Pricing an artist website? The shop is where costs climb.

An artist website is paid for out of a thin income

Most artists already have a website. Creative Australia's Artists as Workers study surveyed artists in late 2022 and early 2023, and was published in 2024. About two in three said they use their own website to promote their work, and about one in four sell through it^[7]. Those figures cover every art form, not only visual artists.

The income behind those sites is thin, and at those incomes a website takes a real share of the year's earnings.

What Australian artists earn from their work

• A$23,200

  average income from creative work

  Professional artists, 2021-22 [8]

• Nearly half

  earn under A$10,000 from creative work

  Artists as Workers study [9]

• 73%

  average share of artistic income spent on producing the work

  Professional artists, 2021-22 [8]

• A$13,937

  average income from practice

  Visual and craft artists, RMIT-led study, 2023-24 [10]

What a portfolio website costs to build in Australia

None of the Australian price guides we read prices a site for artists or photographers specifically. The ranges below are for small-business sites in general, from a quote marketplace and from agencies that sell builds^[1][6].

A brochure site is the closest match to a portfolio: a few pages of work, an about page and a way to get in touch. Bark, a quote marketplace, puts a basic three-to-five-page site at A$500 to A$1,775^[1]. Agency guides start higher. One quotes A$1,500 to A$4,000 for a brochure site^[3], another A$3,000 to A$8,000^[2]. A custom small-business site runs from A$3,000 to A$10,000 and up^[1].

A$500 to A$8,000

The spread is wide, so ask what a quote covers. How many pages are there, is the design made for you or adapted from a template, and who prepares and loads the images?

On a platform, Squarespace's plans run from A$17 to A$109 a month billed annually, or A$24 to A$149 month to month^[4]. You pay with your own time instead. You choose the template, write the pages and prepare the images. For plenty of artists that is a fair trade, and a platform is a sensible place to start.

What each part of an artist or photographer website costs in Australia, in AUD, with how often you pay it

Item	Low	High	How often
Built for you
Hired basic brochure site, 3 to 5 pages[1]	A$500	A$1,775	once
Hired brochure site, agency[2][3]	A$1,500	A$8,000	once
Hired custom small-business site[1]	A$3,000	A$10,000+	once
Hired simple shop (ecommerce) site[1] Where costs climb	A$8,000	A$20,000+	once
Built yourself
Squarespace plans, billed annually[4]	A$17	A$109	per month
DIY builder, one agency's estimate[6]	A$500	A$1,500	per year
Running costs
Domain[1][6]	A$10	A$50	per year
Shared hosting[1]	A$10	A$30	per month
Basic agency maintenance[1]	A$100	A$300	per month

Selling prints is where an artist website costs more

A shop needs product listings, prices, shipping rules and a returns policy as well as a cart.

Hired build, AUD, paid once

1. Basic brochure site, 3 to 5 pagesA$500 to A$1,775
2. Simple shop (ecommerce) siteA$8,000 to A$20,000+

The platform route costs less up front. Squarespace charges a 2% transaction fee on store sales on its Basic plan. From its Core plan up, at A$28 a month billed annually, it charges none^[4]. Shopify, built for shops first, starts at A$42 a month billed yearly^[11]. Etsy is the marketplace route. Wise, a payments company, sets out Etsy's fees for Australian sellers. There is a 6.5% transaction fee, 3 to 4% plus A$0.25 for payment processing, and a A$0.31 listing fee. Sales that come through Etsy's offsite ads also pay 15%^[12]. Before ads and listing fees, that adds up to about 9.5% to 10.5% of a sale (our sum, from Wise's figures, not Etsy's own).

A sale through your own site

A$150print

• ~A$2.78

  card fee from an Australian buyer

  Stripe, 1.65% plus A$0.30, our arithmetic [5]

• ~A$5.55

  card fee from an overseas card, before conversion

  Stripe, 3.5% plus A$0.30, our arithmetic [5]

Every sale through your own site also pays a card fee. Stripe charges 1.65% plus A$0.30 for a domestic card and 3.5% plus A$0.30 for an international one, with another 2% when currency conversion applies^[5]. PayPal's standard rate is 2.90% plus A$0.30 for a domestic sale^[13]. Square charges 2.2% online and 1.6% in person (for sellers who joined from 30 May 2024). That matters if you also sell at markets or exhibitions^[14].

Photographers also pay for galleries and storage

Many photographers need more than a portfolio. They deliver each shoot through a private gallery, where the client views the images, picks favourites and downloads the files. Gallery and proofing tools price by storage. Pixieset, one of them, runs from a free plan up to a top plan with unlimited storage^[15]. Its pricing page names no currency, so check the price at checkout before setting it against the AUD figures here.

clients.yourstudio.com.au

Your private gallery

• Viewthe images
• Pickfavourites
• Downloadthe files

3GB

Storage on one gallery tool's free plan

Pixieset free plan, 15% commission on store sales [15]

A gallery tool is often a second monthly fee alongside the website. Some portfolio platforms bundle galleries in and some do not, so count it when you compare.

Year two: what a portfolio website costs per month

Once the site is live, the build fee falls away and the domain and hosting remain, at the rates in the table above^[1][6]. On a platform, the subscription is the main running cost.

Upkeep can be the larger number. Bark puts basic agency maintenance at A$100 to A$300 a month^[1]. One agency suggests budgeting 20 to 30% of the build cost each year for upkeep and marketing^[2]. Both are agency figures. A simple portfolio you update yourself may need far less.

Two years of a portfolio site, platform or hired

• Built on a platform

  • Squarespace Core planA$28 a month, billed annually [4]
  • Transaction fee on store sales0% [4]
  • Domainnot priced on the plan page

  Over 24 months, our arithmetic

  A$672

  • Left out of the totalYour time to build and update it

• Hired brochure site

  • Build, onceA$500 to A$8,000 [1] [2] [3]
  • DomainA$20 to A$50 a year, A$40 to A$100 over two years [1]
  • Shared hostingA$10 to A$30 a month, A$240 to A$720 over 24 months [1]

  Two-year total, our arithmetic

  A$780 to A$8,820

  the hired two-year total

  • Left out of the totalBasic agency maintenance, if paid for, adds A$100 to A$300 a month [1]

Whichever route you take, check what you own at the end. The domain should be registered in your name, and the agreement should say who holds the site files and the images.

The same goes for photos of your work. If you commission a photographer to shoot your artworks, the photographer owns the copyright in those photos unless you agree otherwise in writing. Agree a licence when you book the shoot^[16][17]. Arts Law reports that 30% of artists do not know whether their intellectual property has been infringed^[18]. This is general information. Arts Law has current guidance for your situation.

Far more artists use their site to show the work than to sell it^[7]. The portfolio comes first, and a shop or client galleries can follow when the work calls for them.

If you would rather have the whole cost fixed before anything starts, see our fixed-price options.