Website template or custom website: which one do you actually need?

By Core Concepts · · Buying guide

A custom website and a template can end up looking equally good. What differs is how you get there: how long it takes, what it costs and how much of the thinking is already done. Here is how to tell which one you need.

What you are paying for with a custom site

A custom project buys you a process. Someone researches your business, proposes a structure, designs it, builds it and revises it with you. That is the right choice when the website is the product, when you have unusual requirements, or when the brand has to be unlike anything else.

It is also slow. Discovery, design rounds and development take weeks at the very least, and usually months. The cost reflects all of that time.

What you are paying for with a template

A template buys you the result of that process, done once for a type of business rather than for you in particular. The structure, the design, the motion and the code are finished. Your job is to replace the content.

The trade is simple: you give up some uniqueness and you get months back. A well-made template can be live the same week.

When a template is the better choice

  • You need a professional site soon, for a launch, a funding round or a new season.
  • Your business fits a familiar shape: a hotel, a law firm, a studio, an app.
  • You would rather spend the budget on photography, copy or advertising.
  • You have a developer, or basic technical confidence, but no designer.

When custom is worth it

  • The site needs functionality that does not exist yet.
  • You have complex content: hundreds of pages, several languages, integrations.
  • Your brand is the differentiator and it must not resemble anyone else.

The middle route most people overlook

You do not have to choose between the two. Starting from a template and paying for a few days of tailoring gets you most of the way to custom for a fraction of the time. Change the typeface, the colours and the photography and very few visitors could tell where it started.

That is how we use our own templates with clients. If that sounds useful, tell us about the project.

A fair way to decide

Ask what would actually change in a custom design. If the honest answer is "our logo, our colours and our words", a template is the faster way to the same place. If the answer is a list of features, go custom.

You can see what a finished starting point looks like in any of our live demos: browse the templates.

Templates in this article

  • Castell & Reeve: A "quiet authority" homepage for law and advisory firms. $79.
  • Brace: A light, modern homepage for contractors and construction groups. $79.