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The Real Costs Of WordPress Plugin Development

“How much does it cost to make a WordPress plugin?” – this is the most comment question we get from our clients, after they find out that they DON’T need a custom WordPress theme, and that all the website’s functionality is actually done by plugins. Obviously, it all depends on the complexity of the plugin and professionalism of the developer. However, there are some ground rules when it comes to pricing the WP plugin development:

Hourly rate. The average price of WordPress plugin development is $15-$30/hour. I would not recommend hiring “cheap” developers. Developers charging less than $10/hour normally lack experience and they may take way more time to finish your plugin. As a result, you will actually pay more at the end. From the other hand, you’ve got expensive developers that charge $100/hour. This is also not your cup of tea. You don’t really need a Senior developer to create a simple WordPress plugin. Middle PHP developer can do it easily, at the same speed and quality as Senior developer but at a much lower price.

However, if you are looking for a complex plugin related to new payment systems, banking, security and so on, it’s better to spend more but get a high quality and secure plugin.

When we develop plugins, we assign a team or a person with the appropriate level of experience to keep prices low, development time fast, and quality high!

Fixed price. Not many clients like working on hourly bases, especially when there is no trust yet between the client and the developer. In the end, if you know nothing about development you can easily get cheated when paying hourly rate. That is why many people prefer paying fixed priced for WordPress plugin development.

The best way to know whether the price you’ve been given is good, you should look around and get quotes from several companies. But don’t look at the price alone. See what kind of extra services are offered and whether you like working with that person/company. Trust your guts!

Generally speaking, simple WordPress plugin can cost anywhere from $50 up to $900 depending on the functionality. Complex plugins related to payment and security, can cost anywhere from $500 up to $3000.

We also prefer working on a fixed project bases which removes stress from our clients as they know what they get and how much it will cost at the end.

Theme + Plugin. Developing a standalone plugin or a plugin compatible with specific theme(s) is a different story. Standalone plugins are normally cheap, but they may have some compatibility issues. Standalone WP plugin development is only good for simple functionality that will work with almost any theme. However, if you have a specific theme you need plugin for, it will be more expensive and it will take a little bit more time to finish as you have to consider theme’s native functionality.

We normally use a special white label theme that is not only easy to use, but also has a great documentation for plugin development. This means we can create any kind of plugin/functionality that you want fast and cost-effective.

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