How much does website or app maintenance cost per year?
Annual maintenance for a website or web application typically runs a modest percentage of the original build cost, but the exact number depends heavily on the scale of the project and the scope of your SLA, from a fairly small amount for a simple business website to a much larger one for an online store or web application. In this article we break that number down so you know exactly what you’re paying for.
What actually falls under maintenance?
- Hosting and domain, the infrastructure your site runs on, including renewals
- Security updates, patching vulnerabilities before they become a problem, including CMS core, plugin and library updates
- Backups, regular data backups and the ability to restore quickly if something goes wrong
- Uptime monitoring, catching outages before a customer does
- Small fixes and improvements, content changes, new features, performance tuning
What does a good SLA actually look like?
An SLA (Service Level Agreement) is a contract that precisely defines how quickly a provider responds to a request, which issues are covered under maintenance, and which require a separate quote. A good SLA answers questions like: are security updates included in the price, how many developer hours does the monthly package cover, and how fast does the provider respond to a critical outage outside normal business hours.
Hidden costs that are easy to overlook
Many businesses forget to budget for license renewals, third-party API fees, or the time needed to respond to incidents outside standard business hours. Another common issue is unclear ownership of content updates, whether text and image changes are included in the package or billed separately.
What happens without ongoing technical care
A website without ongoing care becomes slower, harder to extend, and more vulnerable to attacks over time. Outdated plugins and libraries are one of the most common attack vectors on sites built with popular CMS platforms. Regular maintenance and development isn’t an extra cost, it’s how you protect the investment you already made in building the site or app.
Ask about a maintenance plan sized to fit your website or application.