Quick Summary:
The online dating and matchmaking market is expected to reach an 11.03 billion USD valuation by 2028 with a CAGR of 5.6% from 2021 to 2028. Are you looking to join the bandwagon and secure your place in the world of dating apps? Here is an in-detailed guide for you to decode dating app development costs for your next dating app project.
The online dating app market has matured over the initial years. Initially apps like Tinder, Hinge, and Bumble were some of the top names in the market, revolutionising the industry around 2012-2014.
While they still retain their leadership in the space, there have been many new dating apps that have risen to the ranks over the last decade. In such a lucrative market, you are bound to be curious whether you could swoop in and make a mark for yourself, benefiting from the revenues, profits, and popularity of online dating spectrum.
What separates you from merely speculating to actually achieving this, is your understanding of how-to breakdown dating app development costs and how to plan your dating app development journey.
If you are driven towards giving this a try, we are here to solidify your groundwork by providing you with the ultimate guide on dating app development cost breakdown – the technicalities, the managerial decisions, the priorities, we have it all covered. So, without further ado, lets dive right into it –
Understanding the Dating App Market Size Potential
It is important to know the overall playing field before setting foot in the playground. Knowing the overall market scenario can help you position your dating app strategically, and also envision its capability in terms of growth and revenues.
Here are some of the key dating app statistics provided by BusinessofApps Dating App Revenue and Usage Statistics 2024 –
- The dating app market earned $5.34 billion revenue in 2022, out of which $2.8 billion came from Match Group.
- Tinder was the most downloaded app in 2023, followed closely by Bumble
- Over 300 million people are using dating apps worldwide
- More than 20 million users are paying for premium features
They have also provided some interesting yearly charts such as –
Global Dating App Revenue from 2015 to 2023
As we can see the app revenue from dating apps has only increased every year, with a major boost during the 2017-2018 period. Currently the online dating app market made a revenue of around $5.34 billion during 2023.
Global Dating App Users
Naturally, if the revenue of the overall dating app market increased, so did the number of users. Most of these users make use of online matchmaking services through their mobile apps.
How to Develop Dating Apps like Tinder
Tinder is undoubtedly the market leader of dating apps across the globe. One of the most straightforward yet practical reasons for this is that it is home to the largest pool of single people compared to most competitors. Tinder was also one of the first to revolutionize online dating and begin the ‘swipe’ culture. Let us try to decode this popular app to understand what worked so well.
1. Key Features of Tinder
Here is a list of some of Tinder’s best features that you could include in your dating app as well.
Social Media Login
Tinder also allows users to create their accounts via their Google and Facebook accounts, apart from the standard mobile number registration option.
User Profile
If users make their Tinder account by logging in with Facebook, it synchronizes the data from their account and sets up an initial profile based on pictures they upload there.
Matching
Users can match with other users if they both swipe right or press the heart icon on each other. To reject or deny a profile, users can swipe right or press the cross icon. Additionally, Tinder also provides an option to ‘SUPERLIKE’ accounts.
Preferences for Discovery
Users can find other users by filtering and setting down their preferences regarding distance, age, gender, and much more.
Private Messaging
A simple yet effective messaging interface for matches to chat with each other. Users can currently send and receive messages, like a message and send GIFs to each other.
Push Notifications
Tinder sends push notifications to users when they have a match when their likes refuel if they are on the free version and for other purposes too.
Geolocation
Tinder asks permission for your GPS to find matches in your area.
2. Tinder Tech Stack
Deciding the right tech stack plays an important role in how well an app will work and how much would it cost. Here are the various tools and technologies Tinder uses to build and maintain its app
3. Dating App Like Tinder Costs
The overall cost of developing an app like Tinder from scratch will significantly depend on the complete feature set, app complexity and dedicated mobile app developers‘ hourly rates. If you consider the above metrics, creating an app like Tinder for scratch should take around 2200-2400 hours for iOS, Android, QA, Project Management, User Interface and Backend Development. Let us understand the average hours needed for each stage of developing a tinder-like app and the cost of developing a dating app like Tinder based on the development region.
Cost of Developing App Like Tinder – Country and Hourly Rates
| Development Stages | Development Hours (h) | Average Developer Costs/Hour ($) | ||||
| The U.S. | UK | Canada | Ukraine | India | ||
| Project Manager | 210 | $120 | $120 | $80 | $45 | $20 |
| Business Analysis | 24 | |||||
| UI/UX Design | 150 | |||||
| Frontend Development (iOS+Android) | 950 | |||||
| Backend Development | 950 | |||||
| Total | 2284 hrs | $2,74,080 | $2,51,240 | $1,82,720 | $1,02,780 | $45,680 |
Depending on where you get your dating app developed, your estimated cost of developing a dating app can range from $45,680 (India) to $2,74,080 (U.S.).
