How much does a website cost in the US?

A business website with us starts from $499, an online store from $799 and a mobile app from $1,299. Each of those includes your domain and hosting for the first year, and from the second year renewal is $160 a year. What you actually pay depends on what your project needs, and you get a written quote that spells it out before any work starts.

That is the short answer. The rest of this guide explains what sits inside each package, what pushes any website project up or down in price, what keeps costing money after launch, and a few US rules worth knowing before you sign off on a contact form.

Our three US packages

Whichever you choose, you own the website, the domain and the content, and you get full admin access. You can see the full list on our US pricing page, and each service has its own page: website design, e-commerce websites and mobile app development. Not sure which of the three fits? Our guide to choosing a website, online store or app walks through it.

What moves the price up or down

A starting price covers a sensible, well-built version of each package. Your quote grows or shrinks with the size of the job. These are the things that make the biggest difference with any designer, not just with us.

How many pages you need

A short site for a plumber and a large site for a law firm with a page per practice area are different projects. Every extra page needs a layout, words, images and a check on any screen. Make a list of the pages you want before you ask for quotes, so each designer prices the same thing.

Whether you sell online, and how much

An online store takes more setup than a brochure site: products, prices, photos, shipping options, taxes and a checkout you can rely on. A handful of products is a quick job. A large catalog, each item with sizes or colors, takes real time to load and organize, so tell us roughly how many you plan to sell.

Features beyond the basics

Online bookings, client portals, member areas, quote calculators and links to the software you already use all add work. If your business runs on repeat tasks, a custom tool may save you hours; our web app development page explains what that involves.

Words and photos

Content is the part people forget to budget for. If you already have clear text, a logo and good photos, the project moves faster. If you need words written, product shots taken or a logo designed first, that is extra time, and branding is quoted separately. Our checklist of what to prepare before a website project helps you gather it all.

An app as well as a website

An app is its own project, built and published for Android and iPhone. It can share orders, bookings and accounts with your website, but it is priced on its own.

What you pay after the first year

Your first year of domain and hosting is part of the website price. From the second year on, renewal is $160 a year, so you can plan for it from day one.

Some costs are optional and depend on your plans:

• Care and updates. If you would rather we handled monthly updates, backups and small changes, a website care plan is quoted for your site.
• Being found on Google. Every business website is set up to be found on Google. Ongoing SEO services are priced for each project.
• Marketing and branding. These are also priced for each project, so you only pay for what you choose.
• Growth. You can add an online store or an app later, when the business is ready for it.

How payment works

You pay by card or PayPal, whichever suits you. Before anything starts, you get a written quote for your project, and it sets out the payment terms, so you know the terms up front. We work as a remote team over video calls, email and WhatsApp, at meeting times agreed to suit your working day, and you watch progress on a private link as the site comes together.

Picking a domain: .com or .us

Your first year of domain registration is included, so the question is which ending to choose. You can choose a .com, or .us, the national country code ending, which has its own registry rules.

A .us address comes with conditions. According to the registry, it is open to people and organizations that are citizens of the country or licensed there, including governments at every level. Businesses from abroad can register one too, but only if they have a genuine interest or presence in the United States. The registry also says proxy or privatized registrations are not allowed, so the owner details on a .us name cannot be hidden behind a privacy service. Whichever ending you choose, the domain is registered to you.

Privacy and accessibility rules to keep in mind

A website with a contact form collects personal information, even if it is only names, email addresses and phone numbers. US privacy rules depend on your industry and your state, so this section points to what official sources say rather than giving legal advice.

Handling what your form collects

The Federal Trade Commission publishes a guide called Protecting Personal Information: A Guide for Business. Its plan comes down to a short list: know what personal information you hold, keep only what the business needs, protect what you keep, get rid of what you no longer need properly, and plan how you would respond to a security incident. For a contact form, that usually means asking only for the details you will actually use.

Some states have their own laws. California's Attorney General explains that the California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018 lets people control more of what businesses collect about them. It reaches for-profit companies trading in California that meet at least one condition. One of them is buying, selling or sharing personal information about 100,000 or more households or residents of the state. The Attorney General's page lists the other tests, and notes that the law generally does not apply to nonprofits or government agencies.

Accessibility and the ADA

The Department of Justice published guidance on web accessibility and the ADA in 2022. It says the Americans with Disabilities Act applies to businesses that are open to the public, as well as to state and local governments. The Department does not have a regulation with detailed technical standards for business websites, but it names two existing technical standards as helpful: the Section 508 Standards used for federal websites, and the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG). The guidance names inaccessible forms as one common barrier, which matters for any site that relies on inquiries. Raise accessibility when you ask for a quote, so it is part of the written scope from the start.