In 2026, a custom marketing website for a B2B startup typically costs £1,500 to £3,000 with a freelancer on a five-page brief, £3,000 to £10,000 at a small agency, and well above £10,000 once design, motion and engineering are properly scoped. A template costs $25 to $30 a month in platform fees. At Écrin Digital, coded sites start at 6 000 € excl. VAT (Launch Sprint) and 12 000 € for an immersive site (Signature).
Updated 10 November 2026. By Alexis Chân Gridel, founder of Écrin Digital and member of the Awwwards Young Jury 2026.
Ask five providers for a quote and you will get five answers, from £800 to £40,000 according to The Web People (May 2026). The gap is rarely greed. Providers are pricing different products. This guide is written for founders and marketing leads of funded B2B startups in Europe, the UK, the US and Israel, and explains what each price level buys, what to spend at each funding stage, and when we are the wrong choice.
Price ranges by type of provider
| Provider | Typical price | What you get | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Template or no-code, built by you | $25 to $30 per month in platform fees | A theme you configure yourself; Webflow Premium (with CMS) is $25 per month billed yearly, Framer Pro is $30 | Webflow, May 2026; Framer, 9 Nov 2026 |
| Freelancer | £1,500 to £3,000 for a five-page site (UK); $500 to $10,000+ (US guide) | One person, design and build, limited scope | Whito, July 2026; Fast Digital Marketing citing WebFX, Aug 2026 |
| Small studio or regional agency | £3,000 to £10,000 (UK); agency-built sites average $6,000 to $12,000 (US) | Team, process, revisions | Glide, June 2026; same Fast Digital Marketing page (WebFX survey) |
| Large agency | £10,000 to £50,000+ in the UK; Clutch lists projects from $2,000 up to $100,000 | Account managers, specialists, overheads | Glide, June 2026; Clutch data via Fast Digital Marketing, Aug 2026 |
In continental Europe, La Fabrique du Net data (1,312 budgets, reported September 2026) puts the median custom-coded site at 18 000 €, against a median of 5 000 € for WordPress. Hourly rates tell the same story: Clutch shows US agencies at $100 to $149 an hour, and UK agencies charge £75 to £150 an hour according to The Web People. Most figures above come from commercial guides, not audited surveys, so treat them as orders of magnitude.
What a custom site price actually contains
A serious quote itemises these lines. The shares are indicative, taken from our own projects.
| Line | What it covers | Typical share |
|---|---|---|
| Strategy and scoping | Goals, audience, sitemap, key messages | 10 to 15% |
| Design | Desktop and mobile layouts, design system | 25 to 35% |
| Development | Build, responsive behaviour, performance | 30 to 40% |
| CMS | Back office so your team edits copy, posts and case studies | 5 to 10% |
| Content | Writing, photography, translation (often not included) | Varies |
| Motion and 3D | Page transitions, scroll animation, real-time 3D | Priced separately |
| SEO and performance | Metadata, structured data, redirects, speed targets | 5 to 10% |
| Project management | Calls, reviews, launch | Included in the lines above |
Content is the line most often left out. Whito estimates that copywriting, photography and SEO add 30 to 50% on top of the quoted price.
The 5 factors that move the price
- Custom design or a theme. A theme is configured in days. A design built from your brand and buyers is what stops you looking like your competitors, and it is usually the biggest gap between a £2,000 quote and a £10,000 one.
- Motion and 3D. Careful transitions add days. A real-time 3D scene is a project inside the project, which is why we price it as an option.
- Number of page templates. Layouts matter, not pages. Twenty case studies on one template cost barely more than one.
- CMS and stack. WordPress, a headless CMS such as Sanity, or a no-code tool each carry different build and running costs. Our coded stack (Astro or Next.js with Sanity) costs a little more to build and removes platform lock-in.
- Languages and integrations. On our projects a second language adds roughly 15 to 25% before professional translation. CRM, analytics and booking tools each add scope.
