Taxi App Development: Extensive Guide with All Steps Covered

Uber has long become a synonym of taxi services.

Commuting or even traveling in a different country, it’s almost impossible to imagine a trip that doesn’t involve Uber or another popular taxi sharing solution.

Every quarter, 1.44 billion rides are completed through Uber. That’s almost 70% of the whole US ridesharing market.

Taxi mobile app development can become a lucrative business for companies already operating in the taxi sphere and for startups that want to monetize an idea.

This article explains all aspects of taxi app development, provides insights into the process, and explains price calculation.

If you need a little sneak peek, here’s what’s you’re going to learn:

• Is it smart to build taxi app with so many competitors on the market?
• A dose of inspiration with the most popular taxi apps in the world
• Step-by-step plan for cab booking app development
• Breakdown of taxi app development cost

If you are curious about the process of taxi app development, this guide is for you.

Let’s dive right in.

Key Reasons to Build Taxi Booking App for Your Business

The market of taxi booking apps has been on the rise for a few years.

In 2022, the revenue in the taxi and ride-hailing segment is projected to reach $314 billion. The revenue is expected to show an annual growth rate of 5.30% in the following four years and reach $386 billion by 2026.

Uber, one of the most popular taxi riding apps, made $14.46 billion in revenue in 2021, which made it the biggest taxi app in the world. Lyft follows suit with $3.2 billion.

The growth of the market continues, making more and more businesses pay attention to taxi app development services. Whether you’re a business already working in the taxi industry or just contemplating the idea of entering it, you can enjoy its benefits since such applications simplify the lives of both drivers and passengers.

Passengers get the following advantages:

• Now taxi-hailing on curbsides
• User-friendly payment method
• Transparency and safety
• Detailed ride estimation
• Time-saving ride-booking

For drivers, the benefits are not less diverse:

• Convenient system of finding passengers
• Online payments
• Feedback for each passenger
• GPS support for easy driving around cities

The Most Popular Taxi Applications in the World

It’s now time for a dose of inspiration. The table below presents a list of the most popular cab booking apps in the world with some exciting statistics attached that will make your heart roar with the desire to start taxi mobile app development right away.

Taxi Mobile App Development: Step-by-Step Guide

Taxi app development consists of the following steps:

1. Conduct market research
2. Make competitor analysis
3. Validate app idea
4. Create app design
5. Choose a technology stack
6. Decide on features
7. Choose monetization strategy
8. Start app development process
9. Launch the app and plan for ongoing development
10. Work on marketing and promotion

Read on if you’re interested in discovering the details of each plan.

Step 1: Conduct market research

Whether you already have an app idea concept or just exploring the possibility of taxi app development, market research should be your starting point.

First of all, decide what type of app you are going to develop. You can create a dedicated taxi booking app – an app for an already existing taxi business or an aggregator taxi booking app like Uber or Lyft.

There are also different apps for transportation that you can build:

• Carpooling app
• Car rental app
• Bus booking app
• Bike-sharing
• Employee transportation app
• Truck and logistic solutions
• Car fleet management solutions

After you’ve identified your niche, take a look at the market and evaluate the situation. Market analysis will help you identify your USP (Unique Value Proposition) before you invest in taxi mobile app development.

Step 2: Make competitor analysis

After you’ve identified your niche, take a look at the market and evaluate the situation. Market analysis will help you identify your USP (Unique Value Proposition) before you invest in taxi mobile app development.

Look through your future competitors, analyze their strong and weak points. Try to identify features that they lack, areas that they don’t cover and identify how you can make your app better.

Step 3: Validate an app idea

the analysis should encompass market research and communication with the target audience. You can make polls to ask the audience about their pains, what existing solutions on the market lack, and what features they’d like to have in a taxi application.

This information will help to form an app idea and create a USP that will meet user demands.

