How to Create Your Own Meditation App: A Step-by-Step Guide
- Updated: Nov 11, 2024
- 17 min
Stress. Worry. Anxiety. We all deal with these feelings.
These mental and emotional struggles come from many sources in our daily lives.
Stress is unavoidable. Everyone feels overwhelmed at some point.
To find calm, many people turn to apps. Digital solutions offer guidance to reduce stress.
This raises the question – how can you create a meditation app? And what does it cost to develop one?
The mindfulness meditation market is growing:
- Between 2020 and 2030, it will expand at an 8% annual rate globally.
- In North America, it will exceed $3 billion by 2025.
Want to join this rewarding, high-growth industry? Here’s how to make your own successful meditation app.
Unlock your startup potential now — start transforming your vision into a scalable solution with our expert developers today!
Why Launch a Meditation App
Apart from the lucrative nature of meditation app development, you are looking at a satisfying and empowering business.
Aspect | Reason |
Business Opportunities | After knowing how to make a future-ready meditation app and getting some traction, you can also add other application elements. Besides a simple mindfulness meditation app, you can also add other segments like dietary aspects of meditation. An on-demand service to get in touch with the certified meditation experts and so on. The possibilities are endless with meditation app development. |
Progressive Demand | Every year, the number and revenue coming from the meditation apps are growing, and so is its development abilities. To give you an idea of the consumer spending on meditation applications:
In 2020, the understanding of how to make a meditation app is even more pertinent. This is because of the global pandemic and the rising tensions due to losses in jobs, businesses, and awry family relations. So, the people might find refuge in meditation applications to gain sanity and get back on the horse. |
Versatile Platforms | In another instance, you must know how to create your own meditation app because of all kinds of users. Both Android and iOS users leverage the power of these applications to relieve stress and lead a healthy life. So, you might have to work on different sorts of meditation app design. But, to make it easier, consider making a cross-platform application that runs on both the platforms hassle-free. |
How to Build a Meditation App?
Now that you have a fair idea about the reasons to create a meditation app let’s learn how to do it.
To build a meditation app, we will first need to understand how to regulate the business part.
Here we will discuss:
- Idea Validation
- Types of Applications
- Monetization
- Team and Tech Stack
- Features Integration
- Meditation app design
Shall we begin with the idea validation part of how to create your own meditation app?
Validate Your App Idea
At SpdLoad, before we discuss how to build a meditation app, we discuss the idea behind it.
This is important as it helps you build a sense of security around your business model.
Here we suggest you gather all the evidence about the product’s market fitness and value proposition.
This is the primary step to follow before you create your own meditation app; here’s how to do it.
Well, the SpdLoad way of validating an idea is expanding and measuring it for the best results.
We look at:
- Social Acceptance
- Compatibility
- Relative Market Advantage
- The complexity of the product
- Benefits and Advantages
All these aspects are essential to know how to create your own health-based meditation app.
Choose an App Type
Now that you know the idea (read our I have an app idea article to learn more) behind meditation app development decide what type of application you want?
Along with the types, you must also focus on how much does it cost to build an app.
This is because the meditation app’s interface and design will change with the type.
Type of Application | Description | Example |
Guided Meditation App | These applications contain a playlist of meditation music or songs. Such tracks help with anxiety, calm down the senses, and relieve stress. The tracks are segmented on the basis of their purpose,
It is essential to know how to build a meditation app of your favorite type because the integration of the features might differ. Furthermore, you can also add some additional features to improve the design of your meditation app. | Headspace |
Mindfulness Morning Meditation Apps | These are time tracker applications that help the record every session. Plus, these applications consist of songs and mantras, breathing exercises, and other similar features to help any user get a better experience. To know more about how to create a mindfulness-oriented meditation app, you need better research and deeper insights into the market. However, you can add an endless number of features, like alarms, meditation tips, health-based tips, recommendations on living a great life, and so on. In terms of technological innovations, you can also allow your application to integrate with IoT devices in the house. | Calm |
Networking and Mediator Applications | These applications are like Facebook or Instagram for individuals seeking to meditate with the community. Herein, you will have to know how to create your own meditation app and also integrate additional features. These can be:
Remember that you might also want to keep an eye on how much does it cost to build a new and better meditation app. Because with the features, the cost can easily spike. That is why at SpdLoad, we first address every project idea to our discovery phase services. It allows us to create a roadmap and define a budget range of the meditation app design and development. | InsightTimer |
Monetize Your App
The last business aspect to know while you create your own meditation app is how to generate revenue.
Any type of app development in the aspect must generate some revenue. The same goes for the development of a meditation app.
