How to Build a Simple Website From Scratch in 6 Easy Steps

Website builders can be useful, but you will learn the fundamentals of web development much faster by building a website on your own. Think of this as a real-world introduction to website development. In fact, you can build a simple website using the techniques described here in just a weekend.

The first part of this article describes how to build a website using HTML to create the skeleton and CSS to create the styling used to display the information on your website. This article will help you to learn how to build a simple website from scratch and helps to learn about tools to set up HTML and CSS files to create a simple web page.

Table of Contents

1. Setting Up Your Basic Tools
2. Structuring Your Page With HTML
3. Styling Your Page With CSS
4. Publishing Your Simple Website

Step 1. Setting Up Your Basic Tools

Setting up tools before you start writing any code is the next step. You will need two things: a code editor and a web browser. Both are readily available, and you may have used similar software many times.

• Code Editor – A code editor to write HTML and CSS files. Modern code editors can check code for syntax and other common errors.
• A Web Browser – To preview your page. You can do this by opening your HTML file directly.

This does not require any child servers or other complex software. All you need is an HTML file to preview your work.

Step 2. Structuring Your Page With HTML

Now you need to create the page skeleton, or as we say in development, the structure. For this task, you can use HTML. Typically, the structure of every simple web page is the same. HTML provides the building blocks of every web page. Think of it as the bones of the page. A basic HTML page has the following:

• An introduction heading
• Content containing text at least
• One or more links to other web pages or web locations
• Up to a few images, only if your page uses images

Mozilla’s MDN Web Docs has a tutorial that is used and respected in the HTML beginner community that creates your first HTML page from a blank page, so it is a good resource to use until you know some basic tags. Having a header and at least one paragraph gives you a ready to go, barebones, site.

Step 3. Adding Basic Interactivity (Optional)

An HTML page can look rather bland on its own, but CSS allows for the control of colors and spacing to make fonts appealing and page layouts more optimized. Some key elements of CSS that relate to HTML must be known:

• Control of text and page spacing
• Fonts
• Text colors

After knowing CSS, your site is likely to improve more than what is needed. A basic HTML page involves:

• A page/site introduction heading
• Body content comprised of text
• Web page or web resource links
• Images, if visual content exists

A well-known and reputable beginner’s tutorial from Mozilla’s MDN Web Docs is a good supporting resource for creating your first HTML page from an empty file while you learn about the basic tags. After you have an introduction heading and a couple of body paragraphs, you have a fully operational, albeit unadorned, website.

Step 4: Styling Your Page With CSS

While HTML provides some level of structure to your website, it’s CSS that allows control of the web page in terms of colors, spacing, fonts, and text layout.

The following concepts would suffice as foundational CSS with regards to HTML:

• Selectors that target HTML elements
• Control of backgrounds and text colors as well as fonts
• Margins and Padding, control of empty and nested web space

To begin with you don’t require comprehensive knowledge of CSS. Knowledge on changing of colors, fonts, and spacing would render a site more usable and presentable.

Step 5: Adding Basic Interactivity (Optional)

At this point you can make some more elaborate changes like adding a user interactive button that modifies text content or a simple image gallery to your page if you wish to. This step is not necessary for a straightforward website, but is helpful as a next step when HTML and CSS are somewhat comfortable.

JavaScript is the language of interactivity on the web. A very basic understanding of JavaScript can add interaction to a page that would otherwise be static. Even in response to a button click, there are several basic JavaScript concepts that can add value to your page.

Check our beginner Python guide with source code to practice these fundamental coding concepts in a different language.

Step 6: Making Your Website Live

After you build your page, you have to make it available on the Internet instead of just being able to view it yourself on your computer.

Here are a few simple ways to get your website online.

• Free website hosting services that host your HTML, CSS, and image files for you.
• Free hosting services with your version control system that host your site.
• Basic shared hosting which can host your custom domain in the future, if that becomes important to you.

When you are just starting out, the free website hosting services are likely your easiest choice, as they are configured and require no maintenance on your part.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the easiest way to see my website while I am building it?

Once you save your HTML file, you can open it in any web browser.

Do I need to learn JavaScript to build a simple website?

No, you do not need to learn JavaScript for your first website. HTML and CSS are enough to style a website and make your website interactive. You can see the effects of each change by refreshing the page.

Do I need to buy a domain name to make a website?

Not necessarily. You’re able to build and publish a website on free hosting options without buying a domain name, but you can always buy a domain name to make a website address you’ll be more likely to remember.

How many hours does it take to make a simple website?

A basic website with some styling and a single page can easily be built in a few hours once you know some basic HTML and CSS.

Is it better to make a website from the ground up or use a website builder?

Neither of these is the best choice. Website builders allow you to make a website in a short period of time while making a website from scratch allows you to understand the basic concepts of the web more thoroughly.

Conclusion

Making your first website from scratch is not a problem even with a complete lack of prior experience. You begin with the basic HTML structure and learn the CSS and JavaScript in order to enhance the website. To publish the site, you need to upload your website file. In an instant, your work can be accessed rapidly from all around the world.