Web Design Agencies

Web Design Agencies near you

A web design agency builds the site a business runs on. In the UK that spans a five-page site for a trade business on an off-the-shelf platform, a content-managed site for a professional firm, an online shop, and a bespoke build with integrations into booking or stock systems. The label covers all of them, so the first job is establishing which one is being quoted for.

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A website is also where several legal duties land at once. Under section 29 of the Equality Act 2010 a service provider must not discriminate against a person requiring the service, and the duty to make reasonable adjustments applies to service providers. Selling online brings its own list of information that has to be given before a purchase. And the cookie banner is regulated by the ICO under PECR, which has been the subject of active compliance work across the UK's largest websites.

The commercial risk is quieter. Domains, hosting, and repository access are often set up in the agency's name because it is faster, and that arrangement is invisible until the day you want to leave or the agency stops answering. Registering these in your own name from the start costs nothing and prevents the single most common dispute in this trade.

Kinds of website build, and what each really costs you

Template sites on a hosted builder: quick and cheap to start, limited when you need something the platform does not do.
Content-managed sites on an open platform: editable by your team, and they need updating and security patching.
Online shops, which add payments, delivery rules, tax handling and a much longer list of legal information.
Bespoke builds, justified when the site does something specific such as quoting, booking or syncing with stock.
Migrations and redesigns of an existing site, where redirect mapping matters more than the visual work.
Ongoing care plans covering updates, backups, hosting and small changes, priced separately from the build.

Accessibility and the Equality Act duty on your business

Accessibility is often presented as a public sector issue. It is not only that. Section 29 of the Equality Act 2010 provides that a service provider concerned with the provision of a service to the public, for payment or not, must not discriminate against a person requiring the service by not providing them with the service, and that a duty to make reasonable adjustments applies to service providers. A website that a disabled customer cannot use is one route into that problem.

The technical standard everyone works to is the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines, which GOV.UK describes as requiring content to be perceivable, operable, understandable and robust. The public sector version of the obligation names WCAG 2.2 AA specifically, and it is the same benchmark commercial teams use because there is no competing one.

In practice the fixes are unglamorous and cheap if they are designed in: real text instead of text in images, labelled form fields, visible keyboard focus, adequate colour contrast, headings in order, captions on video, and a page that still works when someone enlarges the text. Retrofitting them after launch is where the cost appears, so put accessibility in the brief rather than the snag list.

Cookie banners that meet the ICO's expectations

Regulation 6 of PECR requires you to tell people the cookies are there, explain what they do and why, and get consent to store them. Consent must be freely given, specific and informed, and given by a clear positive action - the ICO's example is ticking a box or clicking a link, and it is explicit that simply continuing to use the website is not enough.

The ICO also says you cannot set non-essential cookies on your website's homepage before the user has consented to them. That is a build requirement, not a design one: tags have to be held back until consent is recorded, which usually means configuring the tag manager rather than dropping scripts into the page template.

On the banner itself, the ICO's guidance is that it must be as easy to refuse consent as it is to accept, with equally prominent accept all and reject all options, no pre-ticked or default-on toggles, and a way to withdraw consent as easily as it was given. The ICO has run a programme of compliance work across the UK's largest websites, contacting organisations and setting out its expectations, so this is being actively checked rather than left to good intentions.

Information your site must give customers

Your business name, contact details and address, in a place a customer can find without searching.
A description of the goods or services and the price including all taxes.
How a customer can pay, and the delivery arrangements, costs and how long goods will take to arrive.
For ongoing contracts, the minimum length, the billing period and the conditions for ending them.
How a customer can cancel, when they lose the right to cancel, and a standard cancellation form where cancellation applies.
Customers buying at a distance can normally cancel up to 14 days after delivery, and if you do not tell them about that right they can cancel at any time in the next 12 months.
Goods must be delivered within 30 days unless you have agreed otherwise.

Who owns the domain, the hosting and the code

Register the domain in your company's name with your own email as the registrant contact, and keep the login yourself.
Hosting in your own account, with the agency given access, means a dispute never becomes a site going dark.
Ask where the code lives and whether you get a copy, including the deployment configuration.
Third-party licences - themes, plugins, fonts, stock imagery - are bought under somebody's account, so check whose.
Because the creator is the first owner of copyright in commissioned work, get a written assignment or a clear licence for the design and any bespoke code.
Open source components carry their own licence terms, which should be listed rather than assumed.
Put the exit in the contract: notice period, files handed over, credentials transferred and in what timeframe.

