How much does a web app cost? Budgets from internal tool to marketplace
A custom web app built by a freelancer starts at about €5,990 for a lean MVP; platforms with payments, several user roles and integrations run into five figures, and agencies usually charge two to three times as much. With me, web apps start at €5,990 as a fixed price – including frontend, backend, database, authentication and CI/CD. This guide shows what drives the price, how to scope a first version and what the SaaS platform YachtBrokerBid teaches about budgets.
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- 7 min read
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- By Maurice de Felice, web developer in Augsburg, Germany
What determines the price of a web app?
- User roles and authentication: a login is standard; roles such as customer, partner and admin with different permissions are work.
- Payments: Stripe integration, credit balances, subscriptions, invoices – every variant needs verification and booking logic.
- Integrations: CRM, ERP, accounting, AI services, maps, email delivery – every integration has its own failure modes.
- Data model: the more objects depend on each other (orders, offers, deadlines, history), the more logic sits behind them.
- Multiple languages and the admin area: often underestimated, in practice a large share of the work.
- Reporting and exports: dashboards, PDF generation, CSV exports.
- Compliance: GDPR, data processing agreements, deletion rules, audit logs.
What budget should you plan for?
For your own combination of features, the cost calculator shows a range and a timeline in about a minute.
| Project | Typical scope | Guide price (freelancer) |
|---|---|---|
| Internal tool / dashboard | Login, data entry, reporting | from €5,990 |
| Customer portal | Roles, documents, status, notifications | €8,000–15,000 |
| SaaS platform with payments | Subscriptions or credits, Stripe, admin, multiple languages | €15,000–40,000 |
| Marketplace / auction platform | Two user groups, matching, payments, moderation | from €25,000 |
Guide values from my own projects, as of October 2026 – the actual offer is a fixed price after the initial call. All prices are final prices; as a small business under § 19 of the German VAT Act, I do not charge VAT.
How do you scope the MVP correctly?
The biggest cost lever is not the hourly rate but the scope of the first version. An MVP contains only what real users need to use the core of the application – so that you learn what is really needed. The guide what an MVP costs goes into detail.
- One user type instead of three, one payment method instead of five, one language instead of four – you can extend later.
- Admin tasks may run through the database or email in version 1.
- Reports and exports come once there is data worth reporting on.
- Architecture and data model are still built so that everything else is possible without a rewrite.
What did YachtBrokerBid cost in time – and why?
YachtBrokerBid is a SaaS auction platform: yacht owners list their yacht, vetted brokers bid with sealed offers for the mandate. I built auction logic with deadlines, a transaction-safe credit system based on double-entry bookkeeping, Stripe checkout with server-side verification, role-based authentication and a translation workflow – as a full-stack application with Laravel, React and PostgreSQL.
The platform went live after 12 weeks; 20 had been agreed. Choosing Stripe Hosted Checkout instead of a self-built webhook infrastructure kept effort down without giving up reliability. The case study shows the other decisions.
What do running and developing a web app cost?
- Hosting: €20–100 per month depending on load, database and backups.
- Third parties: Stripe fees per transaction, email delivery, AI APIs by usage.
- Maintenance: security updates and monitoring – with me at €95 per hour or under a maintenance contract.
- Further development: budget for the features users actually ask for after launch.
What should you clarify before hiring a developer?
- Who owns the code, and do I get the repository? (With me: you, yes.)
- Which technologies are used, and can another developer take over?
- Are there automated tests and a deployment pipeline?
- How are payments and personal data protected?
- What is included in the fixed price, and what costs extra?
What do clients often ask?
Planning a project?
In a free initial call you get an honest assessment of scope, timeline and a fixed price – by video, or in person in Augsburg and Munich. I usually reply within 24 hours.
About the author
Freelance web developer in Augsburg, Germany. By day a backend developer at one of Germany’s largest comparison portals; as a freelancer I build websites, web apps and SaaS platforms with Laravel and React – for example the SaaS platform YachtBrokerBid. More about me
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