How much does it cost to develop a mobile application? How much will it cost to outsource it?  Quite often business owners find themselves trying to answer these two questions.

The advantages of a mobile application are clear, however, these advantages come with a cost to pay. The cost of application development is mostly based on different variables such as platform, complexity, and features. Different target audiences and the different markets expect different features in the applications; which changes the cost to pay for the development. Understanding the needs and expectations of the target market before launching the application means business owners can avoid unnecessary costs.  On the other hand, it is also a fact that application development is an investment where different requirements and preferences will determine the exact cost of investment and final price of the product. For example, a mobile application that is completely standalone and one that requires a back-end server built and an application wouldn't cost the same amount.

Each mobile application development process involves different factors that collectively influence the final product cost. Mobile application development cost breakdown comes down to:

Mobile Platform: IOS or Android, or Both

The most popular mobile applications in application stores are either based on Android or IOS operating systems.  Android and Apple application users are basically two different target market groups, business owners can choose to build an application compliant with both, which will increase the cost.

Android stands forward in Asia, and Australia while the IOS platform is mostly used in the United States and Western Europe. Aside from location, the behavior of the target market should also be considered in choosing what mobile platform to use.  For example, if developing a paid mobile application, the IOS platform would be a better choice, as a study shows that Android users are not as willing to pay as IOS users for applications. Typically, businesses tend to start with the IOS platform and then enlarge the number of users by making either a different stand-alone or hybrid application version for Android.

Design

Design determines the application’s functionality, which helps have more users. Success in graphic design steals the heart of users. Beauty is not for free. We advise you not to economize your application by sacrificing the beauty of the design. Invest in your icon and interface elements like tabs, buttons, etc. for a long-term win.

User experience is the king in application design, as people love effortless applications. UX design determines the engagement and conversions of your efforts and investment in application development.

Mobile application design is another business even for designers. Be sure to contact a designer who knows the requirements and guidelines of mobile applications. You may need to pay more, but just be willing to pay this amount for developing a successful application with a perfect UX design that will make you earn money.

Application Development Stages Cost

Having a ballpark reference for how much the different stages of a mobile application development allows companies to allocate the cost properly.

The pre-research stage can be considered as the cheapest stage among the application development stages. According to Clutch – B2bB analytics company, 51% of businesses spent up to $5,000 in the pre-research stage, 22% of them went above the spent up to $10,000 and 14% spent around $10,000 to $25,000. For the design stage, 32% of businesses spent less than $5,000, but only 9% spent over $50,000 on the mobile application design. Most business owners stay within more than $5,000 but less than $50,000 budget.  The actual development of the application is the major stage in the process. This is where all the coding happens to create every required feature the product is supposed to have. 9% of the respondents spent below $5,000 in developing the code while 33% spent within the $5,000 - $50,000 budget range.

Finally, for the application deployment stage, 30% of the business owners who participated in the survey spent less than $5,000 for application testing and launch it in the marketing while the other 31% remained within the $5,000 - $10,000 budget range. The rest of the respondents went over the $10,000 threshold to complete the mobile application testing and deployment stage.

Testing and Deployment stage

Each type of mobile application has different product development cost associated with it due to different level of the application’s feature and complexity. Features like built-in user analytics, backend server maintenance, and support, CMS support, shopping cart or social media sharing, and networking features can significantly affect the final cost of the product.

Application Maintenance Cost

With all the costs due to developing a mobile application, businesses usually skip the application maintenance cost. Although it can significantly lower the total project cost, leaving the mobile application after the launch, without support and maintenance is not a smart move. To keep the application attractive and useful to the market for the long term, application maintenance costs should be considered carefully.

The basic application maintenance includes hosting and monitoring, engagement and marketing, and updates and licenses. These are all necessary items to keep the mobile application valuable to the user and keeping these also means additional costs per year as maintenance and support is not a one-time thing.

“Like with any other software product, mobile applications cost has a maintenance component. The industry average accepted cost to maintain software is roughly 15-20% of its original development cost. The maintaining process cost can be broken down to the cost of hosting, monitoring, engagement, marketing, updates, and licenses.”

