Why there's no single number
An MVP is not a commodity. Two founders can describe "the same product" in a discovery call and end up with wildly different build scopes because their underlying assumptions about what the product needs to do are different.
A co-working marketplace that connects individual desks with freelancers is fundamentally different from one that manages multi-floor enterprise clients, even if they both technically "list spaces and accept bookings." The complexity of the product — the number of user types, the edge cases, the integrations, the infrastructure requirements — determines the cost. Not the category.
That said, there are rough ranges by approach that are worth understanding.
The four common approaches, and what they actually cost
No-code tools (£500–£8,000)
Platforms like Bubble, Webflow, and Glide let you build functional products without writing code. For simple workflows — a directory, a booking form, a content platform — they can get you to market fast and cheaply.
When it makes sense: You're validating a simple idea, your flows are linear, and you don't need custom logic or complex integrations.
When it doesn't: Your product requires custom business logic, you're building in a regulated industry (FinTech, HealthTech), you need specific API integrations, or you have serious scale ambitions. No-code platforms have ceilings, and hitting them mid-product is expensive.
Hidden cost: You'll likely need to rebuild on custom infrastructure within 12–18 months if the product succeeds. Factor that migration cost into your thinking.
Freelancers (£5,000–£40,000)
Hiring individual developers or a small freelance team gives you access to specific skills at lower day rates than agencies. The variance is enormous — a good freelance developer can produce excellent work; a mismatched one can leave you with an undocumented codebase and a product that nobody else can maintain.
When it makes sense: You have a technical co-founder or CTO who can manage the team, you have clear specs, and you're comfortable with the coordination overhead.
When it doesn't: You're a non-technical founder, you don't have the bandwidth to manage a distributed team, or your product has cross-functional complexity (design, backend, frontend, infrastructure all interacting).
Hidden cost: Freelancer projects frequently go over time and budget because scope changes accumulate without a process to manage them. Add 30–50% contingency.
Offshore agencies (£15,000–£80,000)
The "build cheaply in [country]" model has been the default for a decade. Rates in Eastern Europe, South Asia, and Southeast Asia are significantly lower than Western Europe or North America, and many offshore agencies produce good technical work.
When it makes sense: You have detailed specs, you have experience managing offshore teams, and you're building something with limited UX complexity.
When it doesn't: You need strong product thinking embedded in the process, you want a team that pushes back when your scope doesn't make sense, or you're building a consumer product where UX quality matters a lot.
Hidden cost: Time zone gaps, communication overhead, and the cost of misaligned assumptions at the requirements stage. We've seen founders spend £20K with an offshore agency and come to us to rebuild it correctly. The real cost in those situations is time, not just money.
Product studios (£30,000–£150,000+)
A product studio is a cross-functional team — product, design, engineering — working as an embedded unit on your product. You're not buying hours. You're buying a team that thinks about your product as if they're building it for themselves.
When it makes sense: You need genuine product thinking, not just execution. You want someone who will challenge your assumptions before spending money building on them. You want code you can actually hand to a CTO later.
When it doesn't: Your product is already scoped to pixel-perfect detail, you only need one specific skill (e.g., a mobile developer), or your budget is under £25K.
The real cost: Higher day rate, but lower total cost when you factor in rework avoided, time saved, and the quality of what you end up with.
What drives the variation within each tier
For the same category of product, costs vary based on:
Number of user types. Every additional user type (admin, end user, partner, moderator) adds complexity. Each one needs their own flows, permissions, and edge case handling.
Integrations. Each third-party API — Stripe, Twilio, Salesforce, a mapping service — adds time. Some integrations are straightforward; others are not.
Mobile vs web. A web app costs less than a native mobile app. A web app plus a mobile app costs significantly more. Start with web unless mobile is genuinely core to the product experience.
Design complexity. A functional product with clean, simple UI takes less time than a highly designed, animated, pixel-perfect product. Neither is wrong — but know which you're paying for.
Infrastructure requirements. A simple app on shared hosting is much cheaper than a product that needs real-time data sync, HIPAA compliance, or multi-region availability.
What's often not included in a quote (and what it costs when it blows up)
Most build quotes don't include:
- QA and testing — often assumed but not always scoped, especially with smaller teams
- DevOps and deployment setup — getting the product onto a reliable hosting environment with proper CI/CD pipelines
- Documentation — handover docs, architecture notes, onboarding guides for whoever inherits the codebase
- Post-launch support — what happens when something breaks the week after you go live?
Ask explicitly about each of these before you sign anything. A £40K quote that doesn't include these can become a £60K reality quickly.
Red flags in a build quote
- No discovery or scoping phase before the quote is given
- A very detailed cost breakdown for unclear requirements (they're guessing)
- No mention of what happens if scope changes
- A timeline that doesn't include a buffer for feedback cycles
- Lowest price by a significant margin compared to other quotes (usually means key things are excluded)
Green flags
- They pushed back on your requirements before quoting
- They scoped the MVP themselves after understanding the problem, not just the feature list
- They have documented examples of what they've built before
- The quote includes a definition of "done" and a process for handling change requests
- They can explain what happens after launch
What our builds cost, specifically
At The MVP Studio, a typical 100-Day MVP engagement runs between £35,000 and £120,000 depending on complexity. We scope every project during a two-week Blueprint phase before committing to a build timeline or price — because a number without a scope isn't a quote, it's a guess.
If you're trying to figure out whether your budget is in the right ballpark for what you're trying to build, book a free scoping call. We'll tell you honestly within 30 minutes.