Spotify Like App Development: The Complete Process and Cost BreakDown

Music Streaming App Development - Scope and Trends

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Astonishing – isn’t it? The above stats are just a small portrayal of how big the Music Streaming App Market is. 

With popular music streaming applications like Spotify getting users in millions every day, the market can be expected to just grow further than its present rate. Now you must be having a clear picture of how big the music streaming application market is and what its future looks like.

App Category Download Rates and Expected Revenues – both being on a rising tangent in the music streaming app development industry – have together created a spike in the competition with a number of brands aiming to get its benefits. 

Let’s now have a look at the competition in the market you are about to enter:

Market Leaders of the Music Streaming Industry

The current conditions show that streaming platforms have changed the music landscape and the manner in which consumers find and listen to their favorite music. While we keep on witnessing new business entrants in the sector every single day, the above-mentioned brands are simply the ones that have established themselves as the music streaming market industry pioneers.

Thus, this is a model that is quickly developing and becoming very competitive. Applications and businesses in this niche are trying to stand out by offering exceptional content, focusing on the artists, or creating diverse business models. 

If you are planning to build an app like Spotify – there are a few features that you must integrate into your Spotify like app. Let’s have a look at all these features now:

8 Must-Have Features of a Music Streaming App Like Spotify

Now that we have seen the market trends and competition in the music-streaming industry – let’s have a look at the must-have features of a music streaming application:

1. App Onboarding

This feature includes registration, authentication and user profile creation.

After installing the app from the app store – your users must find it easy to start using your application and that’s why it is crucial to make the app-onboarding process easy and seamless. Apps like Spotify are connected to Facebook and other social media networks so that app users can sign-up in a single tap. Similarly, you will also have to integrate the same feature in your app.

Also, if your app is using a freemium business model like Spotify – sign-up feature becomes essential. Spotify lets users access the content for free as well during the trial period but it takes the user’s information beforehand. 

In the user profile section, the user should have his own page containing all the essential information like his name, age, gender, date of birth, music preferences, and so on. In this section, you should take information from the user regarding his preferences to envision and provide him content based on his/her desires. 

For the development of the App-Onboarding feature, it will take around 15-20 Hrs on the Front-End and around 20-25 Hrs on the Back-End.

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2. Music-Streaming

This is the main feature of a music streaming app. The streaming method doesn’t require the downloading of the entire file. The audio that the user requests is delivered to him in small packets to play the music instantly. Thus, you need to ensure that the stream is consistent and continuous to hear the clear sound with no stops. 

If you are developing an MVP, it will take less effort and time to build up the front-end and the back-end part of this feature. However, developing the music streaming feature alone for a full-fledged app like Spotify is going to take around 600 hours (350 hours on the front-end part and around 250 hours for the backend part).

For an MVP, the development of the Music-Streaming feature will take around 50-60 Hrs on the Front-End and around 80 Hrs on the Back-End.

3. Search

The entire idea of a music streaming application is to give the listeners the opportunity to search for the type of music they want to listen to as per their mood. 

To make it possible, it is necessary for you to add a search feature in your application. Through this feature, users will have the option to search for their preferred albums, music, picture tracks, and so on. 

Including a Search functionality in the music streaming application services would take somewhere around 16 hours on the front-end and 24 hrs on the back-end.

4. Playlists

What could be a better option than giving your users a platform where they can create a list of all their preferred tracks in a single spot, classified according to their mood. 

This is possible by providing a Playlist feature in your app. Again, the development of this feature will take around 16 hours on the front-end and 24 hrs on the back-end.

5. Social-Sharing

It is a well-known saying that the success your application gets is directly related to the promotions it gets on social-networking websites. 

And, the statement stands true for music streaming applications as well. By giving your users an alternative to share their favorite tune or the entire collection via social networking websites or with somebody using a one-on-one mode with platforms like WhatsApp or Instagram, your brand will get the advantage of word of mouth marketing.

The development of Social-Sharing feature will take around 4 hours on the front-end and 4 hrs on the back-end.

6. Offline-Mode

This feature permits users to listen to their favorite music even without the internet connection. It utilizes the local storage of the device to cache the audio information. 

The time expected to build up an MVP of a comparable music streaming application like Spotify is going to take roughly around 40-50 hrs on the Front-End part and around 24 hours on the Back-End part.

However, if you focus on similar quality and ease of use as in Spotify, multiply this number by 2 or 3.

7. Push Notifications

Push-Notifications are not just a must-have feature, however, the most helpful feature through which you can stun your audience by giving them astonishing offers, notifications about recently added songs, discounts, and more. The feature helps you increase your app engagement rate and keep users hooked to your application.

The development of this feature will take around 24 hrs on the Front-End and around 20 hrs on the Back-End.

Also Read: How Much Does It Cost to Build Video Streaming Apps Like Netflix?

8. Payment

The integration of this feature relies upon your spotify like application’s business model. If your application is having a freemium business model like Spotify, it is important to incorporate this feature in your application so that users can pay hassle-free for all that they want.

The development of the Payment feature will take somewhere around 30 hrs on the Front-End and around 40 hrs on the Back-End.

