How To Estimate Your App Development Budget

Nowadays, having a mobile application is practically indispensable, especially for entrepreneurs. However, their development can cost you from just a few tens or hundreds of dollars to thousands of dollars depending on what project you are on and how you have planned the whole process.

If you are interested in developing an application for your business or company, you have to estimate your budget so you don’t spend everything halfway into the project. You need to lay down some ground rules so you don’t overshoot the budget as well.

Throughout this article, we will talk about the cost of developing an app and how to make an effective estimate.

App Development: Factors That Will Influence Your Budget 

There are a lot of aspects to evaluate when calculating the development budget of a mobile application. Among them, we can find labor (which is constant), the quality of the app, operating system, design or interface, functions, integration with other platforms, and many other things that we will explain below:

    • Functionalities: While there are very simple applications such as the email application on your mobile, others are more complicated. For example, know that if you want to create a video game app, the cost will be considerably high because there are many factors that come into play.
    • Customizations: Depending on what you need, you can increase or decrease the cost of the budget. There are applications that can work through a web page, while others have a basic or personalized interface. Each of these options has a different cost.
    • Services: If you want to have services such as accounts within the application, integration with native apps or social networks, among others, this could increase the cost.
    • Operating system: It is not the same to create an application for iOS, Android, Windows or for two or three operating systems. Each one will have a different price, although it is possible that once created for one system, the adaptation for the other will be of a lower price.
    • Quality: The quality of the UI and the level of the user experience features also determines what you spend. Other features which determine the quality and hence, the price, include external APIs, e-commerce, location, and date tracking. However, a good developer will give you a good result based on the budget you have.

Tips for Developing a Mobile Application and Finding the Right Budget

Developing with the right budget doesn’t necessarily have to mean spending as little as possible. For specialized or long-term projects, you may need to avoid being thrifty, but your money has to go into the right places. Remember that if you have to be lavish on an app project, what you get must be equivalent or more than your money’s worth. The revenue from the app market as of 2017 surpassed $86bn. Hence, you have to invest efficiently during the app creation process if you ever want to have your right share of the cake in the highly-competitive market.

Let’s provide you with some tips for finding the right budget.

    • The business idea: You must bear in mind that the business idea must be convincing enough to get you an ROI. If you already have a company, consider whether it is really necessary to have a mobile application and why it would be better to have it. In case it is a new project, remember to make a market study first.
    • Who will develop the app? You should avoid the use of freelance programmers for a serious project. The best thing is to look for a company with experience in the sector that can provide you with everything you need. However, whichever option you choose, investigate the created applications, opinions of other customers, and compare budgets between the different options.
    • What are your priorities? Keep in mind that many times, the budget may be lower, so you must have different options for your application in case you do not have enough money. In this way, you should include in your plans what has higher priority. Meanwhile, you can include the rest in a future update.

Bottom Line

Finding the budget of an application is often complicated; since basically it will totally depend on the idea that we have about our application. As we have observed, each functionality or detail can increase or decrease the price of the project. However, it is possible to obtain an approximate amount with the help of budget estimation tools or sites.

Before starting any project, you must know your budget. Often, the most important mistake for businesses is to underestimate this part. Knowing the different points before you start can save you time and money. The budget depends on the features to add and developers that are available to you during development.

Take into account that unforeseen events are always possible. The initial budget can be very much exceeded. Keep in mind that the bigger the budget, the greater your room for maneuvering.

Improving your budget also reduces the development time of your application and therefore makes the application operational quickly.

If you were interested in knowing how much it costs to create a mobile application, we hope that the information provided has been to your liking.

Click here to a related infographic with more statistics.

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Karthik Reddy
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