The famous Uber, having investments in millions, has developed Uber Eats. It became the most successful, ground-breaking venture in the sphere. It inspires new startups to take the cue from its colossal success and start food delivery application development.
Food delivery services have become a perfect way to satisfy the hunger in our hectic times, and mobile food ordering apps benefit greatly to the affordability and simplicity of the process.
Simple users benefit from the opportunities of the contemporary food delivery platforms, however, not only. Café and restaurant owners, as well as investors, can also strike gold with such services.
In this article we are going to find out the cost of Uber Eats like app development. Naturally, to gain profit from some venture an investor should always know the input he has to make. But, let's first delve into the reasons for creating a software solution for food delivery. Is it the juice really worth the squeeze?
You may use our calculalor to estimate the approximate cost of app development
Reasons for On-Demand Food Delivery App Development
People are always eager to go after speed and convenience in modern life. This factor is decisive for users to turn to various mobile apps and food delivery solutions in particular.
For ordinary users, the benefit of a food delivery app is obvious — with just a tap on a mobile screen, anybody now can select and get almost any dish of almost any cuisine at almost no time.
Restaurant or café owners can also take advantage of custom food delivery application development
- for extended business reach, new and regular visitors can order food easier from their facilities. Besides, more people can try their cuisine in the orders and then return as visitors.
- for making food delivery available 24/7. In such a way running a business is possible round the clock, to catch trade at any time.
- for marketing campaigns optimization and gaining customer loyalty. Through a food delivery app, the clients can always be notified about the current special offers and loyalty programs updates. The restaurant owners and marketers, in their turn, can monitor what works best in the industry and attract customers in more effective ways.
- for gathering accurate and effective user data for business insights and analysis. Having all the information at hand as to the orders placed, food preferred, payments made, a business owner can make well-weight informed decisions.
- for customer service improvement. Studying the behavior of the customers and their feedback, as a business owner, you can spot the bottlenecks in your service and make the necessary enhancements to your customers better satisfaction.
For investors to create an app like Uber Eats means to reveal the additional ways of revenue-generating through
- commissions received from cafés and restaurants for the orders made,
- commissions from the drivers delivering orders,
- fees for processing certain orders faster,
- subscriptions of the users for special offers and special service,
- paid advertising from food outlets, stores, and other third parties.
The top food delivery mobile solutions have already turned into successful applications with multi-million dollar yearly revenues. However, this field is quite fruitful and there still remains much ground for the new players to join this market.
Guide to Make an App Like Uber Eats
If you consider developing a custom food delivery solution, you should have a clue about the process. Let’s now see how to build an app like Uber Eats step by step.
Any professional food delivery app developer will tell you that with Uber-like apps, the first step to take should be discovery.
At Stfalcon we study the client’s business model in the first turn. Business model Canvas framework and user flow tools work well for the purpose. It’s essential to find out why a customer likes the Uber-like app model and what exact features he needs. We also find out why a client wants to choose our product.
Then we design the prototypes of the solution-to-be, define its functionality, and make the project estimation. It’s the final step of the discovery phase.
Ivanna
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At the stage of product design, we look for ideas, brainstorm, and detail the idea in the process of prototype and mockups creation. To make our app interface intuitive and convenient, we analyze similar apps, which already exist, and their specific features. It helps us understand user experience and make our product UX even better. Usability testing and expert review are obligatory parts of the design stage before the app or site launch. However, research, optimization, and development of a software solution go on even after it.
Development
When it comes to Uber Eats-like food ordering mobile app development, we advise to create native solutions with a backend realized on PHP Symfony.
During the food delivery apps creation, it’s essential to take into consideration the fact that different technologies should be used for Android and iOS applications design and creation. The tools the platforms rely on are variable, and diverse third-party APIs can be implemented for them. These factors along with some others influence the overall cost of the food delivery app development services.
Stfalcon’s experts recommend to realize the infrastructure of such applications on Kubernetes, it helps to provide the application stability and quick work of the development team.
To create an Uber Eats-like service the integration with third-party services are inevitable. At Stfalcon we usually work with the following frameworks and libraries:
- Grubhub API and FourSquare API for restaurant listings,
- Firebase Cloud Messaging for push notifications,
- SMS services,
- Twilio Navigation, Google Places API or Google Maps for navigation,
- Facebook SDK for social media integration,
- Stripe, PayPal, or local payment systems for payment integration.
The choice of the necessary library or the framework is, as a rule, determined by the country the application will operate in.
The Key Features of an Uber Eats-Like Food Delivery App
To define the value of such an undertaking, we should first specify the major features of such an app. Further on we are touching upon the users’ app functionality and the restaurant owners’ app version.
Food delivery application development for consumers
In the development of an Uber Eats-like food delivery service app for users, the following functions are inevitable.
1. Registration and login
The sign-in page is the entrance into the application, and for the user to continue his journey a developer should make the processes of registration and authorization simple and hassle-free. So it’s better to provide multiple options for registration — you can, for instance, request a name, an email, a mobile number, and a password or allow entry via the social profiles.
