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How much does it cost to make an app in 2026?

Building it yourself, an app costs $25 to about $830 in year one: $25 for Google Play, $99 a year for Apple, plus $0 to $708 for a builder plan.

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If you build it yourself, a simple app costs from $25 to roughly $830 in its first year, as of October 2026. The floor is Google’s one-time $25 Play Console fee with free tools like Android Studio or MIT App Inventor; adding the iPhone means Apple’s $99 a year on top. A no-code builder plan that can publish to the stores adds $144 to $708 a year, and a backend can stay free at small scale or cost $25 a month and up.

The figures come from each company’s official pricing and help pages, read on October 26, 2026. We haven’t built apps on these services ourselves. Prices are in US dollars, before tax. This guide covers doing the work yourself; hiring a developer or agency is a separate cost, and we found no official published rates to quote for it.

What every app pays: the store fees

Whatever you build with, the app stores charge to publish:

Store Fee How often Source
Google Play US$25 Once, at registration Play Console Help
Apple App Store US$99 Every year Apple Developer Program

Google’s help center says: “There is a US$25 one-time registration fee.” Apple’s program page lists a “$99 annual membership,” which includes App Store distribution and TestFlight beta testing.

Google adds a time cost for new personal accounts. Personal developer accounts created after November 13, 2023 must run a closed test with “a minimum of 12 testers who have been opted in continuously for at least 14 days” before applying for production access, and Google says it typically reviews those applications within about a week. So budget at least three weeks between your first test build and a public Android launch.

Apple waives its fee only for qualifying nonprofits, accredited educational institutions and government entities. Individuals, sole proprietors and single-person businesses aren’t eligible, and neither is anyone selling paid apps or in-app purchases.

The stores also take a cut of what you sell. That comes out of revenue rather than your build budget; see our note on Google Play’s 2026 fee change.

How much does each way of building cost?

There are three broad routes, and the tool bill differs a lot between them.

Free code tools. Android Studio, Google’s official tool, installs on Windows, macOS, Linux and ChromeOS. MIT App Inventor describes itself as a “free online app development environment” with more than 6 million registered users. Expo, the React Native framework, is free and open source; you pay only if you use its EAS cloud services, and its Free plan includes up to 15 Android and 15 iOS builds a month. For Apple’s side, Xcode needs a Mac; our guide to building an iPhone app without a Mac prices the cloud alternatives.

No-code and low-code builders. These charge a subscription, and the free plans don’t publish to the stores. The cheapest plan that does:

Builder Cheapest plan that publishes to the stores Price Notes
Draftbit Standard $12/mo billed yearly ($144/yr); $15 monthly Full code export; “1-Click Publishing for iOS, Android & Web”
Thunkable Builder $37/mo billed yearly; $59 monthly 1 live published app; unlimited needs Advanced ($99/mo billed yearly)
FlutterFlow Basic $39 monthly; yearly billing saves about 25% Code download and APK download start on Basic
Adalo Builder $65 monthly, or $624 billed yearly 2 published apps; first month $30 for new Builders on monthly billing
Bubble Web & Mobile Starter $59/mo billed yearly 3 live app versions and 5 build submissions a month

Draftbit’s pricing page shows conflicting figures (its plan cards and its embedded data disagree), so confirm the Standard price at checkout. FlutterFlow’s page gives the yearly discount as “~25%” without an exact amount.

AI app builders charge by credits or usage and change often; our best Android app builders roundup tracks them.

What does the backend cost?

Most apps that store user data need a backend for sign-in, a database and push notifications. Two popular options both start free:

Backend Free tier First paid step
Firebase (Google) Spark plan: 1 GiB Firestore storage, 50K document reads and 20K writes a day, Authentication free up to 50K monthly active users, Cloud Messaging at no cost Blaze, pay as you go; usage within the Spark limits stays free
Supabase 2 active projects, 500 MB database, 50,000 monthly active users; free projects pause after 1 week of inactivity Pro from $25/month: 8 GB disk per project, 100,000 MAUs, $10 of compute credits

Firebase says no payment method is needed for Spark and that eligible Blaze users may receive $300 in free credit. Supabase’s free-project pause matters for a live app: if nobody uses it for a week, it stops until you restore it.

Worked example: first-year cost of four common routes

Here is the first-year bill for one simple app with sign-in and a small database, published to both Google Play and the App Store. Store fees are $25 + $99 = $124 in every case.

1. Expo with Firebase, built yourself in code

  • Expo framework: $0. EAS Free: $0 (15 iOS and 15 Android builds a month).
  • Firebase Spark: $0.
  • Total: $0 + $0 + $124 = $124. Android only: $25.

2. Draftbit with Supabase Pro

  • Draftbit Standard: $12 × 12 = $144.
  • Supabase Pro: $25 × 12 = $300.
  • Total: $144 + $300 + $124 = $568.

3. FlutterFlow on monthly billing with Firebase Spark

  • FlutterFlow Basic: $39 × 12 = $468.
  • Firebase Spark: $0.
  • Total: $468 + $124 = $592.

4. Bubble Starter (backend included)

  • Bubble Web & Mobile Starter: $59 × 12 = $708, billed yearly.
  • Total: $708 + $124 = $832.

For comparison, Adalo Builder on yearly billing is $624 + $124 = $748, and Thunkable Builder is ($37 × 12) + $124 = $444 + $124 = $568.

The same app costs from $124 to $832 depending on the route, before any paid add-ons. The bigger costs are time and the plan you grow into: Thunkable’s single live app and Adalo’s two can force an upgrade once you ship a second app.

What else can add to the bill?

  • Cloud builds beyond free limits. Expo’s Starter plan is $19 a month with $45 of build credit, and an iOS build costs $2 or $4 beyond that. Codemagic gives 500 free macOS minutes a month, then charges $0.095 a minute on an M2.
  • Apple’s Xcode Cloud. The $99 membership includes 25 compute hours a month; 100 hours cost $49.99 a month.
  • Extra seats. FlutterFlow’s Growth plan is $80 a month for the first seat and $55 for the second.
  • A website or domain for a support page or landing page. Our build an app hub covers the extras.

What to watch for

  • Monthly vs yearly billing. Thunkable’s Builder plan is $59 monthly but $37 a month on yearly billing; over a year that’s $708 against $444, a $264 difference.
  • Publishing caps. Thunkable Builder allows one live published app and Adalo Builder two. Check the cap before you start a second project.
  • Lock-in. Draftbit’s Standard plan and FlutterFlow’s Basic plan include code export, so you can leave and keep your app. Builders without export keep the app on their platform.
  • Apple’s renewal. The $99 is charged every year, so it belongs in every year’s budget, not just the first.
  • Free backends that pause. Supabase pauses free projects after a week without activity.
  • The Google Play testing wait. New personal accounts need 12 testers for 14 straight days before going public. The rule applies to personal accounts; Google says organization accounts have their own verification requirements.

Which should you choose?

  • A developer on a zero budget, Android first: Android Studio or Expo with Firebase Spark. Your only cost is the $25 Play fee.
  • A developer shipping to both stores: Expo with EAS Free, for $124 in year one including Apple’s fee. See our Expo page.
  • A non-coder who wants an exit: Draftbit Standard or FlutterFlow Basic, both with code export.
  • A non-coder who wants everything in one place: Bubble Starter includes the backend; Adalo Builder publishes two apps.
  • Several small apps: check publishing caps first; Thunkable Advanced allows unlimited live apps at $99 a month billed yearly.

For every builder we track, see the Android app builders hub.

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