Writer: Laura Bernheim
Editor: Lillian Castro
Reviewer: Cristian Lopez
Early in their entrepreneurial journey, aspiring site owners may wonder: How much does it cost to build a website? Web designers and developers get paid a lot, and some agencies won’t even listen to your website ideas unless the project is worth thousands of dollars.
While it might save you a few headaches to outsource your website to someone else, don’t break your budget by hiring a designer or developer for something you can actually do on your own.
That’s right, building your own website isn’t a scary, insurmountable task. Many web hosting plans offer very intuitive programs that help you create the website you’ve always wanted. Even better, they are extremely affordable. Read on to learn how you can get a top-quality website for as little as $2 to $10 per month, as well as a list of the companies that provide the tools that will help you.
Average Cost of Building a Website
Without a trusted hosting company and site builder in your corner, the cost of making a website can soar. Freelance designers typically charge $50 to $100 an hour to make a custom website. Adding the specific features you need, such as a shopping cart or PayPal, can multiply your costs dramatically. However, we’ve found the do-it-yourself website builders many premier web hosts offer are more than up for the task of creating a stunning site for a fraction of the cost.
Low-Cost Website Builder Plans
Some of our favorite hosts created their own site builder tools to help you make exactly the site you want for between $2 and $10 per month — without any coding or programming expertise.
These three hosts offer powerful and intuitive options to help you cook up your own website from scratch. What’s more, they give you at least 30 days to try out their services and get your money back. InMotion’s BoldGrid extends that money-back guarantee to 90 days.
Hostinger.com
Monthly Starting Price $2.69
- Drag-and-drop design from custom tools
- FREE access to hundreds of specialized templates
- Built-in eCommerce and payment processing
- Easily switch among widescreen, desktop, tablet, and mobile previews
- Support for 31 languages and 99.9% uptime
- Get started on Hostinger now.
Laura Bernheim
| Money Back Guarantee | Disk Space | Domain Name | Setup Time |
|---|---|---|---|
| 30 days | 25 GB SSD - 100 GB NVMe SSD | FREE (1 year) | 3 minutes |
Wix.com
Monthly Starting Price $17.00
- No coding skills needed with drag-and-drop builder
- 100s of templates with niche-specific designs
- Add features via the App Market and Wix Events
- Easily create ecommerce functionality easily
- Great way to build small sites on a budget
- Get started on Wix now.
Alexandra Anderson
| Money Back Guarantee | Disk Space | Domain Name | Setup Time |
|---|---|---|---|
| 14-day FREE trial | 2 GB - Unlimited | FREE (1 year) | 4 minutes |
NetworkSolutions.com
Monthly Starting Price $1.99
- 40% off all annual Website Builder plans with code BUILD40
- Get online in minutes with powerful AI tools
- Start with a free domain and professional email
- Integrated email marketing and social scheduling
- Accessible online store capabilities & powerful design tools
- Get started on Network Solutions.
PJ Fancher
| Money Back Guarantee | Disk Space | Domain Name | Setup Time |
|---|---|---|---|
| N/A | Unlimited | FREE (1 year) | 7 minutes |
Cheap Hosting with Free Website Builders
If your budget is extremely tight, these cheap hosts offer great value with their free domain, advertising credits, and site builder for $2 to $3 per month.
Your design options might be a touch more limited with these builders, but most of these plans include eCommerce functionality. By spending so little on hosting, you can maximize your profits.
Hostinger.com
Monthly Starting Price $2.69
- Unlimited everything, from storage to databases
- FREE site builder & WP performance upgrades
- FREE daily or weekly backups
- Custom control panel and auto-installation scripts
- SSH access & unlimited FREE SSL certificates
- Get started on Hostinger now.
Laura Bernheim
| Money Back Guarantee | Disk Space | Domain Name | Setup Time |
|---|---|---|---|
| 30 days | 25 GB SSD - 100 GB NVMe | FREE (1 year) | 3 minutes |
ScalaHosting.com
Monthly Starting Price $2.51
- 1-click install for WordPress, Drupal and 400 others
- Unlimited email accounts, databases & bandwidth
- 24/7 tech support for beginners and pros alike
- 12-month or 36-month plan at $2.51 /month
- Anytime unconditional money-back guarantee
- Get started on ScalaHosting now.
Laura Bernheim
| Money Back Guarantee | Disk Space | Domain Name | Setup Time |
|---|---|---|---|
| 30 days | 10 GB SSD - 50 GB SSD | FREE (1 year) | 6 minutes |
DreamHost.com
Monthly Starting Price $2.59
- Automated malware scans
- Unlimited domain hosting
- Unlimited email accounts with POP/IMAP/SMTP
- FREE eCommerce store tools and PCI compliance
- Streamlined proprietary control panel
- Get started on DreamHost now.
