Many people living in towns or less developed areas have migrated to urban areas or metro cities. For instance, people moving from Nagpur to Mumbai or Carmel to San Francisco. People certainly get inspired by the high rises and the magical-looking silhouettes that make the nights beautiful. However, what happens due to high volumes of migration from small cities to big cities? Yes, you guessed it right! Overcrowding or congestion.
Population increasing at a skyrocketing speed, traffic has become an ordeal in the urban cities. Public transportation services have become a headache for people due to the rising population. Moreover, they do not have a high standard of living to match people's living standards in big city areas. Imagine you live in Nanaimo, but you got a job offer to Vancouver! Wouldn't you take it to live in a beautiful and dreamlike city? However, you cannot afford to buy yourself a car, what will you do? Public transport seems like a mess in Vancouver due to the ever-increasing traffic. This is where car rental services come into the picture.
Have you heard of a famous car rental company named Avis? You probably must have! Avis was established in 1946 with three cars to rent. Today, the company is rendering its rental services in over 165 countries and covers over 5500 locations. Mind-Boggling isn't it! That's why the demand for car rental services is rising day by day, and building an app for it is essential to succeed in the market.
These days, the world is run by mobile apps. They have made our daily life convenient and easy. Small to big businesses everyone has or is willing to develop a mobile app to have a broader reach in the market. Above that, the 2020 pandemic crisis has called for maintaining social distancing, so public transport is no longer a safe option. These car rental cars are a savior as they are affordable for those who cannot buy a car. Several apps like Zipcars, Zoom cars, Hertz, etc., are prevalent in the market at a reasonable cost.
Topics To Cover
- Introduction to Car Rental Mobile App
- Why Companies Invest in Car Rental Apps?
- Types of Car Rentals
- The Process of Car Rental Booking App
- Car Rental App Market Statistics
- Why Will People Choose Your Car Rental Services?
- Business Models of Car Rental App
- Essential Features of a Car Rental App
- How to Create a Car Rental App
- Team Required for Car Rental App Development
- Tech Stack to Build your Car Rental App
- The Cost to Build a Car Rental App
- The Endnote
Introduction To Car Rental Mobile App
These apps facilitate users to get a car to fulfill their travel needs. If you want to get a car rental, you can book it for 24 hours or more, at an affordable cost. Some of these apps, like Zoom cars, even offer cars on a subscription basis. Meaning, you can acquire car ownership for a minimum of 6 months. This is beneficial when you have to commute a lot.
This car rental services app experiences a massive demand due to the pandemic crisis. Along with car rental services, users can also avail whopping offers, flexible booking, pick up and drop cars to your doorstep. You can use the app from anywhere and at any time.
Why Companies Invest In Car Rental Apps?
With the car rental apps burgeoning, several big investors are now investing a handful of amounts in this area. The car rental businesses are enhancing all the aspects of the car rental system. Perhaps in the future, we might ride automated AI-powered cars with self-driving capabilities.
Several people cannot afford to buy a car. Even if they buy it, they fail to pay for its maintenance. Therefore, car rental apps are a great thing as it allows users to own a car for a few days without paying for its maintenance. The users only have to pay for the time and kms that they drive.
Types Of Car Rentals
These apps cater to a broad range of users. Let's look at the various car rental app types available in the market.
Local Car Rental: This type of car rental offers the user car based on hour, half-day, or full-day.
Outstation Car Rental: As the name suggests, this one is for those who want to commute out of the city or state. It allows the user to book a car for a longer haul.
Business Car Rental: This offers ease to office users to book cars for business purposes.
Self-Driven Car Rental: Here, the user books a car on rent and drives it by themselves. He is charged based on the car chosen and the number of hours.
The Process Of Car Rental Booking App
A car rental app offers 2 types of services to their customers: self-driven cars and cab service.
After installing the app from the App Store, the user has to register by verifying their email or phone number.
Once the verification is completed, they have to choose the car type they want to use and find the estimated cost.
If you are ok with the cost, you can search for cabs if you have chosen a cab service. And if you have selected self-driven services, you have to book the car along with the date & time of pick/drop or delivery to your house.
