Companies are always striving to offer the best possible experience to the customer, regardless of the industry they are covering.
Especially nowadays, since more and more people are using their mobile phones in order to make their everyday life easier, providing an app is considered a good idea.
App development is certainly an exciting but challenging process. There are several factors involved in developing an app, which is why the final cost of developing an app varies greatly from project to project.
It is important to be familiar with the whole process of creating a controlled app development budget. It is common thing for developers – especially new programmers – to go over the budget when building and launching an app. You don’t want to spend a whole fortune on it and this is why you should be careful.
If you want to launch an app for your business, you should remember one important factor: it’s impossible to get a perfect budget without analyzing critical factors like business goals, app capabilities, and other application constraints.
Still, by the end of this article, you’ll be very well able to answer the question of how much does it cost to develop an app.
We have talked to our friends from several app development companies in Chicago to compile these numbers. Keep reading to learn all about app development cost estimation and budgeting.
For how much the costs o fan app development can vary and why?
Before even mentioning numbers, we have to point out that there is a slight difference in prices between agencies and solo players.
According to Business of Apps, for a simple app that doesn’t have complex functions such as login, personal profiles and rating systems, freelancers in the USA charge around $4000 and agencies receive $10000 on average. If the application has a few more functions and has a nice design, customers have to pay an agency up to $40,000. If third-party systems are to be connected, a backend has to be developed or the security standard is high, the price can quickly rise to $200,000.
As said, there is no concrete answer to the question of how much an app costs, as it depends on countless factors. The average app development cost can range from $4000 to $200.000 depending on the complexity and features of the app.
Below you can find the various factors that affect the app development budget:
- The number of features and screens in an app
- The app’s complexity itself
- Implementation of modern security and privacy protocols
- Size, level, and experience of the app development team
- The number of app developers working on a single project
- Target group
What we mentioned above are technical aspects. In addition to the functionality and complexity of the app, several external factors also affect the cost of building an app.
Developers and user management teams are paid differently in different countries, making the overall cost of app development vary from country to country. Different countries have different payment rules and app development prices. The overall budgeting also needs to take into account the app development costs which are based on different strategies used to build an app.
Another important thing we have to mention in this article is the latest phase of an app development, and that phase is testing.
Once the app is built, the next step is to test the app thoroughly and ensure that the app works according to the requirements and expectations. Hiring professional QA experts requires a significant budget that can drive up mobile app costs in the app testing phase.
The exact time it takes to test an app depends on its features, goals, and complexity. If your app has a high level of complexity and multiple screens, you will need to devote a large portion of the budget to the testing phase.
As manual app testing is not enough these days to fix the glitches and bugs in mobile apps, you may need an automated one as well.
Features x development time per feature x hourly rate x testing phase = app cost
When compiling the list of features, one should consider the long-term business goals and select the features that are of interest to the target audience. Time also plays an important role in the process of app development. Hourly rate is based on the experience and expertise of the agency or individual developer. When you add the price related to the country where your developer or agency is working from, you will have the final cost of the app you want to launch.