Free calculator · Website and Cost
Website Total Cost of Ownership.
Build, hosting, licences, the small changes nobody scoped and the rebuild in year three. Shows what share of the total the build price actually is, which is the number two quotes side by side can never tell you.
Seeds the figures below to this market. Type over any of them with your real quote.
Sets the subscription, hosting and app costs from published list prices, and the typical build effort.
The one-off figure on the quote in front of you.
Three is roughly how long a site lives before it gets rebuilt.
Text edits, a new team member, a price update. Set this to zero only if someone internal can genuinely make them.
Typical minimum billed for a small request.
Backups, updates, monitoring, support.
Plugins, themes and tools that were bundled into the build quote and renew at full price from year two.
Sites do not last forever. Ignoring the replacement is what makes a long comparison flattering rather than useful. Set to zero to leave it out.
Optional, and the reason a do-it-yourself plan looks free. Leave at zero to exclude it.
Photography, a subscription only this site needs, an integration's own fee. One-off, monthly, or both.
What this website costs over 3 years
AED 26,870
On WordPress, in AED. Averaged, that is AED 746 a month for as long as you have it.
The point of the exercise
The build is 15% of what this website will cost you. Two build quotes side by side cannot show you the other 85%, and the cheaper build is regularly the more expensive website.
Ask any supplier the three questions this figure depends on: who can make a text change without you paying for it, what renews in year two, and what happens to the code if you leave. Those answers move this number more than the build price does. Platform costs are published list prices, read 2026-08-27.
Estimate done
Want the real number for your project?
An estimate works from typical scope. A quotation works from yours. Send this breakdown over and you get a fixed price back, from the person who would do the work, within one business day.
What this tool measures
Every other cost tool here answers what building a website costs. Nobody buys a website once. You buy a build, then hosting, then licences, then the small changes nobody scoped, then a rebuild about three years later — and the build is routinely the smallest line on that list.
This is the number that reframes a cheap quote. A build at half the price that needs a developer for every text change, sits on a platform taking a cut of your sales, and gets replaced in eighteen months because it was never maintainable is not the cheaper option. There is no way to see that from two build quotes side by side, which is the whole reason this exists.
The lines people leave out
Small changes. Every site needs them and almost no quote prices them. On a platform nobody internal can edit, each one is a paid request forever, and across three years this is usually the single largest hidden line. It is also the one that collapses to nothing if the answer to “can we edit it ourselves” is yes.
Year-two renewals. Plugins, themes and tools bundled into the build quote that quietly renew at full price once the first year ends. Nobody hides this deliberately; it simply never comes up during a sale.
The rebuild. Sites do not last forever, and a comparison that assumes yours will is flattering rather than useful. Setting a rebuild interval is what makes a five-year figure honest.
How to read the result
The figure that matters is the build's share of the total. When it comes out at a quarter or a fifth, the implication is direct: negotiating the build price hard is arguing over a fifth of the cost while ignoring the rest.
Your own time is optional and excluded by default, which is why a do-it-yourself plan always looks free. Turn it on if you want the comparison to be fair to the supplier you are about to reject.
Take the averaged monthly figure to whoever signs off the budget. A one-off build price gets approved and forgotten; a monthly number gets scrutinised, and it is the one you are actually committing to.
What to do next
Ask any supplier the three questions this figure depends on: who can make a text change without paying you, what renews in year two, and what happens to the code if we leave. Those three answers move this number more than the build price does.
Then run the same numbers against the second quote. Very often the expensive build has a lower total, and the conversation stops being about price and starts being about what you are buying.
Questions people ask
Three years or five?
Three is roughly how long a site lives before it is rebuilt, so it is the fairest single comparison. Five is more honest about the rebuild and starts to punish platforms with recurring cuts. Run both: if the ranking changes between them, the reason it changes is the real finding.
Should I include my own time?
If you are comparing doing it yourself against paying somebody, yes, or the comparison is not a comparison. If you are choosing between two suppliers, leave it out, since it is the same either way.
Why is the build such a small share?
Because it happens once and everything else happens every month for years. That is not an argument for an expensive build; it is an argument for one that keeps the monthly lines small, which usually means one somebody internal can edit.
Does this work for a store?
Yes, and the gap widens. Stores carry heavier hosting, more app subscriptions and, on some platforms, a cut of every sale, so the build is an even smaller share of the total than it is for a brochure site.
Where to go from here
- Website Platform Chooser — decide the platform first: it sets most of the recurring lines in this total.
- Hosting and Maintenance Plan Builder — prices the care line above, at the response time you actually need.
- Freelancer and Agency Quote Comparator — checks whether each quote even states the things this total depends on.
Built by GoDesign FZE, who build and then maintain the sites we ship.
Get in touch
Want someone to just do this part?
The tool is free and stays free. If you would rather hand the work over, tell us what you are dealing with and you get a straight answer on scope, cost and timeline.
- You own everythingRepository, hosting and domain credentials sit in your name from day one, not handed over at the end.
- A written timelineMilestone dates are agreed in writing before work starts, so you always know what ships next.
- One business dayEvery enquiry gets a reply from the person who would scope the work, not a sales sequence.
Media City, Dubai, UAE · DHA Phase 2, Islamabad, Pakistan
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