While the cost to hire Mobile App Developers may seem high, the return on investment can be substantial when you launch a mobile app, solo or as a part of a company's services.

Globally, in-app spending has grown threefold since 2016 and reached $170 billion by 2023. With a nifty app, a business gets more transactions (like 26% more in the case of Starbucks), stronger bonds with customers, reduced operational costs, improved data collection and brand visibility. How much does it cost to hire someone to build an app and let you drive sales? Providing talent market research is one of our tech recruitment services, so we are experts in the global talent market trends and can make a trustworthy overview ⬇️

How Much Does It Cost to Hire an App Developer in 2024

Is there a ballpark figure for mobile app developers costs? Projects range from $5,000 to over $400,000. A simple app can cost anywhere from $5,000 to $50,000, while a medium-complexity app can range from $50,000 to $120,000. Complex apps with a lot of features can cost upwards of $400,000.

To estimate the total cost to hire an app developer, you can use the formula:

Total Cost to Hire = Recruitment and HR costs + Total Development Time (hours) x App Developer Hourly Rate.

The cost of hiring an app developer depends not only on the app’s complexity, but also the platform, engagement model, and developer location. Let’s take a closer look at these factors.

Beyond App Complexity: What Shapes the Cost of Hiring an App Developer

Engagement model

In most cases, engaging developers through third parties (outstaffing firms, staffing providers, and freelancers) will cost you less than hiring in-house.

Product Team Structure and Management

Mobile development cost depends on your product team structure. If you have an agile self-managed tech team that doesn’t require additional specialists to control each step, you spend less. Just give your team clear requirements, set communication channels, and track milestones to stay in the loop.

Tech Stack

Professional recruiters don’t say: How much does an app developer cost? They’d say: How much does an iOS developer cost? Each specific tech stack has its price on the talent market. Typically, tech stacks are divided by the mobile app development types.

Native app development

Native apps use the official software development kits (SDKs) and programming languages for the specific platform (iOS or Android) to build a mobile app.

Swift is the most popular programming language to build iOS apps. Among other important technologies used by iOS app developers are Xcode (development environment), iOS SDK (Software Development Kit), UIKit (framework), SQLite or Core Data (databases), AFNetworking or Alamofire (networking libraries), XCTest or Quick (testing frameworks).

The Android app developer cost is determined by the cost of Java and Kotlin programming as those programming languages are used for Android apps. Also, Android devs should master Android Studio (development environment), Android SDK (Software Development Kit), and Android (framework).

Hybrid app development

You need to find experts in HTML, CSS, and JavaScript to build a mobile app that can run on multiple platforms. Those specialists should also have mastered such frameworks as Cordova, PhoneGap, or Ionic.

Cross-platform app development

Cross-platform apps are mostly written with the help of frameworks aka Flutter, React Native, or Xamarin.

How much does it cost to hire an app developer for a certain platform? There is an opinion that iOS mobile app developers cost more than Android devs and building for both native platforms is pricier than cross-platform development. From our practice, that’s not always true as the prices fluctuate constantly.

The main thing, I believe, is to focus on the outcome you can get from a certain tech stack rather than opt for a certain tech stack for the sake of its price.

Cross-platform development can reduce the time to launch the app on multiple platforms, as most of the code can be reused. At the same time, native apps tend to perform better, especially for graphics-intensive applications such as games or apps requiring real-time processing.

Developer location: estimated cost to hire app developer by region

While app developers price can slightly change depending on the necessary tech stack, developer location drastically impacts the compensation landscape.

Developer rates are higher in areas with a high cost of living. So, how much do app developers charge across different countries?

Yearly Compensations of Mid-Senior Mobile App Developers

COUNTRY

The USA

IOS

Android

Cross-platform (Flutter, Xamarin)

$100K-164K

$90-154K

$104-172K

Singapore

IOS

Android

Cross-platform (Flutter, Xamarin)

$62-110K

$60-115K

$60-120K

France

IOS

Android

Cross-platform (Flutter, Xamarin)

$50-65K

$47-70K

$50-70K

Japan

IOS

Android

Cross-platform (Flutter, Xamarin)

$40-80K

$40-88K

$37-78K

Spain

IOS

Android

Cross-platform (Flutter, Xamarin)

$34-65K

$34-70K

$37-67K

Portugal

IOS

Android

Cross-platform (Flutter, Xamarin)

$31-62K

$41-68K

$36-65K

Ecuador

IOS

Android

Cross-platform (Flutter, Xamarin)

$35-60K

$27-55K

$24-50K

Poland

IOS

Android

Cross-platform (Flutter, Xamarin)

$30-50K

$32-54K

$24-55K

Egypt

IOS

Android

Cross-platform (Flutter, Xamarin)

$28-48K

$25-40K

$25-43K

Morocco

IOS

Android

Cross-platform (Flutter, Xamarin)

$22-38K

$23-42K

$20-37K

South Africa

IOS

Android

Cross-platform (Flutter, Xamarin)

$21-45K

$24-48K

$23-52K

Brazil

IOS

Android

Cross-platform (Flutter, Xamarin)

$18-35K

$20-34K

$17-34K

Argentina

IOS

Android

Cross-platform (Flutter, Xamarin)

$18-30K

$17-32K

$17-30K

Along with the pricing, the choice of country is influenced by the time zone, IT infrastructure, culture fit, and more.

