Everything that goes into shipping a real iOS and Android app — what it costs (all three layers, not just the build), how long it actually takes once the app stores are involved, when to choose cross-platform over native, and how we build it: one Flutter codebase, a fixed written quote, and 100% code ownership.
Mobile app development is building a native-quality iOS and Android app — usually from one cross-platform (Flutter) codebase — and shipping it through both the App Store and Google Play. Beyond the build, an app carries a platform tax (developer fees plus store commission on digital sales) and an annual maintenance floor, because the stores' SDK deadlines mean an untouched app eventually stops being shippable.
Cross-platform development with AI assistance dramatically reduces time-to-market while maintaining quality.
End-to-end encryption, secure storage, biometric authentication, and compliance with app store security requirements.
Native-like performance with optimized rendering, efficient memory management, and smooth animations.
Smart recommendations, voice input, image recognition, and intelligent automation built into your app.
Apps that work seamlessly offline with intelligent sync, ensuring users are never left waiting.
We handle Play Store and App Store submission, review feedback, and release management end to end.
A mobile app has three costs, and most quotes only show you one. The first is the build — a one-time, fixed number. A focused MVP (one core workflow, accounts, a real database, push notifications, live on both stores) is typically $3,000–$6,000 (₹1.5–2.5 lakh); a fuller product app with payments, offline sync, and an admin backend starts from around $8,000+.
The second is the platform tax nobody puts in the quote: Apple charges $99 a year for a developer account, Google charges $25 once, and both take a cut of digital sales made inside the app — though far more narrowly than most founders fear (nothing at all on physical goods and real-world services, and 15% rather than 30% for most small developers). The third is the maintenance floor: the stores' SDK and target-API deadlines mean an app you never touch again stops being shippable within months. Budget one compatibility release a year. The fully-sourced breakdown of all three is in what a mobile app really costs in 2026.
The build — one-time and fixed: MVP $3–6k, full product app from ~$8k.
The platform tax — Apple $99/yr, Google $25 once, 15–30% on digital sales only (never on physical goods or real-world services).
The maintenance floor — at least one compatibility release a year, because the stores' deadlines make an untouched app expire. The full maintenance budget is broken down in what app maintenance costs.
For most products, cross-platform — in practice, Flutter — is the correct default, and it isn't a compromise: a Flutter app compiles to native machine code and draws its own interface, hitting the same 60/120fps budget as a hand-written native app. One codebase means every feature is built once, every bug fixed once, and every OS deadline met once, which roughly halves both the build and every future maintenance cycle.
Native earns its keep in a narrow, recognisable band: sustained high-end 3D or AR, a game engine's frame budget, deep OS surfaces (watch apps, CarPlay, complex widgets, system extensions), or a vendor SDK that ships native-only. What should almost never drive the decision is a vague appeal to "performance" — a business app is bound by the network, the database, and main-thread work, none of which the framework choice fixes. And the choice isn't binary: platform channels let you drop into Swift or Kotlin exactly where the OS demands it, which is how we build our own apps. The full framework is in cross-platform vs native.
Users cannot name the engineering, but they feel it in the first thirty seconds. An app feels premium when lists scroll at a locked 60/120fps with thousands of items (which takes lazy rendering and fixed row heights, not luck), when every tap answers instantly because the UI updates optimistically and syncs in the background, and when the app opens to their data instantly instead of a spinner — because the source of truth is a local database that syncs, not a network call that blocks.
That last one — offline-first — is the single biggest architectural decision after the framework choice. Done from day one, it makes the app fast on a good connection and usable on a bad one, which in India is not an edge case; retrofitted later, it is close to a rewrite of the data layer. The same day-one list includes real empty, loading, and error states for every screen (no raw framework errors, ever), respect for the user's font-size and reduced-motion settings, and touch targets a thumb can actually hit. None of this appears in a feature list, and all of it is why one app gets kept and another gets deleted.
The invisible half of quality is testing where the bugs actually live. On Android, an entire class of failures — reflection, minification, background execution — is invisible in debug builds and only appears in the minified release artefact, so we test release builds on real devices from week one, not launch week. Premium is not a coat of paint at the end; it is a set of defaults at the start.
A focused MVP is about 4–8 weeks of engineering; a fuller product app is two to four months. But the number you actually need is the calendar, and on mobile it is longer than the build — because a mobile app isn't live when you deploy it, it's live when it gets through the stores.
Three gates sit between "finished" and "downloadable", and only one is fast. Apple reviews 90% of submissions in under 24 hours. Google publishes no guaranteed turnaround and warns of 7 days or longer. And the one that blindsides people: a personal Google Play account created after 13 November 2023 must run a closed test with 12 testers, opted in continuously for 14 days, before it can even apply for production access — a fortnight that's invisible until you go looking for it. The one decision that protects your launch date is registering the right developer accounts on day one. The gate-by-gate map is in how long it takes to build a mobile app.
The build — ~4–8 weeks for an MVP; the part you control.
Apple review — genuinely fast: 90% of submissions in under 24 hours.
Google review — slower and less predictable: up to 7 days or longer.
The hidden fortnight — new personal Play accounts need 12 testers for 14 continuous days before production. Register the right account type on day one.
Almost never the technology. The projects that stretch are the ones where the scope was never really agreed, or where the hard parts were left until the end. Offline-first sync discovered late is close to a rewrite of the data layer; real-time and background work each fight a different battle with every operating system's power management; and an app waiting on feedback simply isn't being built.
The way to keep a mobile project on schedule is the same discipline that makes any build succeed: a fixed written scope, one core workflow shipped properly, decisions answered quickly, and the release build tested on real devices from week one — because on Android, an entire class of bugs is invisible until you test the minified release artefact you actually ship. We build that sequencing in from the start.
