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How a client project runs.
Five steps. The last one is what stops you hosting a site you no longer bill for.
Build the draft on the free plan.
Agree the design with the client.
Move to a paid plan to publish.
Point the client domain at it.
Transfer the site at sign-off.
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The handover, in detail
The design phase costs nothing. The free plan builds and previews privately, so nothing is public until you say so. It is not a launch plan, though. Publishing starts from $7/mo billed yearly, so put the subscription in the quote rather than absorbing it at the end, and agree the design with the client before you move it onto a paid plan.
The second seat can be the client’s. Roles are there to organise who can change what, and Solo includes 2 editor seats, which is a way to give the client review access without emailing screenshots. What each role is actually allowed to do is not documented, and neither is whether a view-only person consumes one of those seats, so check both in the app before you promise access to a client and a collaborator at once.
The site ends up in their name, not yours. Have the client register the domain in their own account and add the DNS record there; connecting it is included on every paid plan at no extra cost. At sign-off, the pricing page lists transfer of a website to another email address on every plan, which frees the slot for your next job. Confirm in the app what travels with it, and check the client is on a plan that can publish — the free plan cannot.
Siter.io for freelancers
One designer, a portfolio and a couple of client sites. What that actually costs a month, how a finished site leaves your account once the invoice is paid, and the briefs to turn down rather than build here.
Start for free -> See the plans
The short answer.
Siter.io suits a freelance designer whose deliverable is a designed site of a handful of pages: import the Figma frame, finish it on the canvas, publish it on the client’s own domain. One live site is Solo at $7/mo billed yearly; your portfolio plus two client sites is Plus at $12/mo billed yearly. What decides most jobs is not the price, though — it is that there is no CMS, no shop and no second language.
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Take the job if…
The site is designed pages — work, services, about, contact — and it already exists in your Figma file. The client sends you copy changes rather than writing their own.
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Turn it down if…
The client means to publish posts themselves, sell anything at all, or run the site in two languages. None of that exists here, and quoting for it is how a small job becomes an unpaid rebuild.
What it costs to keep client sites live.
You pay for a plan rather than per site, up to the plan’s limit, so the only question is how many sites you keep published at once. A custom domain is included on every paid plan at no extra cost. Every price below is the monthly figure billed yearly; month-to-month is in brackets.
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Just your own portfolio
Solo — $7/mo billed yearly ($8 monthly).
1 published website, 10 pages, 3 forms, 2 editor seats. The pricing page lists an extra site at $4.
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Your site plus two clients
Plus — $12/mo billed yearly ($14 monthly).
3 published websites, 50 pages, 5 forms, 4 editor seats. The pricing page lists an extra site at $6. If you keep your own portfolio live alongside two client sites, this is the one that fits.
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Five sites live at once
Pro — $24/mo billed yearly ($28 monthly).
5 published websites, unlimited pages and forms, 6 editor seats, plus the ability to download a page as HTML. The pricing page lists an extra site at $8.
Where the maths turns over
The fifth site is the decision, not the fourth. The pricing page lists an extra website at $6 on Plus, without saying on what cadence extras bill, so confirm that before you commit. On those figures a fourth site takes Plus from $12/mo billed yearly to $18, still under Pro. A fifth lands on $24 — exactly Pro’s $24/mo billed yearly — and at the same money Pro also carries unlimited pages, unlimited forms, 6 seats and downloading a page as HTML.
Monthly billing is a fair choice, not a mistake. It costs $1 more a month on Solo, $2 on Plus and $4 on Pro. On uneven income that premium beats paying a year up front for a client relationship that ends in three months. Move to yearly once a site is clearly staying live.
Watch the page cap. Solo caps at 10 pages and Plus at 50. The pricing table does not say whether that counts per website or across the whole account, which matters if you run three sites on Plus. Check it in the app before scoping a ten-page site.
The rows a freelancer actually reads.
The first row is the one that decides everything. A plan that cannot publish cannot deliver a client site.
| Feature | Start (free) | Solo $7 | Plus $12 | Pro $24 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Publish Live | No | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Websites Included | —* | 1 | 3 | 5 |
| Additional Websites | - | $4 | $6 | $8 |
| Webpages | 10 | 10 | 50 | Unlimited |
| Forms | 3 | 3 | 5 | Unlimited |
| Editors Included | —* | 2 | 4 | 6 |
| Additional Editors | - | $4 | $6 | $8 |
| Custom Domain | No | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Download HTML | No | No | No | Yes |
Read off the “View all features and options” table on siter.io/pricing on 2026-09-03. * What the free plan allows on this row is unsettled: Siter.io’s own help articles say teammates are a paid feature, and that has never been reconciled with the plan matrix. Rather than print a number we cannot stand behind, we have left it out and asked for it to be settled.