Industry

How much does it cost to hire an app developer for a specific domain? This is the same factor as an app’s complexity. Each new feature adds up to an app’s cost. Healthcare, Fintech, and E-commerce apps are costly, as they have higher than average security requirements and complex integrations (with electronic health records and banking systems). Gaming and Social Media Apps can be expensive because of sophisticated UX design, real-time data processing, and complex backend systems.

If you are adapting a web application for mobile devices, you pay much more when creating a solo app. Anyway, the domain-specific needs impact mobile development cost.

What Swells Mobile Development Cost

Overdue delivery and rework

If finalizing a mobile app takes more time than planned, your total cost of an app developer adds up. The reasons for that could differ, from the burnt deadlines to the identified bugs. Moreover, you can realize that you want to add some features not included in your initial contract if it’s a Services Agreement with an outsourcing firm.

As a staffing agency, we look for developers who respect deadlines and deliver products that work well on the first run. It allows our clients to pay only for the agreed time spent to develop the agreed functions, and get the necessary add-ons for reasonable costs.

Switching between projects

If a specialist is committed to several other projects, their focuses are blurred. Then, you cannot be sure to get a necessary feature or fix when you need it most of all. Moreover, some freelancers can “vanish” without a warning.

Staffing can be a way to scale your team without this risk, as staffing companies engage dedicated team members in your projects and cover a specialist’s replacement if a specialist abruptly terminates a contract.

Non-strategic hiring

If you hire in-house and lack expertise in tech recruitment, you can waste resources on specialists that don’t match your needs. Skipping a couple of recruitment stages is not a good idea. Along with an impressive portfolio, candidates should share the contacts of their previous managers and teammates with you. Thus, you can check whether developers are able to take ownership over their tasks and whether they are ready to multitask if you have a lot of projects. The list of clarifications is pretty long and extends with each year of practice in the HR field.

Overestimation

If you cannot negotiate, pay more. If you don’t like that rule, you need to chat with hundreds of developers to crack their thinking and pick the appealing reasoning.

Unstructured Onboarding

Each time you hire someone, mind the cost of onboarding a new employee. The price for the issued equipment, training, and relocation increases the cost to hire an app developer. It’s possible to accelerate the training time more than 3x if you have planned all its steps beforehand. It’s also possible to consider special solutions like VDIs to create reliable and cost-effective remote infrastructure.

How to Hire Great Mobile App Devs With Confidence

• Multi-faceted skills evaluation is a must.

• Use any software for skill evaluation only in combination with humans as decision-makers.

• Hire short-term and globally to attract seasoned pros with the best matching skill sets.

• Hire tech recruiters.

They can find you bespoke team players under flexible conditions. You can task your People partners with recruitment only. At the same time, you can get ongoing HR support and make the most out of your hires. The list of staffing services allows you to hire one pro or to find Mobile App developers together with Project Managers or QA Engineers for hire.

The tech recruiters can step in at any project stage. Just like when one SaaS company asked us to hire an additional mobile developer for them to adapt their web product to mobile. At that time, we outstaffed a couple of web developers working on their product. Thanks to our rigorous selection process, we have spotted a pro able to quickly delve into the existing product architecture and codebase and find a common ground with the rest of the team. The mobile developer hired by us fully lived up to our client’s expectations. If the client decides to upgrade their mobile app, we can easily engage the specialist again on the as-per-need basis, as we keep tuned with him.

One more concern you might face is how to stick to all the local regulations when you hire app developers internationally. A global staffing provider covers that and takes over all the related paperwork. Isn't that relieving for entrepreneurs with never-ending to-do-lists?

Whenever and wherever you hire developers, take into account that we can deliver matching team members short-term as well as build an effective retention system for your long-term hires. Hire your team with us if you need fast and flexible hiring.

FAQ

by Ann Kuss
on June 27, 2024. Share on LinkedIn Post on Twitter

Ann Kuss is the CEO at Outstaff Your Team. After 11 years of expertise in building remote tech teams for startup unicorns and global tech brands, Ann decided to lead a new venture aiming to reinvent the way international tech teams scale. Throughout her career, Ann hired specialists for countless tech positions from more than 17 countries on all major continents. Ann graduated from Kyiv-Mohyla business school, is an MIM Kyiv alumna, and regularly takes part in mentorship programs for junior tech talents. Ann actively promotes knowledge sharing and curates Outstaff Your Team blog strategy, preferring topics that solve practical needs of IT leaders. She believes that structuring business flows (including hiring) is a well-planned journey with predictable and successful outcome.