Food Online. In the era when everything is online, so is a food ordering app. It feels good to be right at home and enjoy food from restaurants while doing what you please. In the course of time, everything has developed and has become modern and fast. So, a food delivery app development will highly profit you once you understand the basics of the development process. When you are thinking about food delivery app development you must also be thinking about the immediate requisites that you have to implement. 

In the advent of food ordering apps, it has influenced us as well. We at Vyrazu Labs have successfully developed four food ordering apps for our customers, who have given notable feedback right after the release of the app. It is no easy task, I agree, but it is also a very successful venture to work on. When there are so many options why will people choose you? The reason being you will completely have a different approach along with unique features that other food ordering apps do not provide.

Let us check out this article and as we proceed food delivery app development will seem to be an easy task.

Two types of food delivery app 

The title indicates there are two types of food ordering apps, even though they are leaves of the same tree they have different usability. One is being the straightforward approach to food ordering apps and the other is like a support system for startups.

1. The supportive model for food delivery app
2. The aggregator model for food delivery app

The supportive model

The supportive model benefits those who are temporarily deprived of the right resources and techniques for starting their own delivery service. This model is profited by different small businesses like food joints, small restaurants, etc. Following this model apps like Swiggy and Uber Eats provide technical support to these small businesses. This is often referred to as the sea of opportunities by the small businesses as it profits both the parties, i.e. the food delivery app development company and the restaurants alike. The startup businesses should be included in this model as I already said it is a profit-profit for all the parties.

The aggregator model

This primitive technique of food delivery behaves as a catalyst towards the users and the restaurants. Those apps falling under this model doesn’t provide any sort of support, except delivering the food to the user who ordered it. Apps like Zomato are responsible for providing a plethora of menus for users to choose from. The restaurants get their share of exposure as they prepare the food and set it for delivery. 

The functionality of both apps is basically the same from the user’s point of view. Both the apps provide the entire menu from all the restaurants they feature from where the users’ order and later rate and review the same.

Serious Contemplation Before you Start food delivery app Development

Before you start with food delivery app development there are numerous considerations/decisions that you will have to make to proceed with the business. All those requisites fall under different titles that will be listed here so that you can follow up on those before you start making a food delivery app. 

Planning for food delivery app development

When you are starting off with a business you will start to have to plan it out. Without a proper plan, you will feel like fish out of water. In the planning process of food delivery app development, a lot of requisites will be covered. Basically, in this stage, you will have to conduct various market research on different aspects using this research for data collection. This will help you to formulate a document that you will be able to hand out to the developers and designers who will be working on your project.

This data will be a documentation of what are the features that you want to integrate into your app, which design will best suit your app, and the content that you have already gathered from the restaurants who agree to partner with you. Of course, you will have to start small as no one will trust you until they see the stats your food delivery app is producing. 

Research for food delivery app development

• Requirements for food delivery app development 

As you must know there are a lot of things that are integrated into a food delivery app development. You must have used a food delivery app yourself, they provide you with a lot of options to choose from and are stuffed with advanced features that make those apps usable and spreadable. When you will go for the food delivery app development make sure that there must be 4 apps.

1. The users’ app
2. The deliverers’ app
3. The restaurants’ app 
4. The admin’s app

• Your customers 

There is a huge base of an audience that you can entertain in your app but you will have to focus on a certain group of customers, who surely will use your app and purchase food using your app. There are many types of customers who will be interested in using your services.

1. The exchange population. Those exchange students who are staying in a new place are always not able to make food hence they prefer ordering from a service that will provide them with countless offers and deals. Similarly, there are many people who come down to metropolitans looking for a good job. They are the same as the students and often don’t like cooking after a busy day. 
   
2. The old people. The old people who are staying alone are not capable of making food by themselves for obvious reasons, the order in food to make the daily task easy. 
   
3. The basic crowd. I mean, the entire population, the general group who used to out for dinner, now that there are food ordering apps they prefer ordering. The general crowd is a working crowd they have children at home and like ordering food once a while. There are some who order food every day as they are unable to manage the time and household chores. There can be a lot of similar reasons that can motivate you for food delivery app development.

