For therapists
What a Therapist Website Actually Costs in 2026 (Every Price, Added Up)
Every website company shows you a monthly price. Almost none of them show you the three-year total, and none of them show you the last column that matters: what you still own when you stop paying. This page is the whole arithmetic (rented therapist sites, DIY builders, and custom builds) with the honest costs of each, including the ones that aren't money.
Prices below come from the providers' published pricing pages or our June 2026 pricing research; the fine print at the bottom says which is which. Your numbers may differ; the math is the point, and it's easy to redo with your own quotes.
The pieces every option includes (or should)
A practice website is really four things: a domain name ($10–$20 a year, and it should always be registered to you, in your own account); hosting (often bundled, nearly free on its own); the site itself (design, pages, copy); and upkeep, the person or company who fixes, updates, and answers. Rented plans bundle all four into one monthly bill, which is convenient, and also why leaving is expensive: canceling the bill usually cancels the site.
One more line most comparisons skip: if your website forms collect anything clinical, you need a vendor who'll sign a HIPAA business associate agreement. With the big rented therapist sites that's typically a paid add-on (Brighter Vision's runs through Hushmail, from about $15/month), and with the general-purpose builders it isn't available at all, so clinical intake has to live elsewhere.
Option 1: Therapist-specific rentals
Brighter Vision publishes three tiers: $99, $179, and $349 a month, plus a $100 setup fee on the two lower tiers (annual billing drops the months to $78/$143/$299). Three years on the entry tier, billed monthly: about $3,700. Three years on the top tier: about $12,700. When you cancel, their own FAQ is clear that the domain stays yours, and the site, design, and copy stay theirs.
TherapySites runs $69 to $336 a month plus a $199 setup fee, month-to-month with no long-term contract. Friendlier terms, same structure. Three years: roughly $2,700 to $12,300, and their published position is that you don't own the website.
For that money you get real things: professional templates, someone else holding the maintenance, no weekends lost. The three-year price of that convenience is simply higher than most people compute at signup, and the exit value is close to zero.
Option 2: Do it yourself
Squarespace (~$16–$39/month) and Wix (~$17–$29–$39/month) are the honest budget answer: roughly $600–$1,400 over three years, modern templates, domain typically included the first year. The costs that don't show on the invoice: the weekends you spend building it, the evenings you spend not-quite-fixing it, and the compliance line above: neither signs a BAA, so intake forms must stay non-clinical. If you enjoy the work, this is the cheapest cash path on this page. If you don't, the site tends to freeze at whatever it looked like the weekend you finished it.
Option 3: A flat-fee build you own
A practice site built once, for a fixed price, with ownership assigned to you in the contract, typically runs $1,500–$5,000 depending on scope (booking, intake, portal). Three-year total: the build price, plus $10–$20 a year for the domain. The meter stops. If you want a human keeping it monitored and updated, an optional care plan (a fair market rate is $29–$49/month) adds $1,000–$1,800 over three years, and "optional" is the load-bearing word: cancel it and the site keeps running, because it's yours.
The bill you're already paying
Most practices also run an EHR. SimplePractice's published solo plans ($49, $79, and $99 a month) already include scheduling, telehealth, and a client portal on the clinical side. That's a reasonable bill for a system of record. It's worth naming because the common stack ends up as EHR rent + website rent, two subscriptions with overlapping features, where the website layer is the one that can be owned outright instead.
The whole table
| Option | Up front | Monthly | 3-year total | You stop paying: what's left? |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Brighter Vision | $100 (waived top tier) | $99–$349 | ~$3,700–$12,700 | The domain |
| TherapySites | $199 | $69–$336 | ~$2,700–$12,300 | The domain, if you registered it yourself |
| DIY (Squarespace/Wix) | Your weekends | $16–$39 | ~$600–$1,400 | Your content; site frozen until you pay again |
| Flat-fee owned build | $1,500–$5,000 | $0 required; care optional | Build + ~$50 domain | Everything, still running |
Read the last column twice. Over three years the owned build is rarely the most expensive option and is usually the second-cheapest, and it's the only row where year four costs approximately nothing.
Five questions that keep any option honest
Ask them before signing anything, including with us: If I stop paying, what do I still have? · Is the domain in my name, in my account? · Who owns the design and words, in writing? · Can I get complete site files anytime, without a fee? · Is there a term, a cancellation fee, or anything I lose by leaving? Vague answers are answers.
Where we fit (briefly)
Headlands builds practice sites and consoles you own: flat price quoted before we start (sites from $1,500, full portal with booking and encrypted intake $3,500), optional care plan at $39/month for founding practices, and everything (domain, design, words, data) assigned to you in the contract. Everything you run. One screen.
Brighter Vision and SimplePractice prices verified against their published pricing pages in July 2026; TherapySites, Squarespace, and Wix figures from our June 2026 pricing research of published rates. Prices change; check the source before deciding. This article is educational and isn't legal, tax, or compliance advice.