How to build an app

Everyone loves apps… but not everyone can build them. Chances are, if you’re reading this, you’re in the small but growing minority of those who don’t just love apps, but want to create them.

Let’s do a little myth busting first:

1) Apps do not cost tens of thousands of pounds to create. If someone tells you it does, they’re looking in the wrong place.

2) You do not need to learn code to build an app. In fact, it’s better if you don’t, unless you’re already experienced in coding.

Want to know more about how to start building your own app? Keep reading!

1. Decide what you want to accomplish

Who is your app for? What is it going to help them with? How will it improve or simplify their lives? How will you market your app?

Successful apps offer a solution to a problem. This makes a successful app, but how will it make you successfully rich?

You need to decide where and how you’re going to make money from your idea. Will you charge for the app? Will there be in-app purchases or upgrades? Will you display ads? These questions should be answered in your initial planning stages.

2. Check out your competitors

Before you start investing time and money into this idea, you need to find out whether anyone else has thought of it. If they have, it’s not the end of the world. You just need to consider how can your idea be better or offer more than theirs does. Think about why your ideal user would prefer your app to your competitors’. 

To give you an idea of the scale of the competition, the Google Play Store currently has 2.87 million apps available to download  – so yours needs to stand out!

Make sure the app’s name is unique and memorable and that you choose something that closely resembles any other brand.

3. Sketch it out

It’s easier to work out the look of your app by physically drawing it. Yup, get your crayons out! Visualising sizes, buttons and colour will help you to nail down the look and functionality of the user interface, or UI in geek-speak. Have a look at some of your fave apps for inspo!

If you have to involve third-parties to bring the app to life, a visual representation of your idea will really help them to get on board.

4. Get a techie

If you’re not a coding maestro yet – as most of us aren’t – your first step is to find yourself one. You can either hire someone to entirely build your app for you, or seek out some sort of mentor to guide you through the coding process.

We’d only recommend building a complete, start-to-finish app yourself if you know one of the following codes: Ruby, Python, PHP, Java, Go, C#.

If you need a little help, experienced programmers offer live 1:1 sessions on Codementor relatively inexpensively – these sessions could help get you on your way, or advise you on where to start looking for your coding aficionado.

5. Test, test, test!

Whether you’ve coded the first shot at your app, or someone else has – take time to test it. Schedule time for amendments and trial phases into your launch, or risk outing a product that’s riddled with bugs and errors.

Coders have a proverb: code for 6 minutes, debug for 6 hours.

Testing tools you could utilise include: Jasmine or Karma for JavaScript, Rspec for Ruby, PyTest for Python, PHPUnit for PHP or Quick and Crashlytics for iOS development.

6. Get a developer account

To launch your app into the big wide world, you’re going to need somewhere to launch it.  

Google Play charges a $25 one-off fee for a developer account, and Apple’s equivalent costs $99 annually – so remember to factor this into your start-up costs.

7. Don’t give up

“Mistakes everywhere! This app is never going to launch!”

You’re not the only app developer or business owner to feel this way. Spotify, iOS, Siri and many more have all suffered ‘buggy’ updates or launches. But you can’t throw in the towel that easily.

With all the intricacies of creating an app, it’s no wonder that the learning process just keeps on giving. Even experienced developers regularly get stuck on bugs – it’s an inevitability of the job. 

8. Get qualified

Want to get all the skills before you begin? It’s a good idea. If you can do all the coding yourself, you can code any app idea you want with no need to pay developers to create it for you.

Learning People offers online coding courses and qualifications that will get you well on your way to being a fully-fledged app-developer, either for your own company or idea, or just as a new string to your bow.

And your coding skills won’t just be limited to building apps – you could develop websites, software, games, and more. Watch the video below from our student Joey, who enrolled onto our full stack developer course, to learn how he hopes to use his new coding skills to go freelance and move into the world of games development:

To know more about training in coding and developing, get in touch with us today and you could be building the next Flappy Bird, Evernote or RedSpottedHanky before you know it!