•  Designing food delivery app

When the food delivery app design proceeds you will have to keep in mind some of the very basic necessities of food delivery app development-. 

1. The UI/UX should be presentable. This means that the food delivery app design should be clean. The design should be so simple that each of the users can use it without getting confused or having to search for the option here and there in the app. They are supposed to access the app even with their eyes closed. 
   
2. The design particularly has to be clean as the users are habituated to use simple and sorted apps that do not take much browsing time and their work can still be done. It should be easy as you are dealing with a hungry group of people you will not want to mess with them, right? 

• Food delivery app development

The food delivery app development should be done with precise measures completely depending on the customers that you are choosing. You will have to judge for yourself if you were the user what will be the features that you will have so that this app does not frustrate you? Of course, there is a catch to this. You will have to select an experienced group of people who have already done these kinds of developments. 

1. When you start the food delivery app development the first thing that you have to think about is the features you would want to add that will help all the 4 apps equally. 
2. Considering certain features that are necessary to add in a food delivery app development will be the ability to access the data that is stored in the app for both the admin and the user which will help them to gather on the type of food they have been ordering and being recommended to try. 
   
3. The option for online payment is highly recommended, the delivery time should be visible to all the apps, the user and the deliverer should be able to track the orders, and the review/rating option should also be present in all the apps. 
   
4. Integrating famous options for online payment is recommended as well if your user is not able to use the online payment option then what is the use of keeping such an option, right? Better think about integrating options like Braintree or Stripe. 

• Partnering up

When you think about partnering with the restaurants be sure to check their backgrounds first, a proper check for quality is very necessary. When you partner up with restaurants be sure to check their authentication and certificates that will help you understand whether it will be right to partner up with them or not. 

1. Pick all kinds of restaurants starting from small to big so that it provides you with a lot of area for business and the delivery is also quick in terms of preparing and delivering the food.
   
2. Remember PR is everything this is where you can not make a mistake or you will have to lose potential customers. Social media is definitely the best option for promotion which will address a huge base of customers. 
   
3. Follow the inbound marketing strategy for attracting, delighting, and engaging your customers to use your food delivery app.

These are certain things that you must keep in your mind for the food delivery app development. These points will help you to plan out the food delivery app development precisely and with ease.

Features for the users’ app you need to consider during food delivery app development

• Login and registration 

This is where you can add social media integration for logging in and registration. Here you can add up some options which the user will fill in so that they can successfully register and use the app accordingly. Make sure that you ask for limited information or it might be too much for the user and they might not like it. 

• Search 
  
  Being able to use the search bar is a liability that the user must get. The user is entitled to search out the restaurants by entering food names. They should be able to connect with the exact item they were searching for. After all, it’s your hungry crowd that you will have to serve without making any mistake. 
  
  • They should be able to locate the restaurants they were searching for
  • The search option should provide the customers with a filtered search so that they can filter their needs.

• Ordering 

The ordering process should be an easy one, the users should be able to order with one click. When they select one item the order now option used pop automatically so that they don’t have to do it manually. Some advanced features that can be added within this feature are

1. Wishlist– Where they can add food items to select from later or they will be able to sort out food in that area without mixing it up with the food they are ordering. 
   
2. Cart– The cart option is seen in almost all the famous e-commerce website the reason for the cart is that it will help the user to keep the food that they have selected to be in a certain place and in the meanwhile. They can through other options and make their orders.
   
3. Delivery time estimation– When the user is ordering the food they will want to know when their food will reach them. It happens to all of us, doesn’t it? We all are very eager to know when our food will reach us. 
   
4. Food tracking– Some food delivery apps also provide the option to track their food right from accepting the order until the delivery person is outside the users’ door. Hence integrate a GPS won’t cost much.
   
5. Favorites– When the users order their food and they liked what they had ordered they will obviously want to save it as their favorites so that they can order from there later.  

• Payment integration

When you are integrating payment options do not leave out the famous options used by almost all your users. When you introduce online payment you must be prepared for securing the same as well. Of course, you will not be happy if someone steals delicate information like from your app. Remember to include as many options as you have heard of once you start establishing your business. During the food delivery app development, you need to think wisely about the security as it is going to add a lot of users’ data in the near future.

