Ask HN: How much are you making as an indie mobile app developer in 2019?

13 points·binconsole··8 comments

My goal is to earn an extra 2k-3k per month. Still worth it to develop apps for iOS?

Do you really mean indie, not freelancer? How much an indie developer earns is probably extremely variable, and is largely down to luck and other soft factors that are hard to control, such as marketing savvy, timing, what app you’re making etc.

I wrote a mobile application 2 years ago and since then, I managed to bring in a little over $1.6M. I price the game at $1.99. Revenue really spiked when was mentioned on the App Store.

iOS or android? Native ?

iOS only

Are you serious ?

I don't know but I am curious about where you are planning on getting clients. Arent you worried about getting undercut by developers in other countries?

I'm one of those "developers in other countries". I wish it were that easy. I have an elite degree (global top 30 college in CS), but I've still been undercut by Americans.

The real problem is that a lot of people are willing to work for nearly free just to play with a new technology, and some are doing it to build a reputation and get reviews.

I think this is a misplaced worry. If you’re a high quality engineer than you shouldn’t compete on price. I do some freelance work but and have found it to be extremely lucrative. (Not in the mobile space though FWIW. Mostly NLP projects) You have to find a niche and provide a ton of value. Being an IOS developer that just delivers features is one way to sell yourself. A better way be positioning yourself is as an IOS expert that knows intricacies which will save the customer $10,000’s in costs via lower maintenance costs, faster dev time, etc

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