How Much Does It Cost to Develop a Photo Sharing App like Instagram

By Ruban8 mins read

With the growth in popularity for photo sharing, photo sharing apps like Instagram have registered an immense increase in users. Statistics show that the number of Instagram users has hit 1000 million active users and is expected to increase even more by 2021.

This growth has created an opportunity to develop photo sharing apps like Instagram. But before you create a photo sharing like Instagram you need to know the app development cost. This article highlights just how much it will cost you to develop an Instagram clone app.

How-much-does-it-cost-to-develop-a-photo-sharing-app-like-Instagram

Features of Instagram and the Time It Takes to Develop Them

Account Authorization
Profile Creation and Editing
Messaging Platform
Photos and Videos Uploads Feature
Photo Editing Features
Extra Settings
Linking with Social Media
Geolocation Feature
Search Option
The App Design

Account Authorization

The first step to creating a photosharing app like Instagram is setting up the account authorization. This feature allows a user to create an account before they can use the application. Most applications provide two ways of authorization.

They include;

Create a new account.
Login with existing Gmail or social media account.

Alongside these two, there is an option that allows users to reset their password in case they forget it. This is done through phone SMS, email or social media account.

As users create accounts, the information is stored in a database at the backend. For users that sign up using their social media accounts, there should be an open authorization protocol called OAuth to allow for secure access to limited user accounts information.

Implementing the authorization features is estimated to take about 65 to 70 hours.

This will include authorization via email and phone number, sign in/sign out, and sign in/ sign out via social media.

Profile Creation and Editing

Creation and editing of a profile is an essential feature of all photo sharing apps. This feature allows users to add and change their profile information including bio, profile picture, and website name.

While the clients edit their profile at the front end, there should be an action with the server of the app at the backend for the adjustments to implemented.

The process of developing these profile related features is estimated to take about 48 to 50 hours.

Messaging Platform

After profile features, the next step in your app developments is creating a messaging feature. A successful app should have real-time messaging. Creating a push notification option allows users to reply messages instantly as it informs them of all incoming message.

As users continuously send messages, requests will be sent to the server to track incoming and outgoing messages. To protect your server from overloading from the messages you need to use RESTful API on HTTP instead of the permanent socket connections.

In order to enable notifications on your app, you need to register with Android/iOS servers. This can be done using APN or GCM.

Developing the messaging feature should take you 120-140 hours.

Photos and Videos Uploads Feature

This is a crucial tool in photosharing apps. It should enable users to either upload images and videos or use images from within the app. Given the strength of any photosharing lies in its video and image uploading capabilities ensure it is well designed to have an edge over other rival apps in the market.

At the backend, the approach you use will depend if you are creating an app for Android or iOS. For Android platforms, your app should be able to read the Camera API, MediaRecorder classes, android.hardware.camera2 API, and SurfaceView. In the case for 105 platforms, you can use the UimagePickerController, which is usually a part of UlKit Framework.

This should take you about 75 to 300 hours depending on the platform you create your app for.

Photo Editing Features

After uploading photos, users need to edit their photos according to their preferences to make them attractive. An Instagram clone app should contain powerful photo editing capabilities. Some of the editing features to add include filters, straightening, and rotation.

When it comes to the backend, you can either use standard filters or you can decide to develop your filters. For the standard filters, you just have to copy source codes already available into the project. If you decide to make your own filters then you have to come up with your own unique source code.

The whole process should take you about 60 to 70 hours.

Extra Settings

When developing your Instagram like an app, you should include settings that users can adjust to give them a great user experience. Such settings include setting preferred language, enabling or disabling push notifications as well as setting account privacy.

To allow notifications, you should ensure your app server is connected to Google or Apple servers. These service providers will then provide you with an ID which will be used to send notifications.

The whole development process should take you between 90 to 125 hours.

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Linking with social media

Just like Instagram, your photo sharing app should allow the user to share content like videos, photos and to other social networks. You should, therefore, provide your users with a link to connect their profile with other social network sites.

For this to be successful, you app developer should be able to connect the users’ app account ID to their social media account lousing the Oauth tool.

The expected completion time should be between 8 to 10 hours.

Geolocation Feature

You should integrate the geolocation feature during your app development. This feature provides the users’ location when they post photos and videos. This way followers can be able to easily track their location. Your app developer can integrate geolocation with the help of APIs.

This process should take about 24 to 30 hours.

Search Option

The search will enable users to find friends and groups on your application and see what they are sharing. Besides search options allow them to familiarise with what’s hot and trending news. Ensure your search capabilities makes it easier for users to find what they are looking for.

This search option in your app development process should take about 60 to 70 hours.

The App Design

The design is the selling point of any application, and it should, therefore, be included in calculating your app development cost. Ensure you keep the design of your app as simple as possible and the user interfaces easy to manage. The colors should also be attractive and kept to a minimum to improve the user experience.

The development of a good design for an app like Instagram takes about 60 to 70 hours.

Other Additional Costs

You may also incur other app development cost in building your Instagram like an app. Some of these costs include; hosting of your app, testing as well as updating the application.

You will also be required to pay your development team. This may include the project manager, app developers as well as the app designer.

Conclusion

On average it will take you about 610 hours to create your photo sharing app like Instagram. The hourly rate of developing an app vary from one place to another as well as the app development company you choose. In the US and Australia, for example, the hourly rate is $100 while in some countries like India it can go to as low as $20.

The average app development cost should come to about $30,000 – $60, 000.

This will, however, depend on any additional features you may want to include in your application. If you develop an app with the limited number of features, the cost will get reduced.

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