Short answer: A small-business website in Dubai typically costs AED 1,000 to 4,000 as a freelancer or template build, AED 5,000 to 30,000 as a custom site from a small studio, and AED 18,000 upward for a custom-designed marketing site with its own content system — all before 5% VAT. E-commerce starts around AED 8,000 and can pass AED 110,000 as the catalogue and integrations grow. The cost most quotes leave out is what the site takes to run afterwards.
This is for founders and marketing managers in the UAE who have collected three quotes that do not resemble each other — one for AED 2,000, one for AED 25,000, one for AED 90,000 — and want to know what is actually different between them before signing anything. As of September 2026, the honest answer is that all three can be reasonable prices, because they are rarely quotes for the same thing.
The price ranges below come from UAE web studios' own published pricing, cross-checked against each other. Where a range is wide, the width is the point: it shows how far one decision — template or custom, five pages or fifty, one language or three — can move the number.
What determines the price of a website in Dubai?
A website's price is set by what has to be built, not by how many pages the sitemap lists. A five-page template site and a five-page custom site with a booking engine, an Arabic version and a content system behind it are both honestly "five pages" — and can differ in price by a factor of twenty.
That is why quotes for what looks like "the same website" range from four figures to six. They are quoting different amounts of design, different amounts of engineering, and often a different person doing the actual work.
Website price tiers in Dubai, and what each one actually buys
| Tier | Price (AED, excl. VAT) | What you get | Typical timeline | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| DIY builder or template | No build fee, subscription only | You assemble it yourself on a platform such as Wix, Shopify or WordPress.com | Days | Testing an idea before committing budget |
| Freelancer or template agency | 1,000 – 4,000 | A stock theme with your logo, colours and text, five or six pages | 3 days – 3 weeks | A single-location business that needs to exist online now |
| Small-business custom site | 5,000 – 30,000 | Original layout, a content management system you can edit, basic on-page SEO | 3 – 6 weeks | A business past the template stage that still runs lean |
| Custom-designed marketing site with CMS | 18,000 – 80,000 | UX research, a design system, multilingual and right-to-left build, technical SEO | 4 – 8 weeks | A brand competing on more than price |
| E-commerce | 8,000 – 110,000+ | A gateway and a handful of products at the low end; full catalogue, logistics integrations and custom checkout at the high end | 2 – 12 weeks | Anyone selling products online |
| Web application or portal | Quoted by phase, above custom-site pricing | Logins, dashboards and custom workflows — priced like software, not a website | 8 weeks+ | Booking systems, client portals, marketplaces |
The ranges in the first five rows come from three UAE studios' published pricing — Tenet's Dubai website cost guide, Owebest's 2026 pricing guide and The Web Makers' fixed packages — plus 4AI's own published floor of AED 18,000 for a focused marketing site. That floor is one data point in this market, not the benchmark for it. If what you actually need is logins, a dashboard or real-time data rather than pages of content, you are pricing software, and what that costs to build in the UAE is a separate, larger conversation.
What pushes a quote up or down?
Templates cost less than custom design because someone else already made the decisions; custom design costs more because a designer is making them for you, which is most of what "brand" means in practice. After that first choice, these are the things that move a Dubai website quote most:
- Page types, not page count. A product page repeated two hundred times costs far less than five different custom layouts.
- Copy and photography. A quote that includes them is not comparable with one that expects you to supply them.
- Integrations. A CRM, a booking system or a payment gateway each adds build and testing time.
- Catalogue size. For anything selling products, every product type, variant and filter is work.
- Performance, SEO and accessibility. Done before launch, it is part of the price; left for later, it becomes a second invoice.
- Languages. A bilingual or trilingual build with real right-to-left Arabic changes the design system, not just the word count.
That last point deserves reading before you scope it: what breaks when Arabic is a translated afterthought instead of a first-class design. A native Arabic version adds real design and typography work, not just a translation fee. Which language to lead with in the first place is its own decision, covered in choosing Arabic or English for UAE marketing.
What does a website cost to run every year?
| Cost | Typical range (excl. VAT) | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| .ae domain (per year) | Varies by registrar | Sold only through registrars accredited by the TDRA |
| .com domain (per year) | Varies by registrar | International registrars; renews annually |
| SSL certificate | Usually free | Bundled with most modern hosts |
| Hosting (per year) | Low for a brochure site; higher for managed WordPress or a busy store | Modern hosts often have a free tier for a small site, then bill by usage |
| Payment gateway fee (per transaction) | 2.9% + AED 1 (Stripe, domestic cards) | +1% for international cards, +1% more if currency conversion applies |
| Maintenance retainer (per month) | From about AED 299, published | Scales with how much content and functionality changes |
| VAT (on every service fee) | 5% | Standard UAE rate, in effect since 1 January 2018 |
A .ae domain can only be registered through a registrar accredited by the UAE's Telecommunications and Digital Government Regulatory Authority (TDRA), which administers the .ae space — the TDRA publishes the accredited list, so check it rather than taking a seller's word. If you build on Shopify, its plans are billed monthly by tier and priced by region, so check the pricing page from the UAE before you budget. Stripe's 2.9% + AED 1 is its published UAE card rate; businesses here also compare Telr, Tap, Network International's N-Genius, Checkout.com and PayTabs for card acceptance, and Tabby or Tamara where paying in instalments matters to the customer. This article does not rank them — each prices, settles and integrates differently, and published fees change, so read each provider's own pricing page before choosing.