When the user searches for a cab service in the app, it will send a request to all the drivers in that vicinity. The driver who accepts your request will drive you on your trip.
Car Rental App Market Statistics
The car rental industry has a massive user base, and it's growing each day. The car rental solution has several benefits for the users. The incredible growth in the user base makes this industry one of the significant places for new opportunities.
Your car rental app should have all the latest features to provide the best user experience and a feature-rich experience to your users. Below are the statistics of the current market situation of the car rental app:
- Car rental service earned a total revenue of $55 million in 2020 worldwide.
- The revenue is projected to grow by 18% between 2021 to 2024.
- According to sources, a single user contributes over $200 to the car rental market globally.
Why Will People Choose Your Car Rental Services?
App users will go for your car rental services only if their expectations are met, such as.
- Your car rental app should have a properly integrated navigation system to save users time while following routes.
- Incorporating live location status so that users can know when the cab reaches their doorstep and they don't have to wait for it outside.
- The estimated cost should be determined before booking the trip for the users to get an idea of how much it will cost them.
- Allow multiple payment options to provide users' flexibility. Not everyone is comfortable with the same payment option.
Business Models Of Car Rental App
Commission-based
This business model allows the app developers to earn money in two ways;
1) You can get a car and place it under your app's service. The user will rent your car and pay you per hour. Some portion of this money will go to the app developers.
2) You can lend the car to a driver responsible for making all the bookings and giving riders a personal ride. Turo follows this type of model.
Fleet Car Model
This model is usually adopted by established companies as it requires heavy investments to buy cars under the company name and allocate it to the drivers. The user will use your app to book the car for car rental services. Since you own it, you will receive the base fare paid by the users. You can then pay the drivers as per the number of trips in a week, month, or day. Hertz is a famous car rental company that uses this business model.
Essential Features Of A Car Rental App
User Side
Registration: Your app should allow users to log in easily via an email or phone number. These days, you must also have social media accounts integrated into your app to enable them to sign up via Google or Facebook.
Choosing Car: The user must be able to choose their desired car type. This is a big USP for your app. The car rental services usually render 3 options: hatchback, Sedan, and SUVs.
Ride Booking: The user has the ability to book rides whenever they want. However, it depends on the car availability. If a car is available for commuting, the app will connect the user straight to the driver.
Manage Bookings: Rescheduling or booking trips from a car rental app is pretty straightforward. You can change or cancel it whenever you want, and it's totally in your control.
Cost Estimates: This is the most effective feature as per users. The users can get the ride estimate before even searching the car availability. Knowing the trip fare is vital for the users as it determines whether they will book a ride or not beforehand and save them time and cost.
GPS Navigation: Google Map integration or other such navigation services is specifically crucial for these kinds of apps. This helps users to navigate the car easily. Moreover, a well-guided navigation app can save plenty of time for drivers and users.
Doorstep Delivery: This feature is for cab rental as well as self-driven car services. The cab rental services perform pickup and drop, usually from door to door. However, if you book a self-driven car, your car will be delivered to your specified location by the car rental company.
Multiple Payment Option: As discussed already, your car rental app should have multiple payment options for the convenience of your users. Some might prefer cash, while some might prefer UPI or net banking.
Referral Rewards: Earning rewards on referral is one of the most effective marketing techniques implemented by every app. If the user prefers the app to another user, both receive rewards with a bonus for their future rides.
Push Notification: This feature helps app users to receive all the critical alerts on the app creatively. A good presentation of your pop-up message might lead your user to use your app.
Driver Side
Smooth Sign In: Even the drivers need a simple login to the app with an email and a mobile number with a password. To render smooth login services, you have to use the top-notch car rental app development frameworks available in the market.
Accept/Reject Request: After completing one trip, drivers can receive the following available user in the nearby proximity. The driver has the option to accept or reject the request so that it does not stay pending for a long time.
Trip Details: Once the driver accepts the user's trip request, the app will provide the driver all details, including name, location, address, and even the payment method is chosen.
