You ask two people in your town to quote for a website for your business. One says ₹15,000. The other says ₹1,50,000. Both say "five pages, mobile-friendly, contact form".
Neither is necessarily cheating you. A "business website" can mean a one-page digital visiting card or a site that takes bookings, sends leads to your sales team and ranks for local searches. The cost depends mainly on what the site has to do, how much content has to be created, how custom the design is, and who maintains it after launch. On top of the one-time build there are yearly running costs, and 18% GST on the service.
This guide explains each of those factors so you can brief a developer properly and compare quotes like for like.
What the market charges, roughly
Published price ranges in India vary a lot, and most come from companies that sell websites or hosting. As one reference point, Hostinger's India guide (updated February 2026) gives these ranges for a site built for you:
| Type of site | Typical range quoted |
|---|---|
| Basic site, 1 to 5 pages | ₹5,000 to ₹50,000 |
| Small business site, 5 to 15 pages | ₹10,000 to ₹80,000 |
| Professional business site, 10 to 20 pages, custom design | ₹80,000 to ₹1,50,000 |
| E-commerce site | ₹1,50,000 to ₹4,00,000 and up |
Treat these as a sense of scale, not a price list. Where your project lands depends on the factors below.
1. What the website has to do
This is the biggest cost driver, more than the number of pages.
| Level | What it does | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Visiting card | Tells people who you are, where you are and how to call | A clinic or a consultant |
| Enquiry site | Explains services in detail and collects enquiries | A school, a manufacturer, a builder |
| Booking site | Lets customers pick a slot or room and confirm | A salon, a lodge, a diagnostic centre |
| Online store | Shows products and stock, takes payment, tracks orders | A textile or grocery shop selling online |
Each step up adds work: forms that must reach the right person, calendars that must not double-book, payments that must reconcile. Once a site needs customer logins, bookings, inventory or payments, you are really building a small web application, and it should be planned and tested like one. See our web application development page for how that differs.
2. Pages and page types
Ten pages that share one layout (ten service pages, say) cost less than ten pages that each need their own design. When you count pages, also count the types of page: home, service, product listing, product detail, gallery, contact, blog.
A useful exercise before talking to anyone: write the list of pages on paper with one line on what each must say.
3. Content: the cost most people forget
The words, photos and videos on the site are often the slowest part of the project.
- Who writes the text? If you supply it, the cost is lower but the timeline depends on you. If the developer or a copywriter writes it, budget for it separately.
- Photos: stock images are quick, but real photos of your shop, team and work build far more trust. A half-day shoot is often worth it.
- Tamil and English: many Tamil Nadu businesses want both. A bilingual site does not double the design work, but it roughly doubles the content work: every page, button and form message has to be written and checked twice.
If your content isn't ready, the project waits. Ask any developer how they handle late content before you sign.
4. Design: template or custom
- A ready-made theme, adjusted with your logo, colours and photos, is the quickest and cheapest route, and fine for many businesses.
- A custom design starts from your customers and brand, and is worth it when the site is a main source of business or has to stand out from competitors with similar offers.
Ask which one you are being quoted for. "Custom design" means different things to different people.
5. Features and integrations
Some features cost almost nothing to add; others add real build and running cost.
| Feature | What it involves |
|---|---|
| WhatsApp button | A click-to-chat link opens a chat with your number. Simple to add. |
| Google Maps and directions | An embedded map. Simple. |
| Enquiry form | Simple to add, but decide who receives each enquiry and how fast. Spam protection matters. |
| Online payments | A payment gateway such as Razorpay. Razorpay's standard pricing has no setup fee and charges a 2% platform fee per successful domestic transaction, including UPI, plus GST. |
| Bookings or appointments | Calendars, confirmations, reminders and cancellation rules: real development work. |
| Links to your other software | Sending enquiries into a CRM, or stock and prices from your billing software. Effort depends on what that software allows. |
If you want customers to get answers on WhatsApp even after hours, that is a separate project; our post on AI automation for small businesses explains what is realistic.
