Short answer: for most small business websites, a few thousand dollars. Published 2026 price guides from accessibility firms put a manual audit of a small site at about $1,250 to $5,000, and fixing what the audit finds at roughly $2,000 to $8,000 if you hire outside help. Larger, custom-built and e-commerce sites cost more. An ADA website lawsuit usually costs more than both.
A client once asked me, “Can we just add a plugin and be done with it?” I get that question a lot. Here is what the work actually involves and what it usually costs.
What drives the cost
- The audit: about $1,250 to $5,000 for a small site. A person tests the site with a screen reader and a keyboard, template by template, against WCAG 2.1 or 2.2 AA. The price follows the number of unique page templates and how interactive they are (forms, menus, checkout), not the size of your business. Mid-size sites run about $5,000 to $20,000.
- The fixes: roughly $2,000 to $8,000 for a small site under 20 pages if an outside developer does them, and about $5,000 to $15,000 for a 20 to 100 page marketing site. If your own developer makes the fixes, the cash cost can be much lower.
- Documents and forms. PDFs, menus and downloadable forms need their own fixes and add to the bill.
- Keeping it accessible. New pages, products and plugins can break things again. Automated monitoring for a small site costs roughly $20 to $300 a month; agency maintenance plans run about $300 to $1,800 a month.
These are published industry estimates, not the firm’s prices. Get a written quote that says which pages will be tested and against which WCAG version.
What not fixing it can cost
Published industry estimates put most small business website settlements between $5,000 and $20,000 before legal fees, and New York cases often run higher. Add your own legal fees and a rushed fix under a deadline, and the total usually passes what the fix would have cost. How much it costs to settle an ADA website case in New York breaks this down.
Fixing the site after you are sued doesn’t end a New York case on its own, because the state and city law claims ask for money for the past. See should you fix your website before or after responding to an ADA lawsuit.
Can’t I just use an accessibility plugin?
A widget or overlay doesn’t fix the code underneath, and it doesn’t stop lawsuits. By one industry count, more than 1,000 lawsuits in 2024 named businesses that already had an accessibility widget installed. In April 2025 the Federal Trade Commission ordered accessiBe to pay $1 million over claims that its AI tool could make any website compliant. More in using an accessibility widget like accessiBe.
What I tell business owners
Treat accessibility like insurance: the upfront cost protects you from something worse. You don’t have to rebuild your site from scratch, but you do need a real audit, real fixes and someone who checks them.
If you have already received a demand letter or a lawsuit, talk to a lawyer before you spend money on the site, because the order matters. I defend New York businesses in ADA website cases on a flat fee that covers all work up to trial, including a motion to dismiss. See ADA defense or call 212-563-9884.
