Short answer: a landing page takes 3–5 working days, a business website 5–7 days, and an online store 7–14 days. Web apps and complex custom projects move from days into weeks or months. The timeline depends not only on the team building it, but heavily on the project type, number of pages, integrations and — honestly — on how fast you deliver materials and approve each stage.

How long does each type of site take?

These are the timelines we work with at shadowforge. I treat them as realistic estimates for a project with a clear brief, not magic promises that ignore reality.

  • Landing page (one page, one offer): 3–5 working days. One message, one goal — that's why it moves fast.
  • Business website (5–8 pages): 5–7 days. Home, Services, About, Contact, plus a few content pages.
  • Online store: 7–14 days. Catalog, cart, payment, delivery, product pages — simply more pieces to assemble.
  • Web app / large custom store: weeks–months. Accounts, roles, business logic, integrations — here "fast" means something else entirely.

Want to see what happens on each day inside these timelines? Read our article The Stages of Building a Website — there we break the process down step by step. Here we look strictly at duration.

What affects the timeline most?

Two "business websites" can take one 5 days and another 3 weeks. The difference isn't magic, it's concrete factors you can size up in advance:

  • Volume: 5 pages vs. 30 pages completely changes the math.
  • Custom design vs. template: a design built for your brand takes more time than a template filled with your text.
  • Integrations: online payment, couriers, CRM, bookings — each connection adds implementation and testing time.
  • Content from you: copy, photos, logo, access. If it's missing, the project stalls.
  • Number of revision rounds: 2 rounds is one timeline, 6 is another.
  • Approval speed: whether a reply comes in 5 minutes or 5 days shows up directly on the calendar.

Simple rule: the more moving parts a project has, the wider the margin of error on any estimate.

Why is a one-day website a red flag?

For a genuine custom project, "ready in 24 hours" almost certainly means a ready-made template with your logo and text poured in. That's not necessarily a scam — sometimes that's exactly what you need. But you should know what you're buying. A site with a structure thought out for your business, its own design, basic SEO and copy that sells does not appear overnight, no matter who promises it. When the promised timeline is suspiciously short, ask directly: "Is this a custom design or a template?" The answer tells you everything.

How do you shorten the timeline, in practice?

Good news: most of the factors that stretch a project are in your hands. Here's what makes the biggest difference:

  • Come with a ready brief and copy. If you know what you want on each page, you've already saved half the delays.
  • Reply fast. Feedback the same day, not a week later.
  • Name a single decision-maker. When four people "still need to look," the project sits frozen. One approver = momentum.
  • Batch your revisions. Send them all at once, not one at a time every couple of hours.

Let's be honest: in our experience, the most common cause of delay isn't the development team — it's waiting on content, revisions and approvals from the client. A project estimated at 7 days can stretch to 3 weeks just because the copy is "coming tomorrow" for two weeks straight.

How does this play out in Moldova?

In Moldova, many small businesses start a project without finished copy and without ready product photos — so the real timeline shifts depending on how fast the materials come together. There's also a genuine need for three languages, RO, RU and sometimes EN: each language version adds content to write and proofread, meaning a few extra days compared with a single-language site. Season matters too: before holidays or a campaign launch the work queue is busier, so a slot booked in advance is what locks your timeline. That's a normal context, not a problem — it just has to be factored in from the start, not discovered halfway through the project.

So how long will it take in my case?

The honest answer: it depends on the type, the volume and how prepared you are. But a serious timeline can be given before the start, once it's clear exactly what we're building. Any estimate pulled out of thin air, without anyone learning your page count and integrations, is just guesswork — and you don't plan a launch on guesswork.

At shadowforge we give you a fixed timeline before we start — once we clarify the type of site, the pages and the integrations — so you know exactly when it's done, instead of waiting for "someday." Send us your idea and we'll give you a real estimate.