Start from the calendar instead of the feature list
A feature list grows every time someone looks at it. A calendar does not. If you know you need to be live in three months, the useful question is not what the MVP should include, but what can be built well in that time and still be worth paying for. Time is the constraint, scope is the variable, and the price follows from both.
How weeks turn into hours
Our model plans work in two week sprints, with about 60 hours of productive work per person per sprint. A team of two covers about 120 hours per sprint, a team of three about 180. Those hours include design, testing and project management, not only code.
- 8 weeks with two people: about 4 sprints, up to 480 hours, roughly $42,500 at $89 per hour
- 12 weeks with two people: about 6 sprints, up to 720 hours, roughly $64,000
- 16 weeks with two people: about 8 sprints, up to 960 hours, roughly $85,500
A bigger team does not divide time evenly. Adding people adds coordination, which is why our model adds 15 percent when a deadline is shorter than the scope suggests.
What fits in 8 weeks
Eight weeks is enough for a focused web MVP. A typical example in our model has user accounts, roles, subscriptions, email notifications and an admin panel. It comes to 470 to 638 hours, or $42,000 to $57,000, delivered in 6 to 8 weeks by two developers with part-time design, QA and project management. That is a product someone can sign up for, pay for and use daily.
- One core workflow, done properly
- Accounts and payments, because you need to charge from day one
- An admin panel, so you can support customers without touching the database
- Basic analytics events to see whether people come back
What fits in 12 weeks
Twelve weeks adds room for a second workflow or a harder feature. This is where a cross-platform mobile MVP fits comfortably, or a web MVP with one integration into the tool your customers already use, or an AI feature such as document extraction at the center of the product.
- A mobile app on iPhone and Android from one codebase
- Or one third-party integration, priced at 16 to 48 hours depending on the API
- Or an AI feature, 40 to 96 hours depending on the type
- Plus the foundations from the 8 week version
What fits in 16 weeks
At sixteen weeks, many products stop being an MVP. If your plan needs this long, check whether you are building version two before learning from version one. Sixteen weeks makes sense when the product only works with several features at once, such as a two-sided marketplace with chat and payments, or when compliance requires features like audit logs and roles from the start.
What to leave for version two
- Real-time chat, 40 to 80 hours, when email notifications can carry the first months
- Multi-language support, 16 to 32 hours, until you sell in a second language
- A public API, 32 to 64 hours, until a customer asks for it
- Native apps for both platforms, when one shared codebase will do
- Complex automation that a person can do manually behind the scenes for now
Every one of these is a good feature. None of them decides whether the first customers pay.
Paying for an MVP without prepaying it
Pay in stages. Discovery and scope comes first, at 10 percent of the estimate with a minimum of $1,900, and it fixes the price of design, build and launch. After each stage you can continue, change the plan or stop and keep what you paid for. That protects your runway if the market tells you something unexpected halfway through. Read more in fixed price vs time and materials.
A short checklist before you start
- Write the one sentence your first customer would use to describe the product
- List the features they need to get that result, and nothing else
- Decide the platform: web, cross-platform mobile or both
- Set the date and work backwards
- Prepare a brief, as described in software requirements brief
See what your MVP costs
Our MVP development services page explains how we build and launch first versions. To get your own range, pick MVP in the estimate form, choose your features and deadline, and see the hours, sprints and price in about a minute.