Ask HN: How much does it cost to outsource iPhone app development?
I searched the web for info on good iPhone dev shops and prices, but couldn't get good answers, so I thought I'd ask HN.
Of course, it all depends on the app. How complex, etc. Assume a moderate app, with, say, up to five different views, storing of some user data, and using the location framework.
Nothing too complicated. I think it might take me a month or more to code, but it should take a more experienced iPhone coder maybe two weeks.
Am I looking at $5,000, $10,000, $20,000, more?
Some info:
1) I don't want bottom-of-the-line developers. I don't mind paying extra for good developers
2) I don't mind paying up to several thousand dollars. My take is that if I can't make that money back from the app, I would prefer to have wasted money than 1 or 2 months of my life.
Besides the price, do you guys know of good iPhone dev shops? I take it that the standard procedure is to look on elance.com, odesk.com, etc, but I've never used them and I'm not sure how to use them to find a good developer.
I'm in the SF Bay Area, so a good local dev shop would be great, even though I wouldn't mind a dev shop from elsewhere.
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Although I do feel a bit spammish writing again (when you've already said you'd be monitoring), I just want to emphasize that if you willing to outsource to a group of moderately trained but dedicated high schoolers, we'd be very glad to accomodate - and would do so cheaply.
Depends a lot on the complexity.
For non-game apps: Some smaller, simple apps are 2-3k, more complex stuff runs in the 10-15k range. Past that you're doing something A> Really Hard, B> New, C> On the edge of what Apple allows or D> Heavily involved with a complicated server component.
I'd happily send you a fixed fee quote for your app if you'd like (see profile for an email address to contact me).
One thing to see: See if they'll set you up on your mac getting you compiling and signing for submission to the store. Lots of overseas shops don't get you through that last part, and it is pretty tricky to do right.
I actually do submission for some people as well and the whole rigmarole. All depends on what the client is interested in paying for.
I've helped several people who hired out of country developers then got left with a pile of source code and no way to get it on the store.
One of them, amusingly, wouldn't let me VNC in to their computer, so I had to do it all by phone (that was fun). Most of the rest of them I use copilot/webex or something to help train them on the process and get their computer setup for distribution.
You are probably looking at the equivalent of $100-200/hr for good development, with the higher end for people located in SF.
If you are going to out-source development, and you have a design/product background, I would build out a product spec and even a draft list of stories into Pivotal Tracker. It will help you define with your contractor what you want but also help to estimate total job time -- and that will help you arrive at a budget, based on the above hourly rate.
[If you don't have a design/product background (or are not a developer yourself) then the success of outsourced is probably going to be mixed]
I also tend to shy away from fixed bid because it doesn't work with an agile approach. You may not know completely what you want and as you get building and can get a better picture, being able to add extra components into the mix will cause friction with a fixed bid contract.
Better to agree a budget so that everyone is clear what the limits and goal posts are.
Fixed bid works just fine with an agile approach. You just start with a very small core project, then iterate upwards with follow on projects.
This is especially important for the Apple App Store because there is no other way to know if your app will be approved.
Fixed bid is sometimes more expensive due to the "risk eating" the developers are taking off your hands, but agility isn't usually the issue with developers who are otherwise good.
We counsel clients to start with a small fixed bid project then use hourly or follow on projects to change the program to a particular place they want to go.
Your system seems to keep everyone in their comfort zone. No uncertainty for either party. (Except the usual, "will they pay my invoice?" and "why isn't he replying to my email!?" that is implicit in any business transaction.)
This is HUGE! Do you believe a company can flourish just as an App store app. or is that just too risky. Would love to hear your personal opinion.
I'm working on an enterprise solution, and it's reliance is completely on Apple's code-of-conduct.
The long and the short of it: You can flourish, but you can also get dragged along and then watch your app get shot like a dog after 6 months of being dragged through "maybe if you did this it would be okay" from the developer liaison people.
