Law firm websites are priced differently from other small-business sites, and not always for good reasons. Here is what the options actually cost.
The three ways firms buy a website
Vendor platforms — $200–$1,500/month, indefinitely
The legal-marketing platforms. You pay monthly, forever, and in most arrangements you do not own the site. Stop paying and it disappears — along with the rankings you spent years earning. Over five years at even $300/month that is $18,000, and you finish with nothing you can take with you.
General freelancer — $800–$2,500 once
Cheapest up front. The risk is that legal has requirements a general designer will not know to ask about: practice-area structure, bar advertising rules, and intake that handles sensitive facts properly.
Custom build — $2,500–$4,500 once
Ours. You own the code, the content and the domain. Additional practice-area pages are $150–$200 each. Hosting is $150/year. Maintenance is optional from $299/month, and the site keeps working if you stop.
The number that actually matters
Not the invoice — the five-year total, and what you hold at the end of it.
- Vendor at $300/month: $18,000, and you own nothing.
- Custom at $3,500 + hosting: about $4,250, and you own everything.
Even adding maintenance for all five years, the custom route finishes with an asset instead of a cancelled subscription.
What drives a law firm quote up
- Practice areas. The main driver. Each area needs a real page to rank for its own searches — a combined list ranks for none of them.
- Attorney bios. Each attorney is effectively a page. Prospects search for people by name.
- Intake. A form carrying facts about a legal problem before any engagement letter exists deserves proper handling — validated server-side, rate-limited, delivered straight to the firm.
- Migration. Leaving a vendor means mapping every old URL so the rankings survive the move.
Questions to ask before you sign anything
- Do I own the source code?
- Who holds the domain registration? (Check this today — it is where switches get stuck.)
- What happens to the site if I stop paying?
- Can I take the content with me?
- What is the notice period?
- Is each practice area its own page, or one combined list?
Question two catches more firms than the rest combined. Look up your own domain's registration record before you do anything else.
A note on bar advertising rules
They vary by state and typically cover disclaimers, claims about results, and how testimonials may be used. Build the site so required disclaimers are easy to place and keep current. Confirming what your state bar requires is the attorney's call — this is information, not legal advice.