Want to know, How Much Does it cost to run a blog (in 2024)

Don’t panic!

In this article, I’m going to walk you through the exact blogging costs to run a blog. Also, give you a quick overview of the latest blogging tools that literally expand your blog quickly.

So, without wasting any time, let’s break down the cost to run a blog in 2024.

What Does It Cost to Run a Blog?

Well, actually the cost of starting a blog is between $50 to $100 dollars. This cost will only include the domain name and good blog hosting.

But the cost will increase between $100 to $250 if you invest in other premium blogging tools such as themes, and plugins.

If you’re a beginner I recommend you spend between $100 and $150 yearly. When you start growing, spend more money on other blogging tools, resources, and essential plugins which especially help you to grow your blog fast

Basically, the initial costs of starting a blog are 1. custom domain and 2. web hosting.

What Blogging Platform Should I Choose?

No doubt, WordPress is the best blogging platform that ever exists on the planet. As you know WordPress (self-hosted) means it is free to use, but the only cost is your own domain and hosting.

You may think, you need a huge budget to start a blog. Well, that’s not true at all. To be honest with you, you only need a custom domain and hosting to start.

Because in WordPress, there are a bunch of things that come at free, like theme and plugins which is enough for a new blog website.

You can use free tools if you start a blog just as a hobby. Even if you have no interest in making money from blogging, then free stuff is enough for you except for domain hosting. 

Let’s say, you want to start a car repairing business, technically, you need initial investment in order to start & grow your business. The same things you need an initial investment to start your blog from scratch.  

So, How much does it REALLY cost to start and run a blog?

As we divided the cost into 4 modules that include the cost:

  • Domain Cost: ($9 – $12/Per year)
  • Web Hosting Cost: ($2.95 – $3.5 Per Month)
  • WordPress Theme Cost: ($60-$70/year)
  • Logo Design Cost: ($5-100 one-time cost)
  • Wp-Rocket (Caching Plugin): Cost $49/year
  • OptinMonster (Lead Pop Up): Cost $9/months
  • BlogVault (Backup): Cost $7.4/month
  • Keyword Research Tools Costs: ($99 to $150 Per month)
  • Pinterest Marketing Tool Costs: ($10 Per Month)
  • Email Marketing Tools Costs: ($29 Per Month)
  • Graphic Design Tools Costs: ($12.99 Per Month)
  • Writing and Editing Tools Costs: ($11.66 Per Month)

These are some of the blogging costs you need to bear if you blog for profit. The cost can be more if you invest in more tools, actually cost of running a blog is endless.

According to the chart list, the cost of starting a blog is anything between $100 to $300 to set up your blog. But running a blog is quite different from starting a blog.

In order to run a blog on average, you can expect to spend anywhere between $20 to $90 per month. However, it really depends on what kind of blog you want to run, and your blogging goals.

Don’t panic here, let’s drive in more detail how much each one will cost you, including any hidden payments!

How Much Does It Cost to Start & Run a Blog (in 2024)

Basically, the cost of starting & running a blog pretty much depends on your blog, budget, and vision. Still, in order to make things clear, we’ve divided 4 parts that can cost you to start and run a blog in 2024. 

Costs of starting a blog come from: 

  1. Domain+ Web Hosting
  2. Design (Theme+ logo)
  3. Blog Functionality (Plugins)
  4. Blog Marketing Tools

Don’t skip any steps because we walk you through each point to build and run a blog in 2024.

Let’s get started!

1. Domain+ Web Hosting (major cost of starting a blog)

Domain and hosting is the very first thing you need to go online. Without this, it’s quite impossible to create the website you want.

Domain: Cost $0- $10

Anyone can buy a domain name. Your domain name is the address of your blog where people are going to find your blog on the internet.

It’s not just a name or address for your blog, it is the first and last thing people will remember about your blog. So, Before you buy a domain name make sure it is easy to remember and catchy.

A great blog name plays a huge role in the blogging business. Before you buy the domain name make sure of the availability.

Because you can’t buy any domain, that has already been registered by another person or business. Furthermore, make sure it is available on social media too because of branding.