Now that we have looked into the present and future market trend and scope of the music streaming industry and the features that should be available in your Spotify like application alongside the development hours that would go behind the making of each, let’s find out the total cost of development of these must-have features:

Depending on the rough estimates in the table given above, we can easily depict that the development of a music streaming app (in MVP phase) will take at least 4 months. Now, the expense of the development of these features will rely upon the hourly rate of your Spotify like mobile application developer. Let’s see what are the other factors that will influence the cost of development of a music app like Spotify.

The Process of Spotify Like App Development and Cost Estimation

Rome wasn’t built in a single day, but they were laying bricks every hour. Similarly, achieving success with an app like Spotify or building one isn’t’ going to happen in a single day. A lot goes into the development of apps that go viral and get millions of downloads on the app stores. 

Let’s see the entire process of Spotify Like App Development, the time it is going to take and the amount of money it is going to cost you:

• Product Designing

Designing an app is one of the toughest tasks of launching a mobile app. 

A product’s design requires several rounds of iterations with careful sketching and planning. It additionally bodes well to set up the initial A/B testing and share the designs with a targeted audience.

All things considered, the designer will need at least 6-8 weeks to come up with the designs, including the entire user flow and UI plan for the iOS and Android applications. The total expense here will come somewhere around $4800-$6400.

• iOS App Development

Building an MVP version of an application like Spotify will require at least one iOS app developer for at least 4 months. The cost of Spotify Like App Development for iOS platform starts from $19,200.

• Android App Development

The similar figures work for the development of the Android application, but it might require a bit extra time than the iOS version. Therefore, the expense of Android development begins usually at $20, 000.

• Backend Development

Depending on the features you want to embed in your app, the backend development will need at least one developer and up to 3 months. The expense here begins at $12800. 

• Quality Assurance

Because of cutting-edge technologies that a music-streaming application like Spotify needs, the quality assurance process is essential. So, for the same, we will require at least 1 QA engineer for at least 2 months.

• Additional Expense

The app development cost is not limited to the development process only. There are several other expenses you should not forget about. In development, integration of a few third-party libraries is essential like (Firebase and Sencha) and therefore you need to keep in mind their expenses as well.

Similarly, there is app marketing cost. Then there is server and app maintenance cost as well.

Keeping everything in mind, we can say that the minimum time required for the development of a Spotify like app – from the initial planning to the release – is at least 5-6 months. And, the cost would be around $42000 – $54000.

Do you think that it is too much for you? If yes, surely you will be interested in the question of whether you can save while developing a music streaming application or not. Fortunately, yes, it is quite possible. Let’s see how:

3 Ways to Save Money in the Development Process of a Spotify Like App

Building up a mobile application precisely like Spotify is a marvelous method to guarantee a streamlined user experience across all devices, to engage users, and to build your brand’s loyalty. However, it can be somewhat expensive. So, what should you do? Don’t worry! 

Using the below-mentioned ways you can save money in the development process:

1. Follow an MVP Approach

Before you plan your budget for developing an app like Spotify – Remember, it is not essential to add all the features you have planned right in the first version of your application. 

To start with, a few features will be useless or even futile in the early stage of your lifetime. Second, using an iterative approach for building an app in which you add features by turn – will spare you time as well as resources that can be utilized for enhancing the main functionality of your app. 

Hence, if you need to create an application in less time and analyze how your target users will like it, plan to launch an MVP first and continually update the application as per the feedback of your users. It is the best way to save money and launch a product.

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2. Select Your Developers Very Carefully

Now, that is what makes a big difference in the overall cost of building a music app like Spotify. In almost all countries, mobile app developers work on an hourly basis and their hourly cost varies from country to country. 

That means the cost to develop a music app like Spotify will be influenced by the location of your developers. For example,

• Developers in the U.S. charge $100-150 per hour 
• Developers in the U.K. charge about £100-180 per hour
• Developers in Eastern Europe change $20-70 per hour
• Developers in India work on $25-50 per hour
• Developers in Bangladesh work on $10-$15 per hour

It is crucial that you select your app developers very carefully to ensure quality and cost-effective results. To save money, you shouldn’t work with app developers that compromise with the quality of your app for saving money.

If you are planning to build a live streaming application of top-notch quality, but you have a limited budget, go with developers from India or Europe. They are very talented and have reasonable rates.

3. Consider a Hybrid App Development Approach

Building dedicated apps for Android and iOS can be very costly for a small business. 

But, both platforms have a considerable number of users that can not be neglected. So, the best solution is to create a cross-platform mobile application that works over multiple platforms. 

Developed using simple frameworks, these applications provide the look and feel of a native application with seamless UI and UX and are submitted to app stores as native apps.

Perfectly built cross-platform apps – also known as hybrid apps – look and feel just like native applications in every way. Flutter, React-Native, Xamarin, and Ionic – are some of the top cross-platform app development frameworks that you can use to ensure quality and less development cost.

All the three factors listed above can help you lessen your app development cost. But, still, the development of a high-performing music streaming application will cost you somewhere around $25000-$30,000.

Wrapping Up

Music streaming applications are well-known entertainment tools for youngsters and millennials. Thus, the demand for such music applications won’t fade anytime soon. The fact creates a number of business opportunities for your brand to stand-out. 

So, do you have a music application idea running in your mind? Want to understand the music streaming app development industry in a better way? Let us help!