The question we get asked more than any other for software work is: how much? And the honest answer — it depends — is not useful to anyone, so let me give you actual numbers and explain what drives them.
What MVP actually means
MVP stands for Minimum Viable Product. It has been so badly misused that most founders either build a full product thinking it is an MVP, or launch something so stripped back it does not validate anything useful.
An MVP should answer a specific question: will users pay for this? It needs enough functionality to deliver the core value proposition. Nothing else.
For a SaaS product, that usually means: authentication, the core feature, a billing integration, and a feedback mechanism. No admin panel, no advanced reporting, no integrations that are not essential to the core loop.
The honest number ranges
Simple web app MVP: $15,000 to $30,000
Two to three core features, Supabase for database and auth, Stripe for billing, Next.js on Vercel, basic user dashboard. Six to ten weeks of build time with a focused scope. This is what we typically quote for a first build when the idea is validated and the scope is tight.
Mid-complexity SaaS: $40,000 to $80,000
More features in the core loop, custom data processing, external API integrations, more sophisticated onboarding. Three to five months. The scope creep risk starts at this level.
Full-featured SaaS v1: $100,000 to $200,000+
Multiple user roles, complex permission systems, extensive integrations, white-labelling, compliance requirements. Six to twelve months. At this level you need a CTO mindset, not just developers.
Where the money actually goes
People assume the expensive part of building software is writing code. It is not. The expensive parts are:
Scope management. Every feature added to scope mid-build costs more than it would have cost to include upfront. The most expensive words in software are "can we also add..."
Backend complexity. Frontend work is predictable. Backend logic — data models, business rules, edge cases, security — is where estimates blow out. Multi-tenancy, billing logic, and permissions are all harder than they look.
Testing and QA. Proper testing is not optional if you are handling payments or user data. It adds 20-30% to the build time and is worth every dollar.
Deployment infrastructure. Hosting, monitoring, backups, staging environments, CI/CD pipelines — the invisible scaffolding that a production app needs.
How to de-risk it
Build the smallest possible thing that lets a real user do the core task and pay you for it. Not a prototype, not a mockup — a real, deployed, working product.
Define scope on paper before a line of code is written. A well-written brief reduces the cost of the build and eliminates the most common source of disputes.
Use modern, proven infrastructure. We default to Next.js, Supabase, and Stripe because they are production-tested, well-documented, and reduce the surface area of things that can go wrong.
Get a technical review of the data model before build starts. More SaaS projects fail because the database schema was designed wrong in week one than for any other technical reason.
The AI accelerant
AI-assisted development has meaningfully changed the economics of SaaS builds in the last two years. Claude Code and similar tools let competent developers move faster on boilerplate, standard integrations, and documented patterns.
This does not cut the cost in half — experienced judgment is still doing most of the real work. But it does mean that lean, focused teams can now produce what larger teams produced two years ago, which compresses timelines and makes smaller scopes more viable.
The economics are genuinely better than they were. The fundamentals of scope discipline and technical decision-making are the same.
