How Much Website and Mobile App Development Costs: Real Ranges and What the Price Consists Of

Why there is no single price

The cost of development is first of all the cost of the team’s working time: analyst, designer, programmers, tester, project manager. The more complex the product, the more specialists and hours it takes, and the higher the final price. A landing page of a few blocks and a marketplace with personal accounts, payment and moderation are different scales of work, even if both are called a “website”.

That is why a meaningful conversation about cost starts not with “how much?” but with a description of the task: what the product must do, for whom, what its mandatory features are and which systems it must integrate with. The clearer the task, the more accurate the estimate. If you simply tell a contractor “I need a website” or “I need an app”, you will get estimates that cannot be compared with each other, because each contractor priced their own version of the product.

How much a website costs: benchmarks for Kazakhstan

According to a public overview of the Kazakhstan market, a quality turnkey studio usually falls within these ranges: a landing page costs roughly 250 to 500 thousand tenge, a corporate website 500 thousand to 3–4 million tenge, and an online store starts at roughly a million tenge and grows with functionality.

These figures need to be read correctly. Freelancers and small teams often offer noticeably lower prices, and builders such as Tilda or Wix cut the initial cost even further but limit flexibility. Conversely, projects with complex logic, integrations and high load go far beyond these ranges. So the table is useful not as a price list but as a way to judge whether an offer you received is within reasonable bounds for your type of project. We covered the structure of website pricing in more detail in our Kazakh-language article “Сайт жасау қанша тұрады”.

How much a mobile app costs: benchmarks and spread

With mobile apps the situation is harder: the ranges are much wider, and there is noticeably less public data specifically for Kazakhstan. The strongest factor is the set of features. Every screen, user role, personal account and separate control panel adds hours of work. A simple catalogue and a platform with orders, payment and moderation differ several times over, which is exactly why the first version (MVP) is usually built around the minimum necessary set, as we wrote in our article on calculating MVP cost.

The second factor is design. Adapting a ready-made template costs noticeably less than developing a custom design with a prototype, illustrations and animation. The third is platforms: for a mobile app it matters whether it is needed for iOS and Android at once, and whether it is built on two native codebases or on a cross-platform framework such as Flutter, which lets you share a significant part of the code between both platforms. A comparison of the approaches is in a separate blog article.

Next come integrations: connecting payment systems, CRM, delivery services, messengers and map services. Each external system requires studying documentation, configuration and testing, and some add their own recurring payments. The price is also affected by the server side and load (will you have hundreds or hundreds of thousands of users), security and personal data protection requirements, the number of interface languages, the presence of an admin panel and the quality of testing. Finally, the price depends on who does the work: rates depend on qualification, region and whether one person or a team with separate roles works on the project.

If you need specific benchmarks for apps, we collected them separately: at Qazaqsoft, mobile app development in Kazakhstan starts from 1,500,000 ₸, and a detailed breakdown is in the article “Mobile App Development in Kazakhstan: Prices from 1,500,000 ₸”.

Who does it: builder, freelancer, studio

A builder is the cheapest and fastest start: a website or a simple app can be assembled from ready-made blocks in a few days, and the cost usually comes down to a service subscription. It suits a business card site, testing an idea and small tasks, but limits flexibility and ties the project to the platform. If the project grows, it will most likely have to be rewritten.

A freelancer is usually cheaper than a studio and suits a small, clearly defined task well. The risk is dependence on one person: if they fall ill, become overloaded or stop responding, the project may stall, and support after launch is not guaranteed. A studio costs more but offers a team (analyst, designer, developers, tester, manager), a documented process and post-release support. The choice is determined not only by budget but also by project complexity and how critical the risk of losing the contractor is for you.

Payment models: fixed price and hourly work

Two approaches are the most common. With a fixed price, the cost and scope of work are agreed in advance and you know the project budget. This is convenient for tasks with a clear technical specification, but any changes during the work are usually formalised as separate addenda and increase the cost. That is why a good specification is especially important for a fixed price — we wrote separately about how to prepare one.

