"How much should a website cost?" has no single answer — it depends entirely on where the person building it lives. The same skills, the same modern stack, the same final product can cost 20× more or less depending on the developer's city. Here's the honest 2026 breakdown.
The country-by-country comparison
Typical quote ranges for a standard 5–10 page business website, custom-designed and mobile-responsive:
| Country | Landing page | Business website | Shopify store |
|---|---|---|---|
| United States | $2,000 – $8,000 | $5,000 – $25,000 | $5,000 – $40,000 |
| United Kingdom | £1,500 – £6,000 | £4,000 – £20,000 | £4,000 – £30,000 |
| Australia | AUD 2,000 – 7,000 | AUD 4,000 – 30,000 | AUD 5,000 – 35,000 |
| UAE (Dubai) | AED 4,000 – 15,000 | AED 8,000 – 60,000 | AED 10,000 – 70,000 |
| Canada | CAD 1,800 – 7,000 | CAD 4,000 – 35,000 | CAD 5,000 – 40,000 |
| India (remote, strong studio) | ~$85 – $400 | ~$120 – $900 | ~$240 – $1,500 |
Why is the gap so big?
It is almost entirely cost of location, not cost of skill:
- Salaries track local cost of living.A senior developer in San Francisco needs a San Francisco salary to pay San Francisco rent. The same developer's skill in a smaller Indian city costs a fraction — because life there costs a fraction.
- Agency overhead. A London agency carries office rent in London, account managers, sales teams, and a marketing budget. All of that is inside your quote. A lean remote studio carries almost none of it.
- Market pricing. Agencies charge what their market will bear. If everyone local charges $10k, that becomes the floor — regardless of the actual hours involved.
None of those three things make the website better. They make the invoice bigger.
Does cheaper mean worse?
Not inherently — but cheap is a spectrum. There's a real difference between:
- The ₹500 template re-skin. Yes, this is worse. Generic, slow, no SEO, no source code. Avoid.
- The strong remote studio at $120–$900. This is notworse. Same Next.js / React / Shopify stack, custom design, proper SEO — it's just built by people who don't need a Western salary.
The trick is telling them apart. A real studio shows live client work, gets on video calls, hands over source code, and works on milestone payments. (We wrote a full vetting checklist in our guide to hiring an Indian web agency.)
What you should actually pay
Three honest scenarios:
- You want it local and you have the budget. Pay your local agency. You get in-person meetings and a name in your time zone. You also pay 10–30× more.
- You want quality without the markup. Hire a vetted remote studio. Expect to pay $120–$1,500 depending on scope. This is where most small and mid-sized businesses should land.
- You're tempted by the $50 offer.Don't. That's the template re-skin. You'll rebuild it within a year and pay twice.
The hidden costs (everywhere)
Wherever you build, budget for these beyond the sticker price:
- Domain: $10–$20/year.
- Hosting: often free on modern platforms (Vercel, Netlify), up to $20/month for heavier sites.
- Maintenance: optional, $10–$50/month for updates and security.
- Content & photography: if you don't have copy and images ready, budget for it — most quotes exclude this.
The bottom line
A professional website in 2026 should cost what the work is worth — not what your postcode is worth. If you're a US, UK, Australian, Canadian, or Gulf business, a vetted Indian studio gives you the same modern website your local agency would build, for 60–90% less. The savings are real and the quality gap is small. The only real risk is skipping the vetting.
StackZio builds remotely for clients worldwide — see pricing on our services page, or check the dedicated pages for London, New York, and Dubai.