Alright, To do so, you need to visit domain name providers, such as NameCheap, Dynadot, or GoDaddy.

I personally recommend NameCheap but GoDaddy is also good. I have managed all my domains with NameCheap because it’s cheap and easy to handle.

They cost the .com domain around $8.99 which’s pretty cheaper than other providers. NameCheap is very cheap in terms of the domain name.

Need to Avoid

Firstly, If you really want to make money from blogging, then book your domain at least for 3 years. It not only helps you with lowering the cost with a good discount but also helps faster rankings.

The last thing is don’t buy a free domain with some of the hosting services that offer a free domain. Avoid it, otherwise, it’s painful when you want to change the hosting in the future.

Web Hosting ($2.75 -$10/month)

Once you settle on the blog name, the next step is to select good web hosting. As of now, website page speed is the major factor in search ranking.

Note: Avoid free hosting that would be a bad decision in your blogging career, so be aware of it, otherwise you regret that in your whole life.

Read More: How to choose a good Web hosting for beginners

There are some of the good web hostings I’ve been using for 3 years now. For the best blog hosting for beginners, I recommend the following hosting that I am using for my own blog.

Web Hosting From:

  1. Bluehost (Best for Beginners)
  2. Rocket.net (for High Traffic Blog)

If you are a starter blogger, shared hosting is the best way to go and Bluehost is the best blog hosting for beginners. They offer easy, quick setup and helpful 24/7 support making them my #1 recommendation.

Overall, if you want good hosting with a budget-friendly, then consider buying from Bluehost. I’m still using it on Passive Blogger and for my all micro-niche blog.

What I like about Bluehost Hosting:

  • It’s a cheap and effective solution
  • Easy to scale
  • Excellent Customer Service
  • You get a Free Domain name
  • free SSL Certificate
  • 45 days money-back guarantee

So, if you’re looking for something affordable, fast, and reliable then Bluehost is definitely the right choice to go with.


Once you’ve selected the right hosting for you, the next step is to select an SEO-friendly blog theme. There’s nothing go wrong with using a FREE blog theme, it t doesn’t hold you back.

But the fact of the matter is at some point they will charge you in order to unlock the premium features. So why not go with the paid theme, which has tons of features with a pre-made design.

I highly recommend going with a premium theme so that you can get a better blog design.

Basically, a blog theme that lets Search Engines crawl your site and index it right away while free themes are lacking it.

So, it’s very important that your Blog theme is SEO friendly and it pushes your blog to the top of the search results. So, do not hold money when it comes to your Blog theme

Note: Stay away from the free blog theme and pirated themes, it will ruin your hard work in just a second.

So save yourself the hassle by using a good theme for your Blog. From my past experience, I’m going to discuss 2 best of the best WordPress themes you can choose that meet all the desires of your blog.

1. Avada –Highly Recommend for Beginners

This is one of the best themes I ever used in my life. My first and 2nd blog, I’m still using it and I love it so much.

This is a super simple and stylish theme. It comes with lots of demos with flexibility meaning, you can change the look and feel whenever you want.

It is THE perfect THEME for people who aren’t tech guy, who wants to easily install their design and create a beautiful and professional layout.

Everything is customizable and the best part about AVADA is that you can see what changes you are making side by side as you are doing them.

This is a one-time purchase that costs you $69 and comes with a lot of pre-made demos that you can use. I found it super easy to work with and the finishing is beautiful.

2. Genesis Framework (Beginner to Pro)

This is another popular blog theme for all bloggers. Genesis is an easy-to-install theme with an awesome look and feel.

They’re a very fast-loaded theme that works exceptionally well. This is why most bloggers use the Genesis framework. Genesis theme which is costing you $ 59.95, but to be honest it is worthy, gives a huge value of money.

Here are some other blog themes I have personally used and recommend:

  1. BeTheme
  2. The 7
  3. Hestia PRO

Now the choice is yours, whether you use a free blog theme or Paid blog theme, depending upon your needs.

