Building a mobile app in 2026 costs anywhere from about $5,000 for a very small single-purpose app to $300,000 or more for a marketplace, a fintech product, or anything with heavy compliance. Most real projects land in a much narrower band. Of the mobile app projects reviewed on Clutch, most cost $10,000 to $49,999, and the average project is $90,780 over about 11 months (Clutch, updated September 21, 2026). After launch, plan on roughly 15% to 25% of the build cost every year to keep the app running and accepted by the stores.
This guide puts the published numbers next to each other and shows where they come from. It covers price by complexity, by platform, and by feature, what each type of builder charges, what the app costs to run, how Apple and Google fees changed in the US in 2026, and what a three-year budget looks like. Every figure has a source and a read date, listed at the end. If you only need the first version of a product, read how much an MVP costs in 2026. If you are comparing hourly rates, read what it costs to hire a freelance app developer.
How much does a mobile app cost? The short answer
| App type | Bubble (Aug 2026) | Appther (2026) | Upwork (Jan 2026) | Typical timeline |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Simple app or focused MVP (one core flow, login, a few screens) | $5,000 to $50,000 | $15,000 to $40,000 | $9,000 to $19,500 | 2 to 3 months |
| Medium app (accounts, database, payments, integrations, admin panel) | $50,000 to $120,000 | $40,000 to $100,000 | $19,500 to $120,000 | 3 to 6 months |
| Complex app (marketplace, real-time data, regulated industry) | $120,000 to $300,000+ | $100,000 to $250,000 | $120,000 to $300,000 | 6 to 12 months |
| Enterprise program | not listed | $250,000+ | not listed | 9 to 18 months |
Timelines are Appther's planning ranges. Upwork prices at the freelance rates on its own marketplace and says its estimates sit at the low end: real costs can be two to three times higher.
The ranges overlap and disagree at the edges because each source prices a different way of building. Bubble sells a no-code platform and quotes traditional development as a comparison. Appther is an agency quoting its own planning bands. Upwork prices projects at the rates of freelancers on its marketplace. None of them is wrong. Compare quotes only when they cover the same list of features.
Why estimates range from $5,000 to $500,000
Every honest quote is built from the same formula:
estimated hours × hourly rate + fixed costs
Xicom, a development company that publishes its math, uses exactly this formula and shows how the same app moves between price bands. A booking app for a home-services business (15 to 25 screens, 1,200 to 1,600 hours) comes out at $36,000 to $64,000 with an offshore team at $30 to $40 an hour, and $120,000 to $240,000 with a US agency at $100 to $150 an hour. Same scope, same hours, more than three times the price.
So three things set the price:
- Hours. How many screens, user roles, integrations, and rules the scope needs, and how much testing you pay for.
- Rate. Where the team is and how senior it is. Clutch lists $25 to $49 an hour as the typical rate in its reviewed projects, which is a blended figure across many countries. Upwork's guide puts a mid-level developer at $80 to $120 an hour in the US and Canada, $35 to $50 in Eastern Europe, and $25 to $40 in Asia.
- Fixed costs. Store accounts, hosting, payment fees, SMS, maps, and AI model tokens. They don't shrink when you negotiate the rate.
The US Bureau of Labor Statistics puts the median software developer wage at $135,980 a year (May 2025), about $65 an hour. Once benefits are added, Xicom estimates the loaded cost of an in-house US developer at roughly $93 an hour, before recruiting and management. That is the floor below which a US agency can't sell an hour.
What drives the cost of a mobile app
Platform: one codebase or two
Building two separate native apps (Swift for iOS, Kotlin for Android) roughly doubles the work. Clutch's guidance, cited by Xicom, is that separate native apps double project cost. Cross-platform frameworks like React Native and Flutter share most of the code between iOS and Android, so you pay for one app plus some platform-specific testing.
| Platform choice | Booking app, offshore team | Booking app, US agency | When it fits |
|---|---|---|---|
| iOS only or Android only | $30,000 to $56,000 | $100,000 to $210,000 | Your users are clearly on one platform |
| React Native or Flutter (both platforms) | $36,000 to $64,000 | $120,000 to $240,000 | Most business apps and MVPs |
| Native on both platforms | $60,000 to $112,000 | $200,000 to $420,000 | Heavy graphics, AR, deep hardware use |
Source: Xicom's worked example, hours × rate, October 2026. Hours are planning assumptions, not quotes.