Opening a live payment account needs a licensed business behind it. If you plan to sell only through your own site and social media, without a shop, Dubai's Department of Economy and Tourism issues an e-Trader licence for that case through the Invest in Dubai portal — confirm the current conditions there, since this is not licensing advice. Many small Dubai shops also take orders through WhatsApp with cash on delivery rather than online payment; that is a legitimate way to start, and it keeps the first version of a store simpler and cheaper.
Red flags in a cheap quote, and the ownership checklist
A cheap quote is not automatically a bad one, but a handful of patterns reliably predict trouble: a template resold with no source files ever handed over; a domain registered in the agency's name instead of yours; a "free website" bundled into a long SEO or ads contract, so the site is never actually paid for — or owned; renewal fees charged later for code you were told you already owned; and no mention of backups or a staging environment anywhere in the proposal.
Before you sign anything, confirm five things belong to you, not the agency:
- The domain and hosting account, registered in your name
- Full admin access to the content management system
- The source code, or a repository you can access directly
- Your own analytics and tag manager accounts
- The original design files, not just exported images
The full contract checklist — what to put in writing beyond ownership, and the questions to ask before you hire anyone goes further than a website brief needs, but the same protections apply.
Do you still need a website if you already have Instagram?
Yes, for two reasons that have nothing to do with taste. Search still sends people who are ready to buy, not scroll, and a search for your business name that turns up no website looks unfinished next to a competitor who has one. AI assistants are the newer reason: when someone asks ChatGPT or Google's AI features to recommend a business like yours, the answer is built from pages the assistant can read and cite, and a website you control is the most dependable of those. What actually gets a UAE business recommended by ChatGPT goes into this in detail. Instagram is a channel you rent. A website is the property you own outright.
How 4AI prices a website
4AI's websites start from AED 18,000 for a focused marketing site, excluding VAT, typically four to six weeks from kickoff to launch, built on Next.js with Supabase behind it — multilingual and right-to-left from the first commit, not retrofitted. Two revision rounds are built into every scope, and the domain, hosting and platform accounts are created in the client's name or transferred to it, with the source handed over. Full scope and deliverables are on the web design and development page; interface and UX work that needs its own research and testing round is priced separately, starting at AED 12,000. We are one studio among several whose prices appear in this article — read our numbers with the same scepticism as anyone else's, or talk to us before you brief three more agencies.
One more check, whoever you hire: contract a UAE entity. A Dubai landing page is not proof of one. Ask for an AED contract and a VAT invoice showing a Tax Registration Number (TRN) before you pay anything — a real UAE business can produce both without being asked twice.
Frequently asked questions
Can I get a decent business website in Dubai for AED 2,000?
You can get a website for that — a stock template with your logo and text swapped in — but not a custom one. Published freelancer and template-agency packages in Dubai run from about AED 1,000 to 2,500 for five or six pages on a theme, which is a reasonable choice for a business that needs to exist online now. What you should not expect at that price is original design, copywriting, or a site built to be extended later.
Is VAT included in website quotes in the UAE?
Usually not, so ask. The standard UAE VAT rate is 5%, charged on top of the service fee, and a proper invoice from a VAT-registered UAE business shows it separately along with the company's Tax Registration Number. If a quote does not mention VAT at all, raise it before you sign, not after the invoice arrives.
How much does it cost to add an Arabic version to my website?
It depends whether "Arabic version" means translated copy on the existing English layout or a properly designed right-to-left build — they are different projects. A translated add-on costs relatively little. A native Arabic design pass, with its own typography and layout direction, is closer to pricing a second site than an add-on, because right-to-left is a different layout system, not a mirrored one.
How much does website maintenance cost per month?
Published UAE maintenance retainers start around AED 299 a month for basic care — backups, updates, security scans and minor content edits on a template site. Larger sites with frequent content changes, several languages or an active e-commerce catalogue cost more to maintain, scaled to how much actually changes month to month.
How long does a website take to build in Dubai?
A template or freelancer build can go live in three days to three weeks. A custom-designed marketing site with a content system typically takes four to eight weeks from kickoff — 4AI's own published turnaround is four to six weeks for a focused marketing site. E-commerce and web applications take longer, because payment, catalogue or account logic has to be built and tested, not just styled.
Is WordPress cheaper than a custom site over three years?
Not automatically. WordPress can be the cheaper build, but plugin licences, frequent security updates and a wider attack surface add up over three years — a fair comparison includes hosting, maintenance and the plugins a real site ends up needing, not just the initial build. A custom build on a modern stack often costs more upfront and less to maintain; which wins depends on how long you keep the site and how often it changes.