• Setting the location

When your user orders the food obviously the app will ask them to add their address for the food to get delivered. That is when the users should be able to insert their address and assign that address as their “home”, “friends place”, etc that they can manually insert and save that address for future use. 

• Rating and Review 

When the user is using a food delivery app they would want to rate and review the restaurants they have ordered their food from it gives them the mental peace to have treated the restaurant right as well as the other users will also know how that restaurant is depending on the ratings and reviews other users post on that restaurant.  

• Help and Feedback

The users might have some issues while they use the app. They have to have a place where they can clear out their issues or make complaints (if any). The help section should have the FAQs so that the users can find answers from the given set of frequently asked questions.

• Notification

The food delivery app development should be done in such a way that it is able to generate notifications, asking the user to visit the app to see the latest updates on their favorite restaurants and if there are any new offers or not. 

Features for the deliverers’ app you need to consider during food delivery app development

• Registration

The personnel responsible for delivering the food will be provided with the option to register in their respective apps so that they can create a profile that can be viewed by the admin and the restaurants who will be supplying the food. In this profile, they will add all the information that is essential for the admin and the restaurants to know about. This profile will have images, numbers, driving license information and other such details.

• Status update
  
  The deliverer should be able to update the information about the order, such as
  
  • Order approved or disapproved 
  • Order picked 
  • Order delivered, etc

• Booking history

The deliverers’ app should have the option for checking the booking history which that particular person has delivered on that day. This will help that person to track those orders and check the necessary errors if any. It might happen that one of the orders was delivered but the user is denying it, the person concerned can show their part of the app for the details that regards that order. 

• Navigation

The person who will be delivering the food should have maps integrated into their device which will help them to navigate to the restaurant and then to the user who has ordered the food. They should also be able to find the shortest route to both destinations. 

• Quick service  

There should be an option with which the deliverers can understand that it is an emergency or someone is calling them as fast as possible. To deliver the food before the usual delivery time. 

Features for the restaurants’ app you need to consider during food delivery app development

• Registration

The restaurant owner will be able to register in the app, giving the essential information, with this the restaurant will officially be able to login to the app and start their business with you.

• Admins’ dashboard 

This is the area where the restaurant can manage all the essentials such as the menus, special offers, any updates on the menu, introduction of items, etc. This is panel is dedicated to the admin and will be able to manage every single detail starting from contact details to available desserts. 

• Content management system
  
  The content management system helps the restaurant owners to manage their individual content using their apps. They will be able to make notable changes by using the cms like:
  
  • Updating menus by adding or removing dishes, special offers, descriptions, delivery charges, price of the dishes, etc.
  • Uploading and updating photos  of the restaurants  

• Order Management
  
  This feature helps the restaurant to manage orders depending on the orders and the delivery time of those orders.
  
  • The order must be shown clearly with the custom changes that the user has made (if any) 
  • Update status, send a notification to the delivery person when the order is ready and can be dispatched 
  • The list of present orders with the given time 

• Payment Received 

The payment is only sanctioned to the restaurant when the user receives their order. If the payment is done online then it directly enters the bank account of the restaurant or the smart wallet account provided. If the payment is made with cash then it has to deliver by the delivery personnel.

• Accepting the order  

The order can only be accepted after the delivery personnel has already accepted the order. It has to be extended to the restaurant to opt for a featured listing in the app. The invoice should directly be generated from this app and reach the user by text, email, notification, etc. 

Features for the admins’ app you need to consider during food delivery app development

The admins’ app should have certain features that will help the admin to manage the app using their side of the app. They will be able to check if the app is working properly or not and do the trillion jobs that the admin has to do.

1. Dashboard
2. Support 
3. Manage
4. Add or remove restaurants
5. Feedbacks 
6. Regular check-up for the app performance

With these features, the admin will be able to keep a regular check on the app and also be able to manage the app as per it is required. The Dashboard will show the admin what are the changes that are taken place in his app, which restaurant is performing better and manage the feedback accordingly. The dashboard will also contain information on the restaurants who have recently joined your app, along with information on the restaurants that you have removed. 

