Education app is trending.
It is empowering people with knowledge and the right skills and enabling them to access great opportunities.
Education apps have broken the old traditions of teaching and learning experience. Today, employers and companies are not looking for candidates with higher degrees, but for people with specialized skills who can assist them in achieving their business goals efficiently.
Stanford University computer science professors Andrew Ng and Daphne Koller created Coursera with a vision to provide an online learning platform where anyone from anywhere has the access to transform their life through online learning.
Coursera first began working with a few schools to bring some of their famous courses online. And today, Coursera has become the world’s famous learning platform with more than 200 institutions around the world and provides over 3,000 courses, certificates, projects, and specialty fields to millions of learners, while making over $150+million dollars money annually.
Not only Coursera but Udacity app, Udemy app, Lumosity, Duolingo are generating a lot of profit through offering online courses and skill-based certifications to users on their mobile devices.
But wait, generating profits through education or eLearning apps is not an easy way. There are over 500,000 educational and eLearning apps. And only a few of them are famous and able to make good ROI.
Developing a quality education app that actually enhances the teaching and learning experience requires an intelligent approach with the right features. Makers who understood this fact got successful in creating a profitable educational app.
Today, eSearch Logix will exactly tell you how to develop an education app that makes high revenue.
Don’t miss this blog if you have an education app idea in your mind. This blog will guide you strategically on education app development.
Table of Contents
Toggle- What is an Education app?
- Current eLearning market in 2021
- Types of Education Apps
- How to build an education app?
What is an Education app?
An education or learning app is a mobile application or software which is designed to help individuals with remote learning. Education apps improve the education system and make it easier for kids, students, and adults to learn things.
Current eLearning market in 2021
According to Statista, the global eLearning market is expected to surpass 325 billion U.S. dollars by 2025. The number of eLearning mobile applications has reached 600K till now- 275,210 on Apple App Store and 308,438 on Google Play Store.
The emergence of several new technologies such as AI, AR, VR, and cloud-based LMS will drive market growth. Especially AI-enabled eLearning solution will leverage the development of smart content, digitized study guides, and real-time questioning.
Education app development has been witnessing exponential growth in the education and corporate sectors over the past three to five years. For example, as per EdSurge Inc., investments in the U.S. education technology sector touched USD 1.6 billion in 2019. Schools and businesses are embracing online learning tools for upgrading the engagement and learning experience of students & employees.
If you see data, In 2020, the North American eLearning market accounted for over 35% revenue share, owing to the presence of top universities and availability of nice internet infrastructure.
Especially the covid-19 pandemic and the subsequent quarantine have forced individuals to adopt education apps to continue their study as well as learn new skills as per their suitable time.
Types of Education Apps
The types of education apps depend on your target audience and promotion methods. Below are the main types which are generally popular in the market.
1. Education apps for kids
Children are usually attracted to modern devices, and parents, who care a lot about the development of their child from an early age, always try to make the best from their child’s hobby. For them, there can be a diverse range of educational apps for learning, reading, writing, science, or developing any specific skill.
Examples: ABCmouse, Epic!, Quick Math Jr.
2. Classroom apps
There are two types of mobile apps for students and teachers. The first of them is used during lessons and serves as tutorial material and supports organize the learning process as well as instruction.
The second type is a cloud-based application that is used for remote learning. Its focus centralizes all teaching materials in one place and gives options for communication between teacher and parent, control of behavior, and knowledge.
Examples: Kahoot, Google Classroom, Classtree
3. Test preparation apps
This kind of education app primarily targets students and adult learners who seek up-t-date curriculum training tests for admission, quizzes, or exams. Despite the limited audience, test preparation apps are always prevalent among learners because they constantly keep abreast of educational programs and update the content to their current state.
Examples: Gradeup, EduRev, PocketAptitude
4. Online courses
This type of app is centered on adults who are looking for new knowledge but don’t have sufficient time or opportunity to attend a course. In online course apps, training programs are given in an interactive form with an abundance of multimedia material.
Examples: LinkedIn Learning, Coursera, iTunesU
5. Language learning apps
Learning a different language is the most popular trend among learners. Language learning apps have become popular in recent years and occupied their own space in the mobile app market.
All language learning apps are similar in delivering learning material. If you develop a language learning app, you will need to take into account users’ knowledge, the structure of material, and additional features that give a seamless learning experience.
Examples: DuoLingo, Memrise, LinguaLift
6. Brain training apps
Ever thought mobile apps can enhance your brainpower? Brain training apps are the closes type to the game applications which merge learning and gaming experience together. These apps are lightweight designed with detailed and colorful infographic in the form of quizzes, puzzles, and games.
Examples: Lumosity, Elevate, MentalUP
Now that you are familiar with the types and the market scope of education apps, it’s time to dwell on how to develop an education app that actually generates great profits
Every type of app has its own requirements. When speaking of education app features, we cannot fail to mention the fact they have certain specific features relevant only for this type of application. Therefore, before diving into the education app development process, you should prepare a list of such features without that the education app would not survive at all. Here we have listed those features:
- Learning material
The primary element of the education app can be categorized into interactive exercises, audio/video content with rules, explanations, and tasks. It is uploaded on the admin site then appears in the mobile application. The material must have a reliable source or author name who has created it.
- Lesson categorization
Learning material will benefit from thoughtful categorization. You can divide it depending on the topic, complexity, or level of the user’s knowledge.
- System of scheduling
Healthy learning requires accurate organization. It allows users to access the learning process in your app systematically. You can further make division into logical blocks to allow assimilating the material better.
