How Much Does Social Media App Development Cost?

Social media has revolutionized how we connect, communicate, and consume information.

Today, these platforms reach over 5 billion users worldwide—62% of the global population—and have become an integral part of our digital lives.

Be it people sharing personal moments or businesses using them for marketing and engagement, there is no doubt that social media is the ultimate game-changer.

The ability to create, share, and connect has fueled innovation across industries, making social media app development a lucrative and strategic investment.

But what does it really cost to develop a social media app? This blog will explore the factors influencing development costs, monetization strategies, and actionable ways to optimize your investment.

What Is Social Media?

Social media, therefore, refers to the many different technologies that make it easier for users to exchange ideas and information amongst themselves.

From Facebook and Instagram to X (formerly Twitter) and YouTube, more than 5 billion people use social media, equal to roughly 62% of the world's population.

In early 2024, 94.7% of users accessed chat and messaging apps and websites, seconded by the social platforms followed by 94.3% of users.

What are Social Media Apps Used for Today?

Six categories of social media platforms that are often recognized include:

• Social networking
• Social bookmarking 
• Social news
• Media sharing
• Microblogging
• Online forums.

These various sites fulfill many different purposes and serve the interests of users. Some attract hobbyists, while others attract users in their work lives. Users seek others worldwide who share their political or other views.

Entertainers can use social media to communicate with fans, politicians to reach voters, and charities to communicate with donors. Governments frequently rely on social media to deliver important information in emergencies.

Social media has become a key marketing tool for businesses. Companies use it to find and engage with customers, drive sales through advertising and promotion, identify fast-moving consumer trends, provide customer service or support, and collect user data.

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How has Social Media Emerged as a Powerful Communications Medium?

Social media has both advantages and disadvantages yet it has dominated both the business circle and the world of advertisements and gained control over education.

For example, WhatsApp has redefined the culture of IMs and taken it to a whole new level. Today, you can text anybody across the globe as long as you have an internet connection.

WhatsApp, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram have transformed this. The importance of social media in communication is always a topic of discussion.

Online communication has brought information to people and audiences that could not previously be reached. It has made people more aware of what is going on in the world, even outside their location.

A great example of social media's reach is the spread of the news regarding the fire in the Amazon Rainforest. It started as a post from one individual and then quickly spread across everybody's news feed on all of the different social media.

Thanks to the increase in social media users, movements, advertisements, and products are all broadcast on social media platforms. Today, businesses rely on social media to create brand awareness and promote and sell their products.

It allows organizations to reach customers irrespective of geographical boundaries. The internet has facilitated a resource for humankind with unfathomable reach and benefits.

The Top 10 Social Media Apps Worldwide

Here is the most used social media app list as of October 2024:

• Facebook (3,070 million users)
• YouTube (2,530 million users)
• WhatsApp (2,000 million users)
• Instagram (2,000 million users)
• TikTok (1,690 million users)
• WeChat (1,370 million users)
• Telegram (950 million users)
• Facebook Messenger (931 million users)
• Snapchat (850 million users)
• Douyin (755 million users)

Facebook is the most popular social media platform by user count, with close to 3.1 billion users worldwide.

Meta owns four of the 10 most popular social media platforms: Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and Facebook Messenger.

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Benefits of Social Media App Development for Businesses

Mobile apps have various benefits for businesses, here are some of the benefits mentioned below:

Direct Contact With the Target Audience

You no longer need to call and email random people to ask whether they are interested in your brand.

Almost everyone is on social media, and this is a great opportunity wherein your target audience could just be one click away from you. Using hashtags, you can directly reach your brand on your target audience's page, giving yourself a humongous reach.

Growing Popularity with the Flow

To anyone in the content marketing and overall digital marketing space, the easy means of gaining popularity is all that counts. Social media sites give a section of people exactly what they desire- increased coverage.

Completing effortless, interactive things such as responding to questions, sharing times, and so on would have made you blow up on these sites after some time. Even though it may take some time to invest, hefty returns are earned at the end of the day.

Increase in Traffic

Since there is a wide range of active people on social media, the scope for diverse traffic is also increased. Optimizing social media to meet your needs will ensure you receive visits and traffic from varied people.

Since people are on their phones most of the time today, it is highly likely that people will come across your brand or work.

Targeting keywords and other SEO guidelines would also ensure heavier and better traffic, as SEO optimization is important for your business.

Create an Image that Lasts

If you are interested in working for your content so that it imprints in the brain of the viewer, using social media is probably the best. Sure, everyone looks at emails.

However, how many can we see scouring their way through their email accounts for hours? Comparatively, people do not get enough hours to spend on social media surfing their way through the web on their handsets.

Hence, you will likely leave your mark if you can optimize your work efficiently there.

Collaborations

Another excellent way social media networks help businesses is by associating with suitable accounts.

Now, countless influencers are on every social media platform - each willing to promote the product they feel will suit their audience.