When to turn the job down.
You will lose more money on the wrong brief than you will ever save on a subscription. All four of these are cheaper to catch in the first call.
The client wants to write their own posts
There is no CMS — no collection, no post editor, no way for a client to add an entry without opening the design canvas. You can keep adding entries yourself as paid work, but you cannot hand over something they publish to. If the brief says “we will be posting weekly”, say so in the first call.
Anything is being sold from the site
There is no e-commerce. It is listed as upcoming with no date, which for the purposes of a quote means it does not exist. A photographer selling prints or a coach selling a course needs a checkout and will not get one here. The workable version sends the transaction to a platform that handles payments — the shop window, not the till.
The site needs to run in two languages
Multi-language is not supported. Duplicating every page into a second set and linking between them by hand is possible and miserable, and you maintain two sites for the price of one. On a bilingual brief, quote a platform that has the feature.
The layout depends on breakpoints you choose
Responsive work here means three fixed breakpoints rather than ones you write. For portfolio and small-business sites that is usually plenty — see the examples and the personal site examples. If a layout needs a fourth, find out while you are quoting. Tracking is the same shape: Google Analytics and Meta Pixel are built in, and beyond those you get site-wide head code on paid plans plus an on-canvas embed element, with no per-page body scripts.
None of this argues against the platform. It argues for qualifying the brief. The way this costs money is quoting for a brochure site and discovering two months in that the client meant to run a shop.
Four things worth knowing.
Two of these change how you quote. The other two change what you promise a client in writing.
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The free plan will not launch anything
It builds and previews privately, which covers the design phase and costs nothing. Publishing needs a paid plan from $7/mo billed yearly. Put that line in the quote.
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The import runs one way
The plugin sends a Figma frame across once. Later edits in Figma do not re-sync, and prototype animations and interactions do not come over at all. After the first import, the canvas is the file that matters.
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The site can leave your account
The pricing page lists transfer of a website to another email address on every plan. Confirm what travels with it, and that the client is on a plan that can publish, before you promise a handover.
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Three fixed breakpoints, not your own
You lay the design out for three widths rather than writing breakpoints. Usually plenty for portfolio and small-business work. If a layout depends on a fourth, find that out at the quoting stage.
Frequently asked.
Which plan does a freelance designer need?
Count the sites you need live at the same time, not the clients you have had. One is Solo at $7/mo billed yearly, your portfolio plus two clients is Plus at $12/mo billed yearly, and five is Pro at $24/mo billed yearly. Month to month those are $8, $14 and $28. A site you have handed over stops being one of yours.
Can I build a client site on the free plan?
You can build the whole thing and preview it privately, which covers the design phase at no cost. What the free plan cannot do is publish to a public address, so the moment the client wants a real URL you are on a paid plan. Treat it as your working draft, not as a way to deliver.
Can I hand the finished site over to the client?
The pricing page lists transfer of a website to another email address on every plan, so the site can move into the client’s account at sign-off. Before writing that into a contract, confirm in the app what travels with it and check the client is on a plan that can publish.
Can the client update the site after I finish?
They can change text and images on the canvas the way you do, and roles are there to organise who changes what — though the exact permissions each role carries are not documented, so check them in the app before you hand a client the keys. That suits a client who swaps a headline occasionally, not one who wants to publish on a schedule, because there is no CMS to publish into. Simultaneous editing is listed as upcoming, so agree who is in the file before you both open it.
What happens when the client wants a redesign in Figma?
The import runs one way with no re-sync, so a change made in Figma afterwards does not reach the live site. Small edits happen on the canvas; a real redesign comes across as a fresh frame and is quoted as such. Worth putting in the proposal — see how the Figma import works.
Who else it is for
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For photographers
Galleries, image weight and the print-sales question, answered honestly.
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For artists
A portfolio that looks like the work, and what it cannot do yet.
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For nonprofits
What a small organisation can build here, and where donations have to live.
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For designers
The core case: your Figma file is already the site.
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For agencies
Several client sites, handoff, and what each extra site costs.
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For studios
Editor seats, roles and how a small team shares a file.
Also useful: Siter.io pricing in full, connecting a client domain and the templates in the app.
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Price the first client site before you quote for it.
Build and preview the whole thing for nothing, then put the subscription in the quote instead of finding it the week you go live. Publishing starts at $7/mo billed yearly.
See the plans -
Start for free with Siter.io
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