Every builder advertises a low entry price. Every finished site costs more. This guide breaks the number down honestly.
We benchmark five scenarios — landing page, small business site, blog, portfolio, ecommerce — across our recommended builders.
What actually costs money
Domain (~$12/year), the builder plan ($4–39/mo), templates ($0–100), plugins/extensions ($0–20/mo), email ($6/user/mo), and — optionally — a designer.
Five realistic scenarios
A landing page on Framer runs ~$10/mo. A small business site on Wix runs ~$29/mo. A content blog on WordPress + Kinsta runs ~$45/mo. A portfolio on Squarespace runs ~$23/mo. An MVP on Lovable runs $20/mo + optional cloud usage.
The traps to avoid
Renewal jumps, per-site pricing, forced email upsells, template locks and 'unlimited' plans with hidden meters.
Affiliate disclosure: some links on this page earn Golvra a commission at no cost to you.
Frequently asked questions
How much does a website cost per month?
$10–30/mo covers most small sites. $30–60/mo is realistic for content sites on managed WordPress.
Are free website builders any good?
Free tiers are useful for testing. Publishing on a free tier usually means the builder's branding on your site.
How do I keep costs down?
Pick a builder that owns hosting, email and analytics — bundling is often cheaper than a stack of add-ons.