Alternatively, you can quickly get a Tinder Clone App developed for around $5000 for Android and iOS. However, the customization and functionality will be severely limited.
Factors That Affect Dating App Development Cost
Now that we have a good understanding of how Tinder made its name in the dating app and the several costs associated with its development, let us break down the several factors affecting the cost of developing a dating app that you need to consider for building any small, mid-scale or enterprise-grade dating application.
Disclaimer – All the costs will be calculated based on Indian Developers Hourly Rates.
Dating App Development Cost Factors:
- Type of Dating App Development – Clone vs From Scratch
- Dating App Development Cost based on App Complexity
- Development Approach – Freelance, In-house, Outsource
- Dating App Development Team Structure
- Dating App UIUX Design Costs
- Cross-Platform vs Native Dating App Development
- Cost of Adding Important Features and Functionalities
- Backend Development Cost
- App Testing Cost
Dating App Development Cost Factor #1-Type of Dating App Development: Clone vs From Scratch
Dating App Development Cost Factor #1-Type of Dating App Development: Clone vs From ScratchThe development approach you take for your dating app will significantly affect your match dating app costs. Generally, you can take either of the two approaches to develop on-demand dating apps – Clone Dating App or Developing a Dating App from Scratch.
Suppose you do not want to invest much time and budget on your dating app, and it is not the centre product of your business offerings. In that case, you can very well opt for a dating clone app and build dating apps like Bumble, Tinder or any other popular dating app. There are scripts available for such apps that can simply be purchased and executed to give you a ready-made dating app solution where you can integrate your brand identity to a certain extent. The cost of the Tinder Script App or Bumble Script App will be significantly lower compared to the app development cost for building an app from scratch; however, it would also have limited functionality, lesser security and almost nil customization options.
| App Development Cost | $2000-$4000 | $40,000-$50,000 |
| App Development Timeline | 1-2 weeks | 13-15 weeks |
| Reliability and Scalability | Highly Scalable | Highly Reliable |
| App Customization | Limited | High |
| Features and Functionalities | Limited | Can add as many with proper coding knowledge |
Dating App Development Cost Factor #2- Based on App Complexity
Your dating app complexity has a direct impact on the cost of making a dating app. Hence, if you need to build a dating app that can perform complex functions like payment processing, syncing with the internet, processing in-app purchases, sending push notifications, using real-time GPS or linking users with other users, it will naturally be more expensive as compared to an essential dating app development cost.
Cost of Basic Dating App vs Complex Dating App Development Timeline
| Project Management | 100 hours | 240 hours |
| Frontend (iOS+Android) | 320 hours | 950 hours |
| Backend | 310 hours | 960 hours |
| UI/UX | 30 hours | 120 hours |
| QA Analysis | 50 hours | 130 hours |
| Total Hours | 810 hours | 2400 hours |
| Average Hourly Rates for Dating App Development in India | $20-$30 | |
| Total Dating App Development Cost (Total Hours * Average Hourly Rates) | $16,200 – $24,300 | $48,000 – $72,000 |
Dating App Development Cost Factor #3-Development Approach: Freelance, In-house, Outsource
Whom you get your dating app developed from also influences the overall cost of dating apps. You can take three approaches for developing your dating app: in–house, hiring a freelancer, and hiring an offshore development centre.
The estimated hourly rates for different dating app development approaches are:
- Freelancers – $12-$24 per hour
- In-house – $150-$250 per hour
- ODC (India) – $20-$30 per hour
As you can see, there is a considerable price difference between hiring an in-house team versus going for freelancers or an offshore development company. You should also note that apart from the hourly wages you will have to pay for your in-house team, you also need to give them leaves and other employee benefits that will only add to your expenses.
| Access to Technical Expertise | High | Low | High |
| Project Budget | High | Low | Medium |
| Project Urgency | Medium | High | Medium |
| Security Concerns | High | Low | High |
| Project Scope | High | Low | High |
Now, between freelancers and offshore development centres, you can hire a skilled freelancer if you have a semi-technical team and only need an expert to look over one aspect of your project. However, suppose you want complete app solution services. In that case, you should rely on the expertise of one of the best on-demand dating app development companies who will manage your project from ideation to final deployment.
