Quick answer
Most small business websites cost about $20–$400 per month to own. Hosting alone typically runs $20–$200 a month, and published 2026 Chicago pricing guides put total ongoing costs, including maintenance and updates, at roughly $100–$400 a month. Online stores, paid plugins and marketing add more.
Monthly costs, line by line
Typical market ranges from published 2026 Chicago pricing guides. These are not Media Express prices.
| Cost item | Typical range | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Hosting | $20–$200 per month | Depends on traffic, speed, backups and support level |
| Domain name | Yearly renewal | Small for common extensions; keep it in your name |
| Maintenance and updates | Part of $100–$400 per month total ongoing cost | Core, theme and plugin updates, backups, monitoring |
| Licenses | Varies | Premium plugins, themes, fonts, booking or form tools |
| Business email | Varies per mailbox | Often billed separately from hosting |
312 Digital describes a realistic Chicago small business budget as $3,500–$12,000 to build plus $100–$300 a month to run.
What pushes the monthly cost up or down
- Who does the work. Doing updates yourself costs time; a plan costs money but saves it.
- Site type. A brochure site needs less care than a store with payments and inventory.
- Plugins and integrations. Each one adds licenses and update risk.
- Hosting quality. Cheap shared hosting can be slow; managed hosting costs more but includes backups and support.
- How often content changes. Weekly updates cost more than yearly ones.
Builder subscription vs owned website
With a DIY builder such as Wix or Squarespace, hosting, security and updates are bundled into one subscription; published guides put DIY at about $0–$500 a year. You pay for convenience and accept the platform’s limits. With an owned WordPress site, you pay hosting and maintenance separately but keep full control of files and data. See WordPress vs Wix vs Squarespace.
Hidden monthly costs
- Emergency fixes after a failed update or hack, often billed at hourly rates.
- Renewals that start low and increase after the first year.
- Paid add-ons for features you assumed were included.
- Lost leads when a broken form goes unnoticed.
Example: estimating your first year
A simple way to see the real cost is to add the build price to twelve months of ongoing costs. Using figures inside the published ranges above, a hypothetical small business site might look like this:
- Build: $3,500 (low end of the $3,500–$12,000 realistic budget).
- Ongoing care: $150 a month, or $1,800 a year.
- First-year total: about $5,300, plus the domain and any licenses.
This is an illustration, not a quote. The point is that ongoing costs add a large share to the first year, so compare proposals on total first-year cost, not on the build price alone. In year two and beyond, the monthly side is most of what you pay, which is why it deserves the same scrutiny as the build.
What Media Express offers
Media Express offers monthly plans that combine the website with ongoing care. Plan contents and prices are agreed in writing before you commit; we do not publish a fixed monthly price because scope differs by site. You keep ownership of your domain, content and access (see website ownership), and everyday text and photos can be edited with Szef Editor. See website maintenance.
Related
Questions and answers
How much does it cost monthly to own a website?
For a small business, typically $20–$400 a month. Hosting runs about $20–$200 a month, and published 2026 Chicago guides put total ongoing costs, including maintenance, at roughly $100–$400 a month.
How much should I pay for website maintenance per month?
Published 2026 Chicago guides put ongoing website costs at about $100–$400 a month. A simple brochure site sits at the lower end; stores and frequently updated sites sit higher.
Is website hosting a monthly cost?
Usually yes, although some hosts bill yearly. Typical hosting runs $20–$200 a month depending on speed, backups and support.
Can I own a website without monthly fees?
Not entirely. Hosting and the domain always cost something. You can keep costs low by editing content yourself and choosing a simple, lightweight site.
Does Media Express offer monthly website plans?
Yes. Monthly plans are available. What is included and the price are agreed in writing before you commit.
Learn more about website design Chicago businesses have trusted since 1995.
More guides
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- Is AI replacing web design?
- WordPress vs Wix vs Squarespace
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- What a small business website should include
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- How to get cited by AI
- Website cost by industry (Chicago)
Popular pages
Our own audience
We don’t buy traffic. We create it.
Most agencies build a website and leave you to find visitors. Media Express owns the audience. Polish Network is the largest Polish-American network of owned media in the USA: 120+ of our own websites and portals, social media channels and news portals.
We also run the world’s largest aggregator of Polish radio stations, with 300+ stations from Poland, the United States and the diaspora in one place. We are building the American edition now, and next an edition for every country.
And we run your business on Szef.AI, our own AI operating system and CRM that works with everything, everywhere. New and better AI models appear every day, and Szef.AI is already connected to them. It is a solution nobody can match.
More than 8 million Americans report Polish ancestry (U.S. Census Bureau). Through our network, millions of people can become your customers. A typical web design agency cannot offer you this.
Ready to talk about your website?
31+ years of continuous web work, same-day website design that grows from a business card site to a portal for millions of views, a media network of our own, Szef.AI, our AI operating system connected to every new model, and direct access to the people who build your site. Tell us what you have in mind; you will get a clear recommendation, scope and price before any work begins.