What does a website really cost?
There is no single number that answers this question, and anyone who gives you one either didn't hear out the requirement or isn't telling you something. The question is still a fair one, and there is an answer that genuinely helps: what the price is made up of, what you pay once, and what comes back every year.
In this piece we go through the costs item by item, with Hungarian market figures at 2026 prices. The actual amounts differ by provider, so we give ranges throughout.
The short version
- A website's price has two parts: the one-off build and the upkeep that returns every year.
- The recurring part is underestimated almost everywhere. Domain, hosting, maintenance and content together run to tens of thousands of forints a year.
- Most of the difference between quotes doesn't come from the development. It comes from the content, the design and the maintenance, or the absence of them.
- The most expensive item often isn't in the quote at all: writing the content, the photography and uploading the product data.
- Budget for three years, not one. A cheaper site with more expensive upkeep closes the gap quickly.
The two big categories
Every cost falls into one of them, and most misunderstandings come from the two getting mixed up in the quote.
One-off cost: the design, the development, the first upload of content, the photography, the migration from an old site.
Recurring cost: domain, hosting, certificate, maintenance, updates, backups, and every subscription the site needs to run.
If a quote only covers the first, that isn't an incomplete quote, just an incomplete picture. It's worth asking about the second.
The recurring costs
We start with these, because they're more predictable and because they're the ones people forget.
Domain
Renewing a .hu domain in 2026 typically runs around 2,500 to 2,600 forints a year; the first year of registration is often cheaper at a promotional rate. A .com is usually more expensive, roughly 6,000 to 6,500 forints a year.
It's the smallest item on the list, and the most important thing about it is that it should be in your name. We wrote a separate piece about that.
Hosting
There's a wide spread here, because very different things get called hosting. For a simpler brochure site or a WordPress site, the realistic range for Hungarian shared hosting in 2026 is roughly 8,000 to 40,000 forints a year. With the faster, better-supported providers it sits more in the 15,000 to 40,000 band.
Premium services go higher still: there are Hungarian providers whose annual fee starts above 50,000 forints gross.
What to look at besides the price: whether there's a daily backup and how long it's kept, how much resource you get, whether there's support in your language and during what hours, and what a restore costs.
For a webshop or a higher-traffic site, shared hosting may not be enough; the next step up is a virtual server, billed monthly.
SSL certificate
Most providers now include a free certificate with the package, and that's enough for most sites. A separate paid certificate is only needed in special cases.
Maintenance
This is the item most people leave out, and then pay for eighteen months later. A website doesn't stand still in time: the system gets updates, plugins go stale, security holes open up.
Maintenance is usually billed monthly and covers updates, checking the backups, monitoring that everything runs, and smaller changes. Skipping it looks like a saving right up until an outdated, compromised site has to be restored.
Subscriptions
Everything the site needs to run that isn't hosting: paid plugins, a newsletter tool, a booking system, payment provider fees, perhaps a licensed typeface. Individually small, collectively not.
The one-off costs
Development and design
This is where the spread is widest and where it's hardest to name a price without an assessment. The main question is whether it's built from a template or designed from scratch.
The template route is cheaper and faster, but the template sets the limits. If how you operate fits inside them, that's an entirely sound decision. Custom design costs more, and not because of the looks: it costs more because the structure follows your process rather than the other way around.
On the Hungarian market a simpler brochure site of a few pages typically starts in the hundreds of thousands of forints; a more complex custom-designed site or webshop is a multiple of that. The price depends on the number of pages, the features, the integrations and the volume of content, not on the word "website".
Content
This is the most underestimated item. Writing the copy, working out the structure, gathering and uploading the product data is serious work, and it usually isn't in the development quote.
There are two routes. Either you write it, and the cost is your own time. Or you order it, and it's a separate line item. The third and most common scenario is that nobody writes it, and the site sits at "coming soon" for six months.
Photography and visual material
With stock photography any site can look fine, but it looks the same as plenty of others. Your own photography costs more, but it sets you apart, and in a webshop product photography directly affects sales.
Migration
If there's an existing site, moving the content across and keeping the search rankings is separate work. Without sorting out the redirects, part of your previous search traffic is lost, and that's hard to win back after the fact.
Let's count three years
A simple comparison, with two imaginary quotes. The numbers aren't quotes, they only show the logic.
Quote A: cheaper build, no maintenance in the package. The first year looks favourable. In the second year an update problem turns up, in the third a security fix, and both are billed case by case. Meanwhile the hosting sits in the more expensive band, because that was the default offer.
Quote B: higher build price, maintenance included. The first year looks more expensive. The second and third, though, are predictable, with no surprises.
The three-year total is often closer together than the first-year price would suggest. Which is why the question worth asking is always: what does this site cost over three years, all in?
What to ask before the quote
These seven questions filter out most of the unpleasant surprises:
- What's included in the price, and what isn't?
- Who writes the copy, and who uploads the content?
- Whose name will the domain and the hosting be in?
- What happens if something breaks after an update? Is that in the price?
- Is there a daily backup, how long is it kept, and what does a restore cost?
- What does a later extension cost, and on what timescale?
- What do I get handed over if I one day move to another developer?
If any of them doesn't get a concrete answer, that in itself is information.
Frequently asked questions
What does a website cost in Hungary in 2026?
- A simpler brochure site typically starts in the hundreds of thousands of forints; a custom-designed site or webshop is a multiple of that. The exact price depends on the number of pages, the features and the volume of content, so without an assessment only a range can responsibly be named.
What's the annual running cost of a website?
- A .hu domain is roughly 2,500 forints a year, shared hosting typically 8,000 to 40,000, plus maintenance and any subscriptions. For most smaller sites that comes to tens of thousands of forints a year together.
Why is the difference between quotes so large?
- Because they usually don't cover the same thing. Content, photography, maintenance and migration are all items that may be in or missing. It's worth asking for an itemised breakdown.
Is a template-based site cheaper?
- To build, yes. The question is whether the template's limits are enough for how you operate. If they are, it's a good decision. If they aren't, stretching a template works out more expensive in the long run than a custom solution.
Do I need maintenance if I don't change anything on the site?
- Yes. The updates aren't needed because of the content, they're needed for security. A site left unupdated for years is the most common target.
What never appears in a quote but still costs money?
- Your own time. Gathering the content, picking out the images, making the decisions and giving feedback are all working hours. Worth counting in up front.
In summary
A website's price isn't a number, it's a structure. Once you know the items, two quotes become comparable and you can decide which one is worth it.
The best starting point isn't the question "what does a website cost" but what it has to be able to do. A concrete quote can be given after the assessment; before that it's only guesswork.
