CHEAPEST WEBSITE BUILDER · OCTOBER 2026
Cheapest website builder in 2026: the sale price and the renewal price, side by side
Eleven website builders, the cheapest plan on each that puts a site on your own domain, what it really costs in year one and year two, what the free plans give you, and what you give up at the bottom of the price list. Every price read on the builder's own page, dated.
Free to build · Pay when you publish · No credit card
The short answer
The cheapest website builder depends on which year you count: Hostinger and IONOS advertise $2.49 and $6 a month, but those prices need a term paid up front and renew at $10.99 and $14, while WordPress.com ($4 a month billed yearly), Carrd ($19 a year), Weebly ($13 a month) and Wix ($17 a month) show one price with no separate renewal line. For a multi-page business site on your own domain with no ads, plan on about $120–$264 a year at the renewal price on the business-grade builders, with WordPress.com's $48 the exception.
The cheapest advertised price among the term-priced builders on this page, Hostinger Website Builder's $2.49 a month, renews at $10.99: about 4.4 times the number in the ad. That is why the table below has both columns, and why it's sorted by the renewal price, not the sale price.
Zarla isn't in the table because its price is on the pricing page, not here: it's free to build, edit and preview the whole site, and you pay when you publish, with hosting, the security certificate, booking, invoices and the leads inbox in the plan rather than sold as add-ons.
Free until you publish
See your website before you pay any builder
Add what you do, your town and your business name, and Zarla builds the site from that one line in about 30 seconds. Build, edit and preview free; you pay only when you publish.
Already have a website? Bring it across →Zarla keeps your old page addresses where it can and redirects the ones that change, helping you keep the Google standing you've built.
PRICES · READ 26 OCTOBER 2026
The cheapest plan with your own domain, builder by builder
Sorted by what a year costs at the renewal price. US prices before tax, read on each builder's own pricing page on the date in the last column. Yearly figures are the monthly price × 12.
| Builder and plan | Sale price | Renews at | A year | Free plan | Read |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Google Sites — Free | Free | — | $0 (plus your domain) | The whole product: free with a Google Account, on a sites.google.com address | 26 October 2026 |
| Carrd — Pro Standard | $19 a year | No separate renewal price shown | about $19 | Up to three one-page sites on a carrd.co address | 26 October 2026 |
| WordPress.com — Personal | $4 a month, billed yearly ($9 month to month) | No separate renewal price shown | about $48 | A free plan with no expiry on a wordpress.com address, with WordPress.com ads | 26 October 2026 |
| GoDaddy Websites + Marketing — Basic | $9.99 a month, billed yearly ($16.99 month to month) | No separate renewal price shown | about $120 | A free plan on a GoDaddy address, with a GoDaddy banner | 17 October 2026 |
| Hostinger Website Builder — Premium | $2.49 a month, 48 months paid at once | $10.99 a month | about $30, then about $132 | No free plan; a 14-day free trial | 26 October 2026 |
| Weebly — Personal | $13 a month, billed yearly ($16 month to month) | No separate renewal price shown | about $156 | A free plan for "basic use" on a Weebly address | 26 October 2026 |
| IONOS MyWebsite — Starter | $6 a month, billed yearly | $14 a month | about $72, then about $168 | No free plan; a 30-day money-back guarantee | 26 October 2026 |
| Webflow — Basic | $15 a month, billed yearly | No separate renewal price shown | about $180 | A free Starter plan: two static pages on a webflow.io address | 26 October 2026 |
| Wix — Light | $17 a month, billed yearly | No separate renewal price shown | about $204 | A free plan on a wixsite.com address, with Wix ads on every page | 26 October 2026 |
| Squarespace — Basic | $19 a month, billed yearly ($25 month to month) | No separate renewal price shown | about $228 | No free plan; a 14-day trial on a private site | 26 October 2026 |
| Durable — Launch | $22 a month, billed yearly ($25 month to month) | No separate renewal price shown | about $264 | A free plan that is a private preview only | 26 October 2026 |
"No separate renewal price shown" means the page lists one price and no renewal line; most of those builders renew at the same price, but check at checkout. GoDaddy's prices are from 17 October 2026: its pages refused our automated read on the 26th.
How to read a website builder's price
- The sale price is a term. Hostinger's $2.49 needs 48 months paid at once; IONOS's $6 is a one-year term that renews at $14. Divide what you'd pay today by the months you're buying, then read the renewal line: that's the price of the site from then on.