Hence, here are some ways to generate money with your healthcare and meditation application.
Earning Model | Description |
Downloading Cost | In this type of meditation app development exercise, you will charge the user once for downloading the application. This can be like a lifetime cost for getting access to some of the major features of your application. You can also combine this aspect with in-app purchases to ensure a steady stream of revenue coming in. |
In-App Purchases | In-App Purchases means when you ask the users to pay and get more premium services. These new and advance features will provide better benefits and more services. Some founders also give free access to their applications. But how do they earn revenue after they create a meditation app? They provide free access but charge for the in-app purchases. And these additional features can be anything:
There are endless possibilities. |
Subscription | Another option to look at while you learn how to create a meditation app is the subscription model. Also, this is a recurring revenue generation model. The users will pay a fixed price for the subscription of your application every month. Mostly, such a model precedes a free trial of one or two weeks. |
Advertisements | Lastly, you have another great money earning system from the meditation app development. Here, you might have to set your meditation app design accordingly. But ad revenue is one of the best options to earn money continuously. |
Moving on with how to build a meditation app, let’s know about the technical part of meditation app development.
In this part, we will talk about:
- Team requirements
- Tech Stack
- Features Integration
- Design
Assemble Your Team
You need a diverse team to build a meditation app that knows how to deliver perfection.
At SpdLoad, our experts not only know how to create a great meditation app, but we can also help you create a market-fit product.
Here’s the configuration of your dream team:
- Frontend and backend developers
- UI/UX designer
- DevOps
- Business Analyst
- Project Manager
- Quality Assurance Expert
If you want to learn more about DevOps specialists, check out our DevOps glossary that covers key terms to help you stay on top of DevOps practices and tools.
Essential and Advanced Features
Coming to the next part of meditation app development, we will know what type of features are essential for your target audience.
You need to understand the features of the MVP development of a meditation app, and a more advanced version is manifold.
- Building an MVP version first allows you to test the waters. It also helps you get a calculated answer to how much does it cost to build a meditation app.
Because with the advanced features, the time and efforts needed to fuel the project will grow easily.
That is why we always recommend knowing how to create an MVP version of the meditation app.
- Secondly, it is easier to modify, alter, and edit the meditation app design or features with the MVP version.
If you build a full-scale meditation app and require changes early on, you might have to learn how to revamp it from the beginning or hire a team for the task.
In any case, the cost and time will increase, not to mention the loss of your customer base.
So, even if you know how much does it cost to build a breakthrough meditation app and can afford it, don’t take the plunge too easily.
Here are the features of the MVP version you should know for meditation app development and design.
Feature | Description |
Sign In and Sign Up | Start from the user onboarding and allowing them to sign in to the app. For better interaction, allow the users to connect their social media accounts with your application to reduce their work. Users need to complete the process in a single step. So, while learning how to create your own meditation app, make sure to leverage the Google and Facebook APIs. |
Creation of profile | Here too, do not ask the users to delve into long forms and ask them to share their life’s story. Just get the basic details required to start giving them a personalized experience. Plus, if you want to include some creative UI and UX experiences in the meditation app design, use them here. Try to create a better user experience, which is fun, accessible, and enabling. |
Statistic screen | A meditation app is similar to healthcare app development. You may need to integrate it with smart technology like wearables. With this, you can give them the option to get health statistics 24/7 and create a better user experience. The statistics screen must also show their past performance or other information like:
|
Search | Create a framework that allows the users to search for their favorite meditation tracks and sequences. Just like any other song, applications that we see create categories in your meditation, and the users will know how to access their best tracks. Embed categories of meditation tracks. You can create categories like emergency, relaxation, anxiety control, stress-relief, and so on. |
Content library | Implementing the right set of the tech stack is also essential for knowing how to make a successful meditation app. For one, you need to work with cloud technology. This article on the cloud migration discovery phase outlines the key steps for a successful migration. Second, create an interactive catalog of the tracks and content. Everything should be sorted and structures. Besides creating categories, leverage powerful and adept databases to retrieve the content as per the user’s search. Plus, all the videos, audios, podcasts, images, animations, and whatnot should boast high quality. Low-quality content discourages the users from engaging with your application. |
Push notifications | Push notifications are an integral part of any user-centric application. In this case, your users might be new to meditation, and they will require constant motivation. So push notifications play a dual role of:
|
Payment integration | Don’t stick to one payment option. When you are creating the meditation app design and adhering to its development, make sure to include multiple payment options. Credit cards, debit cards, online payment options, wallets, and others. Include the entire arsenal in the hopes of creating a better user experience. Thinking of adding a card payment option on your website? Discover the best options for accepting card payments on your website in our step-by-step guide on how to accept card payment on-site. |
Crafting Custom Mobile Apps That Delight Users!
