The main risk in custom software development is not that the developers lack skill. It is that the client signs off a large budget before anyone involved can clearly describe what is actually being built. What follows is familiar: deadlines slip, the scope is disputed, and there is nothing measurable to show until the very end.
We split the journey into stages, each with a fixed price and a tangible result. After any stage you can stop and walk away with an asset rather than a half-finished build. Below is a map of the whole series: ten stages from idea to commercial release, eight growth tracks, and a guide to choosing where you should start.
Three blocks, not one long project
The series has three parts. They answer different questions and cost very different amounts of money.
- The demo sample answers the question "what are we building?". It covers consultation and modelling, the technical specification and prototyping. You come out with documents and a clickable model you can take to an investor, a contractor or your own board.
- The commercial version answers "how does it work in production?". Seven stages, from interface design to testing and handover. This is where a product appears that real people use.
- Corporate growth answers "how will it cope with growth?". Eight independent tracks at $4700 each, added as the product evolves from MVP to MMP and MLP.
Ten stages: price and result
Prices come from Ingello's current price list. A lower bound of $0 means the work may not be needed at all: for example, you already have a design system, or no external services need connecting.
| Stage | Price | What you keep |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Consultation and modelling | $220 | Business requirements and a demo sample: main screens and an admin panel |
| 2. Technical specification | $800 | Written specification, interface and data models, contracts, budget estimate |
| 3. Prototyping | $2400 | A clickable prototype for testing scenarios and showing investors |
| 4. Interface design | $0-2400 | Design system, UX/UI, visual style for web and mobile |
| 5. Front-end markup | $0-2400 | Responsive markup from the mock-ups, PWA preparation for iOS and Android |
| 6. Interface logic | $0-4700 | Interactive scenarios in JS/TS, forms and validation |
| 7. Integrations | $0-4700 | Connected APIs, payment systems, CRM, maps, WebSocket chats |
| 8. Server-side business logic | $0-4700 | A PHP (Yii2) and MySQL back end with caching |
| 9. Deployment and infrastructure | $800-4700 | Docker containers, configured servers and SSL, CI/CD |
| 10. Testing and handover | $800-4700 | Tested interfaces, specification scenarios, integrations and deployment |
If you order prototyping straight away, the technical specification is included at no extra charge. You save $800, and the whole demo sample costs $2620 instead of $3420.
Eight growth tracks
Once the product is live, it does not grow "in general" but along specific tracks. Each costs $4700 and can be added independently, in whatever order the business dictates.
- Events and notifications: alerts, push, e-mail and Telegram messages, an action log.
- Smoother interface and offline mode: data caching and sync without an internet connection.
- Security: audit, API protection, roles and access rights, protection against attacks.
- Server optimisation: database indexes, caching, algorithm optimisation.
- SEO optimisation: DOM-level work and preparation for organic search traffic.
- Documentation: technical and user documentation.
- Refactoring: code quality and readiness to scale.
- Test automation: automated tests instead of manual checks after every change.
How much does it cost to build an app in total?
An honest figure appears after the technical specification, not before. Each stage has a fixed price, but which stages you need and how deep they go depend on the number of roles, screens and integrations and on load requirements. So at the first meeting we discuss budget options, and we give a precise estimate once the boundaries are fixed.
For large systems, development is broken into stages of roughly a month each. A typical stage costs $5,000-10,000 and ends with a demonstration of the result, usually a video presentation. After that you decide whether to start the next one.
How to choose your starting point
- You have an idea but no requirements. Start with consultation and modelling.
- Your requirements are already gathered. Go straight to the technical specification, or take the specification together with a prototype for $2400.
- You already have a specification. An audit of the document is usually enough: we check completeness and contradictions and record the assumptions.
- You only have Figma mock-ups. They show screens, but not the data model, permissions or integrations, so a reliable estimate needs more formal groundwork.
- The system is already running. Start with an audit: $800 for a written report or $2400 with an early prototype of the changes.
- You need a result within a week. Agent-driven prototyping at $1800 a week: the first version in 5 days, but the budget for the whole project is not known in advance.
Where money is most often lost
- Starting with code while the data model and roles are still being debated, so half of what is written gets rewritten.
- Skipping the prototype, so the argument about what a screen should look like lives in email threads for months.
- Treating security and documentation as "finishing touches". Their cost does not disappear: it turns into an incident or into dependence on one person in the team.
What is in the contract that usually is not
We provide free daily technical support after handover: if something breaks, we fix it and do not send an invoice. As far as we know, competitors do not put this in their contracts.
How to read this series
Each stage has its own article: what happens, what you are left holding, what it costs and what breaks if you skip it. The logical place to start is the first stage: it costs $220 and often changes your view of the project more than the next few months of work.
I also recommend the Van Gogh method: it explains why a finished product released quickly usually beats a draft that is polished forever. The stages in this strategy apply the same principle to working with a contractor.
See all stages and prices on the landing page or book a free consultation with an architect. In fifteen minutes we will go through your task, and after the call you will receive a stage-by-stage estimate of cost and timeline.
