How long does it take to build a website?
Two Scoops Web ·
How long it takes to build a website comes down to four things: how many pages it has, who writes the words and when, how changes get sent and approved, and the day the clock starts. Two Scoops Web publishes its own number: two to three weeks for its two smaller fixed-price builds and four to five weeks for the largest, counted from the day the owner approves the written draft. Any timeline you're quoted, ours included, rests on the same four things.
What decides how long it takes to build a website
Four things decide how long it takes to build a website, and you can ask about each one before you sign. If you're building the site yourself, there's no quote to read, and the pages and the words still decide when you finish.
More pages take longer to build
A website with more pages takes longer to build, because every page needs its own words, photos, layout and a check on a phone screen.
A small site for one shop and a site with a page for every service and every town you cover are different jobs, even when the home pages look alike. Count the pages you need before you compare timelines. If one quote is for six pages and another is for twenty, the weeks won't line up.
Anything the site has to connect to, beyond a plain link, adds time on top, like a list of products or properties kept in a database. Each one has to be set up and tested on its own, so name them on the first call. Something added the week before launch moves the launch.
Who writes the words, and when
A website build can only move as fast as its words, because a page isn't finished until the words on it are.
If you're writing them yourself, the build runs on your evenings and weekends. That's a fair trade if you like writing. A blank page called About Us has no deadline of its own, though.
A page laid out around stand-in text gets checked again once the real words go in, because a headline twice as long doesn't fit the same space.
If someone else writes the words, the work moves off your desk, but it doesn't go away. They still need the facts about your business, and those are in your head. Ask how they get them: a questionnaire, a call, your old site. The answer tells you how much of the timeline is still yours.
How changes get sent and approved
Changes stretch a website build when they arrive one at a time, because each one reopens a page that was done.
One email on Monday, a text on Wednesday, one more small thing on a Friday call. Each is quick on its own. Together they keep the site from being finished.
Sign-off works the same way. If three people have to agree on the home page, the timeline includes the time it takes the three of them to find a free afternoon.
What keeps a build on schedule is a rule both sides agree to before it starts. It says how many rounds of changes are included and what counts as one round. It also says who gives the final yes.
When the clock starts
A website timeline only means something once you know the day it starts counting and what pauses it.
Two quotes can give the same number of weeks and describe very different waits. One might count from your deposit, another from the day you send your photos, another from the day you approve the words. Ask which day it is. Then ask whether the time on your side, reading drafts and gathering changes, sits inside the number or on top of it.
How long a Two Scoops Web build takes
A Two Scoops Web build takes two to three weeks for Discovery and Publisher and four to five weeks for Coverage, counted from the day you approve the written draft.
We write the words up from a recorded 30-minute video call and a short form, and that's the draft you approve. The weeks include our work on your two rounds of changes. The time you take to put each list together isn't counted. On Custom, the timeline is in the build plan.
Every step, from the first message to launch, is on how it works.
What to ask before you agree to a timeline
Before you agree to a website timeline, ask these five questions and get the answers in writing.
- What day does the count start, and what pauses it?
- Who writes the words, and when are they due?
- How many rounds of changes are included, and what counts as a round?
- Does the timeline include the changes, or only the first version?
- What do you need from me, and by when?