Ok, that was it about the MVP version of your amazing meditation application.
Moving on with the guide for how to create a meditation app, we have to talk about the advanced features.
Feature | Description |
In-App Recommendations | One of the best-advanced features you can integrate is giving user-specific recommendations. Such a feature requires the understanding of machine learning for meditation app development. Since apps collect and save personal data, a system will first learn about the user’s behavior, activity, and history. This allows the application to create specific profiles of every user and send recommendations accordingly. |
IoT Integrations | The Internet of Things is the next modern aspect of our guide on how to create your own meditation app. Technologies like wearables, smartwatches, and other devices will enhance the user experience. |
Community Chats | With your meditation app development, you will be creating a unique community of users and practitioners. So, there has to be some way for all of them to connect. Such a feature is not an exclusive but necessary feature of mediator networking apps. |
Support | Another great feature that will surely get you better revenue and cost more is onboarding certified meditation experts. This will create a support system for users. After this, you might want to look at the question: how much does it cost to build a meditation app? But such a feature will surely add to the overall user experience and increase the attraction plus retention. Not only meditation, but you can also add other healthcare activities like Yoga or dance to the mix and reach out to more users. Planning revenue projections? Try our handy ARR calculator to get started. |
Social Media | In this, we would recommend that you take a two-pronged approach:
You can create leaderboards, praise top performers, and allow everyone to share their experience. |
That is it about the features in how to make a meditation app. Now we are left with the meditation app design and the cost aspect.
Although there are mentions of both these pointers in the above guide, down below, we will talk in detail about how much does it cost to build a meditation app.
Meditation App Design
Yes, we do need to talk about the design part of how to create your own meditation app.
Because this is a user-centric application. Not that the other application that we build are divergent towards users.
But this is a meditation app. Here your aim is to help the users enjoy their lives to the fullest.
It is about tweaking and tuning their mental health to don a better mindset.
That is why the UI/UX and other designing elements are essential.
So while creating the designs, take care of a few things:
- No bright colors that will pinch the user’s eye.
- Make sure to use fewer design elements. This is because you do not want to clutter the screen with too many pictures or calligraphy writing. Keep it simple and focus on the goal, i.e., to reduce the stress and help them relax.
Aspect | Description | Benefit |
Prototyping | Just as you must first know how to create a meditation app, it is equally important to create a prototype first. Prototypes help simulate the application and create a real life-like experience. You will get to observe and experience how to work with every feature and screen while you actually build a meditation app. | One of the greatest benefits of this exercise is that you won’t make mistakes while designing and developing. Having a prototype will also give you access to CSS configuration and element dimensions. |
UI Kit | Leveraging the design and other elements of a UI kit is cost and time-saving. You will get a ready-to-use kit of different templates that you can edit. So don’t worry about compromising with your visionary design. A UI kit is the complete package. The designs are not way out of the line. At best, there can be a difference in color and typography. But if you talk about the size and screen-fit elements, a UI Kit is one of the best ways to move ahead. | The best is that you won’t have to create designs from scratch. Plus, it will be one thing off the meditation app design process checklist. All in all, if you want to make your life easier while learning how to create a meditation app on your own, use a UI kit. |
Gamification | Embedding the possibilities of gamification in your application can be interesting. Until this part of the guide on how to create your own meditation app, we addressed the features and integrations present in almost every app. This is what can make a difference. But, gamifying, your app has to be highly subjective and creative. You cannot just add any type of element. Instead, it requires testing and creating something that we can call a look-alike audience. Test the gamification features before adding them.
These are some of the gamification aspects that you can consider for meditation app development. But you might ask how much does a meditation app with gamification cost and is it worth? We will discuss the answer below. | Gamification creates an unprecedented level of user experience. Moreover, with gamification based contests, you can get some extra money from the user’s participation. Gamification plays with the user’s innate need to compete and win. So, including it in your application will act as an intrinsic motivator and provide a better response. |
Tech Stack for Building a Meditation App
We have covered the major part of how to create a meditation app.
Moving on, there is the tech stack that you will require and the cost estimation.
Shall we?
