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AI App Development Cost Calculator

What an LLM-powered product costs to build: retrieval over your data, an assistant, uploads, usage billing and evaluation, by sprint and region.

Updated · By Niraj Kumar · 4 sources

Project

The baseline: a React front end with a Node or serverless back end.

Unique layouts, not every page: a product page template counts once.

CRM, ERP, shipping, tax, analytics… 32 hours each.

Features

Sign-up and loginSign-up and login

Email and social login, password reset; SSO or MFA is complex.

User profiles and settingsUser profiles and settings

Profile pages, preferences and account deletion.

Roles and permissionsRoles and permissions

Who can see and do what; complex means custom policies.

Teams and multi-tenancyTeams and multi-tenancy

Organisations, invitations and data isolated per customer.

Admin panel / CMSAdmin panel / CMS

Manage users, content and settings without a developer.

Product catalogue and checkoutProduct catalogue and checkout

Listings, variants, cart, checkout and orders.

Payments and subscriptionsPayments and subscriptions

Stripe or similar: plans, invoices, webhooks and refunds.

Search and filteringSearch and filtering

Full-text search and facets; complex means a search engine.

Email and push notificationsEmail and push notifications

Transactional email, push and in-app alerts.

File and media uploadsFile and media uploads

Uploads to object storage, previews and image resizing.

Real-time chatReal-time chat

Messaging over WebSockets, read receipts and history.

Maps and locationMaps and location

Maps, geocoding, distance search or live tracking.

Reports and dashboardsReports and dashboards

Charts, exports and scheduled reports for users.

AI / LLM featuresAI / LLM features

Chat assistants, summaries or retrieval over your data.

Multiple languagesMultiple languages

Translated interface, locale formats and RTL support.

Offline mode and syncOffline mode and sync

Works without a connection and syncs changes later.

Design and quality

UI/UX designUI/UX design
QA and testingQA and testing

Team

Mid-market US agencies; big consultancies bill $200 to $300 an hour.

Agency tierAgency tier
Seniority mixSeniority mix

More developers shorten the calendar, not the hours.

Sprint lengthSprint length
%
0%50%

A reserve for scope that changes once work starts. 15 to 20% is usual; more for a vague brief.

Likely budget, United States$224,000Range $175,000 to $314,000
Total effort
1,718 hours
909 hours of development
Timeline
14 weeks
7 sprints of 2 weeks, up to 22 weeks if the scope grows
Blended rate
$130 an hour
Across every role on the team
Maintenance after launch
$40,500 a year
About 18% of the build: updates, fixes and small improvements
Lowest-cost region
Philippines & Vietnam
$59,500, $165,000 less
Where the budget goes, United StatesHover or focus a row for its hours and share of the budget.
  1. 1Back end, platform and integrations$62,000
  2. 2Front-end development$53,000
  3. 3Contingency reserve$29,000
  4. 4Project management$21,000
  5. 5QA and testing$20,500
  6. 6Hardening and launch$11,500
  7. 7DevOps and CI/CD$10,500
  8. 8UI/UX design$9,100
  9. 9Discovery (sprint 0)$7,800
Sprint plan, 14 weeks192 hours of development per sprint; design, QA, DevOps and PM run alongside.
SprintFocusHoursCostRunning total
Sprint 0Discovery, backlog, architecture and first designs98$13,000$13,000
Sprint 1Project setup, Sign-up and login and 2 more277$36,500$49,500
Sprint 2Admin panel / CMS, Payments and subscriptions, Search and filtering250$32,500$82,000
Sprint 3Search and filtering, File and media uploads and 2 more250$32,500$114,000
Sprint 4AI / LLM features250$32,500$147,000
Sprint 5AI / LLM features, Integrations250$32,500$179,000
Sprint 6Hardening, acceptance testing and launch120$15,500$195,000
Team by role, before contingency
RoleHoursRateCost
Project manager / BA189$130/h$24,500
UI/UX designer87$120/h$10,500
Senior developer446$160/h$71,500
Mid-level developer545$125/h$68,000
QA engineer227$90/h$20,500
Total1,494$130/h$195,000
The same scope in every region, offshore to onshoreMid-market agency rates at the tier you picked, with each region's coordination overhead added for a US client.
  1. 1Philippines & Vietnamoffshore$59,500
  2. 2Indiaoffshore$62,000
  3. 3Eastern Europeoffshore$84,500
  4. 4Latin Americanearshore$96,000
  5. 5Canadaonshore$177,000
  6. 6Western Europeoffshore$181,000
  7. 7Australiaoffshore$200,000
  8. 8United Kingdomoffshore$201,000
  9. 9United Statesonshore$224,000

How is software development cost estimated?

An AI product with document uploads, retrieval over the customer's data, an LLM assistant, usage-based billing and three integrations takes about 1,700 agency hours. That is around $224,000 with a US agency and $62,000 in India, before the model API bills, which are a running cost.

build = Σ features (hours × complexity × stack) + screens × 10 h + integrations × 32 h + 40 h setup total = discovery + design + build + 10% hardening + QA % + DevOps + PM (12% + time-zone overhead) cost = Σ role hours × regional rate × agency tier; likely = cost × (1 + contingency) sprints = 1 + ⌈build ÷ (developers × 40 h × weeks × 0.8)⌉ + hardening

This page uses the same method as the Software Development Cost Estimator, which explains each term and assumption in full.

Worked example

An AI product on Next.js: 15 screens, document uploads, retrieval over the customer's data with an LLM assistant, usage-based billing and three integrations (model provider, vector database, observability). Built by a US agency (mid-market rates), 3 developers in 2-week sprints, with 15% contingency.

  1. 1Discovery (sprint 0): 57 hours, $7,800
  2. 2UI/UX design: 76 hours, $9,100
  3. 3Front-end development: 381 hours, $53,000
  4. 4Back end, platform and integrations: 445 hours, $62,000
  5. 5Hardening and launch: 83 hours, $11,500
  6. 6QA and testing: 227 hours, $20,500
  7. 7DevOps and CI/CD: 65 hours, $10,500
  8. 8Project management: 160 hours, $21,000
  9. 9Contingency reserve: 224 hours, $29,000
  10. 10Blended rate: $130 an hour across the team
  11. 11Schedule: 7 sprints, 14 weeks

About $224,000, within a range of $175,000 to $314,000, and 14 weeks from kickoff to launch.

Frequently asked questions

Why is the AI feature complex by default?

Calling a model is quick; making its answers good is not. Chunking and indexing documents, prompt design, guardrails, evaluation sets and tuning for cost and latency take most of the time, and they repeat whenever the model changes. A thin wrapper around one prompt is simple; retrieval over customer data with evaluations is complex.

What will the model API cost to run?

That depends on requests, tokens and the model, not on the build. Estimate it with the LLM API cost calculator and see whether prompt caching pays off for your prompts; for many products it is a few cents per user a day.

How much does an AI app cost to build with a team in India?

For the scope on this page, about $62,000, with a range of $48,500 to $86,500 at mid-market rates: 1,902 hours at a blended $33 an hour, delivered in about 14 weeks by 3 developers. Change the features and team above for your own scope.

Sources

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