Native code still makes sense for a narrow part of an app. A common pattern is the main app in React Native with one native piece, like an Apple Watch app written in SwiftUI.
Features
Upwork publishes hour estimates for common features. Multiply them by the rate you are paying.
| Feature | Developer hours (Upwork) | At $40/hour | At $120/hour |
|---|---|---|---|
| Email login | 20 | $800 | $2,400 |
| Single sign-on (SSO) | 60 | $2,400 | $7,200 |
| Push notifications | 10 | $400 | $1,200 |
| Calendar booking | 100 | $4,000 | $12,000 |
| Map, location, and navigation | 100 | $4,000 | $12,000 |
| Product catalog | 200 | $8,000 | $24,000 |
| Vendor portal (business view) | 250 | $10,000 | $30,000 |
| Loyalty system | 150 | $6,000 | $18,000 |
| Bluetooth | 30 | $1,200 | $3,600 |
Treat these as a floor. They cover the happy path of one feature, not edge cases, design, or QA. Bluetooth is a known trap: Polish agency Mobilesoft calls it one of the most underestimated areas, because it has to be tested on real phones and behaves differently across models.
Backend and admin panel
Business logic, the database, the admin panel, and reports often take as many hours as the app itself, Xicom notes. Managed backends like Supabase or Firebase cut that time; Supabase Pro starts at $25 a month. The admin panel where your team manages users, content, and orders is a separate piece of work. Ask whether it is in the quote.
Design and QA
Bubble's phase split for a traditional build is a useful check on any quote: discovery 10%, design 20%, development 45%, QA 15%, deployment 5%, project management 5%. A quote with no line for testing either hides it in development hours or doesn't include it.
Industry
Industry doesn't set the price directly. It adds hours for compliance and integrations. Xicom's planning ranges for a US agency run $160,000 to $540,000 in healthcare (HIPAA, EHR integration) and $280,000 to $600,000 in fintech (PCI DSS, identity checks), against $120,000 to $240,000 for an ordinary booking app.
What it costs by who builds it
| Who builds it | What you pay | What you get | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| You, with an AI or no-code app builder | Bubble Starter Web & Mobile $59/month billed annually, plus store fees | Fast first version; you maintain it | Bubble, October 20, 2026 |
| Freelancer on an open marketplace | iOS $16 to $35/hour, React Native $24 to $45/hour; a six-month v1.0 at $16,640 to $46,800 in developer time | One developer; design, QA, and PM extra | Upwork |
| US-based freelance mobile developer | $108 to $165/hour mid-level, $140 to $210 senior | Direct contact with the person writing the code | Second Talent, September 2026 |
| Offshore or nearshore agency | $25 to $49/hour typical on Clutch; Poland $50 to $99/hour | A team with PM and QA | Clutch, September 2026 |
| US agency | $100 to $150/hour (Xicom's assumption), $205 to $340/hour mid-level (Second Talent) | Full team, onshore overlap, procurement-friendly | Xicom, Second Talent |
A freelancer is usually the cheapest way to get a custom app with clean code you own, as long as the scope is small or medium and written down. An agency makes sense when several people need to work in parallel, when you need cover if someone is sick, or when the industry is regulated. Rates and how to vet a freelancer are covered in our freelance app developer cost guide.
How much does it cost to run a mobile app?
The build is a one-time cost. Running the app is not. Median, a company that turns websites into apps, puts annual maintenance at roughly 15% to 25% of the original build: an app that cost $100,000 costs $15,000 to $25,000 a year to keep running. Appther plans 15% to 20%.
Percentages hide what the money pays for, so count it in hours and bills:
| Running cost | Typical US price | How often |
|---|---|---|
| Apple Developer Program | $99 | Yearly |
| Google Play registration | $25 | Once |
| Cloud hosting | from about $40/month for a small app (Xicom, using an AWS example) | Monthly |
| Card payments (Stripe) | 2.9% + 30¢ per US card payment | Per payment |
| SMS (Twilio) | $0.0083 per segment plus carrier fee | Per message |
| Maintenance and fixes | 20 to 80 hours a month, depending on how much the app changes | Monthly |
| OS and SDK deadline work | 40 to 80 hours a year (Xicom's assumption) | Yearly |
Source: Xicom, prices checked October 13, 2026, unless noted.
The stores raise the bar every year
You can't skip the yearly platform updates. Two 2026 examples:
- Since April 28, 2026, every app uploaded to App Store Connect must be built with Xcode 26 and the iOS 26 SDK. Without that update you can't ship even a one-line bug fix.