Business Model Canvas is one of the ways to organize all the information gathered during market research. This approach helps you document all the aspects of an app idea. Business model canvas usually consists of nine blocks:

• Key partners
• Key activities
• Value proposition (for drivers, for passengers)
• Channels
• Customer segments (drivers, passengers)
• Customer relationships
• Cost structure
• Revenues

Below you can see a template of a business model canvas for taxi app development.

Taxi App Development Business Model Canvas

Step 4: Create app design

App design is the first thing users see when they open your app. In fact, they see it even before opening an app by looking at the app icon.

Underestimating the importance of app design is the worst thing that you can make for a business.

Mobile app design usually covers two parts of the app:

• User experience (UX) – defines how users will interact with your application, sets up user flows, and app screens layouts.
• User interface (UI) – defines how the app and all the in-app elements will look like for end-users, what colors the app will use.

During car booking app development, you should create an app that not only looks great but also meets the best design practices. Google has Material Design Guidelines and Apple has Human Interface Guidelines that provide designers with guidelines on how to create user-friendly mobile applications.

Step 5: Decide on features

The next step of taxi app development is deciding on the set of features that an app will offer. The feature set will be divided into three interconnected parts:

• Features for drivers
• Features for passengers
• Features for admins

Let’s review some of the most basic and advanced features for taxi mobile app development.

The table below presents a list of basic features that you can include into your mobile application.

You can create the wow effect by integrating some advanced features.

Pro tip: launch an MVP with the basic set of features that will ensure the viability of the application. After the successful launch and first feedback from users, move on to adding new and more advanced features.

There are a plethora of features that you can add. Some of them are listed in the table below.

Step 6: Choose a technology stack

Now that you know what features you want to implement during cab booking app development, it’s time to decide on the technology stack for your application.

Step 7: Choose monetization strategy

Now that you know what features your app will offer to users, it’s time to decide how the app will bring you money. There are different monetization strategies that you can implement and we reviewed some of the most important ones below.

• Commission

This monetization model implies carding drivers with a service fee for every ride they perform. The commission may vary from 20 to 25 percent.

• Cancellation fee

You can also charge users a cancellation fee every time they can cancel a ride.

• Advertising

You can run ads in your taxi application, charging for every view or cost per click.

• Third-party promotions

A great example of third-party promotions is used in Uber when the company partners with famous brands and promotes their services or products. Users can receive some bonuses or gifts from brands that work with your application.

Step 8: Start app development process

Before you start taxi app development, you need to find a company that will perform all technical tasks. There are numerous taxi app development companies that you can choose from. Clutch, The Manifest, GoodFirms, and other review platforms are great starting points in your research.

Choosing between companies, keep in mind the difference in taxi app development cost based on the region of outsourcing.

For example, hourly rates for taxi app development services in the USA are around $150-200. The same services cost a lot less in Europe – around $50 per hour. At the same time, choosing Europe you don’t need to sacrifice quality for cost-efficiency. 

Step 9: Launch the app & plan for ongoing development

After the app is ready, you’ll need to submit it to app marketplaces and launch to the market. A taxi booking app development company usually takes on such tasks so you don’t need to worry about it. So, you won’t need to worry about the technical side of the app launch.

Step 10: Work on marketing & promotion

But what you’ll need to worry about is app promotion. In best scenarios, app promotion should start long before the app launches into the market. You can use a whole range of marketing tools and services to spread the word about your application, including

• Paid ads
• SMM (social media marketing)
• Content and SEO
• Influencer marketing
• Partnerships and collaborations

After the app launch, you’ll need to gather user feedback and analyze the first results to plan for ongoing taxi app development and support.

How Much Does It Cost to Develop a Taxi App?

Let’s move on to the most important question – cost.

Taxi app development cost ranges between $100,00 to $170,000 for one platform (iOS or Android). The more platforms and features you can, the higher the development cost.

As mentioned before, development cost highly depends on the outsourcing location. By choosing countries outside the USA, especially in Europe, you can create two app versions – for iOS and Android – while in the USA the same sum will allow you to build only one version of a taxi application.