AI has massively reduced the cost of building software in the last couple of years. Small, specific projects that were never affordable before now easily are - and we pass the saving straight on to you.

1. Idea review - free.

   Tell us the job that's driving you mad. Fifteen minutes, no charge, no jargon. We'll tell you straight whether it's worth building, roughly what it would cost, and - just as importantly - whether something off the shelf already does it. Start now →

2. Scoping - £95–£195, credited in full against your build.

   We write down exactly what we'll build, what it'll cost, and what it will and won't do, so there are no surprises later. If you go ahead, this comes straight off the price.

3. We build it - most small software solutions, £750–£2,500.

   Simpler one-page calculators or forms start from around £500; bigger or AI-powered builds, more. Setup or integration with an existing product? That's usually £150–£400.

4. We look after it - from £50/month, when we're hosting it for you.

   When we build and run your software, we keep it healthy: hosting, backups, security and email support during normal working hours, all included - a real person to email when you need something, not a folder of code you have to manage yourself. And if we've simply given you advice, or set you up on a product you'll run yourself, there's nothing to host and nothing more to pay.

Whatever we quote at scoping is the price you pay - fixed and agreed before any work starts. No surprise bills.

Use our form (takes 2 minutes) to outline your requirements and send them to us. We'll respond by email within 2 working days - if it's something we can take forward, you can suggest a time to talk.

Most small businesses have a handful of tasks that still run on phone calls, paper, spreadsheets, or the same email typed out over and over. Here are a few typical examples:

• "Customers keep ringing just to ask for a price."A simple calculator your customers can use to get the figure in seconds.
• "Every booking goes through the phone and into the diary."A booking app built around the way you work - not forced into someone else's system.
• "We need photos and details before we can quote a job."A tidy form that gathers exactly what you need, before you get in the van.
• "We give the same advice on the phone ten times a day."A simple software solution that answers it for them, so the phone rings less.
• "Our prices depend on size, options, materials…"A configurator that works it out and shows the customer the price.
• "Jobs get lost between the team."A shared tracker so everyone can see what's where, at a glance.
• "It all lives in a spreadsheet that's falling apart."A proper software solution over the top, so it stops breaking every time someone touches it.

We're not a startup chasing a trend. Web Essentials has been building software, near Brighton UK, since 1992 - over thirty years of getting real systems working for real businesses.

What's changed is the tooling. In the last couple of years, the way software gets built has shifted completely: work that used to take us a week now takes an afternoon. So the small, specific software solutions that were never worth quoting for are suddenly well within reach - and we've rebuilt the way we work around exactly that. You get the benefit of both: modern, affordable builds, backed by a company that'll still be here to answer the phone.

A lot of the work we do involves connecting systems that don't talk to each other - linking your booking software to your accounts package, pushing form data into a CRM, or wiring up a webhook so that one thing happens automatically when another does. If you've got systems that almost work together but not quite, that's often a straightforward fix and exactly the kind of job we're built for.

Sometimes the honest answer is "you don't need us to build anything." If something off the shelf already does the job - Calendly for your bookings or Google Forms for questions - we'll tell you, and, if necessary, help you set it up properly, rather than charge you to reinvent something that already exists. We'd rather point you to the right thing and be the people you call when something does need building than sell you something you didn't need.