Two price rises to check before your website renews
Squarespace raised three of its four plans by 19 to 26 per cent in July 2026, by email, and the wholesale price of a .com domain goes up 7 per cent on 1 November. Prices here are in US dollars. Here is what each means for a small business site, and what to do before the renewal date.
The short version
Squarespace's Core plan went from $23 to $29 a month on annual billing in July 2026, a 26 per cent rise that existing customers meet at their next renewal (PetaPixel, 17 July 2026). The wholesale price of a .com domain rises 7 per cent on 1 November 2026 (Domain Name Wire, 23 April 2026). Read the renewal email and note the date, renew your domain for several years before November, and learn how to export your content. A subscription's price is set by the vendor; a site you own has a fixed cost after the build.
Two of the bills behind a small business website are going up, and neither arrived with an announcement. Squarespace raised the price of three of its four plans in July 2026 and told customers by email rather than in public. Verisign, the company that runs the .com registry, raises the wholesale price of a .com domain by 7 per cent on 1 November 2026.
The prices in this article are in US dollars, because that is the currency both companies publish. If you pay in ₹ or €, the percentages are what carry across. The figures on your own invoice will look different.
Neither rise is large on its own. The point of writing them down is that they show how the costs of a website behave: a subscription is a price the vendor can change at any renewal, and the domain is the one recurring cost everyone pays. Read the renewal email, note the date, and use the checklist at the end.
Squarespace raised three of its four plans by 19 to 26 per cent, by email.
In July 2026 Squarespace raised its prices without a public announcement, telling customers by email. On annual billing, the Basic plan went from $16 to $19 a month, Core from $23 to $29, and Plus from $39 to $49. Advanced stayed at $99 (PetaPixel, 17 July 2026). PetaPixel described the Core change as “increasing from $23 to $29 per month on an annual basis, which is a significant 26 percent hike”.
| Plan | Before | From July 2026 | Rise |
|---|---|---|---|
| Basic | $16 | $19 | 19% |
| Core | $23 | $29 | 26% |
| Plus | $39 | $49 | 26% |
| Advanced | $99 | $99 | None |
Existing customers see the new rate at their next renewal, not straight away. The larger shock is for anyone who signed up on a promotional discount, because the renewal drops the discount and adds the rise in one step. One customer quoted by PetaPixel said their price had gone up 61 per cent since signing up in 2021.
If you are on Squarespace, the renewal email tells you which plan you are on and the date. Read both. The date is the one that matters, because it is the deadline for any decision about staying, changing plan or moving. After it, you have paid for another year.
The .com domain goes up 7 per cent on 1 November.
Verisign, which runs the .com registry, is raising the wholesale price of a .com domain by 7 per cent, from $10.26 to $10.97 a year, from 1 November 2026. Its last rise was in September 2024, and under its contract it may raise the price by up to 7 per cent in each of the last four years of a six-year contract period (Domain Name Wire, 23 April 2026).
You do not pay Verisign directly. You pay a registrar, the company you bought the domain from, and it sets its own retail price on top of the wholesale one. Registrars generally pass a wholesale rise on, so expect your own renewal to go up by roughly the same proportion, in whatever currency you pay in. The contract terms also mean this is unlikely to be the last rise.
Registrars usually let you renew a domain for several years at today's price. If your .com is the address on your sign, your cards and your Google listing, renewing it for as long as the registrar allows before 1 November is the cheapest decision in this article. It also removes the yearly chance of forgetting and losing the name. The same habit is worth keeping for a .ie, .in or .eu domain, even though this particular rise does not touch them.
Try this now
Log in to wherever you bought your domain, find the renewal date, and check that the card on file is still valid. Then renew for several years before 1 November. Set a calendar reminder for a month before the new expiry date.
What the new Squarespace rates add up to.