If you'd like, I can call one of them and go "Hey, is this in any shaky territory you can think off of the top of your head" if you want me to. I talk a lot about the environment in my HN comments if you want to read about it.
They're totally non-committal, but hey, they'll point out anything that sticks out.
Then again, we're starting android development here too.... :OD.
In an ideal situation, i'll be giving out the iPad free, shipped with my App. already installed. the value proposition can be so huge that would offset the device cost.
Something like this would fit our slogan iPad was made for our X, all the other goodies are just extra :P
The enterprise solution is only for internal. The only other distribution channel is the App store. You're not allowed to distribute an app any other way.
Sure, you can give them the iPad, but Apple's lawyers will be on your back the second they found out about your practice. And as soon as they sync it to their own account, the app will disappear.
For the iPad in particular, there has to be a way for such apps to get on, or you're never going to see anything resembling enterprise adoption, so i'd expect this to change.
For the good of the discussion, you can only get an iPhone enterprise developer certificate if you have 500+ people in your company and a Dunn & Bradstreet number. Then getting a certificate is fairly easy. This allows you to, as others have said, distribute iPhone apps over a tether.
Yesterday in iPhone 4.0, Apple announced they were now enabling over-the-air install of in-house apps. My current understanding is that this relates to opening specific APIs relating to OTA apps. (full disclosure: I work for a company called Ondeego that delivers in-house iPhone app distribution as a service.)
2> The installs expire after 3 months (adhoc that is)
3> I think this model isn't going to get around apple. They're famous for defeating workarounds.
This is designed for people who say, buy 100 ipads to replace clip boards in their hospital.
You cannot however, do distribution through any mechanism other than the app store (I had one perspective client who wanted to buy $30k of iPodTouches and give them out to clients, Apple flipped a shit when I asked for a discount on them and said you're wholly unallowed to do anything of the kind. Each person must download all their apps through their account on the app store. Anything else is forbidden.
I develop iPhone apps selling on the app store, but have never explored the enterprise distribution side of it. With the iPad, it's becoming interesting.
I don't have heaps of experience (a few apps in the store) but folks out here have balked at the $50-60/hour I've been charging.
Note the "AND"'s. I suspect this isn't some simple thing - it's probably a 300K web app + 2 35K mobile apps.
Multiple resolutions Poor Tools (Eclipse is clunkier than Xcode, but there is no visual layout tool at all like Interface Builder for iPhone)
Hand Coded Layouts in XML
Multiple OS Platforms (Android 1.5, 1.6, 2.0 and 2.1 are all live in the wild and are not user upgradeable past the version they have).
Varied Screen Sizes (And no, you don't have to specifically account for this in the iPad, your iPhone app will run just fine).
In addition to those fundamental issues, currently the apis:
In-App purchase on android is a bit clunky for some programs (you are buying a separate app on the android market)
Sound is horrible, just horrible
Video is poorly documented, not very standardized, and not easy to use. People who write major frameworks have trouble getting documentation on good ways to make good videos (I know, I mailed them the FFMPEG parameters required to do streaming video).
And lastly, it looks like the G1, the flagship phone, has been mis-specced, and will likely never get the 2.x line of android OS releases (that's what droid runs now).
For reference, I built this: http://michaelgrinich.com/hackernews/ The rest of my portfolio isn't yet online. Send me an email and I can show you more.
Clearly the app has to deliver some value outside of the content. Think bottled water.
The app isn't a huge moneymaker, and was never meant to be. I built it out of frustration and only later decided to throw it up on the store. Building against an api-less site was a fun challenge and I learned a ton. It also uses the Three20 framework, which was an interesting experience. (absolutely no documentation at the time)
Think of it as buying me a cup of coffee to help fund a side-project. Next update should have an iPad version, too.
I realize that stating up front that we have limited experience in the area probably doesn't inspire confidence. However, we're a high quality shop with excellent design skills. We produce quality software, and wouldn't let you down.
Contact info in my bio if you're interested.