Here are some requirement considerations that you can use to assess if your project is better suited for freelancers, in-house teams or offshore development companies.
Dating App Development Cost Factor #4 – Dating App Development Team Structure
Any dating app needs collaborative efforts between many I.T. experts to take care of different aspects of your dating app development process. If you outsource your project to an offshore development agency, then you will get an overall price estimation for your project. Alternatively, you can also approach them to hire individual talents missing from your in-house team to complete your dating app development team. In either case, it is good to know what talents you need to hire and their average hourly rates.
| Project Manager | $45 – $120 |
| Scrum Master | $30 – $76 |
| Product Owner | $29 – $74 |
| Designers | $30-$75 |
| Frontend Developers | $40- $75 |
| Backend Developers | $61 – $80 |
| Business Analysts | $20-$56 |
| QA Lead | $15-$45 |
Dating App Development Cost Factor #5 – Dating App UIUX Design Costs
Simple Dating App Cost – $840 | Average Dating App Cost – $3560 | Complex Dating App Cost – $10,600
App design plays one of the most pivotal roles in turning interested audiences into potential customers. When it comes to dating apps, the overall visual design plays a critical role in attracting users and making them actively use your app.
From a cost point of view, if you go for pre-built templates to design your dating app, it would not be authentic, and your dating app would look like just another generic app with nothing new or exciting to offer.
Hence, it is always advised to outsource your dating app design to an experienced on-demand app development team with credible experience in building and designing dating apps. It is also essential to reflect your brands’ identity through your dating app in terms of colors, shapes, fonts and more. Similarly, you need to make sure your app follows a logical and easy to follow design guide that makes sense and makes the user journey seamless through an effective UX design strategy.
| Design Stages | Hours | ||||||
| Simple Dating App Design | Average Dating App Design | Complex Dating App Design | |||||
| Wireframing | 14 | 58 | 160 | ||||
| UI Design | 20 | 90 | 190 | ||||
| UX Design | 8 | 30 | 180 | ||||
| Total Hours | 42 | 178 | 530 | ||||
| Average Hourly Rates | $20-$30 | ||||||
| Total Dating App Design Cost (Total Hours * Average Hourly Rates) | $840 – $1260 | $3560-$5340 | $10,600-$15,900 | ||||
Dating App Development Cost Factor #6 – Cross-Platform vs Native Dating App Development
Another critical decision that affects your cost to build a dating app is whether you go for cross platform or native app development approach for your dating app. Building a cross-platform app enables you to target both iOS and Android at almost half the price of developing a native app for both platforms individually.
Hence, if you are banking on maximum user participation and downloads for earning through your dating app, you should opt for cross platform mobile app development. In contrast, if you plan to target a specific market or have a budget to afford native app development on both platforms, you should go for native development. Native apps have better functionality and a richer user experience.
| App Development Approach | Average Cost of Online Dating App Development | |||||||
| Android | iOS | |||||||
| Native App Development | $30,000 | $45,000 | ||||||
| Cross Platform App Development | ||||||||
Dating App Development Cost Factor #7 – Cost of Adding Important Features and Functionalities
Any dating app needs a particular set of critical features to be an accurate and complete dating app solution that satisfies user needs and demands. Some essential features are also needed to ensure users’ data privacy and security. When they sign up for your services, they trust you with their social logins, critical personal details, and other sensitive data. Here are some of the most important features that affect the cost of developing a dating app.