- Since August 31, 2026, new apps and updates on Google Play must target Android 16 (API level 36). Existing apps that fall behind the minimum stop being offered to new users on newer Android versions.
So an app is never finished in the budget sense. Someone has to rebuild, retest, and resubmit it at least once a year.
Apple and Google fees in the US in 2026
You pay store commission only on digital goods and subscriptions sold inside the app. A free app, an internal company app, or an app that sells physical goods or real-world services (a delivery, a haircut booking) usually pays no commission.
- Apple in-app purchases: 30%, or 15% under the App Store Small Business Program for developers with up to $1 million in proceeds in the previous year.
- Apple link-outs in the US: US apps can link users to a web checkout. As of October 2026, Apple charges no commission on those purchases while a court decides what fee is allowed. Apple proposed 15% (5% for small developers) in August 2026, and that proposal had not been approved at the time of writing.
- Google Play in the US: since June 30, 2026, Google separates a service fee from a billing fee. The service fee is 10% on the first $1 million of annual earnings and on all auto-renewing subscriptions, and 20% on other purchases by users who installed after June 30, 2026 (25% for earlier installs). A 5% billing fee is added only when the purchase goes through Google Play Billing. Developers using alternative billing or external links have had to report those transactions and pay the service fee since October 1, 2026.
These rules are still moving. Check both rate cards on the day you set your pricing.
Example: a three-year budget
Xicom priced its booking app, built offshore with Flutter, across three years:
| Build | Year 1 | Year 2 | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Build | $36,000 to $64,000 | ||
| Store accounts | $124 | $99 | $99 |
| Cloud and maintenance | $7,680 to $14,880 | $7,680 to $14,880 | |
| Platform deadline work | $1,200 to $3,200 | $1,200 to $3,200 | |
| Privacy and security review | $1,200 to $3,200 | ||
| Total | $36,124 to $64,124 | $10,179 to $21,379 | $8,979 to $18,179 |
Three-year total: $55,282 to $103,682. The build is only about two thirds of it, and usage-based fees (payments, SMS, store commission) come on top. If your budget covers the build and nothing else, cut the scope rather than skip the first year of upkeep.
What AI changed in mobile app costs
Cheaper: a clickable prototype and the first screens come together much faster when the developer works with AI coding tools. Bubble notes that a working version can come together in hours instead of weeks. Accelerance's 2026 survey of 60 software partners reported outsourcing rates down year on year (4.4% in Europe, 7.1% in Latin America), partly because of AI-assisted developers. None of the price guides above says by how much the total cost of an app has dropped, so read it as fewer hours at the start, not a discount on the whole project.
New costs: an AI feature inside the app means a monthly bill for model tokens. Xicom's field-service example, with 88,000 AI requests a month, costs $44 a month on Claude Haiku 5.5 and $880 on Claude Sonnet 5.5. Model choice moves that line by 20×, so pick the model before launch, not after the first invoice. Code written with AI help also needs review: in Veracode's July 2026 report, roughly 44% of the coding tasks done by AI models produced code with a known vulnerability.
Unchanged: store review, testing on real phones, yearly SDK deadlines, privacy rules, and support. AI doesn't remove any of them.
If you are deciding between building it yourself with an AI tool and hiring someone, we compared the costs of building an app with AI tools (Polish).
How to keep the cost down without cutting corners
- One user group, one core problem. Xicom's advice for a tight budget is the same: one core journey for one user role. CarSense, a car maintenance app with an AI assistant, had its first MVP working after 25 hours of work because the scope was that narrow.
- One codebase for iOS and Android, unless you need heavy native features.
- Check whether a web app is enough. If the product doesn't need the camera, push notifications, Bluetooth, or offline mode, a web app is cheaper and pays no store commission.
- Use services instead of building them: a managed backend, hosted checkout, a push notification service, a maps SDK.
- Leave for version two: custom animations, extra social logins, chat built from scratch, several languages at launch, and complex reporting.
- Put the store accounts, repository, and hosting in your company's name from day one. Taking over an app without them is slow and expensive.
- Ask for the running cost per month in dollars, not only the build price.
Questions to ask before you sign
- How many hours does the estimate assume, for which roles, and at what rate?
- Is there a paid discovery or workshop phase, and what document comes out of it?
- What does QA cover: which devices, automated tests, security checks?
- How are changes to the scope priced and approved?
- Who owns the code, the design files, and the store accounts at handover?
