Website maintenance cost is the part most business owners forget to plan for. You budget for the build, you launch the site, and you think the job is done. Then a year later the site is slow, a form has quietly stopped working, or something has broken, and nobody was watching.
This guide breaks down what website maintenance really costs in British Columbia, what a care plan covers, and when you actually need one. Your website is probably your most important channel. When I checked the latest Canadian Federation of Independent Business numbers, 78% of Canadian small businesses run on a website, ahead of Facebook and Google Business Profile. The prices here are the real numbers we charge and see across the Fraser Valley. No vague ranges, no scare tactics. You can also use the calculator below to estimate your own cost in about thirty seconds.
Source: Canadian Federation of Independent Business. The website leads every other channel, which is exactly why keeping it working matters.
How much does website maintenance cost per month in BC?
Most small business websites in BC cost about $97 a month to maintain on a care plan, plus roughly $15 to $25 a year for the domain and $50 to $200 a year for hosting. A simple brochure site you rarely change can need almost nothing. A busy site with bookings, payments, or many plugins needs more, so it costs more to keep healthy.
The monthly number is the part people fixate on, but it is only one line. Website maintenance is really three separate costs stacked together: a one-time build, a small yearly bill for the domain and hosting, and an optional monthly care plan. See our full transparent pricing for where each one sits.
Our $97 sits at the low, honest end of the market. When I compared our price against the wider market, GoDaddy's 2026 figures put a small-to-medium business site at $50 to $500 a month, and an ecommerce store at $300 to $1,000 a month. A fair price should track how much your site actually needs, not a round retainer number.
| Site type | Per month | Per year |
|---|---|---|
| Personal site or blog | $5–$75 | $60–$900 |
| Small to medium business | $50–$500 | $600–$6,000 |
| Ecommerce store | $300–$1,000 | $3,600–$12,000 |
| Large or custom site | $1,000–$5,000+ | $12,000–$60,000+ |
Source: GoDaddy 2026 website maintenance cost guide. Our $97/mo care plan sits at the low end of the small-to-medium business row.
What does a website maintenance plan actually include?
A website maintenance plan covers the ongoing work that keeps a site safe, fast, and working: software and plugin updates, security patches, backups, uptime checks, small content edits, and a regular look at speed and search rankings. Website maintenance services are about prevention, not just fixing things after they break.
Here is what sits inside a real plan:
- Core, theme, and plugin updates, tested so an update never breaks the live site
- Security monitoring and patches, plus regular backups you can restore from
- Uptime checks so you hear about a problem before your customers do
- Small content edits: new photos, updated hours, a new service
- Speed and Core Web Vitals checks, and a look at how the site is ranking
On our Growth and Authority website plans, this care is included for the first 6 to 12 months. After that it is $97 a month if you want to stay on it. The full breakdown lives on our Abbotsford web design care plan section.
What are the real line items in website maintenance cost?
Website maintenance cost is easier to trust when you can see every piece. Nothing here is hidden, and none of it is huge on its own. It is the stack that matters.
| Line item | What it is | Typical BC cost | How often |
|---|---|---|---|
| Domain name | Your web address, e.g. a .ca registered through CIRA | $15–$25 | Per year |
| Hosting | The server your site lives on | $50–$200 | Per year |
| SSL certificate | The padlock / HTTPS. Can be free via Let's Encrypt, but must stay installed and renewed | $0–$100 | Per year |
| Updates & security | Software, plugin, and security patching plus backups | Included in care plan | Ongoing |
| Care plan | All of the above, managed for you, plus small edits | $97 | Per month (optional) |
Two of these surprise people. First, Google treats HTTPS as a baseline, so the SSL padlock is not optional. The certificate itself is often free; the ongoing job is keeping it installed and renewed. Second, updates never stop, which is the part a care plan handles.
Estimate your website and maintenance cost
Pick whether you are building new or redesigning, choose a package, and set how many months of care you want in year one. The estimate updates as you go.
Website Cost Calculator
then $97/mo to keep it maintained
Package
Growth includes 6 months of care free · Authority includes 12 months free.
Estimate only, based on our published starting prices. Domain is shown at about $20/yr and hosting at about $120/yr as typical BC figures. Your final quote comes after a free audit.
Do you actually need a monthly maintenance plan?
No, not always. A simple site you rarely change can run on updates you handle yourself. You need a care plan when the site is busy, runs on a platform with many plugins, handles bookings or payments, or when nobody on your team has the time to watch it. The honest truth about website maintenance plans is that the right one is the smallest one that keeps your site working.
We do not lock anyone into a monthly fee. If you do not need ongoing work, you keep the keys and walk away. Compare that with the $50-a-month website builder subscriptions that add up to $600 a year, forever, whether you touch the site or not. Pay for maintenance when it protects real business. A plan bundled in by default is not a reason on its own.
