Four things people mean by a free website
Most offers fall into one of four kinds. A builder’s free plan lets you make a site yourself at no charge. With a free build, someone else makes the site for you and then charges a monthly fee to keep it running. A site that comes free with something else, such as a business listing, lasts as long as that other thing does. And some offers are free only for a while, a trial or a first year, before the charges start.
Each can be the right choice. The trouble starts when an offer of one kind is described in the words of another, so the first job is to work out which one is in front of you.
A builder’s free plan: free to keep, with someone else’s name on it
Builders such as Wix offer a plan that costs nothing for as long as you use it. Wix’s own help pages set out the catch: a free site lives at an address made from your username and the word wixsite, and Wix adverts appear on every page. Connecting your own domain and removing the adverts both need a paid plan.
For a hobby, a test or the first weeks of a new business, that can be fine. For a business that wants to be trusted, the address is the problem: it is hard to say out loud, it does not match your email, and it advertises somebody else on every page you show a customer.
You also do all the work. The plan is free because the design, the words, the photographs and the updates are left to you.
A free build with a monthly fee: the cost moves, it does not vanish
Many web designers now offer to build a site with nothing to pay upfront and charge a monthly fee for hosting, updates and support. This can be good value. It spreads the cost, someone looks after the site, and nobody has to find a lump sum before the business has earned anything.
But the build is still paid for, through the monthly fee, and most offers of this kind have a minimum term to make sure of it. Multiply the monthly fee by the months in the minimum term, then add VAT if it is charged. As an illustration, £35 a month on a 24-month term is £840 before VAT: a fair price for a website and its upkeep, but not nothing.
What matters most is what happens when you stop paying. On some plans you are renting the site: leave, and it stays with the provider, sometimes along with the address. On others you keep your domain and can take your words and pictures, or buy the site outright. Ask before you sign, not when you want to leave.
Free with something else, until it stops
Some websites come free with another product: a listing, a directory entry, or a phone or marketing package. Google offered one of the best known. Businesses could make a simple site from their Google Business Profile at no cost, on an address ending in business.site.
In March 2024 Google turned those sites off. For a while visitors were sent to the business’s profile instead, and from 10 June 2024 the old addresses showed a page not found error.
The lesson is not about Google. A site you do not control can change or disappear on somebody else’s timetable, and every link, card and listing that pointed to it breaks at once. If you use one, keep your own domain and know where your words and photographs are saved.
What the advertising rules say “free” should mean
In the UK, the advertising code that the Advertising Standards Authority enforces is strict about the word. Its guidance says an offer should not be called free if you have to pay anything beyond the unavoidable cost of responding and of collecting or delivering the item.
Something can still be free when you buy something else, but only if the price of what you buy has not been raised to cover it, and the guidance says a commitment such as a subscription must be made clear in the advert itself. So “free website” on its own, with the monthly fee in small print, is the sort of claim the rules are written against. “Free build when you join, £35 a month, 24-month minimum” tells you what you are agreeing to.
You do not need to complain to anyone to make use of this. Treat it as a test: if the price and the term are not beside the word free, ask for them, and judge the offer on the answer.
Six questions that show what a free website costs
Put these to any free offer, in writing if you can, and compare the answers rather than the headlines. A provider with a fair offer will answer all six without trouble.
If you already have a site and want to know whether it is worth replacing at all, the free assessment on this site reads one address and shows what search engines and AI assistants can find there.
- What will I pay in total over the minimum term, including VAT?
- Whose name will the domain be registered in?
- What can I take with me if I leave: the domain, my words and photographs, the site itself?
- What happens if I stop paying, or want to leave early?
- Can the price rise, and with how much notice?
- Will the site carry your adverts or your name, and is a Welsh version included or extra?
Frequently asked questions
Is a free website really free?
Some are. A builder’s free plan costs nothing, but it carries the builder’s adverts and address, and you do the work. Most free websites made for you are paid for through a monthly fee, often with a minimum term.
Who owns a free website?
It depends on the contract. The domain belongs to whoever it is registered to, so ask for it in your business’s name. The site itself may be yours, or rented for as long as you pay.
Can a website be advertised as free if there is a monthly fee?
Only with care. UK advertising guidance allows something free with a purchase if the price of the purchase has not been raised to cover it and the commitment is made clear in the advert.
What happens to a free website if the company stops offering it?
It can go. Google turned off the free websites it made from Business Profiles in 2024, and the old addresses stopped working. Keep your own domain so that you can point it somewhere else.
Is a free website good enough to start with?
It can be, for testing an idea. For a business that wants to be found and trusted, your own domain, nobody else’s adverts and a clear way to leave matter more than a low first price.