The support and management will of the app be done to maintain the app, update it occasionally after adding new features, and other such improvements. If you forget to check your app regularly the app might dysfunction and you might end up bowing your head in front of your users. Hence, see that all the functions are working as they were intended or not. If you don’t take care of your brainchild than who will, of course, the developers will, so will you.

Technical Talk for the food delivery app development

When you will start with the food delivery app development process you will have to keep in mind some of the basic things that have to be included in the development process. First of all, selecting a company for the food delivery app development process is a vital task and you might end up going overboard with the hiring process. If you are hiring engineers, surely check if they have already done such food delivery app development tasks or not.

Ask for examples so that you can get your work done by the right set of engineers. What do we need to build you a food delivery app? We need a set of engineers who will be able to work on JavaScript or React Native for food delivery app development. For more information on the tech stack check out the development section of how to make an Airbnb clone app. The other factor such as where you would want to make the app in iOS, Android, or both the platforms you need to think wisely during food delivery app development.

You will have to be very clear about the decisions as there are ways in which you will be able to make just four apps that you can run on both the platforms without having to think about screen resolutions. You have to integrate third-party APIs for different feature integration like Google maps, sending OTPs, etc. The UI/UX of the app should be clean, smooth and easy to use, hence that has to be taken care of.

In the third-party integration, you have to add the payment gateways as well which will allow your users to pay using the online service. You will have to allow your users to play with your app, i.e. you have to integrate a lot of features that can be customized by your users. As many changes and customizations your user will be delighted and will spend more time on your app that other food ordering apps. During the food delivery app development, you have to be extra careful and you can use analytics to understand which kind of customization features users like most in a food ordering app.

The team for the successful food delivery app development 

The team has to be dependent on the features and platforms that you choose. If you choose iOS then only iOS developers will be working on your project and vice versa. If you choose both a set of engineers both iOS and Android will be working for the food delivery app development.

The team as it might be clear to you will have;

1. Set of developers (both back-end and front-end)
2. UI/UX designer
3. Quality assurance tester
4. Project manager

Cost of food delivery app development

The cost of the food delivery app development is centrally based on you, as when you select the features that you want to include and the platform you will choose for launching the app and other such factors that are involved in the food delivery app development process. Once you are sure with what the development you will be doing.

It will give us the right sphere to understand what the cost should be for that particular food delivery app development according to your business requirement. However, we can provide you with a rough sketch depending on the type of development you are looking for. 

1. Complex food delivery app development- If you are planning to make a complex app, i.e. the advanced features of the app will complex, there will in video/audio integration, real-time tracker, with custom graphics, third-party APIs, offline local cache, the server be backed by numerous database, etc will cost you around $90,000
2. Better than a basic app- If you make an app that is a little better than the basic app, i.e. it has customized UI/UX, advanced features and functions, payment methods, social media integration, notification, navigation, tables support, etc then the cost will be $40,000- $90,000
   
3. A basic app- If you are planning on developing a basic app i.e. a basic UI/UX, search (without advanced features), list of items, and fewer features and functions then your app will cost almost $40,000.

Remember that these are rough sketches depending on the apps that we have developed. Once we know the exact requirements, giving out the cost will be easy. These rates are for the food delivery app development, once your app is created. Then the maintenance cost can be added looking at the amount of job that has to be done for the maintenance of the app.

These factors also depend from company to company as, the location and the cost structure matters. If you are planning to outsource your business to third world countries like ours, you will obviously get a cost line up that will be more suitable than any first world country. 

Conclusion:

I hope you enjoyed this article, if you have spotted some mistakes please mention it in the comments section or leave a feedback about it. If you are planning on making a food delivery app you can reach out to us with hesitation. We provide a whole lot of services from which app design and development is our prime area of work.

We would like to talk with you about app development and design elaborately once you reach out to us. This article was made so that you can gather enough knowledge on how to make a food delivery app so that you don’t miss out on any detail, now that you are getting a team free with an article you might not want to lose this opportunity.