How Much Does It Cost to Develop a Successful Mobile App?

11 min readJun 29, 2021

Is there anything we can’t access online? Be it enterprises, booking a hotel or property, ordering food, purchasing the item, and many more, everything is available online and easy to access in no time. It is possible due to enhancement in mobile app development services. From a large-scale enterprise to a small-scale business, they all need mobile app development services to reach the maximum users.

Studies show that there is 45% boost recorded in mobile app downloads since 2017 and now, there are 3.2 billion smartphone users worldwide. Also, according to stats, American checks their mobile phones every 12 minutes commonly and 10% of users check the phone every four minutes. Undoubtedly, we can say that the entire mobile app industry is booming.

Market Overview of Mobile App Development

Mobile phones and online apps have become a necessity for today’s generation. We use our smartphones at home; work, while walking, eating, roaming, and even in bed. It is reported that 21% of millennials check an app over 50 times a day and 49% of the users check an app over 11 times a day. With the cross-platform app development, these numbers will increase in the future.

As per the stats, 6.378 billion mobile users are active across the globe in 2021 that is much above than 3.668 billion users in 2016. The figures in the below graph also depict those businesses must put money into mobile app development solutions.

Here are some key statistics relevant to the mobile app industry-

Currently, Google play store provides largest number of Android apps that are around 3.48 million to its users.
With 2.22 million mobile apps, the Apple app store is the second largest app store.
Amazon app store is other player except Google and Apple who is ruling the market in terms of relevancy and success.
It is also reported that people spend their 90% of the time in different applications while using mobile internet.

While talking about mobile app development, businesses come with a question, how much does mobile app development cost? Various factors are responsible to decide the overall mobile app cost. Although, developing a simple app with core features wouldn’t cost you much but if you want to have advanced features, then the complete cost will differ.

Following is the cost estimation for different mobile applications-

Simple mobile app development with core features- $10,000-$15,000 (2–3 months)
Medium mobile app development- $20,000-$40,000 (3–4 months)
Complex mobile app with advanced features- $50,000-$100,000 (more than 6 months)

General cost of developing a mobile app can vary according to different aspects. In this blog, we will get to know about the overall estimated cost. To know about it in detail, keep scrolling-

Components that determine the Cost of Mobile App Development

Here we have listed some of the major components that are responsible to determine the final cost of mobile app development. Mobile app development process and some of the additional things are also mentioned in the following points to get the all-inclusive app cost-

1. App Development Partner

Choosing the right app development partner is significant for the business. You can hire freelancers or a top mobile app development company to create the app. In both ways, it is beneficial to hire an app development company rather than going for freelancers.

The only advantage you get by hiring freelancers is cost-efficiency. Freelancers charge less than any mobile app development agency. Generally, you can hire freelancers at the cost of $35-$40 per hour. There are so many sites where you can easily find efficient freelancer mobile app developers.

But if you hire freelancers, it comes with some disadvantages as well. Sometimes, it is difficult to find freelancers with all the qualities; hence you have to find more than one freelancer for different elements of the project. There are chances to not get delivery on time along with good-quality work.

But if you go with the leading mobile app development company, you will get a lot of benefits. Following are some of the advantages of hiring an app development agency-

Effective project lead & management
All-inclusive service charges
Controlled and arranged processes
In-depth involvement
Quality assurance
Project accountability
Simple communication

Generally, freelancers cost less but can take a longer time in project delivery than expected. On the other hand, local firms can charge a little more but deliver high-quality projects. They charge as per the mobile app category and their complexities comprising- basic, medium, and higher level.

2. Location of the Hired Partner

It is significant to decide whether you want to take services from a local mobile app development company or want to outsource the development services. The overall cost of app development will be highly dependent upon it. The charges of services vary as per the locations and some popular locations have different charges including South America, North America, India, Australia, UK, Ukraine, and Indonesia.

You can hire expert app developers from them but first, get to know about their services charges. If you hire developers from famous locations, they charge more than others.