Design is more important than you think. A good design gives a strong impression of your blog and brand. And all the things are happening with premium blog themes that cost between $60 to $90.

Logo ( $5-$100 Cost)

Having a meaningful & simple, logo for your blog leaves an excellent impression on your readers.

To get an awesome logo you can hire a professional logo designer or make it your own. You can use either Fiverr to hire affordable logo design services or use Canva to create your own logo. And the prices come at between $5 to $500.

A logo can be described as the face of your blog. A logo is not just an image, it’s your brand, and it makes a significant impact on your blog for public perception.

Remember, first impressions it the last impressions. If you take your blog as a business, then you need a well-designed logo.

A logo described is an easy way to convey to the targeted audience that your blog is professional, and provides value to the readers.

Note: There are two major costs to start & run a blog, is domain hosting + Blog Design, and The avrage cost is between $75 to $150. But if your blog need more functionality + growth tools then cost would be $175 to $650.

Remember, blogging isn’t free of cost if you want to turn your blog into a business you need to spend some extra. So let’s figure it out; what other tools that cost you more to start or run a blog?


3. Blog Functionality (Plugins)

Just like WordPress themes, there are also free plugins in WordPress. With free plugins, you can set up almost all the things you want to add to your blog.

Still, as I mentioned earlier, they have limitations until you get the premium versions. All the plugins you can easily find in the WordPress plugins sections.

Basically, Plugins come in all shapes and sizes, some are free and some are premium. It depends on the plugin task that you want to do with it.

Building your blog more professionally you should spend some money with these plugins below!

1. Wp-Rocket (Caching Plugin)

Website speed always matters, people will be frustrated while your blog page is loading slowly. To boost your site speed you need cache plugins like WP Rocket.

While site speed in web search ranking factor then you should conscious of that. To increase my site speed I use Wp-Rocket cache plugins.

After installing the plugins it makes my site way 47% faster rather than other Cache plugins. It might cost you around $49/per year, but to be honest, it’s worth paying.

This plugin makes your WordPress blog load fast in just a few clicks and it has many functionalities for website optimization.

I like wp-rocket because while you activate the plugin it automatically starts the basic optimization. I highly recommend Wp-rocket to speed up any WordPress website.

2. OptinMonster (Lead Pop Up)

Building an email list is crucial for every blogger. To grow your email list you need stunning email opt-in forms.

For example, while you visit any blog you might notice that a good-looking opt-in form comes in the sidebar or footer. That says Subscribe to my newsletter, or join free courses and many more.

If you truly want to grow your email list, you must need a high-end template plugin like OptinMonster.

It is a lead generation tool for bloggers, agencies all kinds of businesses. Where a list-building plugin helps and reports to you what you get.

I use OptinMonster for all my blogs, it shows me exactly which opt-in form converts best, which page converts best, and which referring traffic source works best.

3. BlogVault (Backup)

If your WordPress blog is much more than just a blog. It might take hours of taking to create blog posts, and upload pictures, videos, and audio, all because you have a passion for your blog.

To keep your blog content safe and secure you need to prepare because any time disasters can happen. What if your hosting servers may crash, or your blog gets hacked and things may be under control. What are you going to do then?

I think I don’t need to tell you how important it would be to regularly back up your blog. Here is the solution, I use Blogvault to keep a strong backup of my blog regularly so that I can restore it to any previous versions if needed.

Blogvault by default saves a regular copy of your blog on their server and it keeps stored the previous 90 days. So whenever you face any problem with your blog, You can restore it in just a few clicks to any previous dates of your choice.

Other Premium Plugins (optional)

The following plugin is optional but if you want this to boost your website functionality then you can also consider the cost to start a blog.

1. WP Forms (Pro) – WP Form is a drag-and-drop email form builder that helps you to create awesome forms on your Blog.

2. Social Warfare (Pro) – Social media plugins for all the major platforms that’ll help you display your social media content in advanced ways.

3. MonsterInsights (Pro) – This is an analysis of your site where you will understand how people find you and use your website.

4. Sucuri Firewall (Pro) – This is an advanced blog firewall and malware protection

Should I Spend the Money on Paid Plugins?

