Mobile is at the same time the present and the future. This is because we check out our smartphones every once and now for something or the other. Mobile apps have become an integral part of our lives. Naturally, mobile app development remains at the very center of the continuing digital transformation all around us.
Enterprises and startups leverage their business apps using AI and ML technologies for best-in-class mobile app development solutions. The success of a mobile app depends equally on design and development excellence. How well you build and empower the app features for faster server-side response is just one part of the mobile app development process. Another aspect of the course corresponds to the look and feel of the app created by the app designers. The importance of design is equally important as the programming and technical side of shaping the app.
Naturally, efficient and experienced app designers with creative abilities are in high demand now. No wonder, like development, the app design cost is also skyrocketing. So, people are so drawn to figure out the app design budget. Below we are going to give an idea of the factors that affect mobile app design cost and the cost-wise breakup of the app design stages.
What are the Key Cost Factors for App Design?
The design of every app doesn’t cost the same. There are considerable cost differences as per the particular app project in question. Whether you opt for a custom design or a native design makes a significant difference. Similarly, the size and complexity of the app project also impact the cost of app design to a great extent.
Custom App Design
Leading app projects mostly follow this design protocol, which requires shaping the user interface and experience from scratch instead of using prebuilt native templates and libraries. Of course, this involves greater cost and effort to create a perfect design.
Some key advantages that made custom design popular are uniqueness, branding, superior user experience addressing the target audience, etc. The vast majority of the successful apps, such as Uber, Netflix, Twitter, Airbnb, Dropbox, Kindle, etc., have custom designs.
Native App Design
You can follow the design guidelines of the respective platform and place design elements accordingly to shape the look and feel of the app. For example, the “go back” option for Android is mostly provided in the bottom right. In this way, the look and feel of the app will be ruled by the design requirements of the respective platform.
Since it just puts design elements in their respective place to achieve the look and feel of the app, the design cost is greatly reduced. The native design also takes less time for implementation. On the other hand, native design is less effective in branding and impressing the target audience with a unique user experience.
App Size & Complexity
The cost considerations for app design also depend on the size and complexity. The number of screens, interactions, and buttons can impact the design cost to a great extent. Based on the complexity, your need to involve more designers will increase, consequently increasing the overall cost.
How many designers and QA testers do you need for the project? What different roles are they going to work for? These are the key considerations you must review to assess the cost. Some of the key design roles for the project include user persona creation, wireframe designer, prototype builder, UI expert, and QA tester for app UI.
Last but not least consideration will be the number of app features and whether the app will be developed incrementally, starting from a basic app version to a fully-fledged app with additional UI elements. The design cost will be lower for releasing a basic MVP app with elementary UI. But the design cost will go up with a fully-fledged UI design. In the case of an incremental development approach like MVP, you need to keep the future design cost into consideration.
The Breakup of Design Stages and the Corresponding Cost
Now that we have a comprehensive idea of various factors that impact mobile app design cost let us now provide here a breakup of different design stages and their corresponding cost overload.
Sketching the App Wireframe
Making detailed sketches of the app layout with navigation, menu, and other design elements is the first and foremost thing. The cost depends upon the complexity, the number of screens, and the design elements we already discussed above.
While expert wireframe designers mostly rely on hand-drawn sketches, they can also use wireframing tools to speed up the process. The wireframe design will take at least 10 to 20 hours, and depending upon the designer’s hourly rate, and the cost may vary from $100 to $500.
UI Mock-ups
Also referred to as visual design, mock-ups take the wireframes to the next level and shape the look and feel of the app with more vivid visual elements. With the mock-up, how the actual app will look becomes clear. In mock-ups, font, colors, layout, and other design elements become more vivid to provide a detailed look and feel of the app design.
Generally, mock-up design takes 2 to 5 days or 20-50 hours and depending upon the app complexity and the number of screens, it can go slightly up in some cases. Based on the hourly rate of the designers, the cost may vary from $100-600 for a mock-up design.
Mood Board Design
This is an often-overlooked design stage to which many app projects fail to give importance. With mood board creation, you have a strong grasp on the user journey and how the UI will look in different situations with user interactions and allow interactions for an easy experience.
Mood boards ultimately make the design more comprehensible with actual reference to user interactions and hence should be an integral part of the design process. Without a mood board, the UI can miss out on key interactive elements and ease of engagement to a great extent.
Mood board design depending on the complexity of the projects and the number of screens, can consume 5=10 hours, and based upon the hourly rate charged by the designer, the cost can vary from $50-$600.
Dynamic Prototype Design
Finally, the mock-up design and the mood board are taken to the final design stage we call the dynamic prototype. Dynamic prototypes differ from regular prototypes regarding their interactive capabilities and design details. When finished, a dynamic prototype will provide the identical look and feel of the actual app UI as intended and pursued by the design team.
Dynamic prototypes are generally created by using sophisticated prototyping tools, and after all the design elements are put in order, it facilitates smooth user interactions across the screens. As the ultimate design stage, this takes the longest time and can take 150 – 300 Hours costing $2500 – $5000 based upon the design complexity, number of screens, and interactive elements.
Over To You
Even though we have covered all design aspects and considerations for a detailed and meticulous assessment of the design cost, the cost may tremendously vary from project to project. The cost considerations apart, any app project should not overlap any UI design steps to ensure a smooth, engaging, and visually appealing UI design.
About Author: Zabeer Ghanchi is a mobile app developer at IndianAppDevelopers, a leading mobile application development company. He has the unmatched technical skill to develop a high revenue generating mobile app for startup businesses. He is managing many international software development projects.