Businesses wishing to expand often reach out to such influencers who do paid promotions on their profile, thereby creating heavy traffic for the business account.

Availability of Tools for Analysis

Another feature of social media that makes it essential for businesses and content creators is the ability to view analytics. They provide an insight on the performance measurement.

Therefore, business and content accounts can view their posts, see which post was the most popular and why, and how they can improve their feed.

On Instagram, there is an option for post insights for professional accounts - where one can see which posts got the most saves, likes, or reaches.

Get Inspiration

Since most of the content and business pages are public, one can easily scroll through their feeds and get inspiration.

When one's account isn't doing exceedingly great compared to other accounts in that field, one can simply look at the feeds and see what they are missing. Fleeing from such issues may help immensely boost popularity.

How to Earn Money Your Social Media App Development?

Well, after spending a lot of money building a social media app, you must have thought and wondered how to make money from it.

Now, it is time to analyze the application monetization models available to make money with an app once you develop one. Below is a list of models you can follow:

In-App Advertisements

This type of advertising implies the display of ads within the application to generate revenue. You can add banner ads, interstitial ads, video-rewarded ads, and others.

This can be an effective model for displaying ads among users based on demographics, interest, and online behavior.

Affiliate Marketing

This is one of the most effective types of digital marketing and helps applications earn money by promoting external products and services. This can help cover the building cost of your social media platform by using a strategy for building up collaborations with brands.

At the same time, you earn through their product placements between commissions.

Data Monetization

When you create a social media app, you will collect a huge amount of data, including user names, preferences over products, etc. This will be used to earn revenue by analyzing the data and developing reports that can be useful for other brands.

Partnership and Sponsorship

If an app is popular in a niche market, the developers can partner with those companies to promote their brands. You can work with brands and companies to sponsor app features, events, and content.

Crowdfunding

Crowdfunding is one of the important ways to inject funds into the venture, especially during the early stages when a free app is in development.

These websites earn their money from a percentage of what is raised or through direct charges to funders and investors.

Freemium Model

This business model is premised on making the app copy-free with an elementary set of operations available for only a limited purpose.

The extras would be paid functions that can be accessed within the application for a price.

What is the Cost of Social Media App Development?

We have finally reached the segment where we will reveal the app startup cost, if you decide to build a social media app.

On average, the cost to build a social media app typically ranges between $30,000 and $350,000. The overall cost, however, depends on the features that you decide to implement in the app development process.

Want to understand the factors impacting the cost to create a Social media app? Let's try to understand them in the following section with social media app development cost breakdown. Keep reading!

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Factors Affecting the Cost of Building a Social Media App

Each and every social media app development is unique in its way. They have many features and a special amalgamation of platform, design, and technology, which makes a difference in a platform.

Therefore, if you have decided to calculate the total cost to build an app, you must understand these factors very well. Here is a list of things that can help you do the same:

Complexity

You just need to remember a simple formula under this factor. More features result in more cost. This is due to the development time and resources required to make an app.

Features like real-time chat, geolocation, various types of augmented reality, or machine learning algorithms will increase the cost of social app development. Check out the table below for more:

Well, you can hire a mobile app developer who can guide you through the proper aspects of complexity and other factors related to cost impact.

UI/UX Design

The cost of social media app development also depends on the complexity of the UI/UX design trends. User interface and user experience design also increase costs according to their complexity.

Complex designs, animations, and custom interactions take longer and require more significant efforts from designers and developers, which may raise the UI/UX design cost.

A good UI demands research work and a developer’s expertise. Whether it is Android or iOS app development, it will definitely affect the overall cost.

Look at the table below for more information on this:

App Platform

The cost of building a social media app will depend on your chosen app platform.

You can go for iOS, Android, and cross-platform app development. In this section, you will see that the cost will rise for multiple platforms if you opt to deploy an app. You require hiring mobile app developers.

They will write code for each platform and use the tools suitable for your app. Check the list below for details:

Tech Stack

The type of tech stack chosen will determine the expense of social app development. If you choose popular tech stacks like React Native or Flutter for cross-platform development, you can save more than natively developing iOS and Android.

You could also consider using cloud services like AWS or Google Cloud, which can actually make development a lot easier but may also add to costs over time due to operations.

Here is the technology stack you can use to build a social media application:

• Frontend - React Native
• Backend - Python 
• Database - Popstgre SQL 
• Cloud Services- AWS, Google Cloud Storage, Azure 
• Media Server Configuration - HTTPS, RTMP
• Video/Audio Transcoding - FFMPEG, Amazon Elastic Transcoder

Furthermore, the complexity and certain requirements can increase the cost of developing social media apps. Here's a table to check out:

Development Team

The development team plays an important role in app startup costs. Moreover, in this case, you should consider two major factors, including the location and expertise of the team.

This is also an essential factor in evaluating the final cost. However, the hourly rate of developers can also increase or decrease while the final cost to build a social media app.