With hourly payment (or the “time and materials” model) you pay for the time the team actually spent. This model is more flexible and suits projects where requirements change along the way or it is unclear in advance what exactly will need to be done, but the budget is less predictable and requires regular control. Companies often combine the approaches: they fix the cost of the first stage and run further development on a flexible model.

Costs after launch

The development price is only part of the total cost of ownership. After launch, recurring costs appear that are useful to budget for in advance. They include a domain and hosting or a cloud server (we wrote about choosing them in the article on domain and hosting), technical support and updates, bug fixing, adapting to new versions of operating systems and browsers, and filling and updating content.

For mobile apps, store publication costs are added. The Apple Developer Program costs 99 dollars a year, while Google Play developer registration is a one-time fee of 25 dollars. The fees are set by the companies themselves, and it is worth checking them on the official pages before planning the budget. If the app has push notifications, SMS, maps or third-party services, they may have their own tariffs that grow with your audience.

And for people to learn about the project at all, you need a promotion budget: SEO, advertising and audience work are not included in the development cost. A website nobody knows about will not bring customers on its own.

How to get an accurate estimate

For a contractor to name a real price, they need a description of the task. Prepare a short brief: what your business does, what problem the product solves and for whom, which features are mandatory at launch and which can be postponed, which systems must be connected, whether there are examples of websites or apps you like, and approximate deadlines. If you can show at least a sketch of the screens or a list of pages, the estimate will be more accurate.

A good contractor will ask clarifying questions rather than name a price after a single sentence. If you are given an exact sum without a single question about the task, that is a reason to be wary: either the contractor is pricing a template product, or they will add extra charges later. For large projects it makes sense to start with a paid analysis and design stage: it costs extra but gives a clear technical specification and a more accurate development estimate.

How to compare offers

The main trap is comparing only the final sums. Two offers of 300 and 600 thousand may describe different things: one includes custom design, an admin panel and integrations, the other a ready-made template. Ask contractors to spell out exactly what is included in the price: the number of pages or screens, design type, mobile adaptation, control panel, integrations, testing, training, warranty period and support terms.

Pay attention to the process as well: whether the technical specification is fixed in writing, whether results are shown stage by stage, how many rounds of revisions are included, who the domain and hosting are registered to and what happens after the project ends. Study examples of similar work and, if possible, talk to those customers. The best offer is not the cheapest but the one that best matches your task and is predictable in timing and costs.

How to cut costs without losing quality

The most effective way to save is to reduce the scope of the first version. Formulate the minimum set of features without which the product makes no sense and launch it, then add the rest based on the behaviour of real users. This protects you from paying for features nobody will use. The second way is to use ready-made solutions where they fit: platforms for standard websites, standard payment modules, ready-made integrations.

Good preparation on your side also helps you save: a clear brief, ready content (texts, photos, price list), quick approvals and no constant changes of requirements mid-project, since every rework costs team time. At the same time, do not economise on security, the quality of the mobile version, speed and support: the losses from that usually exceed the savings.

Common client mistakes

The most common mistake is choosing a contractor by the lowest price without checking what it includes. A low price often means limited scope, a template solution or hidden extra charges. The second mistake is asking for an estimate without describing the task, which makes offers impossible to compare. The third is not budgeting for support, domain, hosting and promotion, so the project is left without development after launch.

Clients often try to fit all their ideas into the first version at once, inflating budget and timelines, and forget about content: the contractor finishes the work, but texts and photos are ready only weeks later. Another mistake is registering the domain and accounts to the contractor rather than the company, after which changing contractors becomes a problem. And finally, many do not measure results: without analytics and clear goals it is impossible to tell whether the website or app paid off.

Checklist

• The task is formulated: what the product must do, for whom and what result the business needs.
• The minimum set of features for the first version is defined.
• A brief is prepared and, if possible, examples or sketches.
• Several offers are received with a description of what the price includes.
• Offers are compared by scope of work, not only by the final sum.
• The payment method is fixed: fixed price or hourly work.
• Deadlines, the number of revision rounds and warranty terms are agreed.
• Domain, hosting and accounts are registered to the company.
• Costs for support, hosting, app stores and promotion are budgeted.
• The indicators by which the result will be judged are defined.