When creating mobile applications, the conventional wisdom has been to build an MVP — a Minimum Viable Product — before investing more time and resources. The idea behind the MVP is that you can quickly bring an app to market and get feedback from the target audience, which will help you make necessary adjustments before going live with the full-blown version. Intersog specializes in building custom mobile apps and can easily help with your MVP definition and development.
However, for two reasons, some entrepreneurs are apprehensive about the MVP app cost. First, if choosing the wrong tools and techniques, the cost of developing a mobile MVP may outweigh its benefits. They are also concerned that a poor-quality MVP may damage the brand, which would be counterproductive in the long run.
That said, how much does it cost to develop an MVP mobile app? And perhaps more importantly, how to ensure the MVP cost is worth it?
In a nutshell, the MVP mobile development process can take from several weeks to several months. Mobile MVP App development costs vary from $20,000 to $60,000 on average, which is a wide range that is dependent on scope and complexity.
This guide will help you answer these pressing questions.
Let's first start with a fundamental question.
Unsurprisingly, a mobile MVP app is just a stripped-down version of a final product with minimum yet critical features. Shooting to accomplish the 80/20 rule. Cover 80% of the functionality to service the lion's share of users. The remaining 20% can be part of the roadmap scope. However, an MVP app is more than just a prototype. The term comes from the venture capital world, where it has become a standard approach to launching startups.
A Minimum Viable Product means a version of your application with just enough features to excite your customers. In addition, it serves as proof of concept, allowing you to test the idea and get user feedback rapidly.
When developing a new product, you must test it thoroughly before launching it fully. This notion is well-known to both startups and established companies.
These days, many of them are following a minimum viable product development approach because of the following benefits:
There are three key points to consider when estimating the cost of developing a mobile MVP:
Deciding which features to include in your MVP is the first step. Ensure to include all core features at launch and essential extras that make the difference.
Simply put, don't try to build the entire application in one iteration. As your audience feedback suggests, you may find extra functionality worth adding to or dropping from the app.
After all, you don't want to develop a complex app that requires much time and resources but delivers little value to end users.
This factor refers to the choice of programming language, libraries, and frameworks. It means that you should look for a technology stack that is flexible, easy to learn, and integrates well with the business logic of your project.
In general, you will choose between the following app development approaches:
The technology factor takes around 20% of your MVP's budget.
The development team should reflect your app project's capabilities and embrace the MVP's functionality and technologies equally. This notion means you should hire people from diverse backgrounds with different strengths and skills. In addition, your MVP team should be small enough to be agile and highly motivated.
How you assemble your mobile MVP team is a crucial factor affecting the cost of mobile MVP development.
The team includes the following roles:
The payroll is the most significant part of your MVP's development costs, counting 50-60%.
As mentioned earlier, the primary goal of MVP development is to create a basic, launchable version of a mobile application to validate the business idea behind this app and get initial user feedback while using the least resources possible.
To carry out the MVP process, follow these steps:
Like any product, mobile apps must be popular, and people must be willing to use and pay for them. Therefore, the research phase includes a competitor analysis to see what current apps are out there, the number of users they have, and the most popular features of their app.
Besides, you should check the level of competition and the number of competitors, their success stories, and the reasons for their success. This kind of research will help you decide what features you should have in your MVP app.
After doing the competitor analysis and researching your app's potential users, create a concept of how your product will develop and grow. Incorporate all the research findings into the app concept that may help validate or invalidate your business idea.
Also, start thinking about the product's business model and go-to-market (GTM) strategy, how your business will deal with the competition, and how it will look in 2-3 years. The GTM strategy may differ depending on the market (low-end or high-end) and your app business.
Also, focus on mapping out the user flow - how users will interact with your app and the stages where they will feel the product is more valuable. It will help you understand which features are must-have and which are nice-to-have.
With your app concept finalized, design a prototype of the MVP according to your app's GTM strategy. The prototype should demonstrate the core functionality of your product and pave the ground for further communications during the development phase.
The prototype is meant to be a dummy app demonstrating how your app will look and feel. So, put much effort and time into making it better than the competitors. The prototype should be flexible and adjustable to adapt the core app idea to meet your business model.
With your prototype in hand, you should evaluate the product's effectiveness by conducting a survey. Conduct this survey on 100-150 users and score their overall experience with the app. Remember that it is not an MVP but a prototype and is straightforward.
After that, you choose your prototype's top 2-4 features and add more detail. Again, selecting the most-needed features and tossing away less-essential functionality is a priority.
The final stage in MVP development is to start building a basic MVP app. The initial version should be simple, easy to use, and as close to your product's final version as possible. A feature should be integrated as soon as possible if it is unavailable.
The following are some of the characteristics to make your MVP cost-effective:
Even though MVP development is less time-consuming than a full-scale project, it takes some time and monetary resources.
The most accurate way to estimate the cost of MVP development is to count your staff members' salaries and overheads, such as office rent and other administrative expenses.
Then take into consideration the following MVP cost estimation factors:
The scope of work will depend on what features you need to include in your mobile MVP. The more features you want, the higher your cost will be. Think about your competition and market needs, and update your concept accordingly.
In other words, you need to estimate the time and money required for developing must-have features within the scope of your MVP's project.
Here's a quick tip:
The choice of MVP delivery model will majorly impact your costs. You have two options to choose from:
Let's compare the two delivery models and pick one based on the following factors:
It is cost-effective to build your MVP app in-house as you control the whole process from start to finish. However, you need to have a team of skilled developers and designers, plus take care of all the administration and organization work, including:
In-house MVP development is feasible if you already have all of the above. It also makes sense if you have an experienced team, as they can do all the work without asking for help.
Outsourcing mobile MVP development to a remote team is a widely preferred option. You don't need to worry about hiring, retaining, and training your developers, or buying equipment, as the vendor does all of that for you.
Instead, you hire a team of professional app developers ready to work on your product with no hassle. You only have to pay for their working hours and spend more on project management.
MVP development outsourcing is cost-effective, but you must find a suitable vendor with team members who can deliver the product on time without any issues.
So if you're planning to outsource your MVP development, here are a few tips for you:
Below we share sample cost estimates of mobile MVPs across popular app categories, including:
The calculations are based on our team's experience and only cover the client side (front-end development and UX/UI design). The back-end development costs are not included, as the business logic and in-app mechanics differ significantly from app to app.
# | Mobile App Type | Approx. Cost |
1 | Fitness / Health app like Asana Rebel, Glo, Yoga Workout | $19,000-$23,000 |
2 | eCommerce store / Marketplace app like Wish and Flipkart | $29,000-$35,000 |
3 | Travel app like TripIt and Kayak | $23,000-$30,000 |
4 | Social / Entertainment app like TikTok and Pinterest | $25,000-$32,000 |
5 | Expense trackers like Goodbudget and Expensify | $18,000-$23,000 |
6 | Utility apps like Todoist and Proton VPN | $20,000-$24,000 |
7 | Crypto wallet like Trust and ZenGo | $20,000-$25,000 |
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