App development in London, from a team that ships and runs its own apps on iOS and Android.

Most app development companies show screenshots of client work. We can show you two apps we built, released through Apple and Google review, and still run and pay for every day. That matters because the hard part of an app is rarely the first release. It is the store rules, the subscriptions, the updates that must not break the version already on people’s phones, and the crash at 7am that somebody has to fix.

GoRizzume is our careers app for UK students and graduates. It runs on iPhone, iPad and Android from one React Native and Expo codebase, sharing its backend with the web app and a browser extension. It sells subscriptions through Apple and Google in-app billing and runs spoken interview practice with a live AI voice inside the app. It has been on the App Store and Google Play since July 2026.

The Onrolo staff app is the mobile side of our recruitment platform, on iOS and Android for owners, admins, recruiters and field staff, each with their own screens. It covers the attendance register, CV import from the phone’s share sheet, an AI assistant and push notifications, and it ships fixes over the air between store releases. A complete French translation went live across the app in October 2026.

Every app is quoted as a fixed price per phase against a written scope, with a list of what is not included. The range is set by how many kinds of user there are, whether the backend already exists, whether money changes hands in the app, and how much has to work offline. Store submission, privacy labels and the review cycle are in every quote, because they are where first-time app projects lose weeks.

All prices exclude VAT. Apple and Google developer fees, hosting and any AI running costs are paid from accounts in your name and stated in the quote.

UK app developers that publish prices in 2026 put a first app well into five figures. Magora, a London studio, publishes a startup MVP at £10,000 to £25,000 over six to eight weeks and a production app with backend and admin at £25,000 to £60,000. Softomate’s London pricing starts a React Native starter app at £20,000 to £35,000, live in ten to twelve weeks, with mid-complexity apps at £40,000 to £75,000. Dotsquares puts a simple app or MVP in London at £15,000 to £40,000 and a mid-range business app at £40,000 to £100,000.

Our tiers sit at or below the low end of those bands, for the same reason the rest of our prices do: a small founder-led team that has already built the hard parts once, for its own apps, needs fewer weeks than an agency meeting them for the first time. Quoted agency rates for app developers in London run about £80 to £150 an hour; we do not sell hours.

Read on the firms’ own pages on 14 October 2026. Prices exclude VAT where stated. All are credible choices; we list them because a buyer should compare.

We build apps with React Native and Expo, the stack our own apps run on: one codebase produces the iPhone, iPad and Android apps, and the web app can share its logic and backend. For most business and consumer apps that means one team, one set of tests and one release process instead of two, which is a large part of why our prices sit where they do.

It also means fixes reach users quickly. Changes that do not touch native code ship over the air in minutes rather than waiting for a store review, which is how we keep our own apps current between releases. Where an app depends on heavy device-specific work, such as augmented reality or continuous sensor processing, that is a different kind of build, and we will say so before quoting.

Week one: the scope and acceptance criteria in writing, the screens for the core journey agreed, and a working build on your own phone, through TestFlight on iPhone and an internal test track on Android, before the week is out. Then the core journey, sign-in and the backend, with a new build on your phone every week rather than a demo on ours.

The last stretch is the part first-time app projects underestimate: the store listings, screenshots, privacy labels and data-safety forms, in-app purchase configuration, and the review itself, which can come back with questions. We have taken our own apps through Apple and Google review, so the requirements are in the scope from the start rather than discovered at the end. After launch you hold the code, the store accounts and a runbook, and support is a separate monthly line priced in the same document.

The Apple developer account, the Google Play account, the repository, the build service and the backend all sit in your name from day one, not on final payment. An app published under a supplier’s developer account is one you cannot move without the supplier’s help, so we never do it. At handover you receive documentation, credentials, a runbook and a recorded walkthrough, so another developer could release the next version without us.

Build a phone app when the people using it are away from a desk, when they need notifications, the camera or offline access, or when your customers expect to find you in the store. Build a web app first when the users sit at a desk, or when a new product has not yet shown what belongs on a phone; it reaches the same users for less, and the app can follow once people are paying. Many businesses need both, sharing one backend, which is how our own products are built.

Ask every supplier the same questions, us included.