Business Apps

Hosting and Monitoring

To calculate a mobile application backend data hosting cost, parameters such as backend (API) requests, bandwidth per MAU, and bandwidth per user are taken into consideration.  Mobile application monitoring is as essential as the back-end hosting for it to succeed. To monitor a mobile application’s performance, different mobile analytics platforms are available for both businesses and developers to use. Each mobile application product developed will have its unique market and user behavior, there it is not possible to come up with an estimated monitoring cost but contacting possible partners and prospects in the industry can surely provide a benchmark range for the cost.

Engagement & Marketing

“Regardless of the features integrated into the app, you must make people understand that you can help them and that you are there whenever they need your services. There are various techniques that make mobile marketing vital for any brand”

App Samurai

A mobile application marketing cost can include different activities to engage the mobile application userbase. Mobiles and mobile applications, by their nature, allow businesses to create a long-term and solid relationship between themselves and their customers. There is no one-size-fits-all in mobile application marketing.  Effective mobile marketing will need additional costs for testing, and the best strategy may or may not be that costly.

Application Updates and Licenses

Application updates play an important part to keep the mobile application valuable to the user base.  Each mobile application released on an application store, either for Android, iOS, Windows Phone, or other platforms not mentioned will always have updates released.

It is a fact that launching a perfect mobile application is not possible. Subsequent application updates, may it be for performance or user engagement are great tools for the user base to keep patronizing the application. An actual mobile application update release in the application store can take around one hour or two but the time that it takes to develop this update significantly varies and is hardly dependent on the mobile application features and complexity.

Cost of Hiring Application Developer

Outsourcing mobile application development is also very popular not just because of lower cost but because of the quality as well. Once the business decides to hire a mobile application developer(s), the question of how much it will cost them comes up naturally.

"So according to the Indeed.com data, to hire a US-based mobile application development company to need to pay $107,000 / year, which is $10,000 more than the number we established in January of 2016 – $97,000. After converting from a local currency to USD, we see Canada and Australia following the US with $82,000 and $80,000 respectively. In countries like India, it is way cheaper to hire an application development professional – only $4,400 a year, which is explained by the difference in North America, Europe, Australia, and India economies."

• Indeed

The cheaper cost of outsourcing is really tempting especially after the high-cost breakdown, but of course, the price tag and lower cost shouldn’t be the ultimate deciding factor for a business to hire a mobile application development team. It is also important to take note of the company’s feedback from previous clients, level of expertise, and communication strategy as well.

Given that both Android and iOS platforms have a user base engagement adoption and engagement rate, it is a smart strategy for businesses to develop a hybrid or a stand-alone mobile application for both platforms simultaneously. The right software development outsourcing companies can make business ideas become a reality. 

Hybrid Mobile Application Development

When the first handheld mobile phone was introduced, nobody expected that the mobile development industry will be as competitive as it is now. Basic phone functions like calling and sending messages are no longer enough to satisfy the needs of mobile users – thus the development of smartphones. The release of the first iPhone in 2007 marks a new revolution not just for mobile but for the development of applications for these devices. It didn’t take long before the new Operating Systems like Android and Windows divided the already competitive and fast-evolving market.

The division of Operating Systems (OS) led to the development of different applications for each platform, which in turn requires a lot of time that most of the companies, whether big or small, do not have. Since smartphones have become so important, enterprises want to have their apps available for as many people as possible. This only means the development of, at least, one iOS and one Android app with the same content. As a solution, hybrid mobile applications that take advantage of the latest version of HTML 5 as a cross-platform app were created.

The mobile market of offers is expanding and becoming more competitive and expensive every day. Mobile app sales statistics indicate that year after year gadget users switch default services to alternative ones. The built-in mobile task manager is replaced with a new To-Do-List app in town, the default mail client is substituted with the new and fresh Mailbox app and Evernote is now preferred to the standard note editor.

“What situations may call for a hybrid approach? Let’s say the customer requires a straightforward newsfeed that contains nothing but text and images. With this task in mind, the developer is right to choose the cross-platform approach. But if after a while the customer wants the app to store a large amount of data or process sound or graphics, the task becomes more complex. The developer now has to write native code for each specific platform, and the app that was once fully cross-platform goes hybrid.”