- "Billed yearly" means paid yearly. Most builders show the monthly figure of a yearly plan. Month-to-month costs more where it's offered: Squarespace's $19 is $25 month to month, Weebly's $13 is $16, GoDaddy's $9.99 is $16.99.
- The free domain is a first-year domain. Wix, Squarespace, WordPress.com, Hostinger, IONOS and GoDaddy include a year; after that the name renews at the builder's own registrar price. What a domain costs has the renewal prices at four registrars.
- Free plans publish on the builder's address. yourbusiness.wixsite.com, yourbusiness.wordpress.com, yourbusiness.carrd.co, usually with the builder's ads or banner. Fine for a hobby; for a business, your own domain is the thing the cheap plan is buying.
- Ask what the cheap plan leaves out. On most builders the bottom plan is the site alone: online booking and payments start a plan or two up (Wix Core at $29, GoDaddy's $14.99 plan), or in another product (Squarespace's booking is an Acuity subscription). If the site has to take bookings or send invoices, price the plan that does, not the one in the ad.
Cheap, but what do you give up?
At $0. Google Sites is the honest free option: no ads, no banner, your own domain if you bring one. It's a page builder, not a business site: no AI, no booking or payments, no search titles per page, a Google Form for inquiries. Carrd's free plan and the free Wix and WordPress.com plans give you a live site on their address with their branding on it.
Under $5 a month. Carrd's $19 a year buys a single page on your own domain, which is enough for a card-sized business. WordPress.com's $4 a month buys a real multi-page site, with the AI builder on the paid plans and ads off; the cheapest hosting-company builder, Hostinger, buys a full site too, but only at the 48-month price, and it's a hosting company first.
$10 to $25 a month. GoDaddy, Weebly, Webflow, Wix, Squarespace and Durable's plans are where a business site with its own domain, no ads and room to grow actually sits, which is the $120–$264 a year in the short answer. The differences at this price are features, not money: whether the AI writes the site, whether booking and invoices are in the plan or an add-on, and how you make changes.
Then there's the time. The cheapest plan on a drag-and-drop builder costs your evenings; the AI builders (Wix, Durable, Hostinger, GoDaddy Airo, Squarespace, WordPress.com and Zarla) write the first version for you. Our AI website builders comparison scores what each one's AI does, and the free website builders comparison scores exactly what each free plan lets you publish.
STEP BY STEP
How to get the cheapest website that still does the job
Five steps that keep the price low in year two, not just year one.
Write down what the site must do
Show what you do and where, take a call or a quote request, maybe a booking. Price the plan that does that list; a cheaper plan that can't is a cheaper plan you'll replace.
Price the renewal, not the sale
For each builder, find the renewal line and multiply by 12. Add the domain's renewal price. That number is what you're comparing; the advertised monthly price is what you pay once.
Build it before you pay
Most builders let you build first. Describe the business, or bring your current site across, and look at the whole thing with your own words and photos before a card goes in.
Pay yearly, not for four years
A yearly plan gets most of the discount; a four-year prepay locks you in at a price that was only ever for the first term. Register the domain in your own name, with auto-renew on.
Count what a change costs
A new price, a new service or a new town should be something you can change yourself in a minute. If it isn't, the cheap plan has a running cost the price list doesn't show.
The cheapest website builder for a small business
A plumber, a cleaner, a salon or a bakery needs the site to do five things: name each service and town, show real photos and proof, put the phone number one tap away, take a quote request or a booking, and connect to Google. The cheapest plan that does all five is the cheapest website builder for that business; a $0 plan that does two of them is a brochure.
At the bottom of the price list, that usually means a plan in the $10–$25 range on the builders above, plus whatever booking or invoicing add-on the trade needs. Zarla's approach is to put those in the plan: the AI writes the site from one sentence, and booking, quotes, invoices and the leads inbox come with publishing rather than as separate subscriptions. The price is on the pricing page; the site is free to build and look at first. See what one looks like for your trade: plumbers, cleaners, electricians, landscapers and salons.
Weighing the other routes? How much a website costs compares builders with WordPress, freelancers and agencies, and website hosting for small businesses covers the hosting-company route item by item.