Take a look at the following to know about the charges of Android and iOS Apps as per the location-

India:

Android Development- $20-$40 per hour

iOS Development- $25-$50 per hour

Australia:

Android Development- $150-$180 per hour

iOS Development- $160-$185 per hour

UK:

Android Development- $50-$70 per hour

iOS Development- $60-$75 per hour

South America:

Android Development- $40-$45 per hour

iOS Development- $50-$70 per hour

North America:

Android Development- $150-$160 per hour

iOS Development- $160-$170 per hour

3. Mobile App Development Process

Sometimes, mobile app development price depends upon its development and the time taken in it are also responsible to vary the cost. If you want to have the best quality solutions with impressive design, it will take more time to develop.

Check out these different development stages as follows-

i) Business Analysis & Research

To provide successful iOS or Android app development services, companies need to have a great idea that comes from lots of market research. How the team forms the entire idea affects the cost very much. It is an essential step taken for project initialization. These project ideas ensure the success of the mobile app; hence it must be researched properly as per the present user’s demand.

Apart from it, the right target audience is also significant to boost the user engagement for the app. There should be targeted different audiences for different apps. To have the right kind of audience, analyze and identify the competitive market properly, collect the information about potential threats and existing competitors.

Get to know about the difficulties to enter the market. This process will take a lot of time but it is worthy as you should know about the weaknesses and strengths of your opponents to make the right strategies and selecting the audience. Typically, this stage can cost you around $1000 to $4000.

ii) Development Planning

After doing the overall research, it is the right time to do planning based on the collected information. It will include the app configuration and deciding various things. In this phase, it will be decisive comprising the app platform (iOS or Android), mobile app or web-based app, features, functions, design, and many more within your budget.

There will be work on adding competitive elements and advanced features to make the app stand out from the existing ones. Besides the basic things, your app must have something to attract the users like e-commerce apps have secure payment gateway, and dating apps have a link to social media accounts. Development planning includes a cost of around $3000 to $5000.

iii) Idea Validation & App Designing

Having the ideas is not all that is necessary, idea validation is also important. It should be a fast process as after approving the ideas, the next phase will be app designing. Interactive and responsive website design solutions bring more user engagement and add value to mobile app development.

The Front-end development of the app should be impressive enough to leave a mark on the user’s mind and convince them to use it. This phase of app designing will range from $4,000 to $7,000.

iv) Development Team Structure

An appropriate and efficient team is the guarantee of a quality mobile app. Also, the size of your development team relies upon the project scope but if you want to keep the mobile application development cost low, keep the team short with required members. To develop the complex project, there should be experienced and skilled developers, otherwise for a simple project; the following is an extended team structure-

Project Manager
Business Analyst
A system administrator
Android or iOS developers (2–3)
UI/UX designers (1–2)
Quality Assurance engineers (1–2)

v) Application Development

In the app development phase, every person has their contribution including developers, designers, QA engineers, and others. This phase provides a chance for team members to show their skills by building a high-performance mobile app but it should be a fast process because it can affect the overall mobile application development cost. It comprises the three most important steps- front-end development, back-end development, and UI/UX design.

UI is something that provides an amazing appearance to the application in front of the users. Whereas, the front-end works, “what is served to the users”. In the back-end, code will be developed and it connects the UI with the front-end system and is responsible for the app functioning.

Front-end Development- Caching, coordinating, wireframing, UI design & development

Back-end Development- Data storing, user management, data integration, server-side logic, forming

The app development stage can cost you up to $10,000 to $20,000 and if you want to have iOS app development, then the cost can vary.

vi) Quality Assurance

After building the app, nobody can take guarantee that it is working smoothly or not? To know whether the app has any flow or mistake, test the application before its final launch. Quality assurance engineers will identify and examine the app’s functioning and performance. They will go with the alpha and beta testing to make the mobile app error-free and able to use.

After the launch, the app can also improve according to the feedback from the users. The QA testing phase will cost you less than $4000.

vii) Application Deployment

Now it is time to deploy the app and put it in front of the public, after completing the entire mobile app development process. Be it the Apple Store or Google Play store, you have to include app images, descriptions, screenshots, icons, video or demo, and app optimization.

