The Ultimate Guide: How to Make a Food Delivery App?

Who are we? Food lovers!

What do we want? Fast, hot and yummy food!

In today’s world that runs on convenience, food delivery isn’t just about eating. Today’s foodies want more than just food – we want speed, convenience and comfort. So, if you are a restaurant owner or an entrepreneur planning to tap into this thriving market, all you need is a groundbreaking idea, a food delivery app development company, and inspiration to make it happen.

Research from Statista shows that the online food delivery app solution market is all set to generate a whopping $1.20 Trillion by the end of 2024, accompanied with a revenue growth of 20% in 2025.

Here’s the inspiration part – There’s plenty of money to be made in the food delivery app market.

With customers demanding faster, smarter and more personalized delivery experiences, the potential for innovation is massive. So, if you are planning to develop a food delivery app for your restaurant, set up a food delivery app for your grocery store or build a food delivery app like Uber Eats or Zomato, this is the right place to be.

Why Is Food Delivery App Solution a Worthy Investment?

Food delivery apps are cementing their footsteps as one of the fastest thriving businesses in today’s time, underlining the silver lining of a blooming investment.

Let’s square! Statista projected market volume of food delivery apps to accomplish $340.80 billion by 2028, with a CAGR of 4.79% from 2024-2028. Furthermore, the user penetration is forecasted to reach 19.1% by the same year.

Major fast-food chains have rolled-out their apps to enhance customer loyalty through personalized experiences. More specifically, the global online food delivery market is predicted to accomplish $505.50 billion by 2030, accompanied with a CAGR of 10.3% from 2023 to 2030. For traditional dine-in spots, on-demand food delivery app development is key to manage customer data effortlessly.

To brace it more, the rising smartphone usage and internet penetration have added to the growing food delivery market size. Considering the demographics, you’ll realize that millennials and GenZ dominate the lion’s share in the food delivery app market.

Keeping all these points in mind, it’s fair and square to say that if you plan to invest in a food delivery app business, the future is promising and bright. To add, if you invest in integrating AI in your food business, the benefits are certainly manifold.

Top Read – The Role of AI in Food Delivery Business

Types of Food Delivery App Business Models to Choose From

As a food delivery startup, it’s important to know that each model has pros and cons. Thus, choosing the right model would require understanding what works best per your business plan.

If you are looking to enter this thriving market anytime soon, it’s recommended to have a thorough grasp of its business strategy before you do so.

#1. Business Aggregator Model

For entrepreneurs, this is an amazing business plan to follow.

This type of business model connects customers with numerous restaurants and cafes. Herein, app owners provide a platform for eateries to list their food delivery services and connect with customers.

As an outcome, restaurant owners manage the delivery services themselves. Your food delivery app development services is solely responsible for taking orders from customers and distributing them to the respective eateries.

Simply put, this is a company strategy that depends on orders. For consumers, delivery service is offered by the restaurant or a third-party courier service.

Notably, the logistics onus is not on your shoulder as an app owner. Instead, your work consists of being an intermediary between the restaurant owner and their respective customers through this platform.

Often, you can expect a 20% to 30% cut of the order value, in addition to any incurred shipping costs.

#2. Delivery Service Aggregator Model

In this food delivery business model, the owner hires a delivery service partner for easy and efficient deliveries. The third-party delivery provider decides the delivery fees for food orders because they are in charge of the deliveries.

Primarily, this model checks on all the boxes if you are a food business owner and doesn’t want to invest a greater chunk in a delivery fleet but wants the food to reach customers hot and quick. You can collaborate with logistics providers like Zomato, Swiggy, etc to manage the delivery.

The most important part is to track the delivery partner to ensure they are at par with the commitments made to the customers.

#3. Full-Stack Business Model

As the name suggests, a business choosing a full-service food delivery model performs everything on site.

To achieve this, all you need to do more than partnering with a food delivery app development company or hiring delivery partners is you having a cloud kitchen cooking the meals.

The core objective of these facilities is to get food ready for deliveries and not dine-in. Thus, it’s possible to get meals ready at a lower-cost while just paying for the kitchen in the “cloud kitchen” concept.

Customers and businesses can both adopt this platform. This model offers customers a higher degree of personalization as they can customize metabolic meals, run special corporate meal programs, and deliver nutritious and hot meals straight to workplaces.

A little different from the rest of the business model, herein, the admin is the sole owner of the cloud restaurant employing a staff of cooks and delivery fleet. This clearly means that a restaurant owner’s on-demand food delivery app will encompass all the admin functions built right there, letting you reap big profits.

How to Develop a Food Delivery App in 6 Simple Steps?

There’s no one-size-fits all approach when creating a food delivery app solution that users love. Thus, adopting a methodical approach will help you comprehend the market insights, give you time to understand the unmet gaps and achieve the end results flawlessly.

