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There are billions of sports fans hooked on their mobile devices, who are not only watching but also playing. Fantasy sports apps have turned the tables, allowing passive viewers to actively participate, build dream teams, compete, and win real cash.
You must have heard about DraftKings, Dream 11, FanDuel, and MPL. These apps have garnered significant attention and a substantial user base, along with considerable profits. According to a recent study, the fantasy app market is projected to grow at a 12% CAGR from USD 34.08 billion to USD 84.98 billion by 2032.
Although there is demand and applications in the market, only a few can sustain themselves, and the rest must exit the market. We have evaluated the core reasons for fantasy apps shutting down their business, which might help you thrive in the industry. The primary reasons are customization, scalability, and user experience. All the apps that you see in the market lack either of these factors.
That’s where the opportunity lies in offering what users are seeking and keeping them glued to your sports app. Your app should be flawless, provide real-time updates about any live sports, and smartly monetize as well. So, does it mean it will be costly to build or require more capital than ever? Continue reading this article as we uncover the cost of developing a fantasy sport app in 2025.
A Fantasy Sports app is an online platform that allows users to create their teams. The user can pick any live sport and build a team consisting of real players. The virtual team will compete depending on the real-time performance of the players in the game. Based on their performance, users earn points and rewards, making the experience immersive and engaging.
Here are the types of Fantasy Sports apps you can invest in:
1. Daily Fantasy Sports
2. Season Long Fantasy Sports
3. Head-to-Head Fantasy
4. Pick’em or Prediction-Based Fantasy.
5. Draft-Based Fantasy
6. Multi-Sport Fantasy Platforms
Now that you know the different types of sports apps that you can invest in, let’s explore the must-have features in the application.
One of the crucial factors that influence the cost of the Fantasy Sports app is its features. Having engaging features enhances the user experience but can make the backend a bit complex and impact the scalability of the digital platform. We have listed the basic and premium features below to understand what it takes to surge in app development costs.
Since this is the user interface, it needs to be highly engaging and flawless. Here is the list of the features that make users fall for it.
This is the primary feature that allows users to log into their sports application. To make it swifter, you can integrate various methods for logging in, such as social media, phone number, and email address. Additionally, ensure that you have two-factor authentication and OTP-based login to enhance the security of the application.
Cost impact: A basic login doesn’t cost much, but implementing a social and secure login process raises development time and costs.
The home screen is essential, as it displays upcoming tournaments, current contests, sports categories, promotions, and offers. You can even add filters and a quick access feature to connect to relevant games.
Cost impact: A dynamic and customized dashboard increases design time and backend logic.
Another important feature of the Fantasy Sports App is that users can easily enter any public contest or even create private leagues to compete internally with their group of friends. It includes entry fee management and event size configurations.
Cost impact: Real-time contest syncing and managing privacy controls increase backend complexity.
Users would be able to draft players, build or edit teams before deadlines, and view each player’s stats. For better user experience, you can enable auto-saving drafts, player availability updates, and salary caps.
Cost impact: Since users would require live status, the app needs to be built with built-in APIs that enable swift integration. It can influence the costing of your Sports app.
The app needs to have a digital wallet built in. It manages all your transactions like deposits, withdrawals, winnings, and promo codes. For this, you need to have payment gateway integration, such as PayPal, Stripe, or Razorpay.
Cost impact: Integrating a payment gateway raises the cost of developing a Fantasy sports mobile app.
The backend is the spinal cord of how users interact with your Fantasy sports application. It manages content, business logic, and users.
The admin panel has the authority to suspend accounts based on user behavior, track user activity, and respond promptly to any queries. They also have access to KYC verification and fraud detection tools.
Cost impact: The database design and role-based access control surge influence the application’s cost.
When it comes to game management, everything depends on the backend. The more robust a backend system is, the better and more seamless the frontend. Admins can add, edit, or remove contests, manage prizes, and design match parameters. With the backend, users will be able to receive real-time updates about live contests.
Cost impact: Gaming platforms require custom dashboards and real-time syncing, which can increase the cost.
The payment and revenue analytics dashboard display user earnings, payouts, commission reports, and wallet balances. It can generate custom reports and monitor key revenue metrics.