Actually, it depends on you. what’re the plugins that do work for you? You may think that starting a blog costs you more money, but keep in mind, that these are just my recommendations.

I use them and I got a tremendous value for money. But the fact of the matter is you don’t have to pay for any paid plugins to start a blog. For every single of plugin I mentioned above, you will get a free alternative in WordPress.

Then Why Premium Plugins? Paid plugins can help increase the features of your blog and give you more flexibility to monetize it.

They not only save your time and effort to manage your blog, but they also help you to make their cost back as fast as possible by growing your blog.


4. Growth Suite (Cost of running a blog)

Many of you think that, what am I supposed to do with blogging tools? Well, If you want to climb your blogging success, then you need some tools to make it easy for you.

While I started my blogging journey I just focus on producing content, but that’s not the gateway to success. When most of your competitors are smart because they are leveraging their time.

The time and effort on creating new, original content are good but spending some penny on creative tools that literally boosts your blog is like a skyrocket.

There are some of my favorite paid services that I use for my blog and it helps me spread the word about blogging.

These terms also you might say the cost to start a blog, In order to Grow your blog don’t avoid this extra cost to start a blog.

1. SEMrush (Keyword Research)

The keyword is a major factor when you want to get organic traffic from a search engine. In this decade, keyword research and competitor analysis are crucial for growing search traffic.

Without it, you seem to drive a car with no break! I’m including keyword research tools as an extra cost to start a blog. However, I believe that the right keyword is essential to create great content with a purpose.

For example, if you write content that no one even looking for then you will be just writing for readers but no one ever comes to your blog.

If you want to get more traffic from Google then you have to create great content that people are searching for.

With a keyword research tool like SEMrush, you will know the exact keyword that brings traffic. In this tool, you can see the search volume of the keyword and how competitive and profitable that keyword is.

Overall, it helps you to write the exact content that has the highest chance of ranking on the first page of Google’s search results.

Anyways, SEMrush showed me the search volume and difficulty scores so that I can determine whether it is worth my time to write an article.

2. TailWind (Pinterest Scheduling)

Many Amateur bloggers don’t even realize this, but Pinterest is one of the best traffic sources on the web right now.

And if you want to grab extra booming traffic from Pinterest, then I highly recommend you to sign up for Tailwind.

Why Tailwind? For me, Tailwind is one of the best tools for Pinterest scheduling. I personally only use Tailwind for 3 months, to be honest, it’s worth paying.

Tailwind not only schedules the pinned post but also studies your posts and suggests time slots based on your audience’s behaviors.

It’s one of the best pin schedulers and it’s worth $ 9.99 per month. What is holding you back, Start and enjoy all features for free up to 100 Pins?

3. Aweber (Email Services)

For every starter blogger, I highly recommend that begin building an email list from the first day. Once a visitor comes to your blog that should be an opportunity to capture their email in order to turn them into visitors to fans.

Why Email is so important for your Blog? This is an important tool for your blog because it helps you build strong relationships with your readers and they become your fans.

Email marketing is also a gateway to generating more revenue through affiliate offers or selling your own products. Overall, email is the number 1 promotional tool for bloggers.

Here you go, there are some tools that offer email services like Aweber and Mailchimp. They all have a free option to get you up and running.

They are both fantastic, but my favorite email service is Aweber and it costs $29 per month. It is built for any kind of industry whether it’s bloggers or business firms.

Aweber offers free to start 500 subscribers all sorts of functionality like email automation, and many more. They provide drag & drop email & landing page designers to fuel your email list-building power.

4. Canva (Graphic Design)

Canva is one of my all-time favorite blogging services for the design of images for my blog. I create almost all the images on this blog, using Canva.

This is one of the most valuable things we pay for here at Passive Blogger.

If you want to include this awesome imagery and infographics in your blog, then I highly recommend signing up for pro services. It cost you per months for $12.99 per month.

5. Grammarly (Writing and Editing)

Grammarly is the best grammar checker tool I have ever used in my blogging journey. If you want to boost your writing skill you should use Grammarly.