- Statistics of learning progress
Visual learning process gives pleasant emotions and engages the learner for a long tie. A user should be enabled to enter the infographic after passing the lesson/task, where the progress or regression is displayed in percentage figures. Rewarding users on their successful results can be another motivating point for the learner.
- Success assessment
Features of education apps are difficult to implement. Success assessment is among one of them which is responsible for analyzing the user’s learning progress and his or her overall growth in gaining knowledge. It may require even deeper development approach. Many mobile app development companies use AI and Machine Learning to create a decision-making system or prepare a success assessment report based on simple algorithms.
How to build an education app?
Step 1: Define your app concept
Choose which type of education or eLearning app you want to build from above given list. Once you determine, define your app concept as what features will it include, who is the target audience for this app, and what benefits they will get.
You can think about what people are looking into an education app. Do market research and competitor analysis. It will give you insights into how other running apps are working and catering to the audience.
Step 2: Create the Statement of Work
As we told you earlier education app development requires an intelligent approach, you need to hire an app development agency that can develop the app for you in the right procedure.
When you decide to go with a company or agency, you have to formulate a Statement of Work that includes technical documentation and a certain set of features. Designers make wireframes or complete mockups that visually outline your app’s interface. It is crucial for having a common mutual understanding of the app’s features, UI/UX design to avoid prospective problems.
Step 3: Choose the features
Features are the most crucial part of the educational mobile app. They help to maximize user experience and keep them engaged with a seamless learning process. Here are the features of the eLearning mobile application that you should include:
- Dashboard user profile
- Search bar Filters
- Live tutorials and sessions
- Gamification
- Testing
- AI-based behavioral analysis modules
- Link to Social media
- Educational Content
- Database
- learning material storage
- In-app social platform
- Scheduling system
- Download of materials
- Lesson categorization
- Projects, exams
- Statistics of learning progress e. g. charts, reports, etc
- Success assessment
- Push Notifications
- Offline mode
- Personalization
- Payment system (if needed)
Step 4: Choose education app design
The design of an app depends on its target audience and goals. The user interface (UI) of a learning app can vary from colorful and beautiful themes with 3D animations and illustrations for kids, and sober and minimalistic design for adults. But what they all have in common is the UX part.
As an app owner, you need to ensure whether the UX designer holds the knowledge of the critical rules of mobile app design. This is important to because your educational app will become useful when it is able to:
- Capture the attention of a learner and maintain it throughout
- Engage them with learning activities
- Offer meaningful experiences
- Let socially interact
Therefore, to achieve it, app designers should be able to use all kinds of techniques to ensure a smooth continuous flow, ease of use, a sense of achievement, and a clear structure.
Step 5: Decide the technology stack for education app development
It is important to select the best technology stack for mobile app development. Users always demand updated learning resources and smooth features that give them a flawless learning experience. For this, there are two major approaches suitable for education apps: Native apps or Hybrid apps.
Native app development requires a separate codebase for each mobile OS platform. Native apps are generally cost higher due to their dedicated OS development approach. You can choose a native app development approach for your education app if you want to provide a high-quality experience. For this, you should have a sufficient budget.
Whearas, Hybrid app development requires a single codebase for all mobile OS platforms which saves a significant amount in the development cost. You can choose a hybrid app development approach if you want to give users native app-like experience across all platforms at low development cost.
So when it comes to choosing between Native vs Hybrid app, we recommend you native development for your educational app since it offers a more custom and high-quality app experience to users. You shouldn’t forget users don’t want any distraction or flaw in using the app’s features. In Native app, you can make it happen more efficiently.
Technology Stack for education app development for Android:
Technology Stack for education app development for iPhone or iPad,
Step 6: Validate by Rapid Prototyping
Once you are done with selecting the technology stack and UI/UX design part, it’s time to put your idea into a form. The idea behind is to test this prototype with intended users and improve it based on observations. By conducting multiple mobile app tests to ensure every feature is working properly as defined in the initial stage, you will have a clear picture of how your app is going to perform on the real ground.
Step 7: Deploy the App
This is the final stage of your education app development. At this stage, your app is should be ready with full functionality after going through all required mobile app tests and get a good score in quality assurance. Once you are assured your app is fully prepared, you can launch it on the App Stores (Google Play and Apple).
How much education app development costs?
Calculation of your education app potential cost is simple math- start by planning a list of desired features, add the number of developers required executing them, and in total, you will get the hours required for the development. Most development takes 400+ hours for both Android and iOS app development. Here is the below table that will help you estimate the development cost.
How to monetize your education app?
This is the most important part of your entire project. While there are already thousands of eLearning and educational apps competing in the market to gain better profits, it becomes a critical step to determine how your education app will generate revenues.
There are various app monetization models are available, but which of them is suitable for your app depends on many factors such as business idea, audience, market size. The secret to the success of making high profits from an education app is that it must harmonize with the concept of the app, specially its core purpose.
Let’s look closer at the most popular revenue model
- Pay per download
- Subscription
- IAP (In-App Purchases)
- Freemium
- Certificates
Or you can simply follow other different models:
- The Nightschool Business Model
- The Academy Model
- The Combined Model
Conclusion
Knowledge is the biggest power in today’s digital age. And education app is going to reshape the future education system. People who understand its importance and future growth will definitely avail the benefits.
eSearch Logix is here stands as a leading education app development company in India. We use the latest technology stack with a mix of classic learning approach to provide a unique learning experience to users.
Do you have an idea for an education app?
Contact us and discuss your project with our experts for free.