Create A Video Streaming App: Features, Tech Stack, Costs, and Tips¶
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Have you ever watched Amazon Prime videos, Netflix, or YouTube? If yes, then you must know the concept. Are you obsessed with these streaming videos? Don’t you find it a little addictive to watch series one after one? Indeed, it is!
In recent years, live video streaming apps have created a buzz in the industry and have taken the media world by storm. With thousands of apps to choose from in every imaginable category. It has not only replaced traditional television shows with streaming apps, but also made people addicted to watching videos of their choice at their preferred time.
The popularity of video streaming apps keeps increasing with each passing day, inspiring enterprises to adopt this concept and get an entry into the most thriving industry.
“According to a report by Statista, the global live video streaming market is expected to grow from 30.29 billion in 2020 to 106.19 billion by 2025.”
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“That’s a compound annual growth rate of 32.2%.” The report also found that the Asia-Pacific region is expected to be the fastest-growing market, with a CAGR of 38.4%.”
“80% of Americans say they would rather watch videos than read blogs.”
“It is expected that the on-demand video app market will be worth $73.9 billion by 2024.”
However, when it comes to top markets, North America will remain the largest market over the next five years, but Latin America and Africa are expected to post significant gains.
With all these market perspectives of live streaming videos, it is clear that this market is becoming a promising place to get enter with a well-thought application.
So if you’ve already made up your mind to create a live video streaming app, then you must be excited to know: “How much does it cost? What are the most important features to include? Where can you hire a mobile app developer? How long does it take to launch an app? What technologies do you need to consider for building a full-fledged video streaming app?. “
In this article, we will look at how to develop your own live video streaming app, what it takes to do so, and offer some tips on how to ensure your live video streaming app is successful in its development and launch stage.
So here are the key highlights of this blog:
- What are the basics of developing a live video streaming app?
- What type of live video streaming app should you build?
- How to Create a Winning Video Streaming App like Netflix or Hulu?
- Must-Have Features of Creating a Live Streaming App
- Tech-Stack Required To Create a Live Video Streaming App
- How Much Does It Cost to Build a Video Streaming App?
- Conclusion: How to Set a Benchmark with a Live Video Streaming App?
Let’s get into the depth of each point:
What are the Basics of Developing a Live Video Streaming App?¶
When it comes to live streaming app development, there are a few different approaches a broadcaster can take. With businesses having plenty of freedom when it comes to how they want their app to work and what features to include.
However, the choice of creating an app should be kept as simple and as straightforward as possible. Though you can hire an app developer to simplify this task, still it’s important to identify the key aspects of creating one before you start coding up your own live streaming application.
The major basics of creating a video streaming app are : video streaming API, live streaming SDK, and HTML5 video players.
Now let’s decide what type of streaming app you need to develop…
What Type of Live Video Streaming App Should You Build?¶
Before you start the process of developing a live streaming app, you need to decide what type of app you want to create. Do you want to create a live streaming platform for businesses or for general users?
There are different features and costs associated with each type of app, so it’s important to make this decision early on. For example, if you’re creating an app for business use, the cost will be higher than if you’re making an app just for social media users. In addition, one has the ability to monetize the live video stream through in-app purchases, while the other is focused more on user engagement.
1. Live Broadcasting App¶
A live broadcasting app lets you share live video content with your audience in real-time. This can be a great way to connect with your audience and build a following. When developing a live broadcasting app, there are a few key things to keep in mind.
First,you will need to hire a mobile app developer who will help you determine the features you want to include. Second, you’ll need to consider the costs of development and hosting. Finally, you’ll need to create a marketing plan to ensure success.
Some examples are Twitch, YouTube Live, Livestream, and Periscope
2. Audio Streaming Apps¶
An audio streaming app is a mobile application that allows users to listen to audio content on the go. Audio streaming apps are popular with music lovers and podcast fans alike. With an audio streaming app, you can listen to audio being transmitted over the internet live.
Pandora, Spotify, and Apple Music are all part of this group.
3. Video On-demand Streaming app¶
A Video On-demand Streaming app, also known as an online video platform (OVP), is a platform that allows users to upload, view, and share videos. It offers a variety of features, including the ability to live stream video content, that make it popular with users and businesses alike.
Common video-on-demand (VoD) apps include Hulu, YouTube TV, and Amazon Prime Video.
No matter which type of video streaming service you have chosen to create an app for, you need to follow a standard pattern of app development.
How to Create a Winning Video Streaming App like Netflix or Hulu?¶
Now in this section, we are going to discuss the major parts of the app development process. To keep it simple and straightforward, we have mentioned a step-by-step guide to help you understand the development procedure.
Step 1: Conduct a Market Research and Determine your Requirements¶
If you want to create a live streaming app, you won’t do it based on assumptions; instead, you need to conduct an in-depth market research to understand what people actually need and what they’re actually saying. Interview potential users and ask them about any issues they’re having so you can solve those problems before starting development.
Step 2: Choose your live video streaming app platform¶
While developing a live video streaming app for your business, make sure you decide where you want to launch the app. Depending on the target market, you need to decide whether to hire a cross-platform app developer or a native app developer.
Step 3: Determine the features you want in your app¶
Depending on business requirements, decide what features and functionalities you need to implement. Complex app features would require more time for development, so make sure you choose the features wisely.
Step 4: Create a wireframe or prototype of your app.¶
You can hire a UI/UX designer to create a user-friendly interface for the app. Keep in mind that simple and easy-to-access app designs are always appreciated by the users.
