How much does an MVP cost in the UK?

What actually sets the price

Most MVP quotes are a day rate multiplied by a guess at the number of days. The day rate depends on who you hire and where they are. The number of days depends on what you ask for, and on how much of it is still undecided when the work starts. That second part is where most of the spread comes from.

The things that move the number most:

• How many types of user. A tool with one kind of user is one product. A marketplace with buyers, sellers and an admin is three products sharing a database. Each role needs its own sign-up, its own screens and its own rules about what it can see.
• Money. Taking a card payment through Stripe Checkout is a small job. Splitting a payment between two parties, holding funds or handling refunds properly is a different one. Rocking Tech, a UK agency, reports payment gateway integrations quoted at £3,000 to £8,000 by UK agencies.
• Integrations. Every outside service, whether a CRM, a calendar, an AI model or a mapping API, adds setup, error handling and testing.
• Platform. A responsive web app runs on every phone and laptop. Native iOS and Android apps mean two codebases, or a cross-platform layer, plus app store reviews.
• Undecided scope. If the screens and flows are not designed before the build, they get designed during it, at build rates, and usually more than once.
• Who is on the invoice. An agency quote pays for a project manager, an account manager, QA and an office. That is not waste, but it is not product either.
• Location and seniority. ITJobsWatch puts the median UK software developer contract rate at £525 a day over the six months to 9 November 2026, with the 10th to 90th percentile running from £364 to £638.

The honest answer to "how much" is that the price follows the scope. Pin the scope down and the price stops moving. Leave it loose and every quote you get will carry a buffer for the guessing.

Work out your rough number first

Before you ask anyone for a quote, answer these. Each one you leave blank gets priced as a risk, because whoever is quoting has to guess.

If you want a number to take into those conversations, the MVP cost calculator turns these answers into a rough range. If the feature list is long, scope your MVP first and cut it down to the version you actually need to test.

Typical UK prices by MVP type

Every published UK price range comes from someone selling MVPs, including me. Treat the figures below as typical ranges, not quotes. The agency figures come from UK agencies' own published pricing. The freelance figures are my arithmetic from contract day rates. Where I could not find a public figure I trust, the table says so.

A few notes on reading that table. Softomate Solutions and Rocking Tech both put a single-platform web MVP at £15,000 to £30,000. Magora says most of its startup MVPs fall between £10,000 and £25,000, and Rocking Tech says funded UK startups mostly spend £30,000 to £60,000 on a custom MVP. For native apps, Studio Liddell puts a simple app at £15,000 to £35,000 and Softomate puts an iOS and Android MVP at £20,000 to £45,000. The freelance arithmetic uses the ITJobsWatch median of £525 a day for 30 to 40 working days, which is a 6 to 8 week build for one developer. It does not include a designer.

If you want the marketplace version of this in more depth, I have written up marketplace MVP cost separately, using FindPopups as the worked example.

What moves you up or down a band

The decisions that push a build into the next band up:

• A second or third type of user, each with its own dashboard
• Payments that split, hold or refund money between parties
• Native apps on day one, rather than a web app that works on a phone
• Real-time features, such as live chat or live location
• Regulated data, such as health or financial records
• A feature list that keeps growing after the quote

The decisions that bring it down:

• One type of user and one core job for the first version
• Stripe Checkout or payment links instead of a custom payment flow
• Doing the awkward step by hand until you know people want it
• Designs agreed before the build starts, so nothing gets built twice
• Boring, well supported tools that any developer can pick up later

Which BlackFig package fits

Validation Sprint, from £3,500, 1 to 2 weeks. For when you are not yet sure what to build. You get user flows, a clickable Figma prototype, a build plan and a fixed quote. If you go on to an MVP Build, the plan carries straight over.

MVP Build, from £12,000, 4 to 6 weeks. For when you know who it is for and what the first version does. I design it, build the front end and back end, add sign-in and payments, and deploy it on your domain. You own the code. It is 50% to start and 50% on launch.

Build Club, £4,500 a month. For after launch, when you want to keep shipping without hiring. One request at a time, and you can pause or cancel anytime.

The "from" prices are where the fixed quote starts. A build with more user types or harder payments will sit above them, and you see the exact number in writing before you pay anything. All three are on the pricing section of the home page.

What working with me looks like

BlackFig is me, Ant. I am a senior product designer who also writes the code, with more than ten years of designing digital products. I was the first designer at a B2B SaaS company, and I built and run my own marketplace, FindPopups, from Nottingham. There is no handoff between a designer and a developer, because both jobs sit with the same person.

1. 1

   A 30 minute call

   You tell me what you want to build and who it is for. I tell you honestly whether I am the right person for it, and which package fits.

2. 2

   A fixed scope and price

   A short written plan with screens, features, timeline and one price. If the idea is still loose, this is the Validation Sprint, with a clickable prototype to test.

3. 3

   Design, then build

   I design the screens and write the code in Next.js, React, TypeScript and Postgres, with Stripe for payments. You get a preview link every week to click through on your phone.

4. 4

   Launch on your domain

   It goes live on Vercel, in accounts set up in your name. The code, the hosting and the domain are yours.

5. 5

   After launch

   A handover call and written notes. If you want to keep shipping, Build Club carries on one request at a time.

On timing: a Validation Sprint takes 1 to 2 weeks and most MVP Builds go live in 4 to 6 weeks. I use AI tools to move faster on the repetitive parts, which is a large part of why a fixed price at this level works. I only take a few clients at a time, so the start date depends on when a build slot opens.