How much do EdTech websites cost?

The most common question in the mind of any entrepreneur willing to start an EdTech business is, how much would the platform cost? So, I wanted to write this article about the cost of EdTech websites because there are enough distractions on the web and I could not find a definitive answer to this very genuine question.

The cost of your EdTech website

EdTech websites can cost anywhere from a few hundred dollars to tens of thousands of dollars. If you choose a freelancer to build your website, you can get it done for as low as 25-30 dollars an hour, but you might have to compromise on the quality. On the other hand, if you hire a professional agency, they will give you a stunning and professional EdTech website for $2500 to $6000.

Deciding how much budget you should keep for your site has many nuances including your financial position and the level of features you are looking for. Going too fancy when you are starting out can burn a hole in your pocket which can take months to recover for a small business. On the other hand, go too cheap and you end up with an ugly, non-functional website that ruins your brand in the market. In this article, I summarize everything you need to know about the pricing depending on your needs.

How to decide the cost of your EdTech website?

In the no-code era, the cost of building your EdTech website has come down significantly, thanks to platforms like WordPress and its numerous plugins. WordPress offers almost limitless customization and features, which is as good as a custom-coded website. On the other hand, if you are one of those who want to go for an old-school, custom-coded website, the prices will go up. Many agencies will lie to you that custom-coded websites perform better because they want to charge you more for the website. However, I recommend you don’t listen to them.

In this article, I limit the discussion to WordPress, because it hosts over half of the websites on the world wide web, and frankly, it deserves more. If you choose to get your website built on WordPress, the most important factor that will determine the cost is where you want to get it made. If you are a small business and need an EdTech website to just get started quickly on a low budget, then I recommend you hire a freelancer. You can search for a local freelancer in your city or can go to a platform like Upwork. You can find decent freelancers for $25 an hour to $100 an hour.
On the other hand, if you have the budget, I recommend you invest in a web design agency. They have the right experience and the skills to give you a professional EdTech website that will entice your audience and be user-friendly for your customers. The cost of hiring an agency again depends on a lot of factors.

If you hire a professional agency in the US or the UK, it will charge you from $3000 to upwards of $10,000 for your EdTech website. There are others who charge even more up to $100K. However, you can get almost the same level of quality from smaller agencies that can do it for a reasonable rate.
On the other hand, if you decide to outsource the project to an agency in India, the Philippines, or Eastern Europe, you can get the same level of quality at a lower cost like $1000 to $2500. However, while outsourcing, you need to be more careful while selecting the right agency, and you run a slight risk of being cheated.
Let’s see how much an average agency charges for an EdTech website depending upon where they are based.

Variation in EdTech website cost based on the features

Right after who builds it, the next major factor impacting the cost of your website is obviously the features, level of customization, and content of your website. If your EdTech website just needs to have a few short videos, you can embed it directly in WordPress, and you are done. However, if you are trying to build an EdTech business, you will probably need a more complex system. This may include multiple courses and multiple lessons and quizzes within each course, you need an LMS plugin.
You can choose one of many LMS plugins available in the market, like LearnPress, LearnDash, and TutorLMS. Most LMS plugins have a basic free version and a premium paid version. The free version of LMS plugins like TutorLMS or LearnPress has the ability to create a basic course, with various chapters and quizzes. If you need some advanced features like a grading system, drip content, manual enrolment of students, and long-form answers to tests, you need to go for the paid version of LMS plugins.
The price of paid LMS plugins can range from $150 to $2000. Thus, depending on these factors, you might need to invest extra in the LMS plugin, and the extra work put in by the web developer to set up these features will again have its cost.

How content affects the cost of your EdTech websites?

The cost of your website will also depend on how much content you need to upload to your courses. If you need multiple courses with a lot of content, the cost of hosting, content creation, and development efforts will go up proportionately. You can also go for a user-generated content model, where subject matter experts can register themselves as instructors and create their own courses. This model can help you scale up quickly and save some costs on the content creation side.
On the other hand, if you are looking to create all the courses centrally, you need to hire content writers/experts who create the courses. Next, you need to get all the content edited, and arranged in the right sections, and uploaded to the courses. For each course, you need to configure the set-up and publish each course. All of these pieces of work will have their own costs.

Should I go for a budget website designer or an expensive one?

Going cheap with your website can feel like you are saving some money, but in the long run, it does you more harm than good. As an EdTech business, your website is pretty much the core of your business. Having an outdated and unprofessional-looking web ruins your brand reputation and the trust that your brand commands.
Your website is the first thing your audience will look at before making their purchase decision. Even a premium product or service can look cheap in the eyes of customers if the website looks cheap. On the other hand, a premium-looking website creates a premium impression for your services as well. So, we recommend you must go for a professional website design agency that can give you a premium website.

Should I spend extra to get my website coded from scratch?

There is a lot of misinformation on the web when it comes to the comparison between WordPress and Coded websites. Many so-called ‘experts’ claim that WordPress can be used to create only simple, templatized websites. And if you need a customized website with complex features, you need to code them from scratch. Nothing could be farther from the truth. WordPress is an all-around website-building platform and all sorts of web-based solutions can be built on it with much ease.
I recommend you to go for WordPress for all your EdTech website needs. And for any additional feature, your web designer can add a plugin to enable it.
By choosing WordPress over coded websites, you can save thousands of dollars and months of time and you can get your website up and running very fast.

For expert website design advice or more information on pricing, speak to a web design agency today. Alternatively, to explore the costs of a website further, take a look at our web design agency service page where we are open and transparent about our website service pricing and packages.