How long does it take to build a website?
The honest answer is that build time is rarely the constraint. Most website projects take as long as the slowest person supplying content, which is usually the client. Here are realistic numbers, and where the time actually goes.
Typical timelines
- Small brochure site, 3-5 pages: two to three weeks from sign-off.
- Standard business site, 8-15 pages with a CMS: four to six weeks.
- Site with custom functionality — booking, accounts, payments: six to twelve weeks.
- Web application: months, and it should be scoped in phases rather than quoted as one date.
Where the time actually goes
For a typical small business site: design and revisions take about a week, the build takes one to two, testing and fixes take a few days, and launch is a day. That is under three weeks of work. Projects that take four months are almost never four months of building — they are three weeks of building spread across four months of waiting.
What causes delays
- Content. By a wide margin the biggest cause.
- Too many decision-makers. Every additional approver adds a revision round.
- Scope added mid-build. Reasonable requests, but each one moves the date.
- Domain and hosting access nobody can find.
- Third-party integrations, where you are dependent on someone else's API and support queue.
How to spot an unrealistic quote
Be wary of anyone promising a custom site in three days, and equally wary of four months for a five-page brochure site. The first suggests a template with your logo dropped in; the second suggests you are low priority in someone's queue. Ask what happens in each week — a developer who has thought about delivery can tell you.
How to make it faster
Write your content first. Nominate one person to sign off. Sort out domain access before you start. Give feedback in batches rather than as it occurs to you. Those four things routinely halve elapsed time, and none of them cost anything.