Since the onset of the pandemic, the number of grocery app users has increased by several notches. According to a study from statista, it’s proven that the total number of users for online grocery apps in the US only will easily reach a value of 30.4 million by 2022 end.
From the statistics, it’s evident how popular these applications are, especially since now people have become accustomed to online grocery shopping rather than going to Walmart or any other convenience store.
This is why any new startup looking forward to launching a grocery delivery app has a prospective future with many opportunities.
However, the main concern is the overall cost to develop a grocery delivery app. According to recent studies, the overall development expenses depend on a myriad of factors, from the locations of the developers to the theme of the grocery delivery app.
It is not easy to estimate the cost because it varies from one factor to the other. In addition, several overheads or surcharges are involved in the total billing you have to bear once the development is completed.
If you want production support after the application is live, the billing generated by the development company will be separate.
On what factors does the cost of developing a grocery delivery app depend?
The cost to develop a grocery delivery app depends on multiple factors you must consider without fail. Ignorance of any contributing element will lead to a sudden increase in the billing amount that you might not be able to accommodate within your budget report.
Keeping this in mind, we have listed here some of the major factors to be included to estimate the cost of grocery delivery app.
Grocery delivery app theme
One of the major factors on which the cost of your grocery delivery app will depend is the theme of the software. For instance, if you want a very professional and neat theme, you can use the general templates available in many UI builders.
But when it comes to advanced themes with relevant components to your business idea, you need to hire our professional development company that has the experience of working with such user interfaces.
The more experienced and skilled the firm is, the more will be your billing amount. In addition, if you choose a complicated delivery app theme, the expenses will automatically increase.
Features to be included
The next factor on which mobile app development cost for your grocery shop will depend is the list of features. As a general rule, the more complicated the features are, the higher the overall development cost will be.
Therefore, you should list down what features you need to have in the application before moving further. For instance, if you want to include and auto removal cart item feature, the app development cost will increase due to the complexity.
So, you must consider what features you want to add and consult with the development company.
Security layers and authentication
According to a report from statista, 2.2 million cyber attacks were reported on mobile users in 2021. As the grocery delivery app will deal with sensitive information like user info, address, payment details, and so on, every business must incorporate robust security layers for the application.
From 128-bit encryption layers to the double-layered authentication page, there are multiple options for securing the application and datasets handled through it.
Without incorporating appropriate security measures, it’s next to impossible to get that trust and reliability from your targeted audience. The more advanced security measures are, the higher will be the development cost.
Compatibility with devices and OS
When you hire a mobile app development company, one of the main features you have to look for is the ability to develop a cross-platform application.
Cross-platform software can run across multiple devices and operating systems without the need to develop different code bases for every machine or OS.
Although the practice of developing such software products has increased lately, you still need to clarify if the chosen company can work on frameworks like Flutter, Xamarin, react native, ionic, and so on, to come up with the best cross-platform grocery delivery app for your business.
Hiring such a company will cost you more because not every developer can work with cross-platform software development frameworks.
Customizable or personalized features
To improve the user experience, you can easily incorporate customizable features within the grocery delivery app.
For example, users can customize the search list with the help of multiple filter options like brand, product type, quantity, price, and so on.
Similarly, they can also customize their cart according to their choices. If you incorporate such features, the overall cost to develop grocery app will skyrocket.
Therefore, you must decide what features you want to include in your list before having a conversation with the website development company.
Apart from this, if you want to add multiple personalization features, the developers will have to work on a third-party and plug-in integration.
This will further take up the cost by several notches. Therefore, you must plan the entire SDLC workflow according to your financial bandwidth.
Target audience of the application
Though not directly, the price of your online delivery app development will depend on the target audience you want to include.
If the application will deal with local customers only, there is no need to include features like GPS tracking and other types of advanced location-specific records. However, suppose the area of delivery is more, like multiple states or an entire country.
In that case, you need to include location identification features, multiple languages, a refined product list according to GPS location, and so on. Such advanced applications will come at a high price, which is why you need to be aware of your target audience.
Support and maintenance required
The main job of a third-party grocery delivery app development company is to design and develop the software. However, if you want to support and maintain after production or go live, the overall billing cost will increase.
In addition, you may have to board certain developers or other professional individuals associated with the application development process for better support in the production environment.
As the onsite client, you must be at the onboarding costs of all employees augmented within your in-house staff.
Conclusion
With the increase in demand for grocery delivery applications, it’s crucial that you estimate the overall development cost before hiding the agency.
According to a study, 10% of grocery sales will be done via smartphones in 2022. Therefore, you need to invest in the grocery delivery application if you want to take it to greater heights.
Author Bio
Saurabh Sharma is a Digital Marketing Executive at Arka Softwares, a leading web & mobile app development company. He has 2 years of experience in the Information Technology industry. He spends his time reading about new trends in Digital Marketing and the latest app development technologies.