Among both the Google play store and apple store, the Apple store takes more time to launch the app. Google pre-analyzes the app with the help of algorithms, hence takes less time in-app launching.

4. App Platform (Android or iOS)

Cost of developing a mobile app for one platform is less, be it Android or iOS. But having cross-platform apps would provide growth to your business. It completely depends upon your business requirements what type of application you want, hybrid or native.

i) Native Mobile Applications

In layman’s words, native apps are known as individual apps that are developed only for one platform, iOS or Android. The average cost to develop an app would go higher in proportion to the type of platforms. It will be dependent upon the users you are targeting, if you want to hit some specific user base, go for either platform.

ii) Hybrid Mobile Applications

Cross-platform app development is always helpful to get the attention of a large user base. These hybrid mobile apps run smoothly on numerous operating systems that directly refer to decreased development time, cost-efficiency, and many more.

5. Features & Complexities

A simple app with core features can be built by any developer, but creating a complex app with the latest features is not everybody’s cup of tea. Also, you should hire mobile app developers who can develop feature-rich mobile apps in less time.

Consider basic and advanced features carefully as it can vary the final cost to get an app developed. Following are the features that must integrate into your app-

i) Easy Sign-up & Login

An app must provide its users the facility to register and login easily. It should include social media account integration so that users can log in to the app via their other accounts, in case of forgetting credentials. It is a user-friendly option that helps to enhance the user base.

ii) Push Notifications

This feature is beneficial to alert users about real-time updates, be it messages, tags, searches, mentions, and many others. These notifications should be sent to the relevant person via simple text or app notifications.

iii) App Navigation

It helps in keeping the user engaged for a long time by assisting them to switch between apps, screens, access varied features, and going back to the previous app. The complete user flow can be managed through it.

iv) In-app Purchases

Whether it is Android or iPhone app development services, these features are must to have. You can sell your services and products via the built app. It is also helpful for monetization through featuring ads, subscriptions, and membership. For all these, you need to integrate multiple secure payment gateways to get the payment.

v) Google Maps

This feature assists users to navigate and easily find their locations. For this, developers need to include Google Maps into the app to provide ease to users. The indoor-map feature also permits users to traverse within indoor locations like a mall, sports venues, libraries, and so on.

vi) Multiple Payment Gateways

It is more essential in the trading and cryptocurrency market. Along with security, it provides ease to users to make payments from one party to another. It is also helpful in increasing sales, validating user information.

vii) Progressive Analytics

Hire mobile app developers who can provide you this feature as it is a key aspect that is beneficial to easily understand the user’s behavior in-depth via tracking and count the activity within the mobile app. It will include various benefits like marketing strategy identification, improvement in user experience, and many others.

viii) Augmented Reality

This dynamic feature is necessary for the ‘try before buy’ model and it enables users to test the new items dependent upon the characteristics to enhance their decision ability before purchasing. AR provides something interactive and exciting beyond the realms of reality.

An Overall Cost Estimation of Mobile App Development

We have described above all the factors that are equally responsible to determine the all-inclusive cost of mobile app development solutions. This cost can vary depending on what type of app it is, whether it is a basic, data-driven, on-demand, social networking, marketplace, or e-commerce app.

There should be a clear purpose to build the app that has a powerful impact on the overall cost. So, after looking at all these aspects, the mobile app development cost will be around $30,000 to $80,000. This cost can be increased or decreased as per included extra features or technologies. If you want to have cross-platform app development solution, then you have to consider increased average cost to develop an app.

The Bottom Line

Above we have provided a complete guide on how much does mobile app development cost? Not only one, but numerous factors are accountable to overall mobile app development cost. Every business has its requirements and goals to have growth in the market and they expect to have a mobile app that can fulfill all their needs.

That’s why they want to include all the latest features and functionalities in to the app to make it more advanced. It helps boost their business as well. For this, they need to hire expert app developers from a well-known mobile app development company to have quality solutions. They will help you to evolve your business with the most innovative mobile applications.