Business owners feel this too. On small-business forums the common complaint is paying a monthly fee for a site that barely changes, or not knowing whether the bill covers real work or just someone on call. That instinct is right: match the plan to how much the site actually changes. British Columbia has even funded small businesses to build online stores, so a working website is clearly worth the investment. The trick is spending on upkeep only where it earns its keep.
“The right platform is the one that matches where you are right now, not where an agency wants to sell you.”
What happens if you skip website maintenance?
When a site goes unmaintained, it does not fail loudly. It degrades. Pages load slower, security holes open, and one day a form or a page simply stops working. A broken site quietly loses the exact customers it was built to win. That is the real cost of skipping maintenance. The problem is not that the site looks dated. It is that the site stops earning.
This is not a guess. I checked the numbers. Statistics Canada reports British Columbia had the highest cyber-crime rate in the country in 2024, and that 16% of Canadian businesses were hit by a cyber incident in 2023. For WordPress sites, the security firm Patchstack counted 11,334 new security holes in 2025, and 91% of them were in plugins. Most of that risk closes with regular updates, which is exactly what a care plan handles.
From our projects
One of our first clients, Sunrise Cleaning in Abbotsford, ran on a platform that turned out to be very hard to maintain. Over time the pages stopped opening. Visitors would click and nothing loaded, and the site was losing clients. We rebuilt it as a fast, custom-coded website that is easy to navigate, live now at sunrisecleaning-services.ca. The clean, working site brought visitors back and helped the owner land a new commercial cleaning contract with a local dental clinic, Shine Dental. That is what a maintained, working website does. It keeps the front door open.
Does a WordPress site cost more to maintain than a custom-coded one?
It often does. WordPress plugins, themes, and core software all need regular updates, and a broken plugin can slow or break the site. The WordPress project itself recommends keeping everything current for security. A custom-coded site has no plugins to maintain, so upkeep is usually lower and more predictable.
Neither is wrong. WordPress is a strong, flexible choice when someone is managing the updates for you, and we build and maintain WordPress sites too. Custom-coded is our personal preference for speed and low upkeep, but the right tool is the one that fits your stage and who will look after it. If you are weighing this decision, our guide on a website builder versus a web designer goes deeper.
Frequently asked questions
How much does website maintenance cost per month in Canada?
Most small business websites cost about $97 a month to maintain on a care plan, plus roughly $15 to $25 a year for the domain and $50 to $200 a year for hosting. A simple site you rarely change can need almost nothing. A busy site with bookings, payments, or lots of plugins needs more attention, so it costs more to keep running well.
What does a website maintenance plan actually include?
A good plan covers software and plugin updates, security patches, backups, uptime checks, small content edits, and a regular look at speed and search rankings. The point is prevention. Fixing a broken site after it goes down always costs more than keeping it healthy in the first place.
Do I really need a monthly maintenance plan for my website?
Not always. A simple brochure site you rarely touch can run on updates you handle yourself. You need a plan when the site is busy, runs on a platform with many plugins, handles bookings or payments, or when nobody on your team has time to watch it. We never lock anyone into a monthly fee. If you do not need ongoing work, you keep the keys.
Is website maintenance a monthly fee or a one-time cost?
It is a mix. The website build is a one-time cost. The domain and hosting renew every year. A care plan, if you want one, is monthly. So the honest answer is that some of it is one-time and some of it is ongoing. That is exactly why it helps to see it broken into line items.
Does a WordPress site cost more to maintain than a custom-coded one?
It often does. WordPress plugins, themes, and core software all need regular updates, and a broken plugin can slow or break a site. A custom-coded site has no plugins to maintain, so upkeep is usually lower. Both are good choices. WordPress is a strong option when someone is managing the updates for you.
What happens if you do not maintain your website in Abbotsford?
An unmaintained site rarely breaks all at once. It slips: pages load slower, security holes open, and one day a form or a page stops working. A broken site quietly loses the exact customers it was built to win. We saw this first-hand with an Abbotsford client whose old site had stopped opening its own pages before we rebuilt it.
Can I pay once and host the website myself instead of a monthly plan?
Yes. That is our model. You own the site and keep the keys, so you can host it yourself and only pay for work when you actually need it. A monthly plan earns its place when a site is busy, plugin-heavy, or handles bookings and payments. For a simple site that rarely changes, paying once and self-hosting is a fair, honest option.
Harman Chahal
Harman is the founder of IshaanEx Digital, an Abbotsford agency specialising in local SEO, custom-coded websites, AI search optimisation, and website care for Lower Mainland service businesses. He has rebuilt and maintains sites across the Fraser Valley.
About Harman and IshaanEx DigitalFree website audit
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