The build is paid once. The running costs come every year.

How much does a website cost in Australia?

Every build range we found comes from a business that sells websites, hosting or quotes. Antcrow, one of those vendors, says plainly that no independent survey of this market exists^[6], and we found none either. The closest is Bark, a quoting marketplace, which bases its ranges on more than 447,500 website design requests submitted across Australia since 2021. It does not say whether those were quotes, jobs or estimates^[2].

447,500

Requests behind one marketplace's price ranges

Bark, website design requests across Australia since 2021 [2]

Read each range as one seller's estimate, and trust a band more when several sellers land on it. For a small business site, WP Creative^[1] and EB Pearls^[3] give A$3,000 to A$10,000. Bark gives A$3,000 to A$10,000 or more for a custom site of 10 to 15 pages^[2]. SB Web Designs puts a specialist studio at A$3,500 to A$10,000^[7].

Outside that band the figures spread. Online stores start at about A$8,000 to A$10,000 in four guides, and three of them run to A$50,000 or more^[1][2][3][8]. RockingWeb's A$5,000 to A$25,000 for a typical professional small business site is the high outlier^[9].

What a build costs, by type of site

1. Landing pagewhatsthedamage.com.au [4]

   A$800A$3,000

2. Freelancer siteSB Web Designs [7]

   A$1,500A$5,000

3. Small business siteShared bandWhere WP Creative, Bark and EB Pearls overlap [1] [2] [3]

   A$3,000A$10,000

4. Online storeWP Creative and EB Pearls [1] [3]

   A$10,000A$50,000 or more

A$010,00020,00030,00040,00050,000

Build price, A$

Website maintenance costs, line by line

Once the site is live, the bills get smaller and keep coming. A care plan, if you take one, covers updates, backups and security for a monthly fee^[10], and higher tiers add an allowance for content changes^[11].

Year oneYear two

Buildpaid once

Domainrenews every year

Hostingby the month or the year

Emailper person

Care planif you take one

• Paid once
• Billed
• If you take one
• Renewal

Care is the widest line. Antcrow puts plans for small sites at A$100 to A$300 a month^[6]. Blumint describes a standard plan at A$150 to A$300 a month as suiting most small businesses^[11]. Without a plan, changes are billed by the hour: A$80 to A$150 for a freelancer and A$100 to A$250 for an agency, in one guide^[4].

Added up, one vendor guide puts total running costs at A$75 to A$400 a month^[4]. Another puts them at A$2,000 to A$5,000 a year for a typical WordPress business site^[12]. We found no Australian survey of what small businesses actually spend each year, so these are sellers' estimates as well.

Most of these guides do not say whether their prices include GST, and those that do split both ways. WP Creative's maintenance figures are ex GST^[10], two registrars include GST in their domain prices^[13][14], and Google's email pricing leaves tax out^[15]. Antcrow notes that most Australian agencies quote business work ex GST^[6]. Before comparing two quotes, ask which way each one is written.

What a small business website costs to run, item by item, in AUD

Item	Low	High	Billed	GST	Source
Domain (.com.au or .au) at renewal	A$14.90	about A$33	Yearly	Skyrack includes GST; others not stated	[13] [16]
Shared hosting	A$89	A$168	Yearly	Not stated	[9]
Managed hosting	A$30	A$50	Monthly	Not stated	[12]
Business email	A$3.50	A$22.90	Monthly, per person	Not stated	[8]
Care plan	A$50	A$400 or more	Monthly	Not stated	[11]
Edits without a plan	A$80	A$250	Hourly	Not stated	[4]
Paid add-ons and licences	A$0	A$100	Monthly	Not stated	[4]
Website builder subscription	A$300	A$2,000	Yearly	Not stated	[12]

Domain and hosting prices: the renewal is the real cost

Hosting and domains are often sold on a first-year price. What you pay every year after is the renewal. Hostinger's Premium hosting shows A$3.49 a month, but that price needs 48 months paid upfront (A$167.52), and it renews at A$15.89 a month^[17].

Domain Central compared registrars' published prices from February to September 2026 and found .com.au renewals mostly between about A$23 and A$33 a year. One name it found at A$0.01 for the first year renewed at A$23.95^[16]. Some registrars keep one price: Skyrack lists .au and .com.au at A$14.90 a year to register and renew^[13]. Under every retail price sits auDA's wholesale fee of A$9.50 a year per .au licence, ex GST, from 1 October 2026^[18].

.au and .com.au names at VentraIP, A$ a year

1. First yearA$9.95
2. Regular priceA$22.95

Hostinger Premium hosting, A$ a month

1. Shown, with 48 months paid upfrontA$3.49
2. Renews atA$15.89

• First-year price
• Renewal

auDA requires a com.au holder to be connected to Australia as a business, most often through an active ABN or ACN. The name must also connect to that business^[19]. A .au direct name is open to anyone with a validated connection to Australia^[20].

A website builder subscription is a yearly cost too

Building the site yourself on a website builder replaces the build fee with a subscription. That subscription belongs in the yearly budget, the same as hosting. Squarespace's annual plans include a domain free for the first year, which then renews at the standard rate^[21]. The renewal rule applies here too.

Several vendor guides that sell custom builds still list a builder as a legitimate option^[7][22]. Selling online adds a store platform as its own line. A builder also takes the owner's time, first to build the site and then to keep it current.

• A$14.95 to A$22.69

  a month on an annual plan

  GoDaddy, its own builder [8]

• A$300 to A$2,000

  a year for a website builder

  Grove Foundry, vendor guide [12]

• A$42

  a month billed annually

  Shopify Basic plan, to sell online [23]

Year one against year two, worked through

Every number in this worked example is an assumption taken from the ranges above, there to swap for your own.

Say a small business has its site built for A$6,000, inside the shared band. It registers a .com.au at a promotional A$9.95, against a regular price of A$22.95^[5]. Managed hosting costs A$30 a month, the low end of one guide's range^[12]. One person uses Google Workspace Business Starter at A$9.90 a month ex tax^[15]. A care plan costs A$150 a month, the bottom of Blumint's standard band^[11].

Year two drops the build and pays the domain at its regular price, and that total repeats every year the site stays up. It sits inside Grove Foundry's yearly range above^[12].

Care is the largest line in year two. At A$300 a month instead of A$150, year two passes A$4,100.

Worked example, not a real business

• Year one

  • BuildA$6,000assumed, inside A$3,000 to A$10,000 [1] [2] [3]
  • DomainA$9.95first year [5]
  • HostingA$360A$30 a month [12]
  • EmailA$118.80A$9.90 a month ex tax [15]
  • CareA$1,800A$150 a month [11]

  Total, year one

  A$8,288.75

• Year two

  • BuildDroppedyear two drops the build
  • DomainA$22.95at the regular price [5]
  • HostingA$360A$30 a month [12]
  • EmailA$118.80A$9.90 a month ex tax [15]
  • CareA$1,800A$150 a month [11]

  Total, year two

  A$2,301.75

  Repeats every year

Ask for two numbers with any quote: the build, and what the site costs in year two.

Fixed prices are listed on our pricing page.