The market for mobile app development services reached $US 20.5 billion in 2011

The development service market today is almost 3 times of the size of the application download market.

The market for mobile application development services, including application creation, management, distribution and extension services, has reached $US 20.5 billion in 2011. App development services became a mass market that has surpassed the app content market by a factor of 3.

$US 6.8 bn in app download vs. $US 20.5 bn in app development

In 2011 publishers created $US 6.8 billion in application download revenues.

Today most app project revenue is generated from “classical” app creation services (concept creation, design and coding). New service types like app libraries, white label solutions and multi platform app development tools have become more and more popular, but do not yet take a major share of the market.

Daily rates for app development vary

Prices for application development services vary significantly between regions. UK developers charge $US 626 per day whereas competitors from India charge, on average, $US 138 per working day.

App development partners using price as the main criteria for selection will not be lead to an optimal solution as most of the price differences are offset by the additional time needed by offshore app developers.

The Market for Mobile Application Development Services

For more information on the app developer industry see our research report, “The Market for Mobile Application Development Services (2010-2015) – Selling The Spades To The App Gold Diggers”. This report covers the dynamic market on 98 pages. It is written for app developers as a planning and benchmarking tool as well as for app publishers who wants to develop their sourcing strategy.

Please meet us at the M-Days in Frankfurt (1st and 2nd of February 2012) to discuss developments in the app market. To see the program click here: M-Days Program (in German).

  1. I assume that the developer rates quoted here are pure time & material for freelance / consultants? This is not end-2-end mobile web development. The rates charged by MIG, AKQA, LBi, 2ergo, Grapple, Ustwo, etc (and us) in the UK for app development are considerably higher as the rates here would mean a negative margin for most agencies.

    What is the source for the rates?

    Magnus, CEO Golden Gekko

  2. Clarification:
    I meant this is not end-2-end mobile app development which most brands/agencies require.

  3. 2012 will be exciting times. We are rolling out some great b2c apps for 2012. The next three years will be amazing and we look to see how Apple changes some of its policies to truly fine tune the apps.

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  6. Franziska says:

    Thanks for the terrific article

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