- Who handles the yearly Apple and Google deadlines, and at what cost?
- Whose accounts pay for cloud, SMS, maps, and AI tokens?
- How many working hours overlap with your time zone?
A quote given as one number with no breakdown usually means something is missing: the backend, the admin panel, or testing.
FAQ
How much does it cost to build a mobile app in 2026?
Most mobile app projects reviewed on Clutch cost $10,000 to $49,999, and the average is $90,780 over about 11 months (updated September 21, 2026). Published guides put a simple app at $5,000 to $50,000, a medium app at $50,000 to $120,000, and a complex app at $120,000 to $300,000 or more.
How much does a simple mobile app cost?
A simple app with login, basic profiles, and one core function costs $9,000 to $19,500 at Upwork freelance rates, and $15,000 to $40,000 in Appther's agency planning bands. Expect the higher end if it must work on both iOS and Android with a backend.
Is it cheaper to build for iOS or Android?
About the same. Hourly rates don't differ by operating system on Clutch. The fixed fees differ: Apple charges $99 a year and Google Play $25 once. Building both from one React Native or Flutter codebase costs much less than two native apps, which roughly doubles the work.
How much does it cost to maintain a mobile app per year?
Roughly 15% to 25% of the build cost a year, according to Median, or 15% to 20% according to Appther. In hours: 20 to 80 a month for fixes and small changes, plus 40 to 80 a year for Apple and Google SDK deadlines (Xicom).
How much does it cost to add AI to a mobile app?
There is the build work for the feature and a monthly token bill. In Xicom's example of 88,000 AI requests a month, tokens cost $44 a month on a small model and $880 on a mid-size one. The model you choose changes the bill more than anything else.
Do Apple and Google take a cut of my app's revenue?
Only on digital goods and subscriptions sold in the app. Apple takes 30%, or 15% for small businesses. In the US, Google charges a 10% service fee on the first $1 million and on subscriptions, plus 5% if you use Google Play Billing. Physical goods and real-world services pay no commission.
Should I hire a freelancer or an agency to build my app?
A freelancer is usually cheaper per hour and fits a small or medium app with a written scope. An agency fits large builds with several people working in parallel, regulated industries, and teams that need guaranteed cover. Compare total quotes for the same feature list, not hourly rates.
Want to price your app?
I design and build mobile apps for iOS and Android with React Native and Expo, often with AI features inside, as a freelancer based in Kraków, Poland. I work closer to a forward deployed engineer than a classic contractor: we start with a workshop with your team, I write down the scope, and then I build in two-week sprints so you get a working build on your phone early, not a status report. I do the UX and design myself. MVPs start at $5,000, with no upper limit, because the price depends on scope. I bill hourly on a B2B invoice. More on how I work is on the mobile app development page. Tell me about your app and I'll reply within 24 hours.
Sources
Read October 30, 2026, unless noted.
- Clutch, App development pricing guide (updated September 21, 2026)
- Bubble, How much does it cost to create an app in 2026? (August 17, 2026; plan prices as of October 20, 2026)
- Appther, Mobile app development cost 2026
- Upwork, How much does it cost to build a mobile app? (updated January 6, 2026)
- Xicom, How much does it cost to build an app in 2026? (updated October 16, 2026; cites BLS OEWS May 2025, BLS ECEC June 2026, Clutch, Stripe, Twilio, AWS, and Anthropic pricing)
- Median, How much does it cost to make an app in 2026?
- Second Talent, Cost to hire a mobile app developer: US vs Asia (updated September 24, 2026; read October 28, 2026)
- Accelerance, 2026 global software outsourcing rates, via App Development Cost Calculator (read October 28, 2026)
- Supabase, Pricing
- Apple, Upcoming requirements, Apple Developer Program, App Store Small Business Program
- AppSubmit, US external purchase links: the real state of play (October 2026); The Mac Observer, Apple has not set a commission rate for App Store link-out purchases in the US
- Google, Target API level requirements, Service fees, Expanded billing choice and lower fees on Google Play, Alternative billing for users in the US, Play Console registration
- Mobilesoft, Ile kosztuje aplikacja mobilna w 2026 (Polish, read October 27, 2026)
- Veracode, 2026 GenAI Code Security Report (July 28, 2026)
Want to build an AI agent, an MVP, or an app?
I design and build AI products from the first version to production: MVPs, React Native mobile apps, web apps, and AI agents. Tell me what you want to build and I will tell you where to start.