Business of Apps

Advantages of Hybrid Mobile Apps

1. User Experience

   Mobile applications make people’s lives easier and more convenient. However, in the case when a mobile application takes a lot of time to give out responses, anyone would not feel like using it. This is one of the major challenges that native mobile app developers will have to face. For example, if a mobile application is associated with large images, it would obviously take some time for the network to load those images. Hybrid mobile apps are in a position to help users stay away from this hassle. It can deliver a seamless and fast mobile app experience to the users.

   A consistent user application experience across multiple mobile platforms is one of the main reasons behind hybrid applications’ popularity. Users can expect the applications to be instantly responsive on different devices and deliver a glitch-free experience. Hybrid apps core idea is the “information is just a tap away”. While it displays data faster and adjusts to different device screen configurations immediately, it also resolves the concerns of the fluctuating data streaming capabilities. Being lightweight, the hybrid application user interface (UI) can also load the large sizes of high-definition graphics and content quickly.

   Like native apps, hybrid apps can also be installed on the device and can be launched just like any other mobile application. These native attributes make hybrid apps virtually indistinguishable from native app. It is a popular fallacy that behind every icon on the user’s desktop there is a native app. Many people even don’t realize that popular ―native mobile applications like LinkedIn, Foursquare, and Twitter are actually hybrid applications. It provides a good look and seamless experience to its users.

2. Multiple Device Integration

   Installing and downloading a new mobile app can be a challenge to users. However, a large percentage of these users still continue to use mobile applications after downloading. As per 2013 statistics, smartphone users are downloading an average of 80 million mobile applications per month. However, this doesn’t mean that all the people who download apps keep on using them. Hybrid mobile application development is in a position to keep the app users away from the frustration associated with this.

   Hybrid applications offer full device access, including ―native-only features in mobile apps, like the use of an address book, microphone, and camera. Like native apps, hybrid apps leverage the device’s internal programming system through an overlay which helps to enable seamless synchronization with other compatible apps. This reduces the integration issues for developers. In turn, the hybrid apps work well with the device’s native applications such as camera, messaging, GPS, etc. to ensure a smooth user experience. As a result, the hybrid mobile apps would work perfectly well with messaging, cameras, GPS, and other device information in order to provide the best possible user experience. This can contribute towards enhanced customer satisfaction at the end of the day.

   While not usually a requirement for business applications, some companies needed the wide consumer distribution feature offered by the apps store both for Android, Windows, and IOS. For these companies, hybrid applications are the best option. One mobile web application combined with a hybrid mobile framework lets businesses easily create the applications ―native apps and hybrid for distribution in every major mobile app store for a new generation of users.

3. Cost-Effective Cross-Platform Development

   For businesses that prefer the native applications look and feel, without the high development costs, the hybrid mobile application is the best choice. Hybrid development is cheaper as some solutions are quicker to create with HTML and JS than with Objective-C or Java. While it is not as simple as the mobile web application, building a cross-platform hybrid mobile app is considerably cheaper than building a cross-platform native app.

   The resources and costs need to develop a hybrid app are easily accessible by the organization. Hybrid application development is consists of building a mobile web application and then wrapping these apps in platform-specific native wrappers. It also utilizes web technology in order to build applications that make resources easily available to develop an application. This process lets businesses develop cross-platform hybrid apps using their current web development skills in the market.

   A hybrid application also gets the task done sooner than any native or web mobile app. In the fiercely competitive digital era where ‘time to market’ has become critical than ever, cost efficiency plays a vital role in helping enterprises build and get their product to the market in no time. With a set of libraries and various development frameworks such as PhoneGap and Xamarin, hybrid application developers can accelerate the development process and submit the app to various app stores to save both time and cost.

4. Simple Maintenance

   Unlike a web application, a hybrid application is designed to make use of all the features available or soon to be available on different mobile devices. Though native apps also utilize all the device features, maintaining the application alone is already quite a challenge both for users and developers alike. Developers have to roll out new updates in the form of new versions and users are required to update the app every time a new version is launched. A hybrid application bypasses versioning and makes app maintenance as simple as updating a web page, that too in real-time. This level of flexibility further simplifies the scalability needs of any business that plans to maximize the benefits of a hybrid mobile app.

