Ask three suppliers to quote for a clinic website and the numbers will differ by an order of magnitude for what sounds like the same job. That is not because somebody is overcharging. It is because "a website" describes several different products.
The useful question is not what it costs. It is what is included, what recurs, and who can change it afterwards.
What actually moves the price
- Pages, and who writes them. A practice that supplies its own text pays for build. One that needs the treatment pages written pays for writing, which is usually the larger number.
- Bookings. A brochure site is a fraction of the cost of one that takes appointments against real availability, because the diary is the complicated part.
- Multiple practitioners or locations. Each adds structure rather than pages: separate diaries, separate addresses, separate hours.
- Payments. Taking deposits at booking means a payment provider, its fees and a checkout that has to be right.
- Design from scratch. A bespoke design is the most visible cost and, for a clinic, rarely the one that changes how many appointments get booked.
The costs a quote usually leaves out
The build price is not the price. Add the domain, the hosting, the ongoing platform or maintenance fee, the payment provider's percentage, and whatever it costs to have somebody change a set of opening hours.
That last one is worth pricing explicitly. A practice that has to raise a support ticket to correct its Christmas hours will either pay repeatedly or leave the hours wrong, and the second is more common.
Build versus configure
A custom build can do anything, but only what is actually built exists, and appointment scheduling is a large piece of work that is easy to underestimate at quoting time. A configured platform starts with the diary already working and asks you to set your services and hours instead.
For most single-site practices the second is the better trade. The cases for a bespoke build are real but specific: an unusual booking model, an integration with software you already run, or a structure no template expresses. Current platform prices are listed on the pricing page.
Judge it against what it replaces
A clinic website is not a marketing expense in isolation. If it removes an hour of reception time a day by answering availability questions, that is the number to compare the running cost against.
The same applies to no-shows: reminders and self-service rescheduling have a measurable value, discussed in reducing patient no-shows, and a site that does neither is cheaper for a reason.
Questions worth asking before you sign
- Who owns the domain and the content, and what happens if we part ways?
- Can our own staff change hours, prices and text without paying for it?
- Does the price include taking appointments, or is booking a separate product?
- What is the total annual cost in year two, when the build is finished?
- How long from signing to a site patients can actually use?
The last question eliminates more quotes than the first four. If you want to see what the configured version looks like, the medical templates and the booking website builder show what is included before anybody quotes.
FAQ
Is a cheap clinic website a false economy?
It is when it cannot take an appointment. A site that only displays information leaves the whole booking process on the phone, so its real cost is the reception time it failed to remove.
Should a new practice spend more or less at the start?
Less, and revisit it once you know how patients actually contact you. First-year assumptions about which treatments matter are usually wrong, and a cheap site is easier to change than an expensive one.
Does taking payments online add much cost?
It adds a payment provider's percentage per transaction rather than a large fixed cost. Whether it is worth it depends on whether you take deposits at all.
What does the second year cost?
Whatever recurs: domain, hosting or platform, payment fees and any maintenance retainer. Ask for that figure separately, because it is the one you will pay every year rather than once.
Can we start small and add bookings later?
Yes, and many practices do. The thing to check before starting is that adding a diary later does not mean rebuilding the site around it.
Compare your options
- Webkio vs Squarespace - the same site priced on an all-in-one builder.
- Webkio vs WordPress - and what self-managing really costs.