Quick Summary: Do you want to build a food delivery app like Uber Eats? Cost estimation is the first question you may come across. The cost to build a food delivery app will be $5000 to $50,000 or $150,000 or more depending on the type of app you want. Besides, the cost will differ if you want to build an app from scratch or want to have an off-the-shelf or SaaS-based food delivery application. This article helps you estimate costs for everything. Let’s explore.
Are you wondering how much it costs to build a food delivery app like Uber Eats? The cost of the food delivery app, like Uber Eats, will depend on ‘what you want?’
For example, if you want a standard food delivery app, you can have it for just $5,000 to $20,000. However, the cost of the application widely depends on the purpose you want to build a food delivery app. For example, if you want to build a food delivery app for a single food delivery purpose, you may have to spend less as compared to a food delivery app built for multi purposes.
So, the right answer to your question “how much does it cost to build a food delivery app?” is “it depends.” It depends on various factors, like;
What You Want To Build
What You Want to Achieve with the App
App Complexity and Features
Design and User Interface
Technology Stacks
Development Team and Location
These are the common factors that widely impact costing. You can roughly estimate the cost after evaluating these factors. But, if you want to get an accurate cost estimation, you need to connect with your technology partner with your project scope.
In this article, we shall explore everything, from the benefits of having food delivery to factors that will impact the costs. But, let us begin with the market of food delivery apps.
Online food delivery revenue to reach 760bn US Dollars. This project includes grocery delivery as. The growth in the food delivery segment boomed after the pandemic. So, if you want to build a food delivery app, you are all set to catch up with the time. You have 3.1 billion people worldwide who readily order food online.
Benefits of Owning On Demand Food Delivery App
From customer engagement and higher customers retention rates to increase restaurant sales and branding, online food delivery apps offer a wide range of benefits to restaurants. If you are building an application, the online food delivery market is yours. Now, depending on your marketing strategies, you can gain the maximum output of your digital advent. A comprehensive and scalable food delivery app provides various benefits and opportunities to restaurants to grow bigger and bigger in this competitive market. Let’s explore the top benefits you can get.
Online Presence
In the digital era where 3.1 billion customers are ordering food online, you must have strong presence on all digital platforms. Food delivery app comes with integrated marketing elements. For example, when you have website, and mobile for users, they can use your app and place order online. Besides, they can leave reviews and ratings. This will improve your credibility and reliability.
Cost Saving
When you use third party food delivery application, you are paying 30% of your total income to your the vendor. Besides, if 70% of users who order online prefer to order food directly from restaurant rather than using third party delivery app. So, you are not just saving those 30% but also attracting more new customers.
Easy Ordering
A food ordering and delivery mobile app offers customers and restaurant owners an easy ordering process. The mobile app is handy so customers can easily place an order when needed. Further, it eliminates all the possibilities of errors in the case of manual ordering.
New Customers Reach
Reach out to more customers out of your locality or city. Embrace digital technology by tapping into the online world.
Surge in Sales
People prefer staying at home simply out of desire or for many other reasons—for instance, bad weather, social distancing, etc. In such a case, you might experience a lack in sales if you don’t have an online food delivery app. Boost your food orders by providing home deliveries.
Customer Insights
The on demand food ordering system lets business owners know their regular customers better. They can get insights into which food items they like the most. Which area has the highest food orders and more?
Restaurants or food business owners can use these valuable insights to serve their customers better. Thus, motivate customers to order more, boost their experiences and food orders.
Things to Consider While Starting a Food Delivery App
Competition – The online food delivery market is already saturated and full of big players. To stand a chance for your food delivery app and be successful, you need to find a USP for your app and promote it.
Technology Partner – One of the significant challenges companies face is finding the right development partner for their food delivery app. The food delivery app development company that can build the app within a specific deadline while taking care of the budget.
UI/UX Design – The UI/UX design of the online food delivery app is something that attracts users in the first place. If people like the design, they take the next step to download the app. Easy navigation to features makes them keep it on their smartphones for a long time.
The Cost of developing an app like UberEats, Swiggy, and Zomato also depends on the UI/UX design. You need a user-friendly and interactive design for your food delivery app to attract and retain users to your app.
Key Features of the On-Demand Food Delivery System
The choice of features directly affects the cost of developing your food delivery app. More complex features mean more cost. As a startup, you can launch an MVP with the key features. Once you succeed, you can add more features to meet the growing demands of your target audience.
The On-demand food delivery app involves four panels- one for each stakeholder.
Customer App
Restaurant App
Driver App
Admin Panel
Let us look at the features for each stakeholder panel:
Features of Customer Panel : Food ordering App
The users can access the food delivery features and benefits after registering on the customer app. The customer panel lets food delivery app users access digital menus of restaurants, search for any cuisine or meal, pay online, track their orders, and review.
Login
Browse Menu
Search & Filter
Add to Cart
Multiple Payment Integration
Order Tracking
Rating and Review
Customer Support
Features of Restaurant Panel: Food ordering App
The restaurant panel lets restaurant owners register, create digital menus, upload food images and prices, take orders, and receive payments.
Login
Digital Menu Management
Set Prices
Manage Orders
Push Notifications
Checking Rating and Review
Features of Delivery Panel: Food Delivery App
Delivery agents can operate through the delivery app. They receive alerts for new food orders and deliveries, can use GPS navigation and maps to find routes, and keep track of their earnings.