Cost impact: This requires a couple of integrations with third-party platforms that may increase the cost.
You can even ask software developers to build a push notification feature that lets you send promotional offers, real-time match updates, and user alerts to your customers. Ensure it is customized to give your customers an inclusive feel.
Cost impact: Personalization and advanced targeting can increase the cost.
If you want to stand out from the rest of the Fantasy Sports apps available on the market, then make sure to build the following features in your gaming app. It enhances experience, fosters trust due to high chances of winning, and bonds customers for life.
You can integrate SportRadar, CricAPI, or RapidAPI to display real-time scores, player performance, and match updates.
Cost impact: Licensing APIs and maintaining low-latency data handling is quite expensive.
Another vital yet premium feature is to help users select a team and pick players. You can integrate an AI-backed feature that allows users to investigate players’ stats and performance cards.
Cost impact: The development requires hiring a data scientist and dedicated AI model integration, which increases the cost of the Fantasy Sports App.
You can allow users to chat internally during live contests and track rankings in real-time. As a result, it enhances engagement and competitiveness.
Cost impact: For such development, WebSockets integration and high-performance servers are necessary
You can enable multi-language and currency support, allowing users to select their preferred language and currency easily. This way, you can attract users worldwide.
Cost impact: This may significantly increase the cost, as it requires content localization, exchange rate APIs, and international APIs.
Not only are there features, but several factors also contribute to the cost of Fantasy sports app development. Let’s look at it.
How much will it cost to develop a fantasy sports app, which includes figuring out several factors? These factors are the elements that remain to be considered in the costing process, so take note of each one.
The platform choice is the primary factor to consider when developing a Sports app. If you opt for native app development, your app will offer friction-free performance, but it also increases the cost. Another cost-effective method is to develop a cross-platform application that requires only a single codebase.
For example, an iOS-only native app would cost between $25,000 and $35,000, while a cross-platform app (working on both platforms) would cost around $30,000. The cost may vary; these are just hypothetical figures.
You can always opt for basic and minimal designs that craft a simple layout, making it easier for users to access. With an upgraded layout, you can incorporate gamification, customization, and animation; however, this raises the development cost.
Another factor to consider is building backend infrastructure that offers scores, rankings, and contest data promptly. You can even integrate cloud services to handle voluminous data and many users, especially during live matches.
The sports app primarily relies on third-party platforms, including payment gateways, live scores APIs, and social logins. Having such integration makes functionalities better, but requires licensing and implementation costs.
Who and where you develop matters the most when it comes to calculating app development costs. While freelancers usually charge, they often lack accountability, support, and scalability. Additionally, there is no security. In-house is another option, but if you are an entrepreneur looking to develop an app once, this recommendation may not be suitable for you. You must find a software outsourcing partner to build your app and provide maintenance and support as needed. Lastly, hiring software developers from India (or elsewhere in the US) would be a cost-effective option.
Now that you know which external factors influence the cost of fantasy sports app development, let’s also understand the development phase costs.
Building a fantasy sports app doesn’t only suffice; it should offer value to users in terms of experience. That’s where they will be ready to spend on your app. We have listed some effective monetization models:
Let users play for free but pay for advanced features like:
Users love applications that engage them and decide to be a part of them for life. And what’s better than having a Fantasy Sports application that transforms the way users interact with it? Such an application glues users and compels them to come back due to its multilingual and prize-winning features. Investors could capitalize on these opportunities and the growing demand. If you feel like trying your luck with a fantasy sports mobile application, now is the right time to connect with a promising sports app development company.
Our software developers are upskilled with cutting-edge technology that allows users to participate in different games with awesome interfaces and engaging experiences. Connect and let us know your requirements, and we will let you know exactly how much it will cost to develop a fantasy sports app.
You can start with the following things to make your fantasy sports app at a budget-friendly rate:
The development cost ranges from $25,000 to $35,000+:
Typically, it takes around 3 to 6 months. However, if you are just focusing on launching quickly, you can opt for MVP development that gets ready within 8–12 weeks. On the other hand, a full-fledged app with real-time features and admin panel takes around 16–24 weeks. The timelines depend on feature complexity, team size, and tech stack used.
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