How Much Does an IDX Website Cost in 2026? MLS Dues, IDX Fees and Vendor Plans

Introduction

"How much does IDX cost?" has three answers, and vendors only ever quote one of them. The plan price on a pricing page is the smallest of the three. Before it comes what your board charges you to be a member at all, and between the two sits a fee for the right to display the board's listings, which some boards charge, some pass to the vendor, and some waive.

This article puts the three layers in order, with the figures that are actually published and a link to each. Where a board does not publish a number, it says so rather than guessing. It does not explain how a feed reaches a site; the how-to article covers that, and the plugin, widget or integration comparison covers which format to pick.

⚡ Quick answer — what does an IDX website cost an agent? Three layers. Your MLS membership, which you pay whether or not you have a website and which most boards do not publish online. A board IDX or data fee, which for an individual agent is often zero or a small pass-through (one vendor publishes a typical range of $0 to $33 a month). And the website plan itself, where published vendor prices run from $39 to $149 a month, with some charging a setup fee on top. Over a year, the website layer alone is roughly $470 to $1,800 at published rates.

Layer 1: MLS membership dues

You pay these to your board, and you pay them before any website exists. They cover access to the MLS itself, the tools that come with it, and in most markets your local association and national membership.

Very few boards publish the amount on an open web page. MLS PIN says there is no initiation fee and that dues are pro-rated to your join date, and gives the number by phone. Stellar MLS describes one subscription covering 30+ tools and points to a billing-resources page for the figures. Bright MLS and TRREB publish theirs behind member logins. The honest statement is that your dues are a known number to you and an unknown one to any vendor, and that no website plan includes them.

What matters for this article is that dues are a fixed cost of being an agent, not a cost of the website. Compare website options on layers 2 and 3 only.

Layer 2: IDX and data-feed fees

This is the layer that confuses people, because the same board can charge three different amounts depending on who is asking.

An individual agent on a vendor's platform usually pays the least. The vendor holds the feed agreement with the board; the agent signs the board's IDX display agreement and either pays nothing extra or a small pass-through. Showcase IDX publishes that MLS pass-through fees are typically $0 to $33 per month and are not included in its plan price. That range is a fair expectation for most US boards, but it is one vendor's statement, so confirm the figure for your board with the vendor you choose.

A brokerage running its own feed pays the board directly, and here the numbers are published (the board-by-board fee guide quotes each board's page in full, including the agent routes):

A software vendor pays the most, because one feed serves many customers: Stellar lists $7,500 per product per year, MLS PIN $525 per month, ARMLS typically $1,000 to $1,500 per product per month. You do not pay these, but they explain why a vendor's plan price exists and why a vendor that is "connected to your board" has usually paid for the privilege.

Two more published figures round out the picture. Aggregators that sit between boards and vendors have their own prices: Trestle lists $30 per month for broker data feeds and $100 to $175 per connection per month for technology providers, and MLS Grid says you pay only the license fee your MLS requires. An agent never sees these lines; a brokerage or a developer building its own site does.

All figures in this section are as published on the linked pages, checked in October 2026. The detailed version, with a calculator for brokerage and development scenarios, is Peregrine IT's MLS and IDX cost guide.

Layer 3: the website plan

This is the number on the pricing page. Published monthly prices for the common IDX website and plugin products, from their own pricing pages:

These products are not the same thing, which is why the prices differ. Buying Buddy, IDX Broker and Showcase IDX are plugins or hosted search that attach to a website you already run; Realtyna is a WordPress plugin with its own feed; RealFoyer is a full website, IDX and CRM platform that replaces the site. The comparison article explains what that difference costs you later in SEO and lead handling, which a price table cannot show.

Per year

At published rates, the website layer alone comes to:

• $39 a month: $468 a year.
• $49 to $77 a month: $588 to $924 a year.
• $94.95 to $149 a month: $1,139 to $1,788 a year, before any setup fee or MLS pass-through.

Add your dues from layer 1, which you were paying anyway, and any pass-through from layer 2.

What the price does not tell you

Three things are worth asking before the plan price decides it.

Whose domain the listing pages live on. A $49 widget that renders listings inside a frame on the vendor's domain and a $39 platform that creates listing and area pages on yours are not the same purchase, even though the cheaper one does more for search. The format decides this, not the price.

What happens to board fees. Ask the vendor, in writing, whether your board's IDX fee is included, passed through, or your own arrangement. RealFoyer's plan price does not include anything your board charges you directly; your board decides what it charges, and RealFoyer cannot grant or waive MLS access.

What you keep if you leave. Setup fees are sunk; so is a year of listing pages on a vendor's subdomain. A plan that costs more per month but leaves the pages on your domain can be the cheaper one over three years.

FAQ

How much does IDX cost per month? For an agent, the published vendor plans run from $39 to $149 a month, plus a board pass-through that one vendor puts at $0 to $33. Your MLS dues are separate and were already being paid.

How much does IDX cost per year? At published rates, $468 to $1,788 a year for the website or plugin layer, before setup fees. Add any board pass-through.

Do I have to pay the MLS extra to have an IDX website? Usually not much, and sometimes nothing. Most boards charge the feed fee to the vendor or brokerage holding the feed and ask the agent only to sign the IDX display agreement. Some pass a small monthly charge through. Your board, not the vendor, sets this.

Are MLS membership dues included in any IDX website plan? No. Dues are between you and your board, and no vendor can include them.

Why do boards charge vendors so much more than agents? Because one vendor feed serves many agents. Stellar MLS charges a vendor $7,500 a year per product and a brokerage $450 per office; the vendor spreads its fee across its customers through the plan price.

Is a free IDX website real? A free plan usually means the listings render inside the vendor's widget or on its subdomain, with leads routed through the vendor. You can get a site for nothing; you cannot get the board's data for nothing, so the cost is recovered somewhere else.

Does RealFoyer charge a setup fee? Not on an annual plan, which includes one custom design at onboarding. Board fees, if your board charges any, are yours. The pricing page has the current plans in US and Canadian dollars.

In short

Your dues are fixed and not the website's fault. The board's IDX fee is small or zero for an agent and large for the vendor, which is where the plan price comes from. The plan price itself runs $39 to $149 a month at published rates, and the gap between those numbers is mostly about what format you are buying, not how much listing data you get. Decide the format first, then compare prices inside it.

See RealFoyer plans in USD or CAD or check whether your board is supported before you compare vendor prices.

Related reading

• MLS Plugin vs IDX Widget vs Direct MLS Integration
• How to Add MLS Listings to Your Website: The Actual Steps
• How to Choose an IDX Website Platform: A Practical Checklist
• MLS & IDX Compliance: What Your Real Estate Website Must Handle
• MLS and IDX Fees by Board (2026)
• WordPress IDX Plugins Compared (2026 Prices)
• iHomefinder Pricing and Alternatives (2026)
• MLS and IDX Integration Cost in 2026 (Peregrine IT)

Research Integrity

Published 21 October 2026 to answer the cost questions that reach the IDX pages without a page that answers them: "how much does idx cost", "idx cost per year", "idx fees" and board-specific fee searches. Every dollar figure is a published price on the linked page of the board, aggregator or vendor that charges it, as read in October 2026, and is quoted as published rather than averaged or rounded. Where a board does not publish agent dues, the article says so instead of estimating. Competing vendors are named only for their published prices and are not compared on features here; the format comparison lives in its own article. RealFoyer's own price is its current published Starter plan, and the article states that board fees are outside it and that RealFoyer cannot grant MLS access.