5. Offline Use and Support

   Just like native mobile applications, hybrid mobile applications also use the API of the device in order to store some useful information offline. With the continuous increase in the cost of mobile data plans, this can be a prominent benefit that could be delivered to customers who prefer to save money that is meant to be spent on data. Some mobile users have poor connectivity with their mobile devices, and the offline usage capabilities associated with hybrid mobile applications can impress them, as well. As a result, they will be able to use the mobile app without the frustrations the come with online-only mobile applications.

   There’s no clear winner between the two mobile application development approaches. Both native and hybrid mobile applications are ways to fulfill the different needs and preferences of different mobile users and developers. In reality, none of them can be thought of as a perfect solution as they both have their advantages over the other. With the many benefits a hybrid mobile application can bring, it is no wonder why more businesses are leaning towards choosing to invest in this development project compared to the native mobile application development.

   The only thing solid is that when you build mobile apps, it might take a little more investment (in time and money) but the end product is well worthwhile. With all the advantages of the hybrid mobile application we mentioned above, all you need is a bright idea and a good mobile application development company to bring your ideas to life.

For the past few years, mobile network operators and manufacturers manage and control the mobile application development industry. The arrival of new platforms and mobile phone models changed the application development process. The development of mobile applications has generated more interest in both independent and big players in the industry, freelance developers and start-ups.  The constant improvement of hardware related to mobile computing e.g. larger wireless network bandwidth better computing power clearly enhanced and improved the capabilities of mobile devices thus the challenges in the development process are already expected.

According to a Deloitte study (via Time), Americans across all age groups, on average, check their phones 46 times per day. I have three screens of icons, so let's say I see the side screens every third time I am in the apps. Even for a company whose app got relegated to my side screens, I am viewing their app icon nearly 5,600 times a year! That kind of advertising is priceless, so make sure your creative team comes up with a unique, eye-catching app icon – Forbes.

Major software application development companies, such as Google and Apple, are constantly disturbing the fairly safe and established actors of the mobile application development business. These newcomers, together with the big players in the industry, have caused significant structural and multi-cultural changes in the mobile application development field by enforcing and imposing their own rules in the future of the mobile application development industry. The implications of these constant changes do not only concern the mobile phone manufacturers and mobile network operators. The change in the development structure also brings both additional opportunities and constraints for current and new mobile application developers. Because of this, there’s been a demanding need for developers to assess their options while making sure that they are making the most of the advantages of these current trends.

Development tools in Mobile Application Development

The software development kit (SDK) is the center of every development platform. It enables third-party developers to deliver mobile applications running on a specific platform. Software development kits usually include libraries, handset emulators, and debuggers.

Existing popular platforms such as Android and IOS, have taken different approaches when it comes to sharing their SDK with application developers. Some have chosen to restrict access as much as possible, whereas others have chosen to disclose the entire source code of their SDK and OS. SDK approaches can be presented into two main models:

• The Cathedral Model. Popular application development players in the industry, mostly representing roughly half of the customers, chose the proprietary path. Good examples are Apple, Microsoft, and RIM. Linux, Google, and Nokia represent the other half that chose to use open source technology in their development process.

Proprietary platforms all keep the source code of their SDK and OS are hidden from any outsider. The only difference is their level of control over what developers can install on the platform. Apple, for example, has almost unlimited control over third-party applications since all applications pass through an approval before they can be released on the platform. RIM and Microsoft, on the other hand, are more lenient. Advantages of closed technology for the platform provider include being to sell and control your platform, thus increasing the value in return.

• The Bazaar Model. In contrast, open-source technology platforms grant developers full access to all or parts of the source code of their OS and SDKs. Among the three open-source platforms, Linux seems to offer the most freedom to its developers, followed by Google who, for example, denies access to Bluetooth and Instant Messaging APIs for security reasons in their current SDK release. Benefits of open source technology platforms include being able to reduce both development and maintenance costs by taking advantage of the pool of open source developers. Reduced development costs can lead up to reduced platform price and therefore possibly increased number of consumers, without compromising the quality of the application.

