- The published ranges for a custom CRM in the UK start around £8,000 for a small focused tool and reach £50,000 to £120,000 or more for multi-site systems with portals and data migration. A custom ERP typically starts at about £40,000 to £65,000 and can pass £200,000.
- Hourly rates tell you little by themselves. The size of the scope, the number of integrations and the state of your existing data move the total far more.
- Budget for the life of the software, not only the build: hosting, maintenance (commonly 10 to 20 percent of the build cost each year), support, training and changes.
- For a small team with standard needs, an off-the-shelf product is often cheaper. Custom software earns its place when your process is what sets you apart, or when licences for many users add up.
- These figures come mostly from the blogs of companies that sell development. They are directional, not offers, and we do not publish our own prices here.
The short answer
A custom CRM for a small team usually costs between about £8,000 and £50,000 in the UK, depending on how many roles, automations and integrations it needs. A custom management system, an ERP, usually starts somewhere between £40,000 and £65,000 and climbs well past £150,000 when it covers production, several sites and many connected systems. Northern Europe sits in the same region or a little higher, and Italy is generally lower per hour, with its own extra items such as electronic invoicing.
Those are market ranges collected from published guides in October 2026, not a quote and not our price list. They are useful for one purpose: to tell you whether an offer on your desk is in the right neighbourhood, and which questions to ask if it is not. The rest of this article explains how to read them.
Where these numbers come from, and how far to trust them
Be sceptical of any cost article, including this one. Almost every published guide is written by a company that sells development, and a guide that gives low numbers brings in more enquiries. Different guides also measure different things: the hourly price an agency charges, the day rate of a contractor, the salary of an employed developer, or the prices advertised on a marketplace. That is why two sources can differ by a factor of two and both be honest.
What we did was read many of them, look for the ranges they have in common, and report the spread instead of a single figure. Where a number rests on one source, we say so. The sources are listed at the end. We have not measured any of this ourselves, and we do not claim that AI-assisted development makes a project cheaper by a given percentage, because we have not measured that either.
What developers cost per hour or per day
Rates are the first thing people ask about, and the least useful on their own, but they are worth knowing so that a quote can be sense-checked.
United Kingdom
Published guides put a senior contract developer at roughly £550 to £750 per day outside London, with specialists in cloud, data or AI and roles in London reaching £800 to £1,000 or more. The most data-driven source we found, a job-market tracker, showed a median senior contract rate of about £525 to £575 per day in the six months to spring 2025, from a small sample, so it is noisy. An agency charges more than a contractor earns, because its price includes its team, its management, its insurance and its margin.
Northern and Western Europe
For Germany, one 2026 guide quotes agency rates of about €90 to €150 per hour, freelancers from about €75 to €120 and senior consultants up to €180. For the Netherlands and the Nordic countries the sources spread much more widely, from around €35 to €70 per hour for general market averages to well over €100 for contractors and agencies. No single figure is reliable here, which is itself a useful finding: ask for quotes, do not trust averages.
Italy
Italian guides give a senior freelance developer roughly €55 to €100 per hour, with a spread of sources from about €35 to €120, and specialists in areas such as cloud and AI at €80 to €150. A structured software house is commonly quoted at about €60 to €150 per hour. Italy is generally cheaper than the UK and than Germany for the same seniority, though the gap narrows for specialists.
What a custom CRM costs
A CRM keeps track of contacts, conversations and deals. The cost depends mostly on how many different kinds of users it has, how much of the process is automated, and what it must connect to. These are the bands published in UK guides:
- Small and focused, about £8,000 to £25,000. One team, one sales pipeline, contacts and notes, simple reports. Some guides put the very simplest version lower, at £2,000 to £5,000. A London agency estimates £15,000 to £35,000 for a focused CRM for ten users.
- Medium, about £20,000 to £50,000. Several user roles, a permissions model, automation, email integration and richer reporting.
- Large, about £50,000 to £120,000 or more. Several sites, a customer portal, a mobile app, integrations with accounting and other systems, and migration of years of data.
Some guides give higher figures, for instance £25,000 to £60,000 for what they call a focused first version, or £30,000 to £85,000 overall. The differences usually come from what is included: design polish, a mobile app, formal testing, and who carries the risk if the scope changes.
What a custom ERP costs
An ERP, a management system, ties together sales, purchasing, stock, invoicing, accounting and often production. It is bigger by nature, and the published ranges reflect that: one UK guide says a custom ERP starts at about £65,000 and can pass £200,000, while a London agency's table gives £40,000 to £150,000 over sixteen to forty weeks. Smaller internal tools that people call "an ERP" can cost much less, and some sources quote a few thousand pounds for a limited multi-module tool. Treat that as a floor for something narrow, not as a budget for a full system.
As a rough guide to the shape of the bands:
- A first core, about £10,000 to £40,000. The few modules that replace the spreadsheets: customers, quotes, orders, invoices, basic stock.
- A complete small-business system, about £40,000 to £100,000. Purchasing, stock with several locations, reporting, roles and permissions, integration with accounting software, tax submissions.
- A complex or multi-site ERP, about £100,000 to £250,000 and beyond. Production, several companies or sites, many integrations, data migration and a long programme of work, often in phases.
These bands are our reading of the guides, not a quotation. Where your own project falls depends on the points in the next section.
What pushes the price up or down
Two projects that both say "we need a CRM" can differ tenfold in cost. These are the factors that account for most of the difference:
- Users and roles. Ten people with the same access is simple. Five different roles, each seeing different data, is much more work, and it is also where most security mistakes happen.
- Number of modules. Each area, such as sales, purchasing, stock or invoicing, is a project of its own.
- Integrations. Every connection to accounting software, an online shop, your email, a payment service or a tax authority is a cost in itself, commonly in the range of a few thousand to ten thousand pounds each, and a source of surprises.
