"How much does an e-commerce website cost in India in 2026?" is the question we field most often at Excellence Web Services. The honest answer ranges from ₹15,000 to ₹15,00,000 — and the gap between those two numbers is exactly what this post is going to unpack.
Tier 1: Hosted platforms (₹15,000–₹60,000 setup)
Think Shopify, Wix, Dukaan, Instamojo. You pay a monthly platform fee (₹1,500–₹6,000) plus payment-gateway charges (~2% per transaction), and you get a pre-built storefront.
Best for: 50–500 SKUs, single-vertical brand, founder-led marketing.
Setup costs include: theme customisation, product upload, payment gateway setup, basic SEO, logo work if needed. Real budget for a respectable launch: ₹30,000–₹60,000.
Hidden costs: app subscriptions (every feature is an app), theme upgrades, payment-gateway charges, hosting upgrades as you scale.
Tier 2: WordPress + WooCommerce (₹50,000–₹2,00,000 setup)
You own your code and data. More flexible than Shopify but requires more maintenance.
Best for: brands that want full control, custom features, lower long-term recurring costs.
Setup costs include: hosting setup, theme licence, plugin licences, custom development, payment gateway, security hardening.
Hidden costs: hosting (₹500–₹5,000/month), plugin renewals (₹15,000–₹40,000/year), security patches, breaking updates.
Tier 3: Headless / Custom (₹2,00,000–₹15,00,000+ setup)
Next.js or React frontend, Strapi/Sanity CMS, Stripe/Razorpay backend, custom checkout, custom inventory logic.
Best for: brands at ₹2Cr+ annual revenue, multi-vertical catalogues, complex shipping logic, international expansion.
Setup costs include: design, frontend dev, backend dev, integrations, QA, deployment infrastructure.
Hidden costs: the obvious one is the engineering team you'll need to maintain it. Build cost is a fraction of total cost of ownership.
What drives the wide cost range
- Catalogue size. 50 SKUs is a different game from 5,000.
- Custom design vs theme. Theme is ₹5,000. Original design is ₹50,000.
- Payment gateway integration. Razorpay setup is included. Custom UPI deep-links are not.
- Shipping integration. Shiprocket/Delhivery API is standard. Custom logistics integration is not.
- Multi-vendor support. Massive complexity uplift.
- Multi-language / multi-currency. 2-3x base cost.
- Customer login + accounts. Adds substantial work.
- Subscription / recurring billing. Specialty integration.
Hidden costs nobody tells you about
- Payment gateway charges: 2–2.5% per transaction is baked into your unit economics.
- Hosting: ₹500/month for low traffic; ₹5,000+/month at scale.
- SSL certificate: usually free now but verify.
- Domain renewal: ₹600–₹2,000/year.
- Email service: ₹2,000–₹15,000/month for transactional emails at scale.
- Apps/plugins: ₹500–₹5,000/month each, they add up.
- Maintenance: 15–20% of build cost annually for ongoing tuning.
What we recommend at Excellence by stage
Just starting out
Shopify or Dukaan. Get to market fast. Reinvest revenue into ads, not platform engineering.
₹50L–₹2Cr annual revenue
WordPress + WooCommerce with a custom theme. Best balance of cost and capability.
₹2Cr+ annual revenue
Migrate to a headless setup. The unit economics work.
What we charge
Our Excellence Web Services e-commerce builds typically land in the ₹50,000–₹3,00,000 range. We work Pay After Service: small starting fee, balance on delivery.
If you're sizing up an e-commerce project, talk to our team. We'll give you a realistic estimate in 30 minutes.