Mobile Operating Systems: Android

Android appears to be the best-selling mobile operating system and it is developed by no other than Google itself. According to Gartner (2016), Android achieved 84% of the global share in terms of selling during the first quarter of 2016. At the core of the Android, the system is Linux's other libraries and application frameworks. The first version of the operating system Android 1.0 was released in 2008.  Since then, Google has regularly released an upgraded version of the system to keep up with the trends and ever-changing mobile platforms. According to Statista (2016), Google Play Store has over 2 million applications available to download every day and is continuously growing.

The Android operating system is made of different layers - Linux Kernel sitting at the lowest layer, and Dalvik Virtual Machine on top together with other system libraries. Higher layers contain application frameworks and user application layers.

Android applications are develop using Android Software Development Kit (SDK) with Java being its default programming language for application development. C and C++ programmers also can build android applications using a tool called Native Development Kit (NDK1). Programmers write Java source codes for an application, then the source codes are converted or compiled to Java Bytecodes, then the Bytecodes are cross-compiled to a Dex File afterwards. The APK Builder is then use to package the finished Dex file, Resource file and other files into one whole APK file. This APK file is the application file installed in mobile phones.

Mobile Operating Systems: IOS

IOS is developed and solely used by Apple Inc. in its mobile devices.  Originally developed in 2007, for a smartphone, Apple then decided to customize its existing Mac Operating System for the company’s flagship mobile phones.

Using the native application development model, it appeared to be convenient for Mac application developers to build mobile-friendly applications for Apple devices. Initially, the operating system was named as iPhone OS, but Apple renamed it iOS after the release of version 4. The iOS Kernel is called XNU which was developed by Apple in 2003. XNU is part of Darwin which is an open-source Unix-based operating system also developed by Apple last 2000. By June 2016, the number of available applications in Apple’s App Store has reached 2 million but it's still way lesser than Android applications (Statista 2016).

The underlying IOS architecture can be classified into four different layers. The Core Operating System layer sits at the bottom of the architecture while the core services are defined at the second layer from the bottom. There is also Media Services layer that contains audio and video frameworks with graphics that sit at the third layer next to the Core Services. Cocoa Touch which contains the key technologies for building applications is at the topmost layer of the iOS architecture.

The required programming languages for iOS development are Swift and Objective-c. It is also possible to develop iOS applications with C and C++. Once the mobile application development is completed, the application goes through an approval process for the iOS system. Apple released its initial Software Development Kit (SDK) for iOS in 2008. By the release of Xcode 3.1, it became the default development platform for iOS SDK. Xcode could be used free of charge but test deployment to a device or publishing the application to the Apple App Store requires an annual subscription cost. Once the application is published in the App Store, Apple receives thirty percent of the sales revenue.

Mobile Operating Systems: Windows 10

Windows 10 Mobile architecture is also divided into different layers. The Kernel is obtained from the Windows Operating System and it has been modified to work both for computers and mobile devices.

This layer manages networking, security, storage, application frameworks, and core hardware communications. The layer above is the programming and service system framework layer. This layer provides the application developers with all the required frameworks and libraries to build the mobile applications. The topmost layer contains the system applications that come with the operating system and user applications that are downloaded and installed by the user (Windows 2015).

Microsoft introduces Universal Windows Platform (UWP) which allows developers to build and run software on different Windows 10 platforms such as a mobile, tablet, PC, and Xbox. Microsoft Visual Studio uses an emulator for testing. Once the development is finished, the respective application packages could be created for the compatible windows devices ie. mobile, PC or Xbox.  Several programming languages support the development of the Universal Windows Platform (UWP). Supported languages could be grouped in the following order: HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, XAML and C# XAML, DirectX, and C++. Among the supported languages, group a and b support cross-platform development with the help of Cordova and Xamarin (Hissibini 2015).

Over the past few years, we have observed that a relatively stable market for mobile application development. It has evolved in three distinct directions. First, there seems to be a strong trend towards portal centralization. Second, there is an increased number of actors providing open source technology. Third, platforms are moving towards a higher level of integration. Whichever it is, the trend for mobile application development is expected to be continuously competitive for years to come.