Laura Bernheim
| Money Back Guarantee | Disk Space | Domain Name | Setup Time |
|---|---|---|---|
| 97 days | Unlimited | FREE (1 year) | 4 minutes |
How Much Does It Cost to Build an Ecommerce Website?
Future ecommerce site owners have specific needs. They’re looking for inventory management, 1-click Magento installs, and help with marketing their products. Our top host for ecommerce store building offers all that and more — for as little as $3 a month.
This host sometimes offers free advertising credits, which will get your brand noticed and refine the traffic to your site by sending interested customers to your online store.
Cloudways.com
Monthly Starting Price $11.00
- Managed cloud hosting for Magento developers
- FREE Magento website migration and staging areas
- Scale server resources up and down as needed
- Regular security patches and automated backups
- Powered by Digital Ocean, Vultr, Google Cloud, AWS, & Linode
- Get started on Cloudways now.
Alexandra Anderson
| Money Back Guarantee | Disk Space | Domain Name | Setup Time |
|---|---|---|---|
| 3-day FREE trial | 20 GB - 3.84 TB | New or Transfer | 8 minutes |
How Much Does It Cost to Build a Professional Website?
Maybe you’re worried a website that only costs you a few dollars to build and host can’t possibly have a professional look and feel to it. That’s where you’re wrong — The cost to build a sharp and powerful business website can still boil down to $5 to $10 a month.
The Bold Grid platform from InMotion is the only site builder that operates on WordPress, which is the Internet’s most-used content management system.
InMotionHosting.com
Monthly Starting Price $3.29
- Fast and secure hosting for WordPress and WooCommerce stores
- FREE domain, backups, SSDs, and SSL certificate
- Server-level caching and scalable storage
- 400+ free and paid extensions to grow your store
- SPAM Safe™ Email with IMAP support
- Get started on InMotion now.
PJ Fancher
| Money Back Guarantee | Disk Space | Domain Name | Setup Time |
|---|---|---|---|
| 90 days | 100 GB SSD - Unlimited SSD | FREE (1 year) | 5 minutes |
What About the Cost of Building a Website for a Small Business?
If you’re a small- to medium-sized business owner, surely you’re thinking, ‘How much would it cost to build a website for a business with both beautiful designs and a startup budget in mind?’
Fret not. The cost of building a website for a small business with goals for growth is hard to beat with a host like HostGator. The company’s plans include the developed-in-house Gator site builder, unlimited storage and bandwidth, as well as around-the-clock support.
HostGator.com
Monthly Starting Price $2.29
- Host up to unlimited websites on a single plan
- FREE SSL certificate included on all plans
- Unlimited bandwidth & email addresses
- 1-click WordPress installs & FREE blog tools
- Get 77% OFF by buying 36 months upfront
- Get started on HostGator now.
Ryan Frankel
| Money Back Guarantee | Disk Space | Domain Name | Setup Time |
|---|---|---|---|
| 30 days | 10 GB SSD - 40 GB SSD | FREE (1 year) | 4 minutes |
How Much Does It Cost to Build a Good Website?
As our options above show you, a good website doesn’t have to break the bank. Hosting providers and website builders, however, aren’t a one-size-fits-all decision — think about the kind of website you want and the amount of money you’re willing to spend.
You can put together a basic website for as little as $2 or $3 per month, but slightly more established ecommerce brands or small businesses might need to invest a little more to get the performance and added features. For those folks, you should expect to spend between $5 and $10 each month.
The Cost to Build and Maintain a Website is Offset By a Great Host
Don’t let the idea of building your own website scare you into hiring an expensive outside developer or designer. Take ownership of your online presence by creating something completely on your own — our favorite website builder hosts give you all the user-friendly tools that will show you the way.
HostingAdvice.com is a free online resource that offers valuable content and comparison services to users. To keep this resource 100% free, we receive compensation from many of the offers listed on the site. Along with key review factors, this compensation may impact how and where products appear across the site (including, for example, the order in which they appear). HostingAdvice.com does not include the entire universe of available offers. Editorial opinions expressed on the site are strictly our own and are not provided, endorsed, or approved by advertisers.
Our site is committed to publishing independent, accurate content guided by strict editorial guidelines. Before articles and reviews are published on our site, they undergo a thorough review process performed by a team of independent editors and subject-matter experts to ensure the content’s accuracy, timeliness, and impartiality. Our editorial team is separate and independent of our site’s advertisers, and the opinions they express on our site are their own. To read more about our team members and their editorial backgrounds, please visit our site’s About page.
