Pet Care App Development in 2023: Key Types, Features and Cost

Interest is rising in pet care app development services, from both startups and established businesses around the world. The key reason is that today’s pet owners perceive their role differently than they might have years ago; pets are typically viewed as family members, and their owners do their best to ensure their well-being and high quality of life. Software solutions can help them do this. In a previously published blog post, we analyzed the rising popularity of software products for the pet industry in more detail. In this article, we’ll take a look at the latest trends in pet tech and highlight the most popular features of these solutions.

The global pet tech market is expanding rather quickly. It is expected that by 2028, its size will hit the $20 billion mark, up from just over $5 billion in 2021. This means that over the period 2022 to 2028, the market will have grown at a CAGR of 20%.

Of course, the COVID-19 pandemic and financial instability of many households negatively affected market development, but in the second part of 2021, the market managed to return to normal. Now it continues its expansion and is being greatly boosted by user demand for solutions that allow pet parents to monitor the state and mood of their pets remotely, along with general IoT adoption in many countries.

If you’re thinking about pet care app development, the first thing you’ll need to decide on is its type. Classifications can vary, but we suggest considering the following.

• Pet training apps

Sometimes people hire professionals to help them train their dogs or other pets, but this can be costly. A pet training app can help by offering video instruction, images, and tips for training animals, or even provide access to online chats with pet training experts. Such applications can also let users track their pets’ progress and plan the next lessons.

• Pet walking apps

These software products help to track walking distance, speed, and stops, and allow users to plan routes and set goals. Usually, such applications are enriched with GPS tracking functionality for precise location monitoring. A dog walking app can motivate people to pay more attention not only to their pets’ activity but also to their own health.

• Pet tracking apps

This is one of the most popular and common software solutions for pet owners. A pet tracking app can be very similar to a fitness tracker connected to a fitness bracelet or smartwatch. In the case of pet care app development, such solutions are connected to collars or other wearables and can help to monitor the pet’s activity, quality of sleep, and even vital factors such as heart rate.

• Pet health solutions

As you can guess from the name, these apps help track the state of a pet’s health. These software products can be enriched with features such as the ability to store all vet documentation in one place, access to online consultations with specialists, or planning pets’ diets. There are separate apps for owners of pets with chronic diseases, such as a pet diabetes tracker app.

• Networking applications

These applications are targeted to pet owners who want to find new friends with similar interests or find friends for their pets. These apps are similar to typical social media apps and help to establish new connections, communicate with others, share photos, leave comments, etc. Via a pet social networking app, pet owners can find valuable information about pet care, vet clinics, shops for pets, etc.

• eCommerce apps

Such solutions are familiar to smartphone users. The core difference from other eCommerce apps is that they are focused exclusively on products for pets and their owners. Usually, they allow users to find a desired item, compare similar products, place orders, conduct payments and track delivery.

To create a good mobile pet care app, it’s important to understand what functionality users expect. We’ve analyzed the market and prepared a list of features that are required today.

• User account (or pet profile)

The profile should contain all the most important information about a pet, including its name, type, breed, age, weight, color, health data, vaccination and sterilization dates. It is important to make these fields customizable and to ensure the possibility of adding several pets.

• Document storage

Any pet owner will find it convenient to have a single place for storing all documents related to pets, including health and ownership documentation. By storing this information in an app, users can quickly get access to any document.

• Real-time dashboard

Information available on the main screen will differ depending on the type of app. For example, it can show the real-time location of your pet, notifications about upcoming vet visits, or the latest feeding time.

• Feeding monitoring

This is one of the most popular features of pet care apps. It allows users to create a diet plan for their pets, indicate portions, calculate calories, and indicate any allergic reactions pets may have.

• Chat with veterinarians

Apps can provide quick and easy contact with vets in case of an emergency. You can add various methods for interacting with specialists: via online chat, voice, or video calls.

• Activity tracker

This feature helps people monitor the time of their pets’ activities, the distance and time of their walks, view the history, and analyze statistics.

The above-mentioned features are just hints for you. If you have your own unique ideas, it will be cool to use them in your custom pet care app.

Pet care mobile app development, like developing any software solution, involves a series  of challenges a project team should be aware of.

• Security issues. Many pet care apps today rely on IoT technologies that are vulnerable to hacker attacks and data loss. Given the fact that such apps deal with a lot of sensitive and private data, it is very important to think about proper app protection.
• Connectivity issues. Again, here we are talking about using wearables and other devices. Developers building a pet care mobile app don’t always have access to these devices. As a result, it can be difficult to ensure proper connectivity and data exchange.
• Costs. As competition heats up in the pet tech market, app owners want to enrich their solutions with the most cutting-edge features. That, of course, affects development costs. When the budget is rather limited, it is difficult to find a golden middle between a good price and the required functionality.

It’s difficult to give any precise figures without analyzing the peculiarities and complexity of your project. When clients come to us with their ideas, we always carefully analyze their requirements and provide them with estimates. Several factors have the largest influence on a final cost:

• Tools and technologies that will be used;
• The required functionality;
• The number of specialists that will be involved in the project;
• The time needed to build an app.

Usually, the cost of mobile app development varies from $15,000 to $100,000 depending on all the above-mentioned factors. If you want to build a mobile pet care app, the price range will be the same.

Our team portfolio already includes a series of successfully released pet tech products. We’ll mention a couple.

The first is Dog Tracker Nano. It is a feature-rich mobile app for smart dog collars with GPS trackers. Our task was to redesign the mobile app our client already had, to ensure full native performance on both iOS and Android devices and to add new innovative features. The app now allows users to track daily walks, store their history, and monitor dogs’ activity. It’s possible to set goals and see whether they’re achieved.

It also has features that let pet owners build virtual fences to provide a restricted safe zone for dogs. When a dog leaves such a zone, the owner is notified. Users can add several dogs to one account and also can set shared access to the app so that all family members can look after their dog.

The second app we’ll mention is StepUp Horse. This IoT app is designed to monitor the vital parameters of horses during training. Our client was a company that creates special devices placed on the horse’s abdomen and can monitor training factors such as heart rate, speed, distance, and breathing, which makes this solution completely unique.

Racehorse owners and trainers can monitor the data in real time on their smartwatches and get access to statistics and history via their mobile phones. This solution is meant to ensure better racehorse care and increase the efficacy and safety of training.

As with any other software project, pet care app development has its peculiarities that you should bear in mind, whether you want to build a pet matchmaking app or a pet exercise tracker, or an app of any other type. Keep in mind users’ key expectations and current trends to make sure your app wows its future audience. 

If you don’t have prior experience in this sphere, it’s crucial to have a reliable partner with the required expertise by your side. And if you are already looking for such a team, we are ready to help you! Our developers deeply understand the needs of the pet tech market and will be able to build an app that wins the hearts of potential users. Just contact us and share your ideas with our experts.