Report · 26 August 2026
Monthly website maintenance - what's included, what it costs, and when you need it…
Website maintenance is the least interesting thing you will ever buy, and the thing most likely to cost you money by its absence. Here is what it actually is, how it is priced, and the cases where paying for it is money wasted.
What maintenance actually is
A website is software, connected to the internet, running unattended. Like anything in that description it needs somebody to keep it patched, backed up and watched.
In practice that means a short and unglamorous list: applying updates to the software and its add-ons, patching security holes as they are found, taking backups and occasionally proving they restore, checking the site is up, and fixing the things that quietly break.
It is not design work and it is not new pages. Those are projects. Maintenance is the boring part underneath, and confusing the two is how people end up paying a monthly fee for the boring part and getting a redesign nobody asked for. Some suppliers call the same work "support and maintenance"; the label does not change the list.
What it should include
Anything calling itself maintenance should cover:
- Updates. The platform, and anything bolted onto it.
- Security patching, promptly rather than eventually.
- Backups that have been tested. An untested backup is a rumour.
- Uptime checking, so somebody other than a customer notices first.
- Fixing breakages, including the invisible ones.
That last one matters more than the list suggests. The common failure on a small site is not a dramatic outage. It is a contact form that stopped sending three weeks ago, or a certificate that expired on a Saturday, or a page that has quietly returned an error since a plugin updated itself. Nobody notices, and the enquiries simply stop.
How it is priced
Three arrangements, and they behave differently under stress.
Bundled into the platform. All-in-one builders like Squarespace and Wix include hosting, updates and security in the plan. You are already paying for maintenance; it is inside the rent.
A retainer. A fixed monthly fee for a set amount of attention. Predictable, and the only one that reliably gets the preventative work done, because nobody has to approve a bill before somebody applies a patch.
Hourly, when something breaks. The cheapest arrangement in a quiet month and the most expensive in a bad one. It also removes the incentive to prevent anything.
The retainer usually arrives dressed as a maintenance package - Bronze, Silver and Gold tiers, each a bundle of the same jobs in different quantities. A package is fine; the tiering is where to pay attention. Read what is actually in each tier, because the difference between the cheap package and the dear one is often response time and a few extra "content updates", while the work that matters - the updates, the patching, the tested backups - should be in all of them. A package whose bottom tier leaves out backups is not a maintenance package, whatever the label says.
When comparing packages and quotes, compare a bad month, not a quiet one. Every arrangement costs about the same when nothing happens.
When you should not pay for it
Be honest about this, because plenty of maintenance is sold to people who already have it.
If your site sits on an all-in-one platform and is a handful of pages that rarely change, your plan already covers the upkeep. Paying a third party to manage a managed platform usually buys very little beyond somebody to ring. The fuller version of that argument, including when it does earn its place, is in Is it worth paying someone to manage your website?.
If your site is self-hosted, though, particularly WordPress, the work is real and somebody is doing it or nobody is. The trade between the two arrangements is set out in Squarespace vs WordPress in 2026 - an honest comparison for a small business.
What to check before you sign
Four questions, each with a right answer that a good supplier gives without hesitating.
- What is included, and what is extra? Vagueness here is not an accident.
- What happens when something breaks on a Friday night? You want a real response time, not enthusiasm.
- Whose name is the web address in? It should be yours. Anyone wanting ownership of your address is asking for the one thing that is genuinely hard to get back.
- How do I leave, and what do I take? The answer should be simple and stated up front. A service that is easy to leave rarely needs leaving.
Moving and maintaining are usually the same decision
Most people who start looking for maintenance are really looking at a site that has been neglected for a while, and the honest answer is often that it needs moving somewhere lighter as well as looking after.
That is worth knowing because the two are priced separately almost everywhere, and a move done carelessly can cost you the search standing the site already has. What a careful move protects, and what a migration service should be doing for the fee, is set out in Website migration services - what they are, what they cost, and what a good one protects; the five things that decide it are in How to move your website without losing your Google rankings.
How bernard does it
bernard is one arrangement of the three, made deliberately narrow. He moves a simple site onto fast, plain hosting, rebuilds it so it loads quickly and reads clearly to people and to the tools that now read the web, and then keeps it: updates, security, backups, and the things that break. That is his job rather than yours.
The price starts at £200 a year for a simple site with the move included, with larger arrangements above it at £500 and £1,000 a year for sites that need more. Ask what website maintenance costs in the UK and the honest answer is usually "it depends"; this one is deliberately a flat price. What you see is what you pay, with nothing added at the checkout. Your web address and your email stay in your own name, so leaving is always possible.
A members area, a community room and a shop are part of what he builds, not extras he sends you elsewhere for. And he is honest about his limits: he cannot measure a site that sits behind a password, and a very large site or catalogue can still be more than one trip. He tells you which at the measuring-up, before any money changes hands. If that is your site, a retainer with somebody who specialises in it is the better answer, and this is us saying so.
Paste your current address and bernard will measure up, free, and show you the new place before you decide anything.
Questions people ask
- What is website maintenance?
- Website maintenance is the ongoing work that keeps a site working after it is built: applying software updates, patching security holes, taking backups, checking the site is actually up, and fixing the things that quietly break, like a contact form that stopped sending or a link that now goes nowhere. It is not design work and it is not new pages. It is the difference between a site that still works in two years and one that does not.
- What's included in monthly website maintenance?
- At minimum: software and plugin updates, security patches, regular backups that have been tested, uptime checking, and fixing breakages. A good arrangement also covers the small things nobody notices until they matter, such as whether your forms still arrive, whether your certificate is about to expire, and whether the site still loads quickly on a phone. Anything described as maintenance that does not include backups and updates is not maintenance.
- How much does website maintenance cost?
- It depends on which of three arrangements you are buying. A platform plan bundles the upkeep into the rent, so there is no separate bill. An agency retainer is usually a monthly fee for a set amount of attention. Hourly support is cheapest until something goes wrong, when it is the most expensive. Compare what happens in a bad month, not a quiet one, because a quiet month costs nothing whichever way you pay.
- Why do I need website maintenance?
- Because a website is software connected to the internet, and unmaintained software gets slower, breaks and eventually gets broken into. The usual failure is not dramatic: forms stop arriving and nobody notices for a month, or the site drifts out of date until a customer mentions it. If your site brings you enquiries or sales, the maintenance is insurance on that, not an extra.
- Do all websites need maintenance?
- No. A site on an all-in-one platform like Squarespace or Wix already has its updates, security and hosting handled inside the plan, so paying a third party to 'manage' it usually buys very little. Self-hosted sites, WordPress especially, genuinely do need somebody doing the work. Check what your platform already covers before you pay anyone for it twice.
- What makes a good website maintenance service?
- Three things you can check before signing. It states plainly what is included and what is extra. It gives you a real response time for when something is broken, not just a promise of attention. And it leaves your web address and email in your own name, so you can leave and take the site with you. If any of those is vague, that is the answer.