goal is lead generation, e-commerce revenue, or something less directly transactional, such as recruitment or investor confidence. The formula stays the same. Identify the metric your website is meant to move, measure where it stands today, project a reasonable improvement based on comparable redesigns, and calculate the dollar value of that gap.
A CFO evaluating a six-figure enterprise rebuild wants to see this math laid out plainly, not buried in a creative brief. The businesses that get redesign budgets approved quickly are almost always the ones that walk into the conversation with a number, not just a mockup.
What You're Really Paying For
A website's true cost is a function of scope and outcome. You're not buying a set of pages; you're buying a result: leads, sales, credibility, and visibility across both traditional and AI-powered search.
Budget for the outcome your business needs, not the lowest number on a quote. The first step is straightforward. Define your goals and must-have functionality, then get two to three scoped quotes so you're comparing apples to apples instead of guessing based on price alone.
Fratzke works with mid-sized and enterprise marketing teams to scope that outcome accurately before a single design decision gets made. Our website audit services are often the clearest starting point if you're not yet sure what your redesign needs to include.
Frequently Asked Questions About Website Costs
How much does a website cost in 2026?
A website costs between $500 and $250,000 or more in 2026, depending on scope. Most small businesses land between $10,000 and $50,000 for a professional custom site, while DIY builders can launch for under $500 plus a monthly subscription.
How much does it cost to build a website from scratch?
Building a website from scratch typically costs $10,000 to $100,000, depending on page count, custom functionality, and whether you hire a freelancer or an agency. A simple five-page brochure site sits at the low end, while a custom platform with integrations sits at the high end.
How much does a small business website cost?
Small business websites typically cost $10,000 to $50,000 for a custom build, or $2,000 to $10,000 using a template with a freelancer. The right number depends on page count, whether you need copywriting and photography, and how much custom functionality you require.
How much does a website redesign cost?
A website redesign in 2026 costs $10,000 to $150,000 on average, with most small-to-midsize business projects landing between $30,000 and $50,000. Enterprise redesigns with complex integrations and multi-site architecture can exceed $250,000.
How much does an e-commerce website cost?
E-commerce website builds typically cost $25,000 to $100,000 or more, driven by product catalog size, payment integrations, and custom checkout requirements. Simple stores on platforms like Shopify can start lower, while custom platforms with ERP integration run considerably higher.
How much does a website design agency charge?
Website design agencies typically charge $15,000 to $150,000 or more per project, or $100 to $350 per hour, depending on agency size and specialization. Enterprise-focused agencies charge toward the higher end of that range due to the scope and stakes of the work.
Is it cheaper to use a freelancer or an agency?
A freelancer is typically cheaper for small, well-defined projects, running $2,000 to $15,000 per project compared to an agency's $15,000 and up. Agencies cost more but bring project management, QA, and multidisciplinary expertise that reduce risk on complex builds.
How much does it cost to maintain a website per month?
Website maintenance typically costs $100 to $2,500 or more per month, covering hosting, security monitoring, plugin updates, and content changes. A reasonable annual rule of thumb is 10 to 20% of your original build cost.
Why do custom websites cost so much more than templates?
Custom websites cost more because every layout, interaction, and integration is built specifically for your brand rather than reused from a pre-built theme. That investment pays off in scalability, differentiation, and a user experience tailored to your actual audience rather than a generic one.
How long does a website redesign take?
A website redesign typically takes 6 to 12 weeks for a small-to-midsize business site and 3 to 9 months for an enterprise rebuild. Timelines extend most often due to slow content delivery and scope changes requested mid-project.
Should I redesign or rebuild my website?
Redesign when your current platform still meets your technical needs but the design, UX, or content is outdated. Rebuild when your CMS is unsupported, can't scale, or can't integrate with the systems your business now runs on.
Does a website need to be optimized for AI search now?
Yes. AI-powered search platforms are increasingly shaping how buyers research vendors before they ever visit a website directly, and sites built with answer-first content and structured data earn those citations more consistently than sites that retrofit it later.
Fratzke helps mid-sized and enterprise marketing and brand teams close the gap between ambition and execution. With deep experience across top brands and a flexible, human approach, we're built for the realities of in-house marketing.
Many teams have strong plans, solid budgets, and expanding tech stacks, but they're stretched thin. The pressure to perform keeps rising, while time, clarity, and support remain limited. That's where Fratzke comes in. We help teams accelerate brand growth by delivering actionable insights, clear strategies, and consistent results.