Here are the steps you can follow when starting on-demand food delivery app development:

Step 1: Research the Market

First and foremost is researching the market. Use this step to read about your competitors, industry challenges and opportunities and know about market dynamics. Here are some crucial factors to consider:

• Competitors Analysis

Analyze platform-to-consumer and restaurant-to-consumer leaders who have already curated their niche in the industry. You may leverage their strength, evaluate your gaps, seize opportunities and also spot threats by analyzing.

• Opportunities and Threats

Conduct a SWOT (Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities and Threats) analysis in order to compare crucial aspects of your operation to those of your competitors. Besides, you may take advantage of your strengths, understand your weaknesses, handhold new opportunities and identify threats.

• Understand Target Audience

This is inescapable. You must know what audience you are targeting. If you are a restaurant owner, your current clientele base will be your target audience. But, if you’re a startup, tap on a market where penetration will be easy.

Remember, in the food industry the menu showcasing plays a pivotal role to attract the eye of your intended clientele.

Step 2: Evaluate Your Cost and Budget

From a business perspective, a food delivery app oscillates within the bracket of $10,000-$30,000+ depending on the functionalities and features, complexity and much more. Let’s explore some major costs related with food delivery app development services:

• Inventory

If you are a rookie to this segment, requiring a location, kitchenware, flooring, interior decor etc are unskippable. Don’t worry, you can still save big on this by investing in a cloud or virtual kitchen, if you want to test the water.

• Technology Cost

Typically, it costs between $20k to $80+ to develop a food delivery app from scratch. The cost is influenced by app complexity, functionality, team, location, etc.

Thus, it’s recommended to partner with a food delivery app development company that has decades of expertise in developing innovative solutions, has a global clientele base, and 98% client retention rate – all this within your pocket.

• Marketing Cost

The price and marketing cost also adds on the development cost of creating a food delivery app solution. After all, advertising your business to millions of online users will help you get the competitive advantage in minimal time.

• Logistics

Investing in the food delivery business initially, sounds like breaking the budget. You’ll have to invest in a vehicle fleet, manage vehicles and drivers for your food delivery business, and much more add-on cost.

If not, you can opt for third-party delivery services in exchange for a minimal commission.

Step 3: Sort Your Licenses

If you are a restaurant owner, you’ll be having all the needed licenses. But, if you are at square one, check with your state or country licenses and see if anything needs to be added.

Step 4: Define Order Receiving Channels

As  such there are numerous channels where you can accept orders – over the call, through text, Whatsapp, email, apps, and even social media.

Yes, you read it right. Your social media accounts act as a multipurpose medium, helping you in both business marketing and order collection. It’s your best ally. Thus, use food delivery software to develop your app, take orders, and manage deliveries at one place. POS integration and GPS tracking should be vital features of the app accompanied with other amazing features.

Step 5: App Development

This is important.

The next step after finalizing your order channels is to select the platform’s functionality. Selecting the right set of features and functionalities for your food delivery app will help you create an app that is user intuitive, efficient, and easy to use.

In addition, it will help you achieve your business requirements and meet the needs of your target market seamlessly.

Step 6: Launch and Market

Last but definitely not the least, launching your food delivery app.

Of course, you want to get it live on both the stores – Apple App Store and Google Play Store to grow your reach to a far reaching audience.

And, if that’s your business bottom line, then it’s just a matter of marketing your app right and getting people to download it. For local audiences, you can consider providing a discount to the early bird. Even if you’re not making big profits, it can be considered as a small investment for user acquisition.

Finally, your app is out. So, without any ado, do whatever you can to drive downloads. Create a buzz enveloping the app, leaving people curious to download it and be word-of-mouth for the app’s success.

Recommended – A CEO’s Guide to Making a Food Delivery App

How Can Apptunix Help in Launching Your Food Delivery Business?

Your seamless food delivery app’s journey starts by partnering with an entrusted food delivery app development company like Apptunix that is ready to walk the extra mile to drive nothing less than the best. Our team’s core objective has always been to create custom-made solutions for every client that brings desired outcome and even more. Apptunix has worked with global brands to provide them with digital solutions for their successful journey.

One such client we worked with was Expo City Eats. They needed an online solution in the UAE for a global presence. Their immediate requirement was to develop a solution that facilitates multiple order modes, an easy to use app with secured payment gateway. Apptunix was able to craft solutions for an enhanced customer experience, increasing the conversion rate by 35%. It all started by conceptualizing, designing and deploying the right digital solutions.

Considering all this, Apptunix curates as the food delivery app development company you are looking for to roll-out the next big thing. Our experts will assist you through the complete development process and ensure your position to the Forbes list of top entrepreneurs!