Having a website built with AI sounds like a promise: type what you want, get a site. It is partly true. Tools such as ChatGPT, Gemini and the AI builders from Wix, Framer and Hostinger deliver something that looks like a website within minutes. The question that matters is a different one: will that site bring in customers a year from now?
We use AI every day when building websites, so this is not a plea against the technology. It is an honest inventory of what AI does well today, where it fails, what an AI-built site really costs, and when you are better off with an agency that uses AI on your behalf.
Three ways to build a website with AI
1. An AI website builder. You answer a few questions, the tool picks a template, writes copy and finds stock photos. Fast and cheap, but you are locked into the platform, the copy is generic and the site looks like thousands of others.
2. Building it yourself with ChatGPT or Gemini as a helper. You have the model write code, draft copy and solve problems, and assemble it yourself. This works if you are technical and have time. For most business owners it takes weeks and produces a site nobody can maintain.
3. An agency that uses AI in its process. Designers and developers use AI for draft copy, variants, code, tests and optimisation, and make the decisions themselves. The client gets custom work in a fraction of the time it used to take. This is how we work.
What AI does genuinely well
First versions. A draft structure for a service page, a first text based on your brief, ten variants of a headline. AI removes the blank screen and makes the conversation concrete.
Code that has been written a thousand times. A form, a cookie bar, a responsive grid. AI saves hours here, and a developer checks the result faster than writing it from scratch.
Translating and rewriting. A Dutch page into English with the tone intact, a long paragraph made shorter, a technical explanation in plain language. With human review this is reliable and fast.
Testing and checking. Accessibility, broken links, structured data, load time. A model spots patterns a human overlooks.
Where AI fails
Knowing what your customer is looking for. A model knows the average plumber, not your plumbing business in Roosendaal with its heat pump specialism. The copy is correct, but it says nothing a competitor does not say too. And the difference is exactly what sells.
Brand and taste. AI builders produce recognisable AI design: the same gradients, the same icons, the same layout. Visitors notice, consciously or not, and it undermines trust.
Legal care. A generated privacy statement does not describe what you actually process. A generated cookie bar often loads analytics before consent. Under the GDPR that is your problem, not the tool’s.
Maintenance after launch. The AI builder wants a monthly fee. The self-built site has nobody who understands it. Both situations get expensive as soon as something has to change.
Findability. Generic copy without distinctive facts ranks poorly in Google and is not cited by AI assistants. Ironically, a site written entirely by AI is hard to find in AI.
What does a website with AI really cost?
The purchase price tempts; the total cost over three years tells the real story.
- AI website builder: €15 to €50 a month for the platform, plus your own hours. Over three years €540 to €1,800, and you own nothing: stop paying and the site disappears.
- Building it yourself with ChatGPT: hosting at €5 to €30 a month and tens to hundreds of hours of your own time. Priced at your hourly rate, this is usually the most expensive option.
- Agency with AI in the process: one-off from around €3,450 for a business website, plus hosting. You own the code, content and accounts. AI has noticeably lowered the price of custom work in recent years; the difference from five years ago is large.
Set the last option against the cost of a wrong first impression with one major client and the sum is quickly made.
When an AI builder is the right choice
When you want to test an idea before investing. When you need a temporary landing page for an event. When you are putting a hobby project online. In those cases speed matters more than distinction, and a monthly subscription is fine.
As soon as the site has to convince customers, be found and last for years, the balance shifts.
How we use AI
With us, AI writes the first version, never the last. Designers determine the identity, developers check every line of generated code, and the copy is rewritten based on conversations with you, not on the average of the internet. The result is a site that looks different from the neighbours’, complies with the GDPR and that you can manage yourself. And because AI speeds up the work, you pay less for it than you used to.
Frequently asked questions
Can ChatGPT build a complete website?
Technically yes: it writes HTML, CSS and JavaScript on request. In practice that yields loose pieces that someone with knowledge has to assemble, host, secure and maintain. It works for a landing page; for a business site with forms, multiple languages and SEO it costs more time than it saves.
Is an AI-built website bad for SEO?
Not automatically. Google judges quality, not origin. But AI copy without its own facts, experience and distinction is thin, and thin content ranks poorly. The problem is not the AI but the absence of a person who knows what the customer needs.
Am I GDPR compliant with an AI builder?
Usually not by default. Check where the data is hosted, which cookies load before consent, whether there is a processing agreement and whether the privacy statement describes what really happens. With most builders you have to arrange this yourself.
Does my website get cheaper because the agency uses AI?
Yes, you notice it in the price and in the lead time. What does not get cheaper is the thinking: working out what your customer is looking for and how you stand out. That is precisely the part that makes the site work.
Next step
Torn between doing it yourself and having it done? Describe to us in three sentences what your site has to deliver. We will tell you honestly whether an AI builder is enough or whether custom work pays for itself, and what it costs. See our business website packages or ask your question directly.
