How much does an ecommerce website cost? A 2026 price breakdown.
- Typical US ranges
- Updated for 2026
- No sign-up
Ecommerce website cost at a glance
These are typical US ranges, not a quote. Where your store lands inside a band - or above it - depends on the drivers covered below. On top of the build, every store pays payment processing of roughly 2.4 to 2.9 percent plus 30 cents per sale. If a custom build is out of budget, a DIY platform like Shopify or Wix trades the upfront fee for a monthly subscription and puts the work in your hands.
| Store type | Typical range |
|---|---|
| DIY (Shopify/Wix)Theme + subscription, you build | $0 - $50 / mo |
| Small custom storeShopify/Woo, light customization | $5,000 - $15,000 |
| Mid-market storeCustom design, integrations | $15,000 - $40,000 |
| Enterprise / headlessCustom checkout, high scale | $40,000 - $150,000+ |
| Platform feesPayment processing (Shopify/Stripe) | 2.4 - 2.9% + 30c / sale |
Source: 2026 US ranges - hosted platforms vs custom builds
What makes an ecommerce site cost more or less
The first big driver is your platform choice - hosted Shopify, self-hosted WooCommerce, or a fully custom build. After that, the size of your catalog and whether the design is a theme or fully custom set the baseline. The real cost usually lives in the work behind the checkout: payment, shipping, and tax setup, integrations, content, and the scale you need to support.
- Platform choice (Shopify, WooCommerce, custom)
- Number of products and catalog complexity
- Theme vs fully custom design
- Payment, shipping, and tax setup
- Integrations (ERP, CRM, email)
- Content and product photography
- Scale and traffic
Want a number for your store?
Shopify vs WooCommerce vs custom
Shopify is hosted, which means it is fast to launch and you never touch a server - the platform handles uptime, security, and scaling for you. You pay a monthly subscription (roughly $0 to $50 on the lower plans) and a transaction fee on each sale, and you stay inside what the themes and apps allow. It is the right call when you want to be selling quickly without managing infrastructure.
WooCommerce is a free plugin for WordPress. It gives you more flexibility and no platform transaction fee, but you host it yourself and you own the maintenance - updates, security, backups, and keeping plugins compatible. It suits a store that already lives on WordPress or wants more control over the stack without jumping to a full custom build.
A custom or headless commerce build gives you the most control - a checkout, design, and performance built exactly to your requirements, with no template limits. It also costs the most and takes the longest, so it pays off at high scale, with unusual flows, or when the store is core to the business and has to look and behave like no one else.
Get a fixed quote for your store.
A calculator gives you a range. Tell us what you're building - project type, scope, budget, and timeline - in a short guided brief, and we'll come back with a fixed, itemized quote and a plan. No obligation, no sales call required.
Common questions
It depends on how you build it. A DIY store on a hosted platform like Shopify or Wix runs $0 to about $50 a month for the subscription plus $0 to $350 for a theme, with no build fee. A small custom store typically costs $5,000 to $15,000, a mid-market store $15,000 to $40,000, and an enterprise or headless commerce build $40,000 to $150,000 or more. On top of the build, plan for payment processing fees of roughly 2.4 to 2.9 percent plus 30 cents per sale.
Shopify itself is a hosted subscription - typically $0 to $50 a month on the lower plans - plus an optional theme that runs $0 for a free theme up to about $350 for a premium one. If you build it yourself, that subscription is most of the cost. If you hire a studio to design and customize a Shopify store, expect $5,000 to $15,000 for a small store and $15,000 to $40,000 for a mid-market build, on top of the monthly subscription and payment processing fees.
Shopify is hosted and fast to launch - you trade some flexibility and a transaction fee for not having to manage infrastructure. WooCommerce is a free WordPress plugin that gives you more control and no platform transaction fee, but you host it and own the maintenance. A custom or headless commerce build gives you the most control over the design, checkout, and performance, and costs the most. Most small and mid-market stores are well served by Shopify or WooCommerce; custom makes sense at high scale or with unusual requirements.
Beyond the build, plan for the platform subscription (about $0 to $50 a month on Shopify's lower plans, or hosting from a few dollars to $100+ a month for WooCommerce or a custom store), payment processing of roughly 2.4 to 2.9 percent plus 30 cents per sale, a domain (about $10 to $20 a year), and apps or plugins for things like email, reviews, and shipping. Maintenance - updates, security, and small changes - is often 15 to 20 percent of the build cost per year or a monthly retainer.
The biggest levers are whether the design is a theme or fully custom, the size and complexity of your catalog, and how much custom functionality sits behind the checkout. Payment, shipping, and tax setup, integrations with an ERP, CRM, or email platform, product photography and content, and the scale and traffic you need to support all add real work on top. The more of these you stack, the closer you get to a mid-market or enterprise number.
No - these are honest ballpark ranges to help you set a budget, not a quote. Your real number depends on your platform, catalog, design, integrations, and scale. The fastest way to get a realistic figure is to try the website cost calculator for a transparent estimate, or start a brief with us and we will turn the scope into a fixed quote for your store.