My experience is that app development for a medium to high complexity app with location features and accessing a 3rd party API for data would typically take 4-6 weeks including QA but really depends on the complexity.
I've done about 30+ mobile apps now so ping me if you need any advice
I do iPhone development and haven't met anyone getting even close to $150/hr individually. If someone made that, they'd be be making $6,000/week and $300,000/year.
yish, can you confirm that this is an agency rate, not an individual developer/designer rate? or is this the rate you're making personally?
Time spent getting contracts, doing administration, etc. means you can't bill for 100% of your time, but you can definitely make 200-300k/yr pre-tax pre-expense if you work like a dog. Taxes in CA will cut that down to 100-150k net, so it is more like a 100-200k/yr job.
I also think part of the challenge is that to have a stand out app, you now need a team with UI/VisD/Dev skills. Expectations of consumers have grown since the early app store days, and a lone developer rarely cuts it anymore unless they also have some real design chomps.
We just launched two iPad apps this past weekend, and they are in the top 100 in both overall categories (free and paid). And they are a #2 and #3 app in their respective subcategory. Send me an email (its in my comment).
I really like the work these guys do: http://www.ubermind.com
You might also post in 37signals' job board–they have an iPhone category.
I live an Ann Arbor MI, but I've done several projects from companies in CA including a prominent app for a San Jose based company.
Please contact me via email and I'll turn all of this theoretical stuff into real names and places.
<edit>My rate is $75 per hour, which is why I think many CA firms don't mind working with a remote resource<end edit>
-is this your full time job and your sole source of income ? -are you able to find a normal amount of work just like a 9-5 job (i.e. 40 hours a week for 50 weeks -> 2000 billable hours a year)
Of course there are ups and downs, so sometimes I'm working a couple of projects at once and working 60-70 hours, and sometimes I'm fighting to stay busy, but in general staying busy has not been the problem.
Like this post though, given the amount of west coast work, I find myself working late most of the time. But that adjustment was not a big deal and many customers like that I have been working on stuff for them while they were still having breakfast.
All of the facilities you have listed are available in Safari (client side storage, location data).
Also has the benefit that it can be potentially made cross-platform, so you're not as tied into just the iPhone.
And incidentally, are other just dumbfounded by those that advertise "Develop my iPhone app, no compensation" ads? How can they realistically think someone might do that?
I can understand why they advertise, in hope, but I would rather be working on my own company and my own apps for FREE.
We're just starting up. If you're interested in maybe outsourcing something to us, shoot me an email. Since I understand that we're not experienced iPhone developers and maybe not even experienced developers in general (I'd like to think we're pretty decent, but maybe that's teenage arrogance speaking), it would be incredibly cheap.
But we're dedicated, have spare time, want to learn, and we would be willing to accommodate changing schedules, weird requests, whatever, if it means we get a chance.
My email is <my username> at Gmail.com.
You're realistic but may be a little hard on yourself (I can't speak for your abilities in truth). Keep positive and possibly do OS projects as well.
Don't undersell yourself! I learnt early on that charging the right price does wonders for bringing in better customers and better work.
(plus if your earning good then you have more impetus to get finished on time)
Although we could bill $100 - $150/hr, we find clients respond better to fixed rate pricing, which seems to be a more manageable on both ends.
We focus heavily on providing excellent design and rich UI/UX. We often work with agencies behind the scenes or with enterprise customers, brands, publishers and entrepreneurs with an "idea". Pretty much all types of customers.
We also build the web service infrastructure, which may include social, geo and eCommerce capabilities and/or integration.
Btw, we've had iPhone apps approved in as little as 2 days.
Your app seems like some of the apps that we've developed for $2-3k, assuming you have a workflow / spec draft and initial design consideration.
But it is hard to quote a fixed price without knowing much about the application. An application with two custom views with a lot of logic can easilly take 10x as much time as a CoreData 10 view application that is just drilling data.
Send me an email at brunomtsousa@gmail.com if you need any advice/help.
Any other questions, ping me.