How to Make a Rideshare App Like Uber (Steps + Cost)

Travis Kalanick, a founder of Uber, quotes, “We want transportation as reliable as running water.”

That idea has reshaped urban mobility. In 2025, ridesharing apps have become the backbone of modern transportation, helping millions book, share, and pay for rides with just a few taps. 

According to Grand View Research, the global ridesharing app development market is projected to reach USD 96.9 billion by 2030, growing at a 13.7% CAGR. 

For taxi businesses, this digital transformation presents a major opportunity to evolve. Developing your own ridesharing app lets you streamline operations, expand your reach, and stay competitive in a fast-moving market.

Space-O Technologies is a leading mobile app development company in Canada that has been helping startups, enterprises, and Fortune 500 companies with app development services since 2018. 

With our years of experience, we’ve created this guide that covers everything from initial concept to market launch. By the end of this guide, you will learn:

• How to make a ride-sharing app in 7 steps
• How much does it cost to create your own ridesharing app?
• How to make money using ride-sharing apps
• Learn to market your own ride-sharing app

Let’s dive in!

The Outstanding Growth of Ride-sharing Apps

The ride sharing app market has experienced explosive growth, creating unprecedented opportunities for entrepreneurs entering the ride hailing app development space.

• As mentioned in the MacroTrends, Uber generated $47 B in revenue in 2025, a 18.15% increase year-over-year.
• Based on the report from MacroTrends, Lyft reached $6 B in revenue, a 19.94% increase from the previous year.
• Asia-Pacific commands 49.3% of global rideshare market share in 2024 (Source: Grand View Research)
• Ride-sharing app platforms using AI-powered pricing see 15-25% revenue increases and 30% faster pickup times( Source: ModorIntelligence)

From the above statistics, you must have noticed the outstanding growth of ride-sharing apps. This brings an opportunity for all the entrepreneurs who want to build a ride-sharing app. Now, let’s check the step-by-step process of how to build a rideshare app.

How to Create Your Own Rideshare App in 7 Steps

In this section, you will learn the process to develop ride sharing app. We will take you through all the steps and explain everything in detail. Check these steps of how to create a rideshare app that helps you with your question about how to start a rideshare business. Let’s check the first step below.

Step 1. Conduct market research for your rideshare app

Before jumping into ride sharing app development, start with a detailed market analysis.

1. Make a list of the best ridesharing apps available in the market. 
2. After that, check the app store ratings and reviews to find out loopholes in existing applications. Generally, app users share their requirements and challenges in the feedback section. It allows you to plan for your ride sharing app development in a better way.
3. Study all the ridesharing applications to understand the flow and their work functions.  You can check the taxi app features and UI and UX for your application. Also, look for the mistakes made by your competitors. All these things will help you to find the opportunity to make your app successful in your target markets.
4. The next step is to understand your target audience. Your target audience belongs to a specific group who are likely to consume your product or avail of your services.

Let’s take a simple example, GoKid is a carpool app software solution made for families, schools, and teammates. This carpooling helps school children and teammates to book rides and travel along with familiar people. Whereas it allows users to manage the day-to-day transportation schedules.

Now, from the above example, you got the idea that GoKid is for family members, school authorities and students, and office professionals.

Afterward, you need to identify your target audience’s requirements. The following points will help you to determine your target audience requirements:

• Identify the market trends to know your user’s requirements
  
• Conduct market surveys to make strategic decisions
  
• Look at the social media platforms of your competitors to learn their strategies

This will help you get a better understanding of ride sharing business software app available in the market. Besides, you get to know the competition in the market.

Step 2. Choose the right platform for building carpooling apps

When building a ridesharing or carpooling app, one of the first technical decisions is choosing the right platform and tech stack. Your choice determines development time, cost, performance, and future scalability.

Let’s break it down by platform type, device type, and recommended technologies for better understanding.

Platform selection: Native vs cross-platform

Your rideshare app’s success depends on whether you go Native or Cross-platform. Both have pros and cons based on your goals, timeline, and audience.

Aspect	Native App Development	Cross-Platform App Development (React Native / Flutter)
Definition	Built for a single OS (Android or iOS) using platform-specific languages.	Single codebase that runs on both Android and iOS platforms.
Languages Used	Kotlin/Java (Android), Swift/Objective-C (iOS)	Dart (Flutter), JavaScript/TypeScript (React Native)
Performance	Best performance and access to device APIs.	Slightly lower, but optimized for modern devices.
Development Time	Longer — separate builds for each OS.	Faster — single build for both platforms.
Development Cost	Higher — two separate codebases.	Lower — one shared codebase.
Best For	Complex, high-performance apps like Uber.	MVPs or startups testing product-market fit.
Example Use Case	Large-scale ride sharing app software development.	Quick launch for new carpooling app development.

Device selection based on location

Your target market and device preference also influence the platform you choose. For example, Android dominates in Europe, while iOS leads in North America.

Region	Dominant Device Type	Suggested Platform Focus
North America	iOS	Focus on iOS Native or Flutter (cross-platform)
Europe	Android	Focus on Android Native or React Native
Asia-Pacific	Android	Android-first or cross-platform
Global Reach	Both iOS & Android	Choose Flutter or React Native for scalability

Moreover, you can also conduct market surveys in your targeted region to know the choice of your customers. Overall, through data, you will be able to make better decisions for your app.