Grammarly is a free Chrome/Firefox browser extension that helps you write better content. The free version catches common spelling and grammar mistakes which is great. While the premium version helps me to find more complex issues.

It’s free but I use the premium version for $11.66 per month because English is not my native language. I made grammar mistakes more frequently, but using Grammarly helps me a lot to produce great content.

Should I Spend the Money on Premium Tools?

Blogging is not about just writing your thought on the internet. People make passive income through blogging and grow their blogs like a business.

Are you serious about blogging? if yes, then you need the right tools to invest money in order to save your time and focus on publishing more content to maximize your efficiency.

If you do it all by yourself, you become more like a machine. Your brain needs calm so that you can focus on a more worthy task.

However, If you think blogging tools are an extra cost, then you are totally wrong. Every business needs proper investment in order to grow the right way.

Above the list, I mentioned that’s very essential tools for growing my blogging business. After using the tools, my revenue grows up to 47% that’s pretty good, that’s the reason I list them.

Anyways, whether you spend the Money on Premium tools or not depends on the purpose of blogging. What’s your vision for your blog?


FAQ: Cost to Start a Blog

Is it Expensive to Start a Blog in 2024?

Not at all. There are many blogging platforms like Blogspot, and Medium, where you can start a blog with zero money.

I don’t recommend anyone to start a blog for free, Free stuff doesn’t add much value whether it is for business or Blogging.

I always recommend anyone can start a blog with WordPress (Self-hosting). For WordPress, you need a custom domain and web hosting. With these two, you can start your own blog and live your blog. Overall, the total cost of Domain and hosting.

Is WordPress Free to Start a Blog?

Yeah, WordPress is free to Start a Blog. WordPress (self-hosted) is an open-source, free blogging platform. However, to start a blog, you do need to have a custom domain and hosting as WordPress is self-hosted, free, and open for everyone.

Do WordPress Plugins Cost Money?

Well, there are two straight answers 1) it depends, and 2) they’re free. It all depends on what are you going to do with your blog. It can cost you, while some plugins come only at premium services.

Do You Need to Pay to Start a Blog?

As I mentioned earlier, you can start your own blog for free. But if you want money making a blog and enjoy full functionality then you have to spend money on it. Overall blogging isn’t free at all for profit.


Summary: Costs to Start & Run a Blog in 2024

Before you start your own blog, it is important for you to know the exact cost to start a blog. Always try to treat your blog like a business and it’s important to consider the costs that come along with it.

In this article, I have covered a few paid services that I use for my blog, you may also consider it to scale your blogging business.

In summary, if you want to start a blog and make money from it, then the minimum cost is just a domain, hosting, and premium theme. Other things depend on your needs.

So, it would be worth paying for everything at once so that you don’t have to worry about the cost for the whole year.

However, some services are a bit higher so you can go with monthly basics payments. So, how much does it cost to start a blog?

As we already divided the cost into 4 modules:

1. Domain+ Web hosting

  • Domain through NameCheap: Cost ($9 – $12/Per year)
  • Web Hosting Through Bluehost: ($2.95 Per Month)

2. Blog Design (Theme+Logo)

  • WordPress Theme From Avada: Cost ($60/year)
  • Logo Through: Fiverr : Cost($5-100)

3. Blog Functionality (Plugins)

4. Grow Your Blog (Marketing + Tools)

  • Keyword Research through SEMrush: $99/Per month
  • Pinterest Marketing through Tailwind: ($10 Per Month)
  • Email Marketing through Aweber: ($29 Per Month)
  • Graphic design through Canva: ($12.99 Per Month)
  • Writing and Editing through Grammarly: ($11.66 Per Month)

I have tried to figure out the cost of starting a blog I’ve to spend on my blog. I think it might give you an idea about blog investment.

Hope you enjoy this article. If you find this helpful, share it with your friends and family. Let me know

What’s your view on the costs to start and run a blog? Which hosting or extra tools do you recommend? Feel, free to share your ideas and thoughts in the comments below.

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