Registration
Manage Deliveries
GPS Navigation
Availability Toggle
Updating the Order Status
Features of Admin Panel: Food Delivery App
The admin dashboard lets admins manage the entire proceedings on the online food delivery app.
Admin Login
Restaurant Management
Payment Management
Promotions Management
Reports & Analytics
These are the critical features required to build your on-demand food delivery app like Swiggy, Zomato, or UberEats. However, you can add more advanced features to the app per your business needs and budget.
Other Factors that Affect the Cost To Build Food Delivery App like UberEats
Technology Stack
Another factor on which the cost of developing a food delivery app like UberEats depends is the Technology Stack.
Choose whether you want to build your app on iOS, Android, or both. To build a native app, you need to write unique codes for iOS and Android. For hybrid apps, a single code works for multiple platforms. Third-party integrations and APIs also decide the cost of the food delivery app. For example, payment gateways, data sync, geolocation, etc.
Development Partner
The choice of the development partner will directly affect your app development quality and cost. A top-rated food delivery app development company can help to make your own food delivery app satisfying your business needs and customer demands.
However, developers’ outsourcing costs and hourly rates vary from country to country. The developer rates in countries like the US are way higher than those in India and Ukraine. So, you can choose a food delivery app development agency as per your budget.
Developers Hourly Rates Globally:
North America $100-$150 per hour.
Central Europe $60-$80 per hour.
India $10-$80 per hour
Ukraine $30-$60 per hour
Time to Develop an Online Food Delivery App like UberEats, Talabat, and Zomato
If you want to develop a custom food delivery application for your restaurant business, it is crucial to know the time required to create each stage of the app. So, here is the complete data of the hours that goes into developing app design and features.
Customer App 500-700 hours
Driver App 500-700 hrs
Restaurant App 500-700 hrs
Admin Panel 300-400 hrs
Idea Validation 40+ hours
Prototyping 60 hours
Documentation 60 hours
UI/UX Design 130-190 hours
Backend 300+ hours
Testing & QA 60-120 hours
Time for each Platform:
iOS App 600-800 hours
Android App 500-800 hours
How much does it Cost to Build a Food Delivery App like UberEats?
The standard formula to calculate the total Cost:
Total Time to Develop the App * Hourly Cost of a Developer
A custom food delivery application will approximately take around 2200 hours of development.
Let’s take the developers’ hourly rate to be $30 per hour as per Indian rates. The total cost would be 2200 * $30 = $66,000
How can you Reduce The Cost of Developing a Food Delivery App?
66,000 US Dollars. Seems Expensive?
If you do not want to invest such a massive amount in developing a custom food delivery application, you can go for Saas-based Food delivery application.
A saas-based food delivery app is a readymade platform that food business owners can rent for a monthly subscription.
Why go for a subscription-based food delivery app?
The subscription-based food delivery apps offer many benefits. For startups or small businesses, saas-based apps are the best option to enter the online space.
Minimal Investment
Saas-based apps help entrepreneurs launch food delivery at affordable or minimal initial investments. They do not need to spend thousands of dollars developing food delivery apps from scratch. Besides, they do not need to spend large amounts on maintenance. The saas provider company will continually upgrade the apps for the latest versions.
Saves Time
With ready-to-launch food delivery apps, business owners can get their food business out online in the least time. They can eliminate the wait of months in case of custom apps.
Less Risk
When you go for a saas-based food delivery application, you have made close to no investments. So, you can enter the market, check how well your business goes, take feedback from real customers and make improvements at zero costs.
Get Started with Foodiv
Food delivery applications can take your business Up manifold. You can expand your food business effortlessly while reaching a wider audience. Food Ordering and delivery apps help you greatly improve your customers’ overall experience with your restaurant.
Though you can develop a custom food delivery app from scratch, it requires you to invest around $60-$100k and wait until 3-5 months to build the app. However, the SaaS-based food delivery application is a great alternative to kickstart your online food business within a few days and at a minimal cost.
We have spent multiple hours designing, developing, and testing a ready-to-launch SaaS-based food delivery application to save your time and costs.
Foodiv is a complete food ordering and delivery solution that includes a customer app, website, restaurant app, and delivery agent app. Most importantly, it does not require thousands of dollars of investment. You can rent the app on monthly subscriptions.
Frequently Asked Questions About Build A Food Delivery App
Are food delivery apps profitable?
Yes, of course. Food delivery apps can help food business owners expand their food delivery services among a large number of customers. The on-demand food delivery apps are an easy way for the owners to expand their reach and brand visibility.
How to make your own food delivery app?
To make your own food delivery app, business owners need to follow these steps:
Identify your business needs and challenges.
Watch the demo of the food delivery app.
Choose a subscription model as per your budget.
Launch your food delivery app.
Why should I opt for the saas-based food delivery model?
The saas-based food delivery model is an affordable alternative to custom food delivery apps. The food business owners can save huge upfront costs to launch their food delivery business online.
How does a food delivery app work?
A food delivery app has 4 panels- customer app, restaurant app, driver panel, and an admin app.
Customers browse the menu, place an order, and pay.
The order request reaches the restaurant. The restaurant confirms the order.
The chef starts preparing the order and once ready sends the alert to the delivery personnel.
The delivery agent picks the order for delivery and ensures to deliver the order on time.
How to monetize my food delivery app
The food business owners can earn money from their food delivery apps in many ways:
Delivery Charges: The delivery fee on each order delivered. There are chances to earn higher delivery fees during peak hours.
Advertising: Another way to monetize the food delivery apps is to run advertisements on your food delivery.
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