Do you have the skills to write a killer iPhone app? If you do, and you create one that becomes popular, you could watch your bank account grow at an astounding rate. And even if you don’t know anything about programming, if you’re willing to hire someone to do the iPhone application development for you, you could still make a tidy profit. A few iPhone application developers have hit the big time, thanks to thousands of downloads of their programs, most at only $.99 each.
If you’re a programmer already and you have some basic knowledge, there’s a slight learning curve when it comes to programming for Apple’s iPhone. But you can download information and the SDK (software development kit) that will help you learn how to do it. That’s what some have done to avoid paying $150 and up per hour for qualified Apple iPhone developers.
Some programmers are writing iPhone apps in their spare time, hoping for a little side income stream, then quitting their regular jobs to pursue iPhone application development full time once they realize how quickly the profits an add up.
But just writing an iPhone apple doesn’t guarantee success, as many have found, too. So hundreds or thousands spent on design, development and testing if you pay someone to write the code for you could be for nothing. There’s no way of knowing until Apple approves the app and the program is officially entered into the App Store.
Competition is pretty fierce among iPhone application developers. The iPhone App store has only been open since 2008 and there are already over 25,000 applications for buyers to choose from. Creating one that many will want isn’t necessarily an easy task. And if you have the idea, someone else may have had a similar one and an application that does nearly the same thing is already for sale.
Some people become an iPhone developer and earn hundreds of thousands of dollars—a few have earned over a million, while others are pretty much ignored. But the chance that the next new iPhone app could be a big hit keeps people flocking to iPhone application development classes in the hopes of learning to do it themselves and becoming an Apple iPhone sensation.
Once the application is created and tested, then it’s necessary for Apple to approve it and list it in the Apps Store. After that, automation takes over and the developer’s job is done. Apple handles the sales details and keeps 30% of the money from each sale for their trouble. While that seems like quite a chunk, there’s no better deal going since you can’t sell iPhone applications anywhere else.
One might think sales of iPhone apps would slow down, since sales of everything else have in the current recession. But with such a huge portion of the population owning a phone, we’re now in an almost completely mobile economy. People talk, send pictures, surf the Internet and now run programs and play games all on their mobile phones. Because of that, iPhone developers can still earn huge amounts of money if they hit on the right app, so iPhone application development doesn’t look to slow down anytime soon.