What does a scrollytelling agency do?

It designs and builds websites where the reader's scroll drives the story: scenes scrub, charts redraw, products turn, all because the reader moved. The work covers the story beats, storyboard, assets, the scroll build, a mobile performance pass and real HTML text underneath so the page can rank.

How much does a scrollytelling website cost?

Template sites with a scroll effect run about $500 to $3,000. Custom scroll landing pages run $5,000 to $15,000, full custom WebGL story sites $20,000 to $50,000+, and award-circuit agency productions $60,000 and up. DappaSol's Flagship scroll site starts at a fixed $3,000.

How long does it take to build a scrollytelling site?

A single custom scroll page usually takes 2 to 4 weeks once the story and assets are ready. Full multi-page WebGL stories take 6 to 12 weeks. Agency campaign productions can take 3 to 6 months. DappaSol's Flagship ships in 2 to 4 weeks.

Should I hire an agency or a freelancer for scrollytelling?

Hire a freelancer if you already have the story, design and assets and only need the build. Hire an agency or studio if you need someone to shape the story, storyboard it, make the assets and own the result on mobile.

Does scrollytelling work on mobile?

Yes, when it is designed for the thumb: touch-first steps, compressed frame sequences, lazy loading and a reduced-motion fallback. Ask any agency to show you a live piece on a mid-range Android before you sign.

Is scrollytelling bad for SEO?

Only when the words are baked into a canvas or video. Built with real HTML text underneath and compressed media, a scrollytelling page can rank like any other page. Snow Fall, published in 2012, is still online and readable today.

Scrollytelling Agency: How to Hire One + Costs (2026)

A scrollytelling agency designs and builds websites where your scroll moves the story: a scene scrubs, a chart redraws, a product turns. Award-circuit agencies commonly charge $60,000 to $150,000+, mid-size agencies $20,000 to $50,000+, custom scroll pages $5,000 to $15,000. DappaSol builds them founder-direct from a fixed $3,000. Vet any agency by scrolling its work backwards on a phone.

How this page differs. Looking for inspiration? Our ten scrollytelling examples walk through Snow Fall, The Deep Sea and the rest. This page is for when you are ready to hire someone to build one: who does it, what it costs and how to tell the real ones from the template shops.

Scrollytelling started in newsrooms. The New York Times' Snow Fall made it famous in 2012 and data teams like The Pudding turned it into a craft. Brands took it from there: launches, founder stories, product reveals, portfolios that play like a showreel.

The agency you want depends on which of those you are making.

What a scrollytelling agency actually builds

Three moves, arranged well. A trigger starts something when it enters the screen. A scrub ties something to your scroll position exactly, so scrolling back rewinds it. A pin holds an element still while the story moves past it. A good agency storyboards those moves before anyone writes code, then builds them so they hold up on a phone.

The deliverables, in order: a story in beats, a storyboard, the assets (3D, frame sequences, illustration or data), the scroll build, a mobile performance pass, and real HTML text underneath so the page can rank. If a proposal skips the storyboard, you are buying animations, not a story.

Agency vs studio vs freelancer

Option	Typical cost	Best for	Watch for
Award-circuit agency	$60,000 to $150,000+ for flagship creative production	Global campaigns with sound, original 3D art direction and press	Months of process; you are one client among many
Mid-size creative agency	$20,000 to $50,000+ for a full custom WebGL site	Brand launches with an internal marketing team to brief it	Who actually builds it, and whether it survives a phone
Data-viz studio or newsroom-style team	Quoted per project	Data stories, research, reports with live datasets	Great charts, less interest in selling your product
Founder-direct studio (DappaSol)	Flagship from $3,000 fixed, 2 to 4 weeks	Founders, launches, portfolios, product brands	Smaller crew; not for heavy live-data journalism
Freelance developer	Hourly; see our Three.js hiring guide	Teams that already have the story, design and assets	You become the art director and the project manager

Agency ranges are our own estimates from the 3D and scroll website cost guide; the founder-direct price is from our pricing page.

What a scrollytelling site costs

Tier	What you get	Typical cost	Timeline
Template plus scroll effect	A theme with an off-the-shelf scroll effect dropped in	$500 to $3,000	1 to 2 weeks
Custom scroll landing page	One bespoke page with a scroll-driven hero and real motion design	$5,000 to $15,000	2 to 4 weeks
Full custom WebGL story	Multi-page, real-time 3D, the whole site reads as one experience	$20,000 to $50,000+	6 to 12 weeks
DappaSol Flagship	A cinematic scroll site on our productized scroll-film architecture	From $3,000 fixed	2 to 4 weeks

Why ours costs less: we built the scroll-film architecture once (it is what runs Streets of Punk, one pinned WebGL canvas cross-dissolving frame sequences under a post-process grade) and reuse the engine, not the design. Every site still gets its own story, assets and type. More on what moves the number in what a cinematic website costs.

How to brief a scrollytelling agency

The story in five beats. Where the reader starts, what they see change, and what they do at the end. One sentence each.
The one action. Book, buy, sign up, enquire. A scroll story with no destination is a screensaver.
What assets exist. Product models, footage, photography, data. Missing assets are the biggest hidden cost.
Your audience's device. If most of them are on phones, say so on page one of the brief.
Deadline and budget band. A real agency will tell you what fits inside it instead of pretending everything does.

How to vet one in a week

The backwards test. Scroll their best piece down, then back up. If the story rewinds under your thumb, it is scrollytelling. If cards just fade in again, it is a template with motion sprinkled on top.
The phone test. Open it on a mid-range Android. Smooth, or stutter and black frames?
The text test. Can you select the words? If not, Google and AI assistants cannot read them either. Check the page against Google's Core Web Vitals too.
The reduced-motion test. Turn it on in your OS settings and reload. A careful team plans for it.
The ownership question. You should own the code, the assets and the domain at the end. Get it in writing.

Where DappaSol fits

We are a founder-direct studio, not an agency with account managers. Ishan scopes it, the price is fixed before you commit, and the work ships in weeks. Live proof: Streets of Punk, a sports videographer's site that plays as one continuous film, and Nugget Nation, a scroll-driven 3D brand site for a Chandigarh restaurant.

Not a fit: newsroom data journalism on a live dataset, or a global campaign that needs a production crew, sound studio and media plan. Hire a data-viz team or an award-circuit agency for those. Looking for a studio in India specifically? See the best cinematic and 3D website studios in India.

Scrollytelling agency: how to hire one and what it costs (2026)