If you're a managing partner reading this with one eye on the firm's website open in another tab, you already know. The photos are dated. The bios read like CVs. Mobile is broken in places you stopped checking. Page speed is somewhere north of 4 seconds. And in the last quarter, three lateral candidates told you the site was a factor in their hesitation.

This is not a small problem. The website is the first artifact every prospective client, lateral hire, and referral source meets. For partner-led firms — boutique through AmLaw 200 mid-tier — it does more recruiting and qualifying than the partners realize. When it's wrong, it leaks deals quietly.

Here's what a modern law firm website should actually be in 2026, what it should cost, and how to think about the rebuild.

The signs your firm's site needs a redesign

You don't need an audit to know. Any of these is enough:

The site was last redesigned more than four years ago. It runs on WordPress with a dozen plugins, or on Wix or Clio Grow. Your marketing director can't add a partner bio without an agency call. Your page speed score is below 70 on mobile. Your attorney bios don't have schema markup. You have no Insights section, or one updated quarterly. Google's AI overviews aren't picking you up. A junior associate or lateral candidate has mentioned the website to you in the last six months.

If two or more of those land, you're past due.

What a modern law firm website actually includes

Six elements, in order of impact:

Practice-area pages with real scope. One page per practice. Not a list. Real description of what you do, who you do it for, recent representative matters, the partner who leads it. This is what ranks for jurisdiction-plus-specialty queries on Google. It's also what referral sources read when deciding whether to send you the deal.

Attorney bios that read like profiles. Not CVs. A photo that doesn't look like 2014. A first paragraph that says what kind of work this lawyer actually likes. Education and credentials below. Recent matters and publications. Author schema on every bio so Google indexes them as people, not list items.

Results and case studies. Anonymized when needed, named when allowed. The single biggest credibility signal a law firm website can carry, and the one most under-built. A handful of well-told matters beats a list of fifty.

Insights as a real publication. Not a blog with three posts from 2022. A monthly cadence of partner-authored pieces on developments in your practice areas. This is what compounds your SEO and what gets your firm cited in trade press.

A fast contact path. One field is fine. Two is better. Asking for case details up front kills conversions. Cal.com or similar booking links work shockingly well for the partners willing to publish them.

Speed, accessibility, AI-readiness. Sub-1-second loads on mobile. WCAG 2.1 AA accessibility — a real legal liability if you're missing it. Structured data so AI search and Google's AI overviews can read your site as a knowledge source, not just a brochure.

Built for partner-led firms

This is who we work with: 2- to 50-partner firms, boutique through AmLaw 200 mid-tier. The buyer is the managing partner or the marketing director the partners trust. The buying decision is conservative because the website outlasts the engagement that prompted it.

What we don't do is template-platform builds. If your alternatives are Wix, Squarespace, or a Clio Grow site that all your competitors use, that's not what we do. We build custom Framer sites that are designed and developed end-to-end by a senior team. Your marketing director can update content without us. We pick up the phone three years from now when you need to add a practice area.

What it costs

Honest brackets, in 2026 dollars:

Marketing site rebuild — $45K to $120K. Six to ten weeks. Practice areas, attorney bios, results, insights, contact. Custom design, Framer build, CMS your team operates. This is the right scope for most boutique firms.

Custom design system plus full CMS — $80K to $250K. Twelve to sixteen weeks. Adds practice-area microsites where it makes sense (M&A, securities, litigation), multi-region or multi-language support, and a deeper component library your marketing team can reuse for landing pages, microsites, and event pages.

Monthly retainer post-launch — $4K to $15K per month. Iteration on what's converting and what isn't, new pages as the firm grows, performance and accessibility maintenance, AI search readiness updates. Most engagements that start as projects turn into multi-year retainers.

You'll see big-agency rates 2× to 3× higher for the same scope. The reason ours are lower is structural: senior-only team, no juniors to train, no offshore handoffs, no agency overhead funding accounts that aren't yours.

How we're different from the alternatives

The platforms law firms usually consider — Wix, WordPress with a legal theme, Clio Grow — solve the wrong problem. They make it easy to ship something. They make it hard to ship something that looks serious to serious clients.

We build on Framer. It gives us pixel-level design control, sub-1-second loads, a CMS your team can actually run, and zero plugin maintenance. We've migrated firms off WordPress, Wix, and Clio Grow and it's almost always faster and cheaper than the next "upgrade" within those platforms.

The other thing we do differently: we don't disappear after launch. Most law firm websites die slowly because the agency that built them moves on and the firm is left with a static site they can't evolve. We stay. The retainer is built around the assumption that your firm will change — new partners, new practices, new positioning — and the website should change with it.

Frequently asked questions

What features should a law firm website include for client engagement?

Practice-area pages with clear scope, attorney bios that read like profiles not CVs, recent matter highlights, an Insights section for SEO, a fast contact path, and structured data for Google's Lawyer schema.

How do we improve SEO for a law firm website?

Practice-area landing pages targeting jurisdiction plus specialty queries, attorney author schema on every bio, FAQPage schema on service pages, and a regular Insights cadence. Page speed and AI-search readiness now matter as much as on-page keywords.

What are the essential pages for a legal practice site?

Home, Practice Areas (one page per area), Attorneys (one page per partner), Insights or Articles, About, Contact, plus Privacy, Terms, and an accessibility statement.

What platforms do you build on, and why?

Framer. It gives us pixel-level design control, sub-1-second loads, a CMS your team can actually run, and zero plugin maintenance. We've moved firms off WordPress, Wix, and Clio Grow.

Do you handle compliance, accessibility, and disclaimers?

Yes. WCAG 2.1 AA accessibility, jurisdiction-appropriate disclaimers, ADA review, privacy and cookie banners. We've shipped sites that survived AmLaw 100 IT review.

How long does a typical law firm redesign take?

Six to ten weeks from kickoff to launch for a marketing site. Twelve to sixteen weeks for a firm with custom CMS and multiple practice-area microsites.

How much does a law firm website redesign typically cost?

$45K to $120K for a marketing site rebuild. $80K to $250K for a custom design system with CMS. Monthly retainer for ongoing work runs $4K to $15K depending on scope.

Ready to rebuild?

Book a 20-minute call. We'll review your current site, walk through what we'd change, and tell you straight if we're a fit. No deck, no sales script. Cal link in the nav, or email artyum@agr.studio directly.