How realistic are free mobile app development promises, and where do the hidden costs kick in?

There's no such thing as a free lunch. You sign up thinking it's free then they want 20 EUR to add your logo 40 EUR to send a notification to parents and 100 EUR to publish it to the store. You end up paying agency prices on an installment plan without even realizing it.

We tried one of those free platforms for our 65-member gym. The first month had zero costs, but by month two they charged 49 EUR because our notification limit ran out, then asked for 150 EUR for a store update. We dumped the whole thing after wasting 600 EUR over six months.

The free tiers of those platforms usually just give you a webview. Meaning your app isn't actually a native app, it's just a website wrapped inside a shell. The Apple App Store will flat-out reject basic webview apps like that for lack of content.

Don't even bother with a mobile app for 80 students. Just handle the booking system through a mobile-friendly webpage. Text parents the link, and whoever books gets it dropped straight into their calendar. Zero software headaches, zero monthly costs.

That agency quoting 4,200 EUR probably isn't writing code from scratch either; they'll just grab an existing template, slap your logo on it, and hand it over. Most of what they call "custom software" is just open-source booking engines under the hood. Don't blindly trust either extreme.

parents dont want to download a separate app for every little thing anyway. plus good luck getting them to enable notifications. setting up a simple mobile-friendly portal is always way less of a headache.

Don't get discouraged if your budget is tight. What matters to parents is being able to book easily. You can integrate this onto your existing site in a single day using free mobile-friendly booking plugins, solving the whole issue without paying a single cent in agency fees.

Are you going to take online payments from parents, or are they just picking a time slot and booking? If there are no payments involved building an app is a complete waste of money.

i completeely agree but i mean the cheapest quote is usually the least thought-out one.

i'm also curious if anyyone does it differently.

Looking at it as a process, the picture changes. Every "we'll look at it later" in a meeting means unbilled work.

Correct me if I'm wrong.

Could you elaborate on that? Implementing a change request process doesnt slow things down it speeds them up.

Of course it varies if your situation is different.

We need to make a distinction here. If you get three different answers on a topic, the question was asked wrong.

If I were you, I'd go this route.

I have a question. Trying to do this alone is the most expensive way.

Good luck with that.

we experienced almost the exact same thing last year. trying to do this alone is the most expensive way.

thats all sorry if I went on too long.

Let me summarize what's been said so far. btw solutions that work at a small scale collapse when you grow; I learned this late.

My questions are cleared up, thanks. Mistakes made on the mobile app development side are usually reversible but expensive.

Every "we'll look at it later" in a meeting means unbilled work. If I were you, I'd go this route.

Just a heads-up. If code ownership isn't in the contract, you have no bargaining power when leaving.

In legacy systems, the most expensive thing is unknown dependencies. This is my opinion, I'm not claiming it's absolute truth.

The opposite happened to me, that's why I'm writing. When making a decision, first look at what data you have on hand.