Instant Messaging App like WhatsApp – Features and Development Cost

8 Trillion Text messages are sent daily around the world. Out of them, WhatsApp is used to send over 60 billion messages. With over 1.5 billion active users and counting, you can imagine how the popularity rate of WhatsApp keeps on increasing worldwide. Therefore, it is worth to have an instant messaging app like WhatsApp. You may wonder: Is it feasible to have a messaging app like WhatsApp? The answer to your question is yes, you can get such an app with desired features. Read on to get more insight about the necessary features and app development cost.

The skyrocketing popularity of the messenger apps like WhatsApp, Viber, and LINE are attributed to the convenience and user-friendly features. Here are the key features you need to implement in your IM app.

Important Features for Messaging App:

If you want to make your app popular among a huge audience, all you need is to meet the requirements of the target audience with a simple yet elegant interface and advanced features. Though the primary function of an instant messaging app is to send messages, your app should offer all the modern functionalities to remain firm amid a fierce competition. Let us start making a list of basic features you require to make a messaging application:

• Simple and Safe Registration

The integration of registration process is one of the most difficult aspects of your IM app. It is because you need to keep the user’s convenience and privacy protection in mind. Like other chat applications, you can utilize the phone number for registration. For enhancing security, the option of sending an SMS with a confirmation code is very useful.

• Contact Addition

Your app users want to expand their network, and you can assist them by integrating your app with their phone and social media contacts. If you have budgetary limitations, you can start with the address book integration. You can add social media integration in the later versions of your app.

• Messaging Feature

The most important feature of your app is the Messaging Services. It enables your app users to communicate in an easier and friendlier way. It is necessary to pay attention to a few significant factors given below:

Conversation History-It is of utmost importance that your app gives an easy access to the chat history anytime and on different devices. Also, your app should enable the app users to delete the chat. Viber effectively provides this facility. WhatsApp also does not use its server for storing the user’s conversations.

Chat Format– Private, group, and public chat are different chat formats your app must own to remain competitive.

Additional Features– How about making the virtual communication more expressive and effective? You can achieve this objective by integrating custom fonts, stickers, and scheduling of messages. As per your development budget, you can give your app users a plethora of options to make their chat livelier.

Security of Data- Today, people are concerned about the personal data security and cyber-attacks. It is better to address the data security issue by following the procedures of similar apps like SnapChat, Telegram, and WhatsApp. You should also provide the encryption facility to enhance the data safety.

• File Sharing

These days, people tend to share impressions and express their views with the help of pictures, videos, and GIFs. Therefore, your app should have a multimedia file transmission features. It also gives the benefit of synchronization with various cloud-based servers like Google Drive.

• Location-based Functionality

Location is a small but significant feature. You cannot create a messaging app without this feature. The users can share their location with the help of this feature. The mobile app developers can customize this feature by using Apple MapKit and Google Location SDK.

• Addition of Push Notifications

Your WhatsApp like messaging app also requires push notifications to keep users up to date with the latest news and new messages. Google Cloud Messaging and Apple’s Push Notifications services remain handy to integrate this feature.

What’s more, you can offer additional features like video chats, VoIP calling, and audio-video streaming to attract more users.

Features and development time are the deciding factors for the cost of your app. It is better to consult a reputed mobile application development company to get a comprehensive quote as per your project requirements. You should consider the factors like the operating system (Android, iOS or cross-platform), functionality, and UI/UX design to get a precise idea of a messaging app development cost.

Here we give a brief information about the pricing:

Instant Messaging App Development Cost

Like any other mobile apps, the instant messaging app also follows the same app development process. From prototyping to the backend, the development stages remain the same. But then, if you want to integrate expensive features like VoIP calling and file transfer, then the development cost can increase.

If you want to hire mobile app developers for your project, you will get the team consists of iOS or Android app developers, UI/UX designers, QA expert, project manager, and front-end or back-end developers.

The approximate duration of app development can be stretched up to 2000 hours depending on the complexity and functionality integration. The hourly rates are different in different regions of the world. The rates are high in the US and Europe.

The US-based developers can take charge up to $200/ hour and European developers can take up $150/hr, whereas Indian mobile app developers charge around $20 to $35 an hour. In other words, if you have budget constraints, it is better to hire mobile app developers from India for your messaging app project.

Well, that’s not all. You should also make provision for the maintenance cost. But, all these expenses are necessary to make your app viral with a seamless performance and pleasant user experience. Once your app becomes popular, you can monetize your app by implementing a few known ways.

At Solution Analysts, our dedicated mobile app developers have hands-on experience of crafting customized apps across various industry verticals. If you want to know more about a customized messaging app, just drop us a line at sales@solutionanalyts.com.