Grants and support for websites in Wales: what Business Wales really offers, what else exists, and what is not real

There is no standing national grant in Wales that pays for a business website. What exists is free advice from Business Wales, free Welsh translation of up to 500 words a month from Helo Blod, council business grants that open and close with each funding round, loans from the Development Bank of Wales, and sector funds for tourism, food and the Welsh-language economy that sometimes include a website in a bigger project. This guide says what each one actually gives you, how a grant round works when one is open, and which offers to ignore. It contains no grant amounts, because the amounts change with every round and anyone quoting one without a date is guessing.

Business Wales: advice, not money

Business Wales is the Welsh Government's business support service, and its advice is fully funded: an adviser assigned to you, workshops including ones on digital and online selling, and online resources. It does not hand out website grants itself. What it does that is worth your time is two things. Its advisers know which local funds are open this quarter and what they will and will not pay for, which saves the month a business usually spends finding out. And its website keeps a searchable list of current funding, which is the place to check before believing anything a salesman says about grants.

Helo Blod: free Welsh, and real

Helo Blod, launched in March 2020 as part of the Cymraeg 2050 strategy, translates up to 500 words a month into Welsh free of charge for businesses and charities in Wales, returns them within four working days, and checks up to 1,000 words of Welsh you have written yourself. It is a genuine human service and it has passed a million words. For a website it covers the short things: the welcome line, the menu labels, signage, social posts, the odd new paragraph. It does not cover a whole site, which is bought by the word from a translator, and it does not do the addresses, the hreflang and the switch, which are the site's job. Use it for what it is for and the paid translation goes on the pages that matter.

Council grants: the rounds

Each of the 22 councils has run small business grant schemes in recent years, many of them funded through the UK Shared Prosperity Fund, and a website or online shop has often been an eligible cost inside a broader project. The schemes are not permanent: a round opens, is oversubscribed within weeks, closes, and the next depends on the next funding settlement. The shape is consistent: a percentage of the cost with the business paying the rest, two or three quotes from suppliers, an application judged against jobs or growth rather than the website itself, and payment after the invoice, so you fund the work first. Check your council's business or economic development pages, and ask the Business Wales adviser what is open, before you plan around one.

Loans

The Development Bank of Wales, owned by the Welsh Government, lends to Welsh businesses at sizes a high street bank rarely bothers with, and a website that is part of a plan to sell online is an ordinary use of a small loan. It is a loan, with interest and a repayment, and it is the honest alternative to waiting for a grant round that may not open.

Sector and language funds

Tourism businesses have had capital grant rounds from Visit Wales in past years, usually for accommodation and facilities rather than a website on its own. Food and drink producers have Food and Drink Wales, the Welsh Government's programme for the sector, which runs support and events and occasionally funds. Charities and community groups have the National Lottery Community Fund and the councils, and their applications ask how a project serves Welsh speakers, which a bilingual site answers. The four Welsh-speaking counties, Gwynedd, Ynys Môn, Ceredigion and Carmarthenshire, ran the ARFOR programme for businesses that strengthen the Welsh-language economy; its second phase ended in 2025, and whether a successor is open is a question for the county's economic development team. For each of these the pattern is the same: the website is funded as part of a bigger project, not on its own.

What is not real

A phone call or an email offering a government website grant, a free website funded by the Welsh Government, or a voucher that only a particular designer can redeem. There is no such scheme; the voucher is a discount on an inflated price, and the designer is usually not in Wales. A site claiming to be Welsh Government approved: the government approves no web designers. And any offer that asks for a payment to release a grant. Business Wales advisers are free and will tell you in one call whether an offer is genuine.

Applying without wasting a month

1. Ring Business Wales and ask which funds are open in your county this quarter and whether a website is an eligible cost.
2. Check the council's business pages for the current round, its closing date and its match-funding percentage.
3. Get the quotes the round asks for; ours is fixed and on the pricing page, which makes it the easy one.
4. Write the application around the business outcome, online sales, bookings, a new market, with the website as the means.
5. Plan to pay first and be reimbursed, and do not start the work before the approval if the rules say not to.
6. Use Helo Blod for the short Welsh whatever happens; it is free and it is now.

What we do when a client is applying: supply the quote in the format the round wants, hold the price for the round's decision period, and start the day the approval arrives.