How Much Does a Website Really Cost? A Breakdown for Non-Developers (and the Devs Who Have to Explain It to Them)

If you've ever built a site for a client, a friend, or your own side project, you've had this conversation: "So... how much would a website cost?" And you've answered with "it depends" — which is true, but useless without context. So here's the breakdown I wish I could just link people to instead of explaining from scratch every time. First: "Website" Is Not One Thing If you've ever built a site for a client, a friend, or your own side project, you've had this conversation: "So... how much would a website cost?" And you've answered with "it depends" — which is true, but useless without context. So here's the breakdown I wish I could just link people to instead of explaining from scratch every time. A landing page and a custom marketplace platform are both "websites" the same way a bicycle and a truck are both "vehicles." Different build process, different skillset, different price tag. Once you separate by type, the numbers actually make sense: Type Typical Range Landing Page / One-Pager $500 – $3,000 Multi-Page Business Site $1,500 – $8,000 E-Commerce Store $2,000 – $20,000+ Custom Web App / Platform $10,000 – $100,000+ The Build-Method Question (This Is the Part Devs Actually Care About) No-code builders (Wix, Squarespace): $15–$50/month. Fast to ship, fine for a hypothesis test. The tradeoff is architectural debt you don't see until you hit it — custom logic, advanced SEO control, and scaling all get harder or impossible without a full platform switch. WordPress / CMS: $50–$500/year for platform + plugins, plus dev time. Flexible, huge plugin ecosystem, no vendor lock-in — but every convenience plugin is also a maintenance and security surface you now own. Custom-coded: starts around $1,000, no real ceiling. This is the only route when requirements exceed what a template or plugin can do — unusual functionality, real performance constraints, or a design that isn't achievable off-the-shelf. The trap: a $20/month builder that gets outgrown in 18 months and rebuilt