Here, the rate may vary from region to region, and the cost to hire a developer is based on the expertise of that developer. You can find the table below for more.

Development Company Location

The cost to build a social media app is also subject to the development company's location which you opt for.

For example, suppose you need a development company for your project in Asia.

In that case, the total cost will be less if you are not hiring a social media app development company in the UK and US region with the same experience level.

Location-wise hourly rates of Android social media app development:

• North America - $100-$150
• Russia - $25-$45 
• South America - $30-$50 
• Asia - $18-$40 
• Australia & Europe - $60-$95

The actual development cost varies according to the complexity and features integrated into the apps.

App Maintenance

Expenses incurred by app maintenance & support services are factors you can't avoid in determining a budget for creating a social media app.

These factors recur processes and need attention from dedicated developers. You will also require technical support from experienced developers for your mobile app to function efficiently.

However, this will further hike the mobile app maintenance expenses.

Feature List

The list of features for a social media app development impacts the total cost of software development of the social media application.

Developing a social application with a high feature list will increase engagement in the app and user retention.

You will need to consider a few features to make it engaging and interesting for the user. This is a very rough estimate of the time & cost taken for most of the typical features of social media applications:

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What Does Arramton Infotech Suggest to Reduce the Cost of Social Media App Development?

The next thought that will come to your mind is: Is there any process to reduce the cost of creating a social media app?

Yes, there is. Want to know how?

Well, Arramton Infotech, a custom mobile app development company, has compiled a list of many tips, can check here for strategies that can assist you in reducing the cost.

Determine the Core Features

You should create a minimum viable product (MVP) in this strategy. It will assist you in deciding the core features suitable for your app and can reduce the development cost of a social media mobile app.

Here, you should start by prioritizing essential functionalities for your app, including user authentication, profiles, news feeds, and basic messaging.

Use Open-Source Framework

You should consider the usage of open-source frameworks, including react native or Flutter, for development. Here, you can construct apps that run on iOS and Android with a single codebase.

This can help you look into available open-source libraries and APIs for user authentication, push notification, and other social media functionalities.

Outsourcing Tasks

It is worth taking in-house and outsourcing non-core activities, which means outsourcing tasks not central to the business, like development stages or entire activities.

It can allow you to work cost-effectively offshore or nearshore development teams for those.

To reduce the cost of creating a social media app, consider factors such as region, experience, and skill set when selecting an outsourcing associate.

Scalability

Scalability can be implemented during the app development process. You must build a social media app in order to concentrate on scalability. You can opt for a cloud-based total infrastructure, which scales up your app and makes it flexible.

You can also use cloud development structures like Amazon Web Services (AWS) or Google Cloud Platform (GCP) to provide various scalable services that cater to your needs.

Automated Testing Method

You can implement automation tools that reduce the time and resources required for manual testing. It will assist you in reducing the development cost of social media apps by discovering bugs and regressions early on.

These tools can even prevent pricey delays and transformations. You should automate the deployment techniques to streamline app updates and reduce the chances of human errors.

Regular Optimization

Regular monitoring of app performance and user feedback can help identify areas for optimization and improvement. To implement this strategy, you should prioritize the user needs and cost-effectiveness.

App performance optimization is one of the end steps of a product experimentation procedure. In this, you are feeding back all your learning to the previous stages of the process.

Here, you can bring down the cost of building a social networking app through regular updates and enriching its features.

The Final Thoughts

The social media app development is highly variable and depends on the features, complexity, platform, and location of the team. However, careful planning and strategy can help reduce costs.

Some of these strategies include prioritizing core features, using open-source frameworks, and outsourcing wisely.

Social media apps are more than just communication tools; they are platforms of influence, innovation, and opportunity.

Whether it is about building the next global phenomenon or a niche community application, understanding such cost factors and strategies is integral to making such visions a reality.

Partnering with an experienced development team, like the frontend and backend developers of Arramton Infotech may ensure your social media app outshines competition in the constantly changing digital world.

Furthermore, you can connect with us for on-demand app development, web development, social media management, Search Engine Optimization, and more.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q. How much does a social media app development cost?

Ans: The cost of developing a social media app may vary from $30,000 to $350,000 or more, depending on factors such as features, platform (iOS, Android, or both), design complexity, and the location of the development team.

Q. What are the key features of a successful social media app?

Ans: The typical features of a successful social media app include user profiles, messaging, content sharing, notifications, newsfeeds, and search functionality. Advanced features like live streaming, AR filters, or AI-driven recommendations can enhance user engagement.

Q. How long does it take to develop a social media app?

Ans: The timeline of developing a social media app varies from 4 months to more than a year, depending on the app's complexity, the size of the development team, and if additional time is needed for testing and optimization.

Q. Can a small business afford social media app development?

Ans: Yes, small businesses can afford to develop a social media app by starting with an MVP that would focus on the most essential features. It could also manage the cost by leveraging open-source frameworks and outsourcing to cost-effective regions.