Dashboard: This is again the essential feature helpful for the drivers. A good app dashboard includes all the significant information and shows it on one screen.
Ride Navigation: Like the user, driver apps should have an excellent navigation service integration to provide time-saving services to their users.
Earning Register: This is a log maintained by the car rental company for the drivers. This log should contain detailed information for the far so that the drivers can get good earnings as they deserve.
Admin Side
Car Management: The overall car management can be performed by the admin as it allows them to update the card details in their records with the user details to whom the cars have been provided,
Dashboard: Here, the admin can manage all the cars and update the dashboard with details on the number of cars occupied by the users.
User Management: The users registered with this app are monitored, and their details (addresses, services used, ratings, etc.) are stored here.
Payment Management: This feature enables the admin to manage all payment gateways, payment information, and commission fee given to the services in this category.
Tariff Management: The trip fare depends on several factors such as time of the year, climatic conditions, peak hours, etc.
Analytics: All the information about the cars and the recent trends fall under this feature. It helps the admin to smoothen the time schedules, cars, and the services chosen.
How To Create A Car Rental App
The
car rental app development process depends upon the app type. But there is a fundamental process to create these types of apps like;
- Create a unique name & logo, as people will recognize your brand with your name and logo.
- A different business model is incorporated in the app to get more revenue and a larger user base.
- Later, you have to decide the UI and ensure that the user receives a smooth user experience while using the app.
- Once the UI is created, the development services will build the software with the multilingual framework and development tools.
- Once the app development process is finished, the app is tested and developed in the market.
- Also, the ratings and reviews feature is essential in your app, as it helps you to identify your flaws and improve your user experience.
Recruiting an experienced and reliable
mobile app development company like Hyperlink InfoSystem will make the whole development process seamless and time-saving.
Team Required for Car Rental App Development
To guarantee success in the car rental industry, you must outsource the best car rental mobile app development company in the market. Only they can deliver a flawless and feature-rich mobile app at a reasonable price and enhanced functionalities. There are several aspects to build an app, and a group of developers will focus on every aspect of the app meticulously. Moreover, coordination among the team is necessary for a better outcome. Below are the required teams to develop a car rental app.
- iOS and Android app developers
- Q&A experts
- Project manager
- Front-end and back-end developers
- UI/UX designer
- Testing team
Tech Stack To Build Your Car Rental App
Below are the technologies required to build a fantastic car rental app and release it on iOS and Android devices.
- Real-time analytics: Big Data, Hadoop, IBM, and more.
- Mobile OS: iOS and Android
- SMS / chat verification: Twilio or Nexmo
- Cloud Computing: AWS, Azure, or Google
- Database: Postgress, HBase, MongoDB, and more
- Payment Gateway: Stripe, Braintree, and more
- Push notification: Push.io
The Cost To Build A Car Rental App
The app development cost of car rental depends on several factors such as;
- UI/UX Design
- App features (basic and advanced)
- Location (North America, India, Europe) (*The cost to develop an app in North America is around $100-150, while in India it is $30-50)
- Number of Platforms (iOS or Android or both) (*The cost to develop an app on Android is higher than iOS as it has to be tested on numerous devices)
The app development cost will be higher if you use more high-end features in your app.
The
app developers usually charge on an hourly basis while building a car rental app. Below are some of the hours needed to build an app.
- App design - 55 - 85 hours
- User panel development - 250-400 hours
- Admin panel development - 125 - 185 hours
- APIs development - 95 - 125 hours
Although it is not practical to give you the exact cost, an app's cost can only be determined based on the client's requirements. However, we can provide you a rough estimate of basic app development costs, which can be around $15,000 to $25,000.
The Endnote
Smartphones have modernized our lives, while mobile apps have digitized our lives. The car rental market is booming, and there are a plethora of new opportunities for young businesses to succeed in this market. If you have a unique concept for your car rental app that will make you stand out from the rest, you should definitely come forward with your idea and share it with our professional team to get an idea from the start.
Hyperlink InfoSystem makes your app development journey smooth and helps you develop the best apps using the latest frameworks and advanced technologies. So, don't waste more time and get set go!