2. Order placing
In fact, it’s a complex process containing several successive steps, the creators should aim to make this experience easy and satisfying for the users. You can also take care that the interaction with your application would be more personalized to the customers with reference to their preferences.
UberEats' order placing
So to achieve an innovative and hassle-free approach to the customer include such features into your application as:
Food Categories, Search
A good food delivery app should reveal the wide choice of food menus from all the cafes and restaurants combined on the platform, while also the reflection of content, pictures, prices, and special offers should not be jumble.
So it’s a good idea to divide dishes into categories with detailed subcategorization. The hungry user should also have direct access to search and be able to just type the name of the favorite dish and get proposals of it.
Order Customization
People like to customize their menu or certain dishes, having individual tastes and likings. So it’s reasonable to add a feature, which will allow the customers to indicate their specific demands.
Order Checkout
As soon as the foodstuff is selected, the checkout procedure should follow. The possibility to alter the chosen items and to check the final bill amount after applying discounts and promo codes should be implemented here.
3. Payment
On confirming the order, payment follows and the more methods to pay you offer, the more clients you would gain. Add as many options as you can just think of. Integrate the possibility of card payments, third-party gateways like PayPal and e-wallets along with Google and Apple payments, whatever.
At the same time, let your customer have a Cash on Delivery option.
UberEats' customization
4. Notifications
The client should be kept notified on the up-to-the-minute status of the order. So SMS or push notifications should be implemented for the purpose.
5. Order Tracking
The modern tracking technology nowadays allows the users to track their orders, GPS technology is of use here. Such a facility helps the clients see the estimated delivery time, follow the order travel to the destination up-to-the-moment, and offers some kind of relief from the anxiety of waiting!
6. Reviews and Rating
At present these features have already become a vital feature of any app, people first read others feedback and only then make their final decision nowadays. So let your users share their experience either by means of a five-star rating or detailed review.
7. Features to enhance the version
While all the above features — are an utter necessity in food ordering app development, there are also some advanced functions, which can help you craft the best food ordering app ever. Here you may consider adding the possibility of wish-list creation or order history preservation for a certain period, or any other features useful for the users of your app.
Food delivery service app design
UI/UX design is nowadays the crucial element, which can get the app an immense drive or alienate certain customers. Keeping this in mind, you should concentrate on the convenience and swiftness of order placement procedures. Each design element should be clearly visible and intuitive to use.
The clients should not have any questions when using the application.
The prime elements to concentrate on should be your main page, restaurant selection page, and dishes dominating the menu.
UberEats' design
Food ordering app for restaurants’ owners
This is the other side of mobile app for restaurant ordering and it has certain distinguishing features. The main of which are admin and control rights and various dashboards and categories management.
Let’s look at it in more detail.
Login
The restaurant owner/admin login process should be even easier than the users’ one.
Menu items management
Restaurant owners should have the possibility to adjust their menus and catalogs to keep up with the clients’ demand and preferences.
Order management
A simple and clear system of order checking and verification should be created so that the admin could get all the necessary details from the restaurant order taking app any time.
Push notifications
This function is especially handy for on-demand app development. It can help keep track of the orders with COD payment.
Control panel
The most important part of any restaurant mobile app development is crafting the CP — control panel and admin rights implementation. It should be realized in such a way that the owner can administer all the operations and activities inside the application, and manage the database.
Payment options
The admin dashboard should be created with the management option for the payments received, sources they come from, and orders placed.
Food Delivery App Development Cost Approximation
The rough estimations of the foodservice app development cost results in about 500 hours of development work and around 200 hours of design, which approximately equals 35 thousand dollars in money equivalent. Yet, you should remember that every project cost always depends on the scope of work, its complexity, and personal wishes. That's why the estimations should always be done individually for every project.
Our Experience
Speaking about food ordering app development services, we cannot but should mention mobile solution creation for SMILEFOOD. We conducted a Discovery and worked out the order flow’s prototype, wrote User Stories, and estimated the app’s development in 2 variants: Native Android & iOS or Flutter for the client to decide.
Read the full case study
The next stage was to develop the app’s design based on the Discovery made, in which lots of little cases were worked over. It will help speed up the development stage in the future. We adapted native iOS to the native Android elements, prepared graphics and UI Kit for developers, worked out the plan of migration to the new backend and the existing clients’ base synchronization with the future one.
Conclusion
We hope the information on how to make a food delivery app step by step was useful for you. If you do not have a clue about app development, but want to find professional restaurant mobile app developers, you should have some criteria to choose real experts for smooth cooperation. The major of them are a portfolio, expertise, approach to work, and scope of services provided. Stfalcon can help you cope with the task, as we have enough experience in application development. We provide further maintenance and support to every project fulfilled with the possibility of further optimization.
If you are ready to start a project or scale your business, contact us to discuss it.