- Existing data. Moving years of records from spreadsheets or an old system is routinely underestimated. Dirty data, duplicates and missing fields take real time to clean, and some guides put it at a large share of the budget.
- Reports and documents. A dashboard is quick. A set of tailored invoices, statements and exports that must match your accountant's requirements is not.
- Security and compliance. Handling personal data, payments or regulated records adds design, testing and documentation.
- Interface quality and mobile. An internal tool can be plain. A tool your customers use must feel polished, and a mobile app adds a second product.
- Certainty about what you want. Unclear requirements are the biggest hidden cost. A written specification before the build removes many of the guesses.
The costs after the build
The build price is not the price of the software. Over several years the running costs can match it.
- Hosting. For a small system, commonly £30 to £150 per month, more for high availability or large volumes of data.
- Maintenance and support. Estimates range from 10 to 15 percent of the build cost per year in UK guides to 15 to 20 percent in others. It covers fixes, updates of components, security patches and small changes. On a £60,000 system, that is roughly £6,000 to £12,000 a year.
- Changes. Your business will change, and the software must follow. Expect a continuing stream of small improvements.
- Training and adoption. A system nobody uses well has no return. Some guides suggest several thousand pounds for training and change management.
- Third-party licences and services. Mapping, email delivery, payment fees, document signing.
When you compare options, compare over five years. A custom system that costs more up front can cost less in total when you would otherwise pay a licence for every user every month.
Build or buy?
Custom software is not always the right answer. Off-the-shelf products have price lists that cover the work of thousands of customers, and for standard needs they are hard to beat.
- Buy when your team is small, your process is standard and you can live with the product's way of working. Several UK guides say as much: for fewer than about five users with ordinary sales workflows, a common off-the-shelf CRM is usually the better choice.
- Build when your process is what makes you different, when no product fits without expensive customisation, when you have many users and licences would add up, or when you need to own the system and the data outright.
- Mix when the middle path suits: a product for the standard parts and a small custom layer for what is special.
Some vendors publish five-year comparisons showing a custom CRM as far cheaper than a large subscription product for ten users. Remember who wrote the comparison, and run the numbers with your own users and your own scope.
A note on Italy, and on the Italian items
Italian guides place the first core of a management system at roughly €3,500 to €8,000, a complete system for a small or medium business, with warehouse and electronic invoicing, at about €8,000 to €25,000, and a complex multi-site ERP at €60,000 to €250,000 and more. Some guides go higher for several modules at once, up to €40,000 to €100,000. The figures are lower than the UK ones for comparable scope, which fits with lower hourly rates, but they are also mostly from companies selling development.
A management system for an Italian company has items that a UK one does not: connection to the national electronic invoicing system, VAT and withholding rules, the link with the accountant, and often the migration of many years of records. Each should be a separate line in a quote. The Italian version of this article goes into them in more detail.
How to compare quotes
A quote is only comparable if the scope is the same. Before you ask for any, write down:
- what the system must do, in plain sentences, with a few examples;
- how many users and which roles;
- which systems it must connect to;
- what data must be brought in, and in what state it is;
- what you need on day one and what can come later.
Then ask each supplier the same questions:
- Is the price fixed, time and materials, or a fixed price per phase? What happens if the scope changes?
- What is not included? Migration, training, hosting, licences and testing are the usual gaps.
- Who owns the code and the data, and where is it hosted? You should own both, and be able to move them.
- Who reviews the code, and how is security tested? If AI assistants are used, who checks what they produce?
- What does maintenance cost each year, and what does it cover?
- What does the first phase deliver, and what is the price of stopping after it?
Ask for at least three quotes against the same written scope. If one is far lower than the others, find out what it leaves out. If one is far higher, find out what it includes that the others do not.
What we do and do not say here
We build software and we use AI assistants to do it, but this page is not an advertisement for a price. We have chosen to publish only the ranges the market publishes, and to be clear about their limits, because we think an honest range is more useful than a low number meant to bring in enquiries. We have not measured how much AI-assisted development changes the cost of a project, so we do not quote a saving.
If you would like help writing the scope, so that the quotes you collect can be compared fairly, we are happy to do that with you, whoever you end up choosing to build it.
Sources used
Figures were collected in October 2026 from published guides and are summarised here, not reproduced. They were written mostly by companies that sell development and should be treated as directional.
- UK custom CRM cost guides: Jabu Designs, Softomate, Softrivox.
- UK developer day rates: Lorien, IT Jobs Watch.
- Hourly rates in Germany and Europe: Milkycode, Index.dev, nCube.
- Italian rates and costs: SystemForge, Sydus, Nesso Digitale.
Common questions
Why do quotes for the same project differ so much?
Usually because the scope was not written down in enough detail, so each supplier filled the gaps differently. Some leave out migration, testing, training or hosting, which look cheaper at first and cost more later.
Is it cheaper to hire freelancers than an agency?
Often per hour, yes. But an agency's price includes management, a team with several skills, continuity if one person leaves, and a contract. For a small, well-defined piece of work a freelancer can be excellent. For a system your business depends on, think about who is there in three years.
Does AI make custom software much cheaper?
It changes how the work is done, and it can speed up some parts. We have not measured the effect on total project cost, and we would be cautious about anyone who promises a fixed percentage. It does not remove the need for design, review and testing.
Can I start small and grow?
Yes, and it is usually wise. Build the first core that replaces your spreadsheets, learn from using it, and add modules in phases. Agree up front what the first phase delivers and what stopping after it would cost.
How much should I budget for maintenance?
Published estimates range from about 10 to 20 percent of the build cost per year, plus hosting. Ask each supplier what is covered and what is charged separately.
Photo: Skylar Kang on Pexels