Step 5: Develop the backend frontend infrastructure for your app.¶
Once you are done with wireframing and features, it’s now time to code the script. You can outsource the professional programmers to make the task easier. To create a feature-rich video streaming app, you need to hire a cross-platform app developer and a team consisting of a UI/UX designer, a QA engineer, and a project manager.
Step 6: Test and launch your app.¶
Before you launch your app into the app store, make sure you conduct a quality test to eliminate errors.
Must-Have Features to Create a Live Streaming App¶
A live streaming app lets you share real-time video with your audience. To create a successful live streaming app, you need to consider the following features:
- User Registration: A registration form needs to be created in a simple manner that will allow users to create an account, log in and use the app.
- Live video streaming: Make sure you have a feature in app that allows users to broadcast live videos for people who subscribe to their account.
- Search — A search function that allows users to search for content based on topics, popularity, trends, channels, locations or interests.
- User Profile — While creating a video streaming app, make sure you have a feature that shows the user’s personal information and profile picture to friends and subscribers.
- Push notifications: Allow the app to push notifications to users when an interesting stream of content is being broadcasted.
- Social media integration: Signing up for an account has never been easier! With just one touch of a button, you’re connected to all of your social media.
- Commenting and Rating: Live-streaming apps thrive off of social engagement. A good idea would be to include a comment and rating system, so that users can leave feedback on the video they are watching.
- Live chat: Many live streaming apps allow users to have an in-app chat box that allows them to connect with others during the broadcast. It’s important for viewers to feel like they’re not just watching someone perform but also conversing with them.
- Multiple Camera Angles: If you want to switch up where people are looking in order for more people who might be watching on their mobile device or desktop computer, it’s important for them to be able to see from different angles so they can keep up with what’s happening in the broadcast at all times.
- Clear Visuals: A good quality image is essential when it comes to broadcasting events and videos online, because if the visuals are too blurry or pixelated then it can cause headaches for those who are trying hard enough to just try to watch something.
These are the few basic features that you need to consider while developing a video streaming app. But if you are planning to compete with full-fledged live streaming applications like Hulu or Netflix, then you need to look for the advanced features and functionalities that add an edge to your brand.
Tech-Stack Required to Create a Live Video Streaming App¶
Are you impressed with Netflix or Hulu? Surely, the seamless processing of such complex apps can easily attract users to stay engaged with the app. So here we will relive the success mantra of developing a video streaming app like Netflix. It all depends upon the technologies that you consider using in app development and the team you hire for the development.
They help you launch an app wrapped in complex technologies that make it work flawlessly and ensure you excellent performance.
Here are the basics of tech stacks that you need to consider while developing a live streaming video:
- Programming languages: Swift, Kotlin, Java.
- Content delivery network: Cloudflare/Amazon CloudFront.
- Hosting: Amazon EC2.
- API server: Javascript’s framework -Node.js.
- Media processing platform: DaCast, Wowza.
- Streaming protocols: WebRTC, RTMP.
- Database: MySQL, Oracle.
How Much Does It Cost to Build a Video Streaming App?¶
When it comes to developing a video streaming app, your prime concern is to understand how much it costs to develop a video streaming MVP. But unfortunately, there is no simple answer to this question.
Answering this question without knowing your requirements is like putting an invalid question to the developers. But still, we try to conclude it as per the market standards based on various factors.
An accurate estimate of how much it would cost to develop a feature-rich video streaming app such as Netflix or Hulu can’t be given without evaluating the various factors involved. In order to simplify this process, we have identified some of the most important considerations when determining a final quote.
Here are the major cost-affecting factors:
- The complexity of the App: It is defined by the choice of features you are planning to integrate into your app. A great strategy when making an app is to release it with a few key features and then update it periodically. This saves you the time and money of You are adding unnecessary new features that may not interest your customer base at this point in time.
- Choice of App Platform: The platform for which you want to build the app also matters a lot. The platform that you select makes a considerable difference between the amounts, as Apple’s App Store is more expensive than Google Play. Also, if you want an app that works with all devices, you will have to pay quite a high price. That’s where a simple and cost-effective solution is to hire an app developer who can help you target both platforms by developing a single app. Since React Native is one of the most popular cross-platform app development frameworks and uses a single code base for app development, you can create an app that seamlessly runs on multiple platforms. With 70 to 80% reusable codes, you can save up to 40% on app development.
- App Design: It is no surprise then that complex designs might put a strain on your budget as well as not engage the user. The best option is to pick an intuitive UX/UI design for the app that is easy to comprehend and navigate.
- App Development Team: The location of app developers also affects the final cost. If you seek app development services in the US, you will have to spend more than what companies from India demand.
All in all, the average cost of creating a video streaming app ranges from a few thousand dollars to fifty thousand dollars, depending on the complexity of the requirements. In addition,, the simple app will take around 3 to 4 months in develop, whereas, complex app versions may take 9+ months to develop. So, before you assume these estimations as the final app development cost, it is worthwhile to discuss your project requirements with experts.
You can also opt to book a free consultation slot to get a fair estimation of the app development.
Conclusion: How to Set a Benchmark with a Live Video Streaming App?¶
Understanding and developing a video streaming service app is a challenging task for startups as well as enterprises. While it involves various technologies, features, and functionality, it is better to hire a mobile app developer that can help you build a simple app wrapped with complex features and functionalities that enables you to secure a prominent position in the market.
So if you have any ideas about developing a video streaming app and are looking for app developers, you can drop a query below or contact us!