The top custom software development companies exhibit strong technical expertise, project management skills, and have the ability to produce high-quality solutions for businesses across industries and platforms.
Our experts have identified the global leaders in this space. Here are the top three:
Altar.io is an award-winning product development company with offices in London and Lisbon. The company provides custom software, web and mobile development services to startups and corporations worldwide.
Featured Clients: AlixPartners, Apiax.com, Systemorph.com, Teezler.com
Syberry specializes in software, mobile, and product development. The company has built over 250 custom software solutions for over 150 corporate clients in a variety of sectors, from healthcare to entertainment.
Featured Clients: Shell, THG, Livestream, PayPal, Walt Disney
itCraft delivers high-end mobile and software development services to clients in various industries, from healthcare to logistics and fintech. Their teams are specialized in Android, iOS and full-stack web development.
Featured Clients: Deloitte Digital, Sodexo, DHL, Rossmann
California based software development company with over than 10 years experience. Their team of highly skilled professionals provide end to end solutions from system architect, prototyping to the beta release and QA.
Featured Clients: Kurtis Hewson, Boris Roche, Phix, Fooder, PetPlan
Experts in end-to-end custom software development. Supporting Fortune 500 to startups with SaaS, mobile and custom applications solutions in a healthcare, education, marketing and financial industries.
Featured Clients: Epion Health, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Verizon Media
A custom software development company conceptualizes and develops platforms, programs or digital solutions to meet their clients’ specific business requirements.
These companies usually create custom solutions to improve businesses’ workflows, optimizing their productivity.
Their robust targeting and personalization help you improve customer engagement and conversion rates while increasing your revenue as well.
For instance, the average ROI for custom CRM solutions alone is $8.71 for every $1 spent.
And that return on investment is, of course, not limited to just CRM, but other types of custom solutions as well.
Top Custom Software Development Companies design, create, deploy, and maintain solutions for a specific set of users, functions, and organizations.
Some of the services they offer include:
Custom products can be created by an in-house team of developers, or it can be outsourced to a 3rd-party service provider.
The terms custom-written and custom software mean exactly the same: solutions developed specifically for your brand only.
However, it is easy to confuse them with customizable off-the-shelf solutions.
Off-the-shelf -or readymade- solutions are generalized stock software that can be somewhat personalized provided a business purchases its licenses.
However, those small personalizations cannot compare with the benefits of custom solutions.
In addition, off-the-shelf solutions typically require licensing fees in perpetuity for the duration of its use.
Therefore, although off-the-shelf solutions may seem cheaper initially, those long-term costs can ultimately make it more expensive than custom solutions, which have higher upfront fees, but often lower long-term costs.
The cost of building custom solutions can vary drastically, based on:
However, there are some commonplace pricing structures that can help businesses build a generalized budget for their development projects.
On average:
If you are still not sure whether you should invest in custom-built solutions, go through the following signs and decide for yourself:
Wondering why you should invest time and money into tailored solutions when the commercial ones are readily available to use at a much lower cost?
These are the advantages of working with a custom software development company:
This means that unlike off-the-shelf or packaged solutions, you can ask your partner to include specific features and even exclude some that you don’t need.
With off-the-shelf solutions what you see is what you get. And, if it happens to miss a certain functionality or features that will be useful to you, well, tough luck.
According to Small Biz Club, brands should not buy the false promise of off-the-shelf solutions because they are too bland to be effective.
Another problem with commercial solutions is that it’s entirely up to the company that developed it to decide how long it is going to maintain it.
Unfortunately, users don’t have much say in this. If, for instance, Microsoft decides out of the blue to discontinue support for Office 365, then that’s it.
A software developer, on the other hand, will update and maintain your product until you need to use it.
Even if the off-the-shelf solutions are, at the start, just what your business needs, don’t expect this to last. Companies grow and, with them, their software requirements as well. At some point, you will see that commercial software can’t cope with the increasingly heavy load.
Custom-built solutions are much more flexible in this regard and are, therefore, better able to scale and evolve with your business.
The primary goal of the off-the-shelf software developers is to sell as many licenses as possible.
Unfortunately, individual users and their problems quickly lose their importance with this approach.
For top custom software developers, users are always important. Since your business is likely the only one to use this particular software, they can focus all their attention on it via top-notch technical support.
In the Security Considerations in Managing COTS Software report, the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) identifies several key risk factors of COTS (Commercial Off-the-Shelf) solutions.
These include:
All of this makes off-the-shelf solutions much more vulnerable than custom-built ones
Does it mean that custom-built solutions are 100% safe and secure from external threats?
No, but at least not every hacker under the blue sky will attempt to probe your software.
Automation is not always possible with off-the-shelf solutions. However, as you’ll no doubt learn, certain workflows are infinitely more efficient when automated.
Each organization is unique and their processes are too. What better way to automate than with solutions tailored to your specific needs?
Not only does every organization has its own requirements, but very often those between different departments can clash with each other.
Custom development makes the integration between different departments within an organization and their applications much easier, which in turn promotes better collaboration.
Choosing the right software partner for your project is crucial for project success. Hire the wrong one, and you could face delayed timelines, higher costs and wasted energy.
Luckily, there are two key qualities to keep in mind that will help you choose the best developers for your upcoming project:
Not all development services are created equal.
Selecting the right agency requires careful consideration. You can’t improvise this decision.
A wrong choice can set your project weeks or months back, and cost you more than a pretty penny.
Here are several factors that will help you pick the right partner for your brand:
When looking for a development partner, it is important to determine if they fit your requirements and your management style.
There are several factors here that you should consider, such as:
These are just a few major questions that will help you understand which of the top custom software development companies is the right fit for you.
Software companies specialize in various technologies, types of services, and solutions.
Look for the ones that highlight the services that you need, whether it is consulting, architecture, programming, or end-to-end development.
Look for the companies that specialize in the technologies your solution requires.
Research their portfolios and interview past clients to evaluate their level of competence.
A little research into the company’s past work will not only tell you whether they have the required experience, but also that they are easy to work with.
Previous industry experience can significantly improve the quality of your solutions, as well as accelerate the delivery of your project.
The logic is simple: The more your partner understands your target market and competition, the better they can meet your needs.
So, go through the portfolios of the potential firms and see what projects they have worked on.