

Ask HN: What is the going rate for developing an iPhone app? - weaksauce

I was wondering if anyone here had any guidance on the current market for developing iPhone apps. Any links, market research, or anecdotal evidence would be appreciated.
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drewcrawford
I charge $40/hr, and I'm the cheapest guy I know. Anywhere from $40-$150
hourly for competent people.

Nobody looks at apps that are below about $5k in size. So that's your starting
point for something simple (tip calculator, etc.). Web services, datacenters,
anything algorithmic is way, _way_ more (~50k?)

Never hire people on eLance.

Market: grows 10-20% every six months or so. You won't get rich, especially if
you expect Apple to do all your marketing. You can make a living if you're
competent. Blockbusters are pure luck, but if you get one you can make 50k a
month. 5-10k a year is much more common for niche apps with no marketing (what
everyone seems to write).

Free+in-app purchasing may change the market quite a bit ("oh, you want wheels
with that car?"), but nobody really knows yet.

App review is a bitch, so get a developer who's been around the block to
advise you on getting through review.

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rscott
Interesting reply. I have a couple of questions for you.

1\. How do you get your clients?

2\. Could you elaborate on "5-10k a year is much more common for niche apps
with no marketing (what everyone seems to write)." I'm curious about your apps
and results.

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drewcrawford
1\. People find me. A combination of Google juice (I occasionally blog about
iPhone development), and people (ab)using the "support contact" for my apps in
the store. I've never (except when I had just started) actually had to
approach anyone. Random point sample: I've gotten two e-mails so far from
people who have read my comments on this post. It's a developer's market.

2\. I don't talk about clients' numbers for obvious reasons. I'm not really
sure how to elaborate. Can you elaborate on your question?

The figure I gave above is for a generic niche app that does a useful
computation for those in a particular profession with no marketing budget.
There are a lot of people who say to themselves "I'm a doctor, and I want an
app that does X" where X is something doctors do. That is, the primary
audience is the client. In cases like this, the marketing budget is 0 and the
client's focus is to make a little extra income, but his day job is being a
doctor, and making his own life easier. If he makes his investment back in a
year, he's happy, and has 3-4 years or however long the lifecycle is of pure
profit.

Other times you have people who use iPhone apps as a loss-leader (online
ordering, etc.) for their real business. I have no way of tracking the
"success" of this, but anecdotally the proposals are like 25% of the market.

The "startup" case--where somebody quits his job to develop the killer iPhone
app--is actually not that prevalent (except on HN). 90% of these people are
those flakey guys who "have a killer idea" that reduces to "Facebook for X" or
"Let's make a CSI-enchance button for the iPhone camera." There are other
problems too, that basically reduce to not having thought things through or
not knowing what they're doing. The remaining 10% are legit, but it's work to
separate them from the flakey people, and meanwhile I've got unsurmountable
piles of Type A and Type B people's proposals in my inbox.

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Rothmic
I charge $125/hr, and I turn down people willing to pay that amount on an
almost daily basis. Just another data point.

~~~
malbiniak
I'll second the rate. Adding more, most apps we see are typically around $40k
(+/- $10k) but as high as $100k.

~~~
davidcann
Congrats if you truly get that rate for every hour you work on multi-month
projects.

I'm currently making apps for Disney and I price total projects based on a
detailed spec (not hourly), but when you figure actual hours worked, I don't
charge anywhere close to this rate.

Do you really not stay up until 4 am polishing the app even when you're over
budget?

~~~
drewcrawford
Get better at estimating.

I typically take whatever I think it's going to be and multiply by 3. I'm
usually 75% under budget with this method.

The market will certainly bear hundreds an hour.

~~~
davidcann
So you're honestly making $250,000 (40x125x50) a year doing contract iPhone
apps?

Edit: I just saw you posted below about $40/hour. That's fine to overestimate
when you're charging $40/hour. My comment is directed at Rothmic and malbiniak
above. Apologies for the mistake, drewcrawford.

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lefstathiou
I am not a developer but I have hired a couple to develop apps on my behalf. I
think $60/hour is a reasonable rate and I have no trouble (psychologically)
paying that. When I see someone charging $40 my first thought is to assume he
is either a college student or an indian (i dont mean that offensively). When
it comes to development, price is indicative of quality (at least someone on
the "buy" side like myself thinks so).

That being said, I think you will find it difficult to go around charging $125
an hour unless you are damn good. When I hire someone at $100 an hour (which I
currently have), I know I am getting a guru. Your price should be indicative
of your level of expertise. Your clients will find out sooner rather than
later if you arent worth what they are paying you and that isnt good for
anyone.

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hyung
I've found it's easy to find relatively small projects (1 good engineer, 1-2
months), but more difficult to find larger projects.

I generally advise potential clients not to expect too much from the App Store
(~$30K-$40K revenue for a "good" game that's featured by Apple for a short
time), unless they get lucky.

Our company is based in Vietnam and self-published a relatively successful
iPhone game recently. Using it as our foot-in-the-door, we've been seeing
~$80/hour for smaller projects requiring 1-2 very talented engineers, and
~$40/hour for larger projects requiring more engineers.

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rwhitman
I've been doing a ton of research on this over the past few days and put it at
this: _Freelancers: $40/hr-$75/hr_ Shop / Agency: $100/hr-$250/hr

Just wish there were more developers out there. I've been scoping projects and
looking for resources but its tricky. Its such a different world than web that
you almost need to find Mac software engineers really.

Since there were only so many mac engineers out there to begin with, its about
getting old dogs to learn new tricks which is slow and painful, or college
kids breaking in, which is where I'm looking...

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jasonlbaptiste
check this out, which might help: <http://www.getappsdone.com>

~~~
weaksauce
Thanks... I will check that out! How is the community there? Do they post
often? Do you check the site out regularly?

~~~
davidedicillo
Hi, I'm the co-founder of Get Apps Done. The site is still pretty young, but
we get a few new job listings everyday. Let me know if you have any other
questions about the site.

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zain
I charge $65/hr, but that's because I'm just starting to get into the market
and I'm not yet swamped with work. From what I've heard in the community, you
can expect to pay twice that for someone established.

edit: if you'd like to get in touch with me, my email's in my profile.

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devmcgravy
You might be shocked to think how much money is in iPhone applications. I run
a small group that has some big clients, and we are going to clear 1MM easily
this year doing just iPhone, and Android.

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joecode
I generally don't accept work, but if I did, it would be $120 at least, and
I'd do it mostly for fun. There's plenty left to be done independently.

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gte910h
I've done apps for less then 5k.

Depending on art, etc, they are 3-40k for most apps, and more for more
advanced stuff.

~~~
gte910h
And a way to reach me is:

iphoneappsiphoneapps at gee mail dawt com.

~~~
drewcrawford
Generally considered best practice to put contact info in your profile and
keep the thread clean :-)

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gte910h
Crap, have done that now, do not appear to be able to delete this though :O(

Relatively new to hacker news, still expecting it to be like reddit sometimes.

~~~
chrismear
Well, I certainly applaud anyone wanting to delete a hundred comments...

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khurrams
Hi We are an offshore company and have developed various corporate
applications and few ranging to top download both on iPhone & Android. We
charge only $ 30 an hour ! I feel like , i am charging lowest but have
developed some really interesting applications ! We also developed ODesk's
iPhone App ( those are considering using elance , ODesk etc ) !