6. Being found on Google
A well-built site includes the technical basics: fast pages, sensible page titles, a sitemap, analytics, and pages written around what customers actually search for. For local businesses, a complete and accurate Google Business Profile (free) often matters as much as the website itself.
Be wary of anyone who guarantees a first-page ranking. Nobody controls Google's results. What a developer can promise is a site that is technically sound and easy for search engines to understand. Ongoing work to grow visibility is a separate digital marketing job.
7. Who builds it
| Route | Good for | Watch out for |
|---|---|---|
| Do it yourself on a website builder | A simple visiting-card site, very tight budget | Your time; you are the designer, writer and support desk |
| Freelancer | Small, well-defined sites | What happens if they become unavailable; who holds the logins |
| Agency or software company | Sites that bring in business, need integrations, or must be maintained for years | Higher price; make sure you know exactly what the quote includes |
There is no single right answer. The question is how much the website matters to your business and who will look after it in year two.
The yearly running costs
The build is a one-time cost. These come back every year, and quotes often leave them out:
| Item | What to know |
|---|---|
| Domain name (.in or .com) | Renewed every year. Make sure it is registered in your business's name, with your email address. |
| Hosting | Shared hosting is enough for most small business sites; online stores and booking sites need more. |
| SSL certificate (the padlock) | Free certificates from Let's Encrypt are supported by most good hosts. You rarely need to pay for one. |
| Business email (you@yourbusiness.in) | For example, Google Workspace's Starter plan is listed at ₹270 per user per month on an annual plan in India; tax extra. |
| Maintenance | Software updates, backups, security fixes, small content changes. |
| Payment gateway fees | A percentage of each online payment, if you take payments. |
GST on website development
Website design and development falls under IT design and development services (SAC 998314), which attracts 18% GST. If your business is GST-registered and the website is for business use, you can generally claim this as input tax credit; check with your auditor. Make sure the quote says whether GST is included, and ask for a proper tax invoice. Our guide on how to make a GST invoice shows what one should contain.
Plan for privacy now, not later
If your website collects names, phone numbers or other personal details through forms, bookings or orders, India's Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 applies. Its Rules were notified in November 2025, and most of the obligations on businesses, including giving people a clear notice of what you collect and why, apply from May 2027.
It is cheaper to build a clear privacy notice and consent wording into the site now than to retrofit them later. Ask your developer how their forms will handle it. This is not legal advice; for your specific case, speak to a lawyer.
Ownership: settle it before you pay
These questions cost nothing to ask and save a lot of money later:
- Is the domain registered in my business's name, and do I have the login?
- Whose name is the hosting account in, and can I move it?
- Will I get the admin login to update content myself?
- Do I own the design and code, and are any paid themes or plugins licensed to me?
- What happens to the site if we stop working together?
Checklist: prepare this before asking for quotes
Developers can only quote accurately on what you tell them. Send every developer the same brief:
- Goal: what should a visitor do? Call, WhatsApp, enquire, book or buy.
- Pages: your page list, with one line each.
- Content: what you will supply (text, photos, logo) and what you need help with.
- Languages: English only, or Tamil and English.
- Features: forms, WhatsApp, payments, bookings, links to other software.
- Examples: two or three websites you like, and what you like about each.
- Updates: who will change content after launch, and how often.
- Existing assets: do you already have a domain, hosting or business email?
- Deadline and a budget range.
Then compare quotes line by line: what is included, how many rounds of changes, who supplies content, what happens after launch, and whether GST is included.
Planning a website for your business? BIGXSTAR Technologies designs and builds business websites for growing businesses in Tamil Nadu and beyond, with the scope, timeline, ownership and support agreed in writing before work starts. See our Website Design & Development service, read how we work with local businesses, or book a free consultation.