Mobile app maintenance cost: what it really runs in 2026

Short answer

Annual maintenance for a mobile app usually runs between 15% and 30% of the initial build cost. For an MVP shipped at €15,000, budget €2,500 to €4,500 a year. For a €50,000 app, more like €10k to €15k. Maintenance covers OS updates (iOS and Android each ship one major release a year), bug fixes, third-party SDK upgrades, and a bit of product evolution. Under-budgeting this line is the number one reason apps rot within 18 months and die quietly.

Why a mobile app needs maintenance at all

A lot of founders think the work is done once the app is shipped and live. Wrong. Mobile is an ecosystem that never stops moving.

Three forces push you to maintain an app even if you never add a single new feature:

iOS and Android updates. Apple ships a major new iOS release every autumn. Google does the same with Android. These updates regularly break things: permissions, push notifications, safe area layout, deep links. Without maintenance, your app will have bugs on the newest phones within 6 to 12 months.

Store requirements. Apple changes its guidelines often (minimum SDK version, target SDK, required API levels, privacy declarations). If you don't update your build, your app can get pulled from the store.

The third-party library ecosystem. You're probably using 30 to 80 npm packages (auth, payments, notifications, analytics). These packages evolve, some ship security fixes, others go stale. Skip the updates and you pile up technical debt.

The longer the app sits untouched, the more expensive the catch-up gets. An app left alone for 24 months often needs a partial rewrite just to start moving again.

What "essential" maintenance covers

Essential maintenance includes, at a minimum:

Dependency updates every 4 to 12 weeks (security fixes, patches).
Compatibility with new iOS and Android versions as soon as they ship (September for iOS, August/September for Android).
Major SDK upgrades (Expo SDK once or twice a year, React Native).
Fixes for critical or blocking bugs when they show up.
Crash monitoring (Sentry, Firebase Crashlytics) and action on recurring crashes.
Renewing the Apple Developer certificate (yearly) and provisioning profiles.

This kind of maintenance adds no features. It keeps the app from rotting.

What "active" maintenance covers

Beyond the essentials, most apps need regular product work:

Small UX improvements based on user feedback.
Tweaks to the onboarding flow.
New secondary screens (advanced notifications, settings, sharing).
Extra integrations (product analytics, A/B testing, in-app support).
A/B tests on conversion.
Small visual changes or a design refresh.

Count on 2 to 8 dev days a month depending on the app's pace and roadmap.

Price ranges seen in 2026

For maintenance outsourced to a studio:

Very simple app (5-8 screens, few integrations): €200 to €500/month essential, €800 to €2,000/month active.
Mid-size app (10-15 screens, backend, payments): €500 to €1,200/month essential, €1,500 to €4,000/month active.
Complex app (15+ screens, several roles, business integrations): €1,200 to €3,000/month essential, €3,000 to €8,000/month active.

For a freelancer: usually 30 to 50% cheaper on the hourly rate, but with a higher risk on availability and a single point of failure.

For an in-house dev: see the math in our article Build an app in-house or outsource to a studio.

The hidden line items most people forget

Third-party service subscriptions. Stripe, Supabase, Sentry, OneSignal, Mapbox, RevenueCat, and so on. These stack up. Budget €50 to €500/month for a mid-size app, more depending on user volume.

Backend hosting. If you run your own backend (Node, Python), plan for €30 to €300/month depending on load. Vercel, Railway, Render, AWS, it varies.

Apple Developer + Google Play. $99/year for Apple, $25 once for Google Play. Small line, but don't forget it.

Push notifications. Services like OneSignal are free up to a certain volume. Past that, plan for €30 to €200/month.

Monitoring. Sentry and Firebase Crashlytics have free tiers. Above them, €30 to €300/month.

Domain and email. Small line, but €50 to €200/year.

Typical running cost for a mid-size app (excluding dev maintenance): €200 to €800/month depending on the stack and volume.

The cost of NOT maintaining

If you cut maintenance to save money, here's what happens over 18 to 24 months:

Month 3 to 6. A few bugs on the newest phones. Users complain, some uninstall. Your store rating drops.

Month 6 to 12. Push notifications stop working on iOS. Stripe payments crash in certain cases. Camera or location permissions break.

Month 12 to 18. Apple or Google pulls the app for not complying with new rules. You redeploy in a panic, but your build no longer compiles because the SDKs are too old.

Month 18 to 24. A partial rewrite becomes mandatory just to restart. Cost: 30 to 60% of the original build cost.

Regular maintenance at €4,000/year typically avoids €15,000 of rewrite at the 24-month mark.

How to choose between studio, freelancer and in-house for maintenance

Studio (the safest choice). You get a contract, delivery commitments, several people who know your code. More expensive on the hourly rate, but zero risk of someone vanishing. Good for the first 24 months of a serious app.

Freelancer (the budget choice). Hourly rate 30 to 50% cheaper than a studio. Risk: if the freelancer disappears or takes another long engagement, you're alone with your code. Fine if the project is secondary for you and you can afford 1 or 2 months without maintenance.

In-house (the long-term choice). Hire a mobile dev in-house once you have 12+ months of visible roadmap and the app is central to your product. Below that threshold, it's rarely worth it.

The rule of thumb to keep

To budget your first year of maintenance without getting it badly wrong:

15% of the initial build cost if you have a stable app with few changes planned.
25% of the initial cost if you have an active roadmap.
40% and up if you plan heavy product work alongside maintenance.

For an MVP shipped at €14,000, that's €2,100 to €5,600 a year, to plan from signing, not to discover 6 months after delivery.

How it's structured at Inyka

Inyka offers a Care maintenance plan in three monthly tiers: Essential at €290, Standard at €590 and Premium at €1,190. You subscribe within the month following project delivery.

No hard sell here: we recommend always setting aside at least 15 to 20% of the initial budget for annual maintenance, even if you go with someone else. It's the move that saves the apps that actually work.