Cheapest website builder: common questions
At the advertised price, Hostinger ($2.49 a month on a 48-month term, then $10.99) and IONOS ($6 a month for a year, then $14); at the price you pay from year two, Carrd ($19 a year, one page), Google Sites ($0, no AI or booking) and WordPress.com ($4 a month billed yearly). For a multi-page business site on your own domain with no ads, the renewal prices run from about $120 to $264 a year across GoDaddy, Hostinger, Weebly, IONOS, Webflow, Wix, Squarespace and Durable (prices read on their own pages, 26 October 2026).
Yes, with conditions. Google Sites is free with a Google Account, with no ads, and connects a domain you own; it has no AI, booking or payments. Wix, WordPress.com, Carrd, Weebly and GoDaddy's Websites + Marketing have free plans that publish on the builder's own address with its ads or banner; Webflow's free plan publishes two pages. Zarla, Durable and GoDaddy's Airo AI builder are free to build and preview and charge to publish; Squarespace and Hostinger start with a free trial.
Carrd's Pro Standard at $19 a year, if one page is enough. For a multi-page site, WordPress.com's Personal plan at $4 a month billed yearly ($48 a year) with a free first-year domain, or Hostinger's builder at $2.49 a month if you're willing to pay 48 months up front and renew at $10.99. Add the domain's renewal price from year two: a .com is about $15 a year at a typical registrar.
Because the advertised price is an introductory rate for the first term, and the renewal price is the plan's real price. Hostinger's $2.49 a month renews at $10.99; IONOS's $6 a month renews at $14. The pages say so, in smaller type under the big number; this guide prints both in the same size.
It's real for the first term: $2.49 a month is $119.52 paid at once for 48 months, and the plan renews at $10.99 a month, so about $132 a year from year five. For four years it is the cheapest full builder here; the question is whether you want to pay four years up front for a site you haven't built yet (read on hostinger.com, 26 October 2026).
On the bottom plan, by $2 a month: Wix Light is $17 a month for a yearly subscription and Squarespace Basic is $19 a month billed annually ($25 month to month). With online booking, the gap closes: Wix needs Core at $29, and Squarespace's booking is a separate Acuity Scheduling subscription on top of any plan. Both include a first-year domain with a yearly plan and have a free way to start: Wix a free plan with ads, Squarespace a 14-day trial.
For a site on your own domain: $4 (WordPress.com) to $25 (Durable, Squarespace month to month) a month on the plans in this guide, with most business-grade bottom plans at $13–$22 a month billed yearly. Plans with online booking or an online store built in run higher on every builder. Prices read on each builder's own page, October 2026.
The cheapest plan that does the five things a small business site must do: services and towns, real photos, a tap-to-call number, a quote or booking form, and the Google connection. On the builders here that's a $10–$25 plan plus any booking add-on the trade needs. A $0 plan that does two of the five is cheaper and costs more, because the calls go elsewhere.
Zarla is free to build and preview: the AI writes and designs the whole site from one description, and you can edit it as much as you like before paying anything. You pay when you publish, and the current plans are on the pricing page; they include hosting, the security certificate, the SEO setup, forms, online booking, quotes, invoices and the leads inbox.
Where these prices come from
Every price on this page was read on the builder's own pricing page on the date beside it, in US dollars before tax, and the yearly figures are our arithmetic on the published monthly prices (× 12). Builders change prices without notice; the date is the guarantee. Related: how much a website costs, website hosting for small businesses, what a domain name costs and Zarla's free AI website builder.
- Google Sites — pricing — read 26 October 2026
- Carrd — pricing — read 26 October 2026
- WordPress.com — pricing — read 26 October 2026
- GoDaddy Websites + Marketing — pricing — read 17 October 2026 (its pages refused automated reads on 26 October 2026)
- Hostinger Website Builder — pricing — read 26 October 2026
- Weebly — pricing — read 26 October 2026
- IONOS MyWebsite — pricing — read 26 October 2026
- Webflow — pricing — read 26 October 2026
- Wix — pricing — read 26 October 2026
- Squarespace — pricing — read 26 October 2026
- Durable — pricing — read 26 October 2026
See the website before you compare the prices
Describe your business in one line and Zarla builds the whole site: pages, words, photos and the Google setup. Build, edit and preview free; you pay only when you publish, and the current plans are on the pricing page.
Already have a website? Bring it across →Zarla keeps your old page addresses where it can and redirects the ones that change, helping you keep the Google standing you've built.