Multiplied out, the Core rise is $72 a year, and that is the number to weigh, not the monthly figure in the email. The table shows the working for two of the plans, using the July 2026 prices (PetaPixel, 17 July 2026).
| Line | Working | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Core, per year | $29 × 12 | $348 |
| Plus, per year | $49 × 12 | $588 |
| Core, rise per year | $29 against $23, over 12 months | $72 |
| Core, over five years | $348 × 5 | $1,740 |
Over five years Core comes to $1,740 at the new rate, before the domain. That is not an argument against subscriptions. It is the figure to hold against what a site built once and hosted plainly would cost over the same five years, and against what the site brings in. If the site produces one extra booking a month, the rise disappears in the noise. If it produces nothing, the rise is a reminder that it never did.
A subscription is a price you rent. A built site is a price you paid.
The two kinds of website cost behave differently, and the July email is a clean example. On a subscription builder, the monthly fee covers the software, the hosting and the templates, and the vendor can change it at any renewal. A site built once by your web designer and put on plain hosting has a build cost, paid, and then a fixed running cost: the hosting and the domain. Hosting can go up too, but a site made of ordinary files can move to another host. A design that lives inside a builder cannot.
Monthly or yearly fee set by the vendor, changeable at renewal
Build cost once, then hosting and the domain
Design and content live inside the builder
Files you can move to another host
Nothing to update yourself
Someone needs to keep it updated
A price rise arrives by email
A hosting rise arrives by email too, but the site can move
Domain renewal: you pay
Domain renewal: you pay
Neither is right for everyone. A builder is the sensible choice for a business that changes its pages weekly and has no one to call. A built site suits a business whose pages are settled and who wants the running cost to stay put. What matters is knowing which you have, and what its price is allowed to do. The planning article works through that choice before any money is spent.
Before the renewal date.
Whichever kind of site you have, the renewal date is when you have options, and the day after it is when you do not. Everything below can be done in an afternoon, and most of it once.
- The renewal email is found, the plan and the new price are noted, and the date is in the calendar.
- You know how to export your pages, images and any blog posts from the builder, and you have tried it once.
- The domain is registered in your own name and account, not your web designer's.
- The .com is renewed for several years before 1 November; a .ie, .in or .eu for several years whenever it next comes up.
- The card on the domain account is valid past the next renewal.
- You have compared the yearly total against what the site brings in, honestly.
- If you move, the domain stays the same, so the website link on your Google listing and every business card still work.
0 of 7 checked
One last check after any move or plan change: open the site on a phone and go through the homepage check. A price rise is an annoyance. A homepage that stopped saying what you do and where you are is what actually costs bookings.
A few common questions.
I got an email from Squarespace about a new price. Is it real?
Yes. In July 2026 Squarespace raised three of its four plans and told customers by email rather than in a public announcement. On annual billing, Basic went from $16 to $19 a month, Core from $23 to $29 and Plus from $39 to $49. Advanced stayed at $99. You pay the new rate from your next renewal.
Why did my price go up by much more than 26 per cent?
Most likely you signed up on a promotional discount. At renewal the discount ends and the new rate applies at the same time, so the jump can be far larger than the headline rise. One customer quoted by PetaPixel said their price had risen 61 per cent since signing up in 2021.
Does the .com rise affect a .ie, .in or .eu domain?
No. The 7 per cent rise from 1 November 2026 is to the wholesale price of .com only, set by Verisign. Other endings have their own registries and their own prices. Whatever ending you use, renewing for several years at a time protects you from the next rise and from forgetting.
Can I renew my domain for more than a year?
Usually, yes. Most registrars let you pay for several years in advance at today's price. Log in to wherever you bought the domain, check the renewal date and the card on file, and renew before 1 November if it is a .com.
Should I leave Squarespace over this?
Not because of the rise alone. Work out the yearly total, weigh it against what the site brings in, and decide whether you need what a builder gives you, such as editing pages yourself without calling anyone. If the pages have not changed in a year, a site built once and hosted plainly may cost less over five years. If they change every week, the builder is probably still the right tool.
What is the one thing to do this week?
Renew the domain for several years before 1 November, in your own name and account, and find out how to export your site's content. Both take under an hour and both keep your options open on the renewal date.
