What Does a Trades Website Cost in Ireland in 2026?
You can spend €300 on a trades website. You can also spend €8,000. Neither figure is automatically right or wrong. It depends entirely on what you get for the money and what the website does for your business afterwards.
The problem is that most tradespeople don’t know what they’re comparing when they get quotes, so they either go too cheap (and get something that doesn’t work) or pay too much (for things they don’t need). Here’s the honest breakdown of what each option actually involves.
DIY website builders: Wix, Squarespace, and the rest
The cheapest route is building it yourself using one of the drag-and-drop platforms. Squarespace is the most polished. Wix is the most flexible. Both cost approximately €15–€25 per month including hosting.
The real cost isn’t the subscription. It’s your time. Building a decent trades website from scratch on one of these platforms takes most people 15–25 hours, spread across a weekend and several evenings. That time has a value.
The result, if you’re willing to invest that time and have some design instinct, can be perfectly adequate. The limitations are in the detail. DIY sites frequently have:
- Generic, template-look aesthetics that don’t build trade-specific credibility
- Poor mobile performance if the template isn’t chosen carefully
- No local SEO setup, as the settings that tell Google what you do and where are often misconfigured or ignored entirely
- No ongoing maintenance plan, as these sites get built and then never updated
For a tradesperson who is tech-comfortable, has the time, and is willing to learn the basics of GBP and local SEO separately, a DIY build is a legitimate starting point. For everyone else, the time cost makes it less attractive than it first appears.
Hiring a freelancer
The middle ground is hiring a freelance web designer or developer to build the site for you. In Ireland in 2026, expect to pay €800–€2,500 for a straightforward 5–8 page trades website.
The range reflects quality and experience. A student or recent graduate might charge €600–€900. An experienced freelancer with a portfolio of local business sites will charge €1,500–€2,500.
What you typically get for this money: a custom-designed site built to your brief, basic SEO setup (title tags, meta descriptions, your location mentioned), mobile-responsive design, and a handover where they show you how to update content.
What you typically don’t get: ongoing maintenance, local SEO ongoing work, hosting (usually a separate €100–€200/year), or anything after the handover. The site is built and then it’s your problem.
The hidden cost of freelancer-built sites is maintenance. Platforms, plugins, and security need to be updated. Most tradespeople aren’t able or willing to do this themselves. When something breaks six months after the freelancer has been paid and moved on, the repair quote for a new person to pick up someone else’s code is often higher than expected.
Web agencies
Agencies, proper digital agencies with a team, an office, and a case study portfolio, charge €3,000–€10,000+ for a small business website.
You’re paying for project management, multiple specialists (designer, developer, copywriter), a formal process, and a guarantee that the project won’t disappear if one person gets sick or busy. For larger businesses with complex requirements, this makes sense.
For a sole trader or small trades business needing a clean 6–8 page website, you are almost certainly paying for overhead you don’t benefit from. The site a large agency builds for €6,000 is rarely six times better than what a good freelancer builds for €1,000. It’s a different experience to work with an agency, but the end product for a simple trades site often isn’t dramatically different.
Monthly website services
A newer model, and the one that makes most sense for most trades businesses, is an all-inclusive monthly service covering website build, hosting, maintenance, updates, and local SEO for a flat monthly fee.
Our Digital for Trades service is €49 per month with no setup fee. That covers: a professional website built specifically for your trade and location, hosting and security maintenance, Google Business Profile setup and management, local SEO, and monthly reporting.
The economics are straightforward. At €49/month, the annual cost is €588. Compare that to €1,500–€2,500 for a freelancer-built site that needs separate hosting, separate maintenance, and no ongoing SEO. Over two years, the monthly model is often cheaper in total, and you have the ongoing support and SEO work included.
The downside of monthly services is that the website typically belongs to the provider, not you. If you stop paying, the site comes down. This is the trade-off. For businesses focused on practical outcomes rather than asset ownership, it’s usually an acceptable arrangement, especially at this price point.
What actually matters vs what’s nice to have
Before spending anything, be clear on what a trades website needs to do: appear in local searches, convince visitors you’re credible, and make it easy to contact you. That’s it.
What you need: fast mobile performance, your trade and location clearly stated, real photos of your work, customer testimonials, a prominent phone number, a working contact form, and basic local SEO in place.
What you don’t need: elaborate animations, a live chat widget, a blog you’ll never update, an e-commerce section, or a custom booking system for a business that primarily operates by phone.
The temptation when briefing a website is to add features. Resist it. A simple site that loads fast and converts visitors is worth more than a complex site that confuses people and loads slowly.
Want a professional trades website without the agency price tag?
Our Digital for Trades service gets you a website built for enquiries, live on Google, and maintained every month, from €49/month, no setup fee.
Book a free 30-minute call. We’ll show you exactly what you’d get for your trade and your area.
Or read next: 5 Things Every Irish Trades Website Must Have to Get Enquiries