Recurring costs
The build is not the total. Budget for a domain, hosting, CMS seats and maintenance. Lucky Media (November 2026) cites Vercel Pro at $20 a month and Sanity Growth at $15 per seat for Next.js or Astro sites. Glide puts ongoing hosting, maintenance and updates at £150 to £3,000 a year, usually quoted separately.
Our Care plans are 79, 190 and 390 € per month (1, 3 and 6 hours of changes), with extra hours at 60 €, and cover hosting, dependency updates and monitoring. Partner, for continuous development, starts at 2 200 € per month. All prices are excl. VAT. Full details are on the pricing page.
What to spend by stage
This is guidance, not data. It reflects what we see founders need, not a market statistic.
- Pre-seed. Your site has one job: look credible when an investor or first customer checks you out. A template on Webflow or Framer, a short custom build, or a focused page is enough. Under 6 000 €, we are not your studio, and we will say so.
- Seed. You are selling, hiring and raising again. A coded marketing site with a CMS, case studies, a careers section and fast pages is worth a budget from 6 000 € to 15 000 €. The site becomes a sales asset your team can edit without a developer.
- Series A and beyond. A bigger brand, several audiences, multiple languages and sometimes a product tour or 3D. Budgets of 12 000 € and above, with ongoing development, are normal. If you need a large in-house-style team, a bigger agency fits better than a small studio.
Think in jobs. For fundraising, the site must make your traction and team legible in under a minute. For hiring, it must show how you work. For sales, it must load fast, explain the offer in one screen, and make the next step obvious. Our own site, ecrin.digital, scores 98 for performance and 100 for accessibility, best practices and SEO on Google PageSpeed Insights mobile (measured 10 November 2026).
A worked example with our published prices
A seed-stage fintech SaaS needs an eight-page site in English and French with a CMS.
| Item | Price excl. VAT |
|---|---|
| Roadmap (paid scoping, deducted if you sign within 30 days) | from 1 500 € |
| Launch Sprint (5 to 9 pages, premium design, animation, CMS, technical SEO, bilingual) | from 6 000 € |
| Care Growth plan, 12 months at 190 € | 2 280 € |
| Year one, from | 8 280 € |
Payment on the build follows 40% at signature, 30% at design approval and 30% at launch, so 2 400 €, 1 800 € and 1 800 € on a 6 000 € project. For a real example, the Viewz website, a fintech SaaS, was built with Astro and Sanity and shipped in 4 weeks.
How to read a quote: the usual traps
- "Custom design" that is a purchased theme. Ask whether layouts are created for you.
- Missing content. Who writes the copy and translations, and at what cost?
- Ownership. You should receive the code or a full export, with hosting and domain accounts in your name.
- Unmeasured performance. Ask for a target PageSpeed Insights mobile score in writing.
- "SEO optimised" with no list. Ask for metadata, structured data, sitemap and redirects.
- A vague life after launch. Ask about bug-fix delay, warranty and the price of changes.
Frequently asked questions
How much does a custom website cost in 2026? For a UK small business, freelancers charge about £1,500 to £3,000 and agencies £3,000 to £10,000 (Whito, Glide). For a funded B2B startup with a CMS and custom design, plan from 6 000 € at a coded studio like ours.
Is a template good enough for a startup? Yes at pre-seed. Webflow or Framer cost $25 to $30 a month and launch in days. Move to a custom site when the site must carry sales, hiring or a rebrand.
How long does it take? Our Launch Sprint takes 4 to 8 weeks and Signature 8 to 12 weeks. The Viewz site shipped in 4 weeks.
What does a website cost per year after launch? Allow for hosting, CMS seats and maintenance: from 79 € per month with our Care plans, and £150 to £3,000 a year according to Glide.
When are you the wrong choice? If your budget is under 6 000 €, or you need a large team for a multi-market platform, choose a template, a freelancer or a larger agency.
Next step
If your budget starts at 6 000 €, book a 20-minute call. If we fit, the next step is a paid Roadmap from 1 500 €, deducted from the project if you sign within 30 days.