| Dating App Feature | Feature Development Time | Average Developer Rate | Feature Development Cost |
| Authorization | 25 | $20-30 | $500 – $750 |
| GPS | 5 | $100 – $150 | |
| User Profile | 80 | $1600 – $2400 | |
| Settings | 55 | $1100 – $1650 | |
| Matching Algorithm | 90 | $1800 – $2700 | |
| Notifications | 25 | $500 – $750 | |
| Communication | 130 | $2600 – $3900 | |
| 3rd Party Integrations | 30 | $600 – $900 | |
| Total | 440 hrs | $8800 – $13,200 |
8. Dating App Development Cost Factor #8 – Backend Development
Building a robust backend infrastructure is crucial to ensure proper handling of user data, matchmaking algorithms, ensuring properly functioning messaging features and other such functionalities. Now depending on the scale, complexity and scope of your dating app, setting up the backend comes with many cost factors that needs to be considered. Let’s understand them better –
| Backend Development Factor | Description | Estimated Dating App Cost Range |
| User Data Management | Creation of Databased and Implementation of CRUD operations. | $5000 – $14,000+ |
| Matchmaking Algorithms | Designing and implementing algorithms based on user interest, preferences and location | $5500 – $20,000+ |
| Messaging System | Build a real-time messaging system with features like push notification, media sharing support and more. | $12,000 – $24,000+ |
| Scalability | Backend needs to be configured for scalability for increasing the app’s ability for handing increasing users and data volume without performance degradation. | Varies |
| Security | You need to keep your dating apps secure with secure authentication, encryption and other such security best practices. | $5000 – $22,000+ |
| Infrastructure Setup | Setting up the servers, databases and other backend infrastructure components including managed services or cloud hosting. | $3500 – $25,000+ |
| Maintenance and Support | Ongoing maintenance, cost for monitoring performance, health of the app, backups and more. | 20-50% of initial development cost, annually. |
Dating App Development Cost Factor #9 – App Testing
App testing is essential to validate and verify that the app is designed and developed as intended and actually performs optimally in different situations. The testing is a thorough process that can easily take up 130-150 hours for a mediumly complexed dating app. It is important that your dating app solutions provider has a dedicated development team of testers, analysts, consultants as well as developer to ensure they cover all aspects and use cases thoroughly.
Cost of Testing Dating Apps Tabular Breakdown
| Type of Testing | Description | Average Cost Range |
| Functional Testing | Individual feature and functionality testing to ensure they work as intended. | $8000 – $10,000 |
| UX Testing | Evaluating the app’s usability, navigation and user experience. | $3500 – $12,000 |
| Performance Testing | Assessing responsiveness, uptime, speed, memory utilization and other such performance factors. | $5000 – $20,000 |
| Security Testing | Identifying and mitigating potential security threats like data breaches or any vulnerabilities in the codebase. | $6000 – $22,000 |
| Compatibility Testing | Verifying functionality across different devices, OS versions and browsers. | $3000-$8000 |
| Regression Testing | Ensuring new updates don’t cause issues with existing systems. | $2000 – $8000 |
| Localization Testing | Verifying linguistic and cultural appropriateness for different languages and religions. | $4000 – $8000 |
| Accessibility Testing | Evaluating compliance with accessibility standards to ensure user-friendliness for especially abled. | $5000 – $20,000 |
| Beta Testing | Real-world testing by releasing the app to a limited group of users for feedback. | $4000-$7000+ |
| Automation Testing | Developing scripts for automating necessary but repetitive tasks, improving efficiency over time. | $5000 – $20,000+ |
Popular Dating App Cost Comparison
Now to wrap it up, let us have a quick comparison between the leading dating apps in the market in terms of their pricing models and the basic features they provide.
1. Bumble
Subscription Price: Premium $2.99/month or $46.99 for three months.
Users: 42 million monthly users.
Key Features of Bumble Premium
- Unlimited Likes
- Beeline
- Advanced Filters
- Incognito Mode
- Travel Mode
- 5 SuperSwipes a week
- 1 Spotlight a week
- Unlimited Extends
- Unlimited Rematch
- Unlimited Backtrack
- Unlimited Best Bee Likes
2. Hinge
Subscription Price: Premium $29.99/month or $19.99/month for three months.
Users: 6 million monthly actively users.
Key Features of Bumble Premium
- See everyone who likes you
- Set more dating preferences
- Sort all incoming likes
- Browse by who’s new or nearby
- Unlimited likes
3. Plenty of Fish
Subscription Price: $10.18/month for eight months.
Users: 150 million registered users.
Key Features PlentyofFish Premium
- See who likes you
- 50 First Contacts
- Unlimited Likes
- First look at new members
- Username search
- Extended profile viewing
- Read receipts
- Up to 16 images on your profile
4. Tinder
Subscription Price: $14.99/month for age below 30, $29.99/month for age above 30.
Users: 66 million monthly active users.
Key Features Tinder Premium
- Check who likes your profile
- Unlimited Likes
- 1 Free Boost Per Month
- Top Picks Daily
- Hide age and distance
- Five Super Likes Weekly
- Control Who Sees You
- Control Who You See
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Wrapping it up!
This is your go-to guide for estimating dating app development costs for your next Tinder-like app project. Consider all these factors and come up with an efficiently laid out dating app budget plan to create the best dating app amongst your competitors.