Step 3. Decide the key features for ride sharing app solution

While creating your own best rideshare app software, one of the important aspects to consider is the features. It allows you to offer better conveniences to your users when they use your mobile application.

Generally, a ride sharing application like Grab or Lyft is divided into three sections, driver, customer, and admin side. Therefore, we have bifurcated features into different categories to make it easier for you.

Driver App	Passenger App	Admin Panel
Registration & profile management	User registration & profile	Booking management
Real-time trip notifications	Ride booking	Location management
Navigation & route optimization (AI-powered)	Real-time tracking	Trip fares & dynamic pricing management
Messaging & calling with passengers	Ride history & receipts	Driver verification system
Rating and reviews	In-app payments (Stripe, PayPal)	Notification management
Waiting time tracking	Book for others	Promotion and discount management
AI-based demand prediction	Push notifications	Payroll & commission management
Fraud detection alerts	Ride scheduling (book for later)	Data analytics dashboard
Driver background verification	Split payments with friends	Corporate billing dashboard
Insurance & liability details	Multi-stop rides	Travel policy compliance
Accessibility settings	Favorite drivers	Employee expense management
SOS button & emergency contact sharing	Safety alerts & live location sharing	AI-based fraud & safety monitoring
–	AI chatbot for customer support	Intelligent driver-passenger matching

Step 4. Choose the right tech stack for ride sharing app development

Selecting the right technology stack is one of the most crucial decisions in ride sharing app software development. The right stack ensures your app’s scalability, performance, and security while also allowing flexibility for new features as your business grows.

Before finalizing, analyze which technology stacks work best for mobile carpooling app development, based on your project size, target devices, and performance goals.

Category	Technologies
Frontend (Mobile Frameworks)	Swift, SwiftUI, Kotlin, Jetpack Compose, Flutter, React Native
Backend Frameworks	Node.js, Python (Django, Flask), Ruby on Rails
Databases	PostgreSQL, MongoDB, Redis
Cloud Infrastructure	AWS, Google Cloud, Microsoft Azure
APIs & Integrations	Google Maps, Mapbox, Stripe, PayPal, Braintree, Firebase, OneSignal
AI & ML Tools	TensorFlow, AWS AI, Azure ML
Automation & Testing	Appium, Selenium, BrowserStack
Security & Compliance	OAuth 2.0, SSL Encryption, GDPR Compliance
Analytics & Monitoring	Mixpanel, Firebase Analytics, Google Analytics

Step 5: Hire a custom ride share app development company

To develop the product, you need to hire a custom ride-share app development company like Space-O Technologies. We have hands-on experience in ride-sharing app development and have successfully delivered on-demand mobility solutions for clients across various industries.

Hiring an experienced ridesharing app development company helps you execute your idea into a reality by developing a full-fledged product. A professional Android app development and iOS app development agency like Space-O Technologies understands the competitive mobility market and can efficiently address challenges to meet your unique requirements.

The benefit of partnering with a custom ride share app development company is that you get all the required resources under one roof. Moreover, developers have specific expertise in AI/ML, real-time systems, and payment gateway integration to build a scalable product. They can even provide valuable insights to enhance the overall development process and user experience.

So, if you are looking for dedicated app developers in Canada, connect with us to leverage our expertise in ride-sharing app development.

Step 6. Create wireframe and UI/UX of the rideshare app

The purpose of developing a wireframe is to know the workflow of the app. Making a wireframe helps to have an idea of the design of the final product. Also helps you to build the basic foundation of your app. Here is the image to understand how the wireframe helps.

You get clarity on whether your application screen layout meets the objective, usability, and flow according to your expectations or not. Moreover, it allows you to create a visual understanding of the app.

Before designing the UI/UX of your product, wireframing helps to build the initial level design of the product. Rectifying the issues in the wireframing saves your time during the development phase. Once your wireframe is ready, the designing process gets started.

UI/UX design is the essential factor. You will be required to choose the perfect design for an app that is attractive and makes you stand out from the competitors.

The importance of creating an attractive, seamless and user-friendly interface helps your users in navigation. Creating a smooth UX for your users requires different mobile app design tools which are mentioned in the following image.

Here, making an effortless UI won’t let your users struggle using your app. Thus, it will likely create an impact on users to download the application for personal benefits. Furthermore, you can read our complete guide on the UI/UX trends.

Step 7. Development of the custom ridesharing app

If you are looking to develop an application with minimum features or a limited budget, you can create a ride-sharing MVP version of your application.

MVP refers to a minimum viable product that intends to make a product with maximum research on customers’ needs that includes minimum efforts. Here are the purposes of MVP that you need to know before you start your ride-share app development.

How Does MVP Help You in Executing a Business Idea?

The purpose of developing the MVP of the product is to create an app with a small budget and essential features. Once you launch the MVP of your app in the ridesharing market, it allows you to gain valuable feedback from the customers and improve your car sharing app further in the long run. If you want to know more about developing the MVP of the app, then you can surely read our guide on the minimum viable product.