Task | Toolkit | Benefit |
Project Management | Jira | Jira can cater to a wide variety of processes and environments. It is highly customizable, and you can leverage it to create any kind of scenario. Choosing the best project management software is crucial for keeping projects on track and organized. |
Project Requirements | G-Suite | You can do a lot with the G-Suite, and keeping everything related to the project in one place is imperative. |
Prototyping | Balsamiq |
These are only some of the significant aspects of Balsamiq, and it helps create amazing designs for meditation apps. |
Design | Figma | Figma comes pre-loaded with screen-specific elements and artboards. It has a library of icons and items that are native to a platform like Android and iOS. If you’re planning to build an app, these detailed guides on Android app development costs and iOS app development costs will help you navigate the financial aspects. Also, feel free to explore these best iOS app development tools that simplify the iOS app development process. |
Hosting | AWS | Higher Security and fast operational capacity plus the ability to host several applications. AWS is the panacea for a wide gamut of application services. See how Digital Ocean, AWS, and Google Cloud stack up on performance, cost, and features. Explore the top hosting solutions for SaaS products and find what works best for your business in our hosting for SaaS article. |
Coding (Backend) | Laravel | Laravel is excellent in terms of an inbuilt support system. You can integrate several third-party tools. It helps streamline the backend processes and procedures, making more room for efficiency and productivity. This article on the best Laravel tools and resources includes essential frameworks and libraries. |
Coding (Frontend) | React.js | The trifecta of React.js is speed, flexibility, and usability. At Spdload, we utilize the advanced models of React.js to create custom experiences for our clients. Our guide to the cost to hire a React.js developer explains everything from hourly rates to experience levels. |
Payment | Paypal, Stripe | Online payment systems help users get better accessibility and easy operation. Plus, PayPal and Stripe are highly secure and work faster. |
Push Notifications | Firebase | With Firebase Cloud Messaging included in the meditation app development process, you can interact with the users at any time and in a personalized manner. It also provides a smooth and robust connection between the server and user devices. |
Optimize Your Development Lifecycle with DevOps Experts.
How Much Does It Cost to Build a Meditation App?
Isn’t that the million-dollar question?
It all boils down to the cost, the budget, the monies, or whatever you want to call it.
The fact is that only after understanding everything about how to create a meditation app we can estimate the cost.
Although there are a lot of cost-influencing factors, two of them are critical.
- Features (which we have already covered)
- What kind of meditation app development is it?
As far as the development team is concerned, you have four options. Rest assured that all the teams know how to create, design, and deploy a meditation app.
For this, we are assuming that the entire process will take 1000 hours to complete.
Team Type | Who are they? | Average Cost per hour | Total Cost |
Local Development Agency in the US | These are the big guns. They are highly sophisticated, focus on work, and will develop you a fantastic meditation app clone. Getting your work done from any US development agency has its perks. But there are downsides to it too. You are looking at a huge development cost. Plus, these guys work on an hourly basis. So you cannot bargain with them for a contract or a lump sum. Having said, they have aced the procedures of meditation app development. | The hourly rate of a US-based developer is in range of $150 – $200 per hour. | $150,00 |
Freelancers | Freelancers are one of the cheapest options to get an affordable answer to your question. How much does it cost to build a meditation app? They are also experienced, understand the market, know the technology, and develop the solution in less time. But, if you are ready to compromise on the quality, take the lead. Plus, freelancers are relatively less reliable than an agency. | You can get your hands on a freelance developer within the price range of $15 to $40 per hour. Let’s take an average rate of $20 per hour. | This way, you are looking at the total cost of $20, 000. |
Outsource Agency in India | India is full of developers at this stage. This is one around every corner. These are the guys who ensure quality, deliverability, and create incredible designs. However, as per the majority of the experiences, the Indian developers are infamous for not adhering to the guidelines. | The average hourly rate of an Indian developer is $25 per hour. | So, the total cost comes out to be $25,000. |
Outsource Agency in Ukraine | Now comes the best part of your guide on how to build a meditation app. Outsourcing your meditation app development works to an agency in Ukraine will get you:
A Ukrainian development agency houses some of the best developers. These guys know how to create a market-fit meditation app. They are agile, use advanced technologies, and, most importantly, they are reliable. If you’re considering outsourcing, check out the benefits of IT outsourcing for insights. | The average hourly rate here is $35. Even though it is more than the Indian counterparts, the quality and service efficiency you are getting is commendable. | So, at this hour, you are looking at an expenditure of $35,000. This is the real answer to how much does it cost to build and design a meditation app. |
Creating an app can be complex, but these app development tips simplify the journey.
Ready to Build Your Meditation App?
Building a competitive meditation app can seem daunting. But with the right partner, it’s totally achievable. In fact, now is the ideal time to tap into surging demand.
At SpdLoad, our skilled designers and developers have launched dozens of successful mobile apps.
With deep expertise in healthcare apps and proven results, we can bring your vision to life.
Let’s connect to explore how we can help you capitalize on the growth in meditation.
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