What custom software actually costs — and why quotes vary so wildly

If you have asked several developers to quote the same project, you have probably seen a spread wide enough to make you doubt everyone involved. That spread is real, and it is usually explainable.

What you are actually paying for

Writing the code is rarely the majority of the cost. A realistic breakdown for a mid-sized business application looks roughly like this:

• Discovery and scoping — working out what the software must do. Skipping this is the most common reason projects overrun.
• Design — screens, states and flows, settled before code.
• Development — the part everyone pictures. Often under half the total.
• Testing and fixes — reliably a quarter of the build.
• Deployment and handover — infrastructure, documentation, training.

A very low quote usually means several of those are missing. They do not disappear; they resurface as change requests.

The three questions that move the number most

How many user types are there? One is simple. Three, each with different permissions and dashboards, is roughly three times the interface work and considerably more testing.

Does it integrate with anything? A self-contained system is predictable. Anything that talks to accounting software, a payment provider or a legacy database inherits that system's quirks — and its downtime.

Who is responsible when something breaks at 9pm? A quote that includes support is not comparable to one that does not.

Fixed price versus hourly

Hourly billing transfers the risk of a bad estimate to you. Fixed price transfers it to the developer, which is why proper fixed quotes take longer to produce — the estimate has to be right.

Our position is that if we estimated badly, absorbing it is our problem. That is only sustainable because we spend real effort on scoping first.

Questions worth asking any quote

• What is explicitly not included?
• What happens if the estimate turns out to be wrong?
• Who owns the code and the accounts at the end?
• What does support cost after launch?

The answers tell you more about the eventual total than the headline figure does.