From brief to launch

Discovery and a written specification naming pages, functions, integrations and what is excluded.
Wireframes or a prototype approved before visual design, so structure arguments happen early and cheaply.
Design of key templates rather than every page, with the pattern applied consistently afterwards.
Build, with the accessibility and consent requirements treated as acceptance criteria.
Content: usually the thing that delays launch, so agree who writes it and by when at the start.
Testing across devices and assistive technology, redirect mapping from the old site, then launch and a snagging window.

What happens after launch

Platform, theme and plugin updates, which are security work rather than improvements.
Backups held somewhere other than the server being backed up, and tested by restoring one.
Certificate and domain renewals, both of which take sites offline when missed.
A named route for small changes, with a response time, so the site does not freeze the day it launches.
Periodic accessibility and consent checks, because new embeds and scripts bring new problems.
Analytics reviewed against the original goals rather than left running unexamined.

Web Design Agencies: frequently asked questions

Does a small business website have to be accessible?

The specific public sector regulations apply to public sector bodies, but the Equality Act 2010 applies much more widely. Section 29 says a service provider must not discriminate against a person requiring the service, and the duty to make reasonable adjustments applies to service providers. The recognised technical standard is WCAG, which asks that content be perceivable, operable, understandable and robust. Building to it is far cheaper than retrofitting.

Do we need a cookie banner?

If your site sets anything beyond strictly necessary cookies, yes. PECR requires you to tell people the cookies are there, explain what they do, and obtain consent by a clear positive action - continuing to browse does not count. The ICO also expects refusing to be as easy as accepting, with equally prominent options and no default-on toggles, and non-essential cookies must not be set before consent is given.

Who should own our domain name?

Your company. Register it in the organisation's name with a company email address as the registrant contact, and hold the login yourself. Agencies often register domains under their own accounts because it is quicker during a build, and it works fine until you change supplier or the agency closes. The same applies to hosting, the DNS and any analytics or search console properties.

What must an online shop tell customers before they buy?

Your business name, contact details and address, a description of the goods or services, the price including all taxes, how to pay, delivery arrangements with costs and timescales, contract length and cancellation conditions, and how to cancel including a standard cancellation form. Customers can normally cancel up to 14 days after delivery, and if you do not tell them about that right they can cancel at any time in the next 12 months.

Do we own the website code when the project finishes?

Only if the contract says so. UK law makes the creator the first legal owner of copyright in a commissioned work, not the commissioner, unless agreed otherwise in writing. Many agencies grant a licence to use the site rather than transferring ownership, which is workable provided the licence is broad enough and survives the relationship ending. Read that clause before signing, and make sure you get a copy of the files either way.

Sources

Written by the LokalMatch editorial team. Last reviewed 22 September 2026. How we write and check our guides

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What affects the fees web design agencies charge

Fees depend on the work involved and how the professional bills. We only publish fee ranges when they’re backed by real LokalMatch data or reliable sources. Until then, here’s what usually changes the fee:

Scope and complexity of the work
How the firm bills: hourly, per project or on a monthly retainer
Experience of the team
Timeline and how urgent the work is
Ongoing support after the work is delivered

How to compare web design agencies before you hire

Ask for examples of similar work for clients like you.
Read reviews and ask for references you can contact.
Make sure the scope, deliverables and timeline are written down before work starts.
Ask who will do the work: an in-house team, freelancers or subcontractors.
Compare two or three proposals before you decide.

Questions to ask web design agencies before you hire

Have you done work like this before, and can I see examples?
Who will work on this, and who is my main contact?
How do you charge: hourly, per project or monthly?
What is included, and what costs extra?
How long is the contract, and how can either side end it?
How will you report on progress?
Who owns the work, files and accounts you set up for me?

Licences and registration

This kind of work is often limited to licensed or registered professionals, and the rules depend on where you are. Ask which body they’re registered with, and check their status on that body’s public register before you hire.

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