Every real app is two systems: the one on the phone and the one it talks to. Accounts, data sync, push notifications, file storage, payments — all of it needs a server side, and the choice of how that side is built moves cost, timeline, and your future options more than most feature decisions do.
For most products the right default is a managed backend platform — in our builds, typically Supabase: authentication, a real PostgreSQL database with row-level security, storage, and realtime, operated for you rather than by you. It removes months of undifferentiated server work (which is exactly why the MVP numbers in the cost section are possible), scales well past the point where most products need to care, and — because it is standard Postgres underneath — leaves a clean migration path rather than a proprietary trap. A fully custom API earns its extra cost in a narrower band: heavy server-side business logic, unusual compliance surfaces, or integration constraints an off-the-shelf platform cannot express.
Two things stay true in either case. The backend pairs with the offline-first architecture from the premium-feel section — the app reads and writes its local database instantly, and the backend syncs behind it, so the server's job is durability and reach, never blocking a tap. And everything runs on accounts you own from day one, so the no-lock-in promise covers the whole system, not just the code on the phone.
Shipping to the stores is a project of its own, made of chores that are individually small and collectively a week of someone's life. Store listings and screenshots for both platforms. Privacy questionnaires that must match what the binary actually does — Google's Data Safety form and Apple's privacy manifests are both grounds for rejection if they drift from reality. Signing keys and certificates that must be created correctly once, because some of them cannot be regenerated later. Review guidelines with sharp edges (demo accounts for reviewers, permission justifications, age ratings). We handle all of it as part of the build, because a finished app that cannot clear review is not finished.
We also set up the release machinery properly rather than shipping from a laptop: builds produced by CI, every release going to an internal testing track first, and production releases promoted from the exact tested artefact — never rebuilt — so what your users get is byte-for-byte what was verified. Staged rollouts go to a small percentage of users first, so if something slipped through, it reaches 5% of your users, not all of them.
Two facts from the timeline section are worth repeating here because they are the ones that ambush launch dates: Google's 12-tester / 14-day closed-test requirement for new personal accounts, and the review-time asymmetry between the stores. Both are survivable with sequencing — accounts registered on day one, the closed test running while polish lands — and painful without it. The gate-by-gate detail is in how long an app takes.
Launch is the start of the feedback loop, not the end of the project. From day one your app ships with crash reporting and structured analytics — every screen viewed, every key action, every funnel step — so week two's conversation is about what users actually did, not what anyone guesses they did. A crash affecting 2% of Android devices, a signup step where half of users stall, a feature nobody finds: these are visible immediately if the instrumentation exists, and invisible for months if it does not.
The operational floor is modest but real: the stores' SDK and target-API deadlines mean at least one compatibility release a year (the maintenance floor from the cost section), plus dependency updates and the occasional OS-behaviour change that arrives with a new Android or iOS version. A well-built app makes these releases boring — a version bump, a test pass on release builds, a staged rollout. We scope this honestly up front rather than leaving it off the quote and surprising you in month eleven.
Growth work then rides the same rails: feature sprints on fixed quotes, informed by the funnel data, shipped through the same internal-track-then-promote pipeline. Because you own the code, the accounts, and the signing keys, every option stays open — keep us for the sprints, take it in-house, or mix the two. The apps we are proudest of are the ones still shipping useful releases a year later, quietly, on schedule.
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In-depth, founder-written guides that go deeper on every decision above — with real, sourced numbers, and free. Start with the question you're weighing right now.
A focused MVP is typically $3,000–$6,000 (₹1.5–2.5 lakh); a fuller product app with payments, offline sync, and an admin backend starts from around $8,000+. But budget all three costs, not just the build: the platform tax ($99/yr Apple, $25 once Google, plus 15–30% on digital sales only) and an annual maintenance release, because store deadlines make an untouched app expire. Every figure is a fixed written quote, and you own 100% of the code.
For most products, cross-platform with Flutter — it compiles to native code, hits the same 60fps budget, and building once roughly halves both the build and every future maintenance cycle. Go native only when a platform-specific capability is the point of the product: heavy 3D or AR, a game loop, deep OS surfaces like watch or CarPlay, or a native-only vendor SDK. "Performance" alone is usually the wrong reason to choose native.
A focused MVP is roughly 4–8 weeks of build; a fuller app is two to four months. The calendar is longer than the build, though, because of the app stores: Apple reviews most submissions in under 24 hours, Google can take 7 days or more, and a new personal Google Play account must run a 12-tester, 14-day closed test before it can ship to production. Registering the right developer accounts on day one is what protects your launch date.
Yes, from one Flutter codebase — so the app is built once and ships to both the App Store and Google Play, rather than being written twice. That is the single biggest cost lever in mobile, and it compounds: every feature, fix, and OS deadline is handled once instead of twice. We handle both store submissions and their privacy disclosures as part of the work.
Usually not. Store commission applies only to digital goods and subscriptions sold inside the app — physical goods and real-world services (retail, delivery, bookings) carry no store commission at all. And most small developers pay 15%, not 30%: Apple's Small Business Program is 15% up to $1M, and Google charges 15% on the first $1M each year. The headline 30% only bites once you're genuinely successful.
Budget the platform floor — $99/yr for Apple plus your hosting — and at least one compatibility release a year, because the stores enforce SDK and target-API deadlines that make an untouched app stop being shippable. A small, well-built app is cheap to keep alive, but it is never zero: "we'll never touch it again" is not an option the app stores permit. We scope maintenance honestly rather than leaving it off the quote.
Tell us what you want to build. You'll get a clear plan and a fixed written quote after a free scoping call — one codebase for both stores, and you owning 100% of the code.