How long does it take to build a website? The answer to that question can depend on a few different factors.
Each website is unique. While two sites may appear similar or serve similar functions, they are their own projects with unique goals. Creating your website can and should take time.
Delivering an exact timeline estimate at the beginning can be hard, even for experienced professionals like us at Website Design Kingston.
To help you understand the average time to develop a website, first, you need to understand the factors that can impact the timeline.
Timeline Factors of a Website Development Project
For website development projects, there are lots of factors that can impact the timeline for completion. It is not a simple process. In fact, if it were simple, you’d probably have the skills and the time you need to complete the project yourself.
When asking how many hours it takes to create a website, you need to understand that it will take some time. This is why it is essential to hire a web designer.
A successful, professionally-designed website will be worth the wait! There are a number of things that can speed up or slow down the design process. Here are some of the most significant factors that can impact the completion of your website project.
When Can The Developers Get Started
Obviously, the sooner the developers can get started, the sooner you will have your site up and running. The vast majority of web design agencies are busy, which means there may be a waiting period before they can even begin your project. While this may be frustrating, it is actually a good thing.
Any website design and development agency worth their salt will be busy. A busy design agency is the sign of a high-quality product. When thinking about your site launch timeline, plan for this delay. Most things worth having are worth waiting for.
Website Size and Complexity
The bigger and more complex your website, the longer it will take to build.
If your site is 10 pages, that could take a few weeks. If it is 50 or even 100 pages, it could take two or three times that to produce a final product. On top of that, if your site has custom user dashboards or built-in payment processing, that also adds to the timeline.
All of these elements need to be designed and built, but they also need to be tested on all devices and for functionality. The more pages, the more complex your site automatically becomes as all pages must be pointing in the right direction.
Website Functionality
Website functionality is the ease with which users can navigate your site, find what they are looking for, and perform the actions you wish them to take.
Some examples of website functionality include:
- eCommerce
- Payment processing
- In-site search
- Photo gallery
- Video library
- Location map
- Forms
- Memberships
- Social sharing tools
- Blog
- Events calendar
- Dashboards
Each one of these functionalities will improve user experience on your page which is important for keeping people on your site and increasing website conversions.
Because they are a bit more complex, these things add to your timeline. Each bit of functionality added to your site requires planning, development, execution and troubleshooting. They may be ‘simple’ on their face but connecting them all within your website as a whole is time-consuming.
Website Design and Number of Unique Page Designs
Some sites are relatively quick and easy to build. A few pages with a simple design will be the fastest to build. Other sites need more complex designs or include many different page designs.
The websites with complex designs or multiple designs will take longer to complete. Not only do these sites require more careful planning, but they also require more execution time.
Your website design is important. It is the online entrance to your brand or business so you need to ensure that it properly represents you. The right website design will pay for itself in the long run so be patient with your timelines.
Content and Assets
Many of the factors that determine the time it takes to build your website are out of your control, but there are certain things you can do to help speed up particular stages of the process. Having your site content and assets ready to go can help shorten build time.
Things like brand assets, required images, page copy, and product descriptions should be handed over to the design team as soon as possible. If the content is delayed or assets aren’t ready when asked, it will increase your timeline and may lead to more revisions, holding up the timeline even more.
Client Engagement and Response Times
As a client, your engagement levels and response times can play a role in the time it takes to build your website. As mentioned above, having your assets and content ready can make a big difference in your overall timeline, but beyond that, being engaged and responsive during the process is important, too.
Things come up over the course of a website build. Your team may have questions that only you can answer, or they may need information and details that only you can provide. Perhaps something requires your approval before other elements can be worked on and completed.
If it takes days to respond to questions or requests from your website developers, those are days that will be added to the timeline. The sooner you respond, the sooner your team can get back to work and the sooner the project can be completed.
Requested Revisions
When you receive a timeline estimate at the outset of the project, it is in reference to a design plan and scope agreed upon by both parties, but sometimes plans change or the scope of the project widens.
This is okay, sometimes it is hard to know exactly what you want until you see what you definitely do not. It is important to remember that the number of revisions or additional requests outside of the original scope of the project will increase the timeline. You deserve to get what you want, but the more deviations from the original plan, the more the timeline will change.
Summary: Average Time to Build a Website
As you can see, there is a lot that goes into determining the average hours needed to build a website. From the size and complexity of the site to the responsiveness of the client, narrowing down a hard finish date is difficult.
In general, a typical website could take at least 12 weeks from the beginning to the launch, but this timeline also depends on the type of site you are building.
For example, simple landing pages will take less time than a full eCommerce website. At a minimum, a landing page will require around 22 hours, a business site needs 55-70 hours, and an eCommerce or Membership site is closer to 150 hours.
While your decisions will be determined by your budget and other considerations, the timeline shouldn’t necessarily be one of them. Certainly, you want your site done as quickly as possible, but high-quality website design services or website development services will take time.
If you’re ready to move your website project toward the planning and development stages, it is time to reach out to WDK. Contact us today to get started!
Additional Resources:
- Why Hire a Web Designer?
- Benefits of Website Maintenance
- What is the Difference between Frontend and Backend Web Development?
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