Step 8. Quality testing and car ridesharing app deployment

After the development of ridesharing applications with basic features, the QA team of a mobile application development agency performs testing. The purpose of testing is to check whether the application performs according to your requirements or not.

Once the QA team performs all the test cases and errors get resolved by developers, the application is released in app stores like Google Play Store and Apple App Store. These app stores may review your mobile application and take 48 hours to release your mobile application into its store.

Also, you might need to maintain your app once it is launched, or you will need to integrate essential features. It enhances your app and helps you to get success in the long run. This helps to keep the application quality top-notch for your users.

As we have learned the step-by-step process of how to create a rideshare app for your taxi services business, now we’re going to know the estimated cost of creating a ride-hailing app like Lyft or BlaBlaCar.

How Much Does It Cost to Create a Rideshare App?

To give you an exact idea of the ridesharing app development cost, we have listed down the table of features with its hours and cost.

You can use the formula to get the cost estimation to build a rideshare app. Multiple hourly rates of the mobile app developer to the time required for the development of a mobile application. The answer you get is the final cost of mobile app development.

Let’s take an example to understand this better:

Suppose a developer charges $30 per hour, then multiply it by the hours of each app.

• Driver App: $30 X 200 = $6000
• User App: $30 X $240 = $7200
• Admin Panel: $ 30 X 160 = $4800
• Webservices API: $30 X 200 = $6000

Additionally, you need to know the cost to develop an application like Lyft depends on the following factors:

Cost to hire rideshare app developers

Generally, the cost of rideshare app development solution or any mobile app development depends on the developers you hire. The charges of rideshare app developers can be different according to their locations. Here’s the table to give you a brief idea about mobile app developers’ per hour cost of four different locations.

The following image will help you to understand the app development cost by different geographical locations.

Now, if you are looking for the best ways to make money using ridesharing apps, then check the next section.

How to Make Money Using Ride-sharing Apps?

Choosing a monetization model is essential to grow your ride share business and generate profits out of it. Deciding on a rideshare or carpool business model helps you to cut future costs. Here are the three business models.

1. Commission model

   A commission-based module is a well-known module amongst ridesharing apps. In this module, service fees are charged from each payment transaction. For example, Lyft charges 20% from the drivers for each ride.

2. Partnering model

   Making partnerships with more vehicles opens the opportunity for more earnings and offers a variety of vehicles to customers. Thus, Grab partnered with the Hyundai Motor Group to accelerate the EV adoption models in Southeast Asia.

3. Advertising model

   Advertising refers to running third-party apps ads in your app to earn nominal revenue. Generally, most carsharing apps are not using this type of model because of the fear of losing customers. Showing a frequent number of advertisements can lead to losing customers.

Once you select the monetization strategy, it helps you to generate more revenue from your app. Now, the next part that comes is to market your carpooling app development solution. It will help you to build awareness among users to know about your application.

Market Your Own Ride-sharing App

When you launch a car sharing app like Gett or develop your own rideshare platform, you need to plan strategic marketing campaigns from the start. Effective promotion is as important as the development itself to make your app stand out in a competitive market. Below are some proven ways to market your ridesharing product after development.

1. Referrals

   Offer referral programs to attract new users when promoting your ride sharing user app development solutions. For example, Uber’s referral program rewarded users with free rides for inviting friends, a simple yet powerful way to scale user acquisition for your custom ride share app.

2. Partnerships

   Collaborate with automotive or tech companies to build credibility and expand your audience reach. Lyft’s partnership with Waymo for self-driving cars is a great example. Strategic partnerships not only grow your user base but also enhance the overall value of your car sharing app development initiative.

3. A loyalty program

   Introduce customer loyalty programs to encourage repeat use. Uber, one of the top ridesharing app development services success stories, runs its “Uber VIP” program for loyal riders with exclusive rewards and premium benefits. Building similar loyalty mechanisms can fuel word-of-mouth growth and user retention for your app.By implementing these marketing strategies effectively, you can boost visibility, engagement, and trust when working with a custom ride share app development company like Space-O Technologies.
   

Now, we will move further to check the 3 best ridesharing mobile apps that are primarily famous for their services.

3 Best Ridesharing Apps

Now, we have listed the top ride-sharing apps based on popularity from which you can learn and make an app with unique features in your mind. Let’s check them out.

Still, do you have any doubts car sharing apps? You can check out our frequently asked questions for car sharing app development.

Take Your Ride Sharing Business Online

Ridesharing apps have made transportation easier for people and also become beneficial for the environment. Moreover, it brings benefits to the users and car owners by reducing the tip cost and saving fuel. In addition, it is widely used amongst users.

As you have learned about the process and understood the steps, now you have an idea about how you can build your own rideshare app. Uber, Lyft, and BlaBlaCar are the leading ridesharing and carpooling apps in the market to compete with.

Have an idea for creating a rideshare app? We have an expert team of developers and designers who have years of experience in developing applications. Approach us today. We are a leading software development company in Canada and have completed 100 projects successfully